Vengeance

"Ronnie? What are you doing here?" Her ex-husband was seated casually on the hood of his car. "Vonni, long time no see. I was in town and I thought I'd pay you a visit."

"You always were a horrible liar, Ronnie. What do you really want?"

"Actually, I'm here to see Cameron. He and I have a few things we need to discuss."

"What makes you think he's here?"

"Why wouldn't he be? I'm sure he fell head over heels once he got a look at your fine ass."

"But he's supposed to be in jail, isn't he?"

"Are you kidding me? *I* got him out of jail!"

"Wha... what do you mean? What the fuck are you talking about?"

Ronnie sighed. "Christ, you really have no idea... Remember the robbery at my store?"

"The one he got locked up for..."

"Yeah, a real shame about that. But, I needed somebody to take the fall. I needed somebody that even if the set-up *were* discovered, I'd be the last person they thought of. So needless to say, when I found out about the married chick he was fucking, he became the perfect patsy."

"I still don't get it. Why would you stage a robbery in your own store?"

"The insurance money, why else? And Cameron made it really easy for me too, giving that broad a key to his place. All I had to do was go to her husband, give him all the info on Cameron, and in exchange for what he *thought* was a fifty percent cut, he steals his wife's key, goes to Cam's place, gets his gun, leaves it in the store, and I do the rest."

"How much did you get?"

"Five hundred thousand dollars."

"In exchange for a man's life?"

"Maybe not by itself, but the other hundred and fifty grand I got from selling the store -- after I divorced you -- made up for it. I'd have been content with that, to just take the money and run. Unfortunately, Lynette's husband suddenly decided to grow a conscience. See, he had never confronted Lynette about her cheating, but somehow it came out. She agreed to send his lawyer the pictures of the two of them together, but only if she agreed to never see him again."

"But I thought he had killed her!"

Ronnie grinned. "Ah, so you *have* seen him! And I'd bet any amount of money you brought him here to meet the family."

"And what if I did?" She was not pleased with herself at giving away her own lie like that.

"Then I can't allow him to leave here alive. The thing is, I knew that if he was eventually exonerated for the robbery, the cops would reopen the case. If that happened, that would have left me open to being investigated for insurance fraud. The only chance I had was for him to commit an even bigger crime to buy myself some more time to leave the country, which is where you came in."

"What do you mean?"

"Tell me something: have you been getting a lot of phone calls lately about your health?"

"Why?"

"Because I took out a $2.5 million life insurance policy on you before we got divorced."

"You did what?! Why the fuck would you do something like that?"

Ronnie simply shrugged. "For the same reason I put this whole thing in motion: the money." The total lack of emotion in his voice caused the anger welling up within Giovanna to boil over, but before she could do anything about it he continued, "What I was counting on was Cameron coming by and maybe blowing up the house or something like that. That way, you're dead, I'm rich, and he's back in jail. That's also why I told him Lynette was dead; if she had been waiting for him, he'd have gone straight to her and not even bothered with trying to get revenge."

Giovanna shivered with rage. "You sick son of a bitch," she said as she slapped him hard across the face. He said nothing, merely smiling as he grabbed her around the throat with one hand and produced a silver pistol from his coat pocket with the other. "Let's go see if we can find Mr. Dent, shall we?" he said as he held the gun to her head and pushed her roughly inside the house. Everybody jumped in panic, but a quick wave of his gun quieted them. "Relax everybody, I'm just here to find a former employee and have a little talk with him. The sooner I find out where he is, the sooner I leave and you all go back to your little holiday get-together."

"Don't bother," Cameron said as he walked nonchalantly down the stairs. "You want me, here I am. Leave these people alone."

Ronnie smiled as he pulled his gun from Giovanna's head. "See how easy that was?" he cockily addressed the family. "Let's step outside, Mr. Dent." Issuing one final warning to the Lawsons, he said, "And *nobody* follows us." Cameron stepped outside, keeping his eyes on Ronnie the whole time. Ronnie made the mistake Cameron did not, and as soon as he stepped outside Cameron blindsided him. He pushed Ronnie's own gun underneath his chin and pulled the trigger, all using Ronnie's own appendages. Everybody came running out when they heard the shot, which had torn straight north through Ronnie's skull.

Ronnie lay dead on the porch until EMS arrived on the scene. True to his word, the police had already been looking for Ronnie to question him about possible insurance fraud on the robbery, and when they heard Giovanna's recount of what he had said to her, they decided that Cameron had indeed been in mortal danger and declared the killing self-defense. As he watched Ronnie's body loaded into the back of an ambulance, Giovanna asked Cameron if he had still wanted to kill him.

"To tell you the truth, no. All I wanted to do was move on, put my life back together."

"What about Lynette? Now that you know she's alive, I'm sure you want to see her again..."

"Nah. If she wanted to see me, she'd have stayed. Besides, she made the better decision to work on her marriage. I mean, she was probably ready to leave him for me, but I don't know if I would have been able to live day-to-day without thinking if she would do me the same way."

She put her arms around him and her head on his chest. "So what are you going to do now?"

He looked down at her. "Well, I'm thinking as soon as we get back about getting my stuff out of storage."

"Really? Have you figured out where you're going to live?"

"Yes, with you."

She stepped away from him in a huff. "Me? After what you said last night? You have two weeks to find a place *and* a job, and then you are getting out of my house!"

"Did you not even understand what I said last night?"

"Yes, and you made it perfectly clear that my feelings for you are not being reciprocated!"

"Are you fucking kidding me? Read between the lines, woman! If last night I had said that I loved you in response to your saying that you loved me, even if I truly felt that way -- *WHICH I DO* -- it would have felt like I was just saying it to make you happy." He put some definite emphasis on the words 'which I do.'

"So what are you trying to say?"

"You really don't get it, do you? OK, take exactly what I just said and repeat it back."

"You said that if you had said you loved me in response to my saying I loved you, it would have felt like you were just trying to make me happy even if you truly felt that way, which you do."

"OK, now say those last three words again."

"Which you do."

"Again..."

"Which you do... which you do... which you do!" It finally kicked in the point he was trying to make without actually coming out and saying it. "Oh baby!" she squealed, jumping into his arms and kissing him full on the mouth. She managed to pull her tongue out of his mouth long enough to hiss, "I want to hear you say it."

"I love you," he said. "I love you, Giovanna Lawson."

"I love you, Cameron Dent."

Cameron and Giovanna returned home on Sunday morning, a day earlier than they had planned. True to his word, as soon as they returned he began emptying out his storage unit and moved into Giovanna's house, but not before she had the house renovated. He found a job soon enough, and within a few months, they were engaged. The following year they returned to the Lawson family house for another month over Christmas and New Year's. When they returned home this time, the name Lawson stayed at her parents' house.