still open door to begin the festivities.
“What do you say," I asked, extending a bat to Astrid handle first. "Up for some righteous destruction?”
“Oh, hell yeah!”
Astrid grabbed the bat and followed Morgan, leaving just me and Freya in the second wing.
“Ah-am?”
“It's Adam, but that's still very close.”
“Oh.”
Bending down, I scooped her up and held her close in the hip-hold I remembered my mother carrying me around in and went for the door. Baby on one side, baseball bat on the other.
“Come one, little one. Let's teach you a valuable lesson about consequences.”
Chapter Seventeen - Morgan
It was an absurd amount of fun. I went for the camera by the door first. Making sure to give it the finger first, I swung high and hard, knocking it clean off the base and onto the floor. I swung down several more times, reducing the camera to an ovule of splintered plastic.
As I turned in search of another victim, Astrid came in behind me and made for the kitchen. Her technique was a bit different. Knocking the camera off the wall with the bat, she lay into it with her boots, crushing it even more than I had managed to.
“Leave some for me,” I heard a familiar voice call out.
“Adam!” I exclaimed, hugging the side that wasn't holding Freya, giving them both an enthusiastic kiss.
Setting Freya up in the living room of the main part of the house with a servant to watch over her, we continued on our path of destruction, knocking out every camera and microphone we could find. A great sense of catharsis came with every pile of deconstructed plastic left in our wake.
Freya cheered us on from her spot in the living room whenever she could see or hear us. It felt nice to finally find an activity we could all do together.
It was what she had wanted. I had actually asked Freya if she wanted to go home or with me and Adam and she had said home. As it was said, so it was done. Adam arranged the jet to pick us up in the morning and Shonna to drive us back to the apartment.
Astrid seemed happy to be going home too, even if it was my home, at least for a while. We were basically sisters anyway, so it really didn't make much of a difference.
The plane wasn't quite big enough. It was fine for short range, but didn't have the fuel capacity for intercontinental. That required something a bit bigger. If it also happened to have flight attendants with awesome accents and first class seating, that was even better.
The airline's name was even fun to say. It sounded like a kind of song or possibly a sex act. Aer Lingus. Every time I thought of it, I smiled a bit. No wonder the Irish tended to sound so upbeat.
Adam had thought we could use a break. To get away from all the trouble and the drama for a while. He would be returning to his island after it had been cleansed of all evil influence.
I wasn't sure if I would, but I did like the sex swing and the cave was really cool. I really wouldn't know until I tried to go there again to see how it felt, post-filming. In the meantime, he wanted to take me to the island where he was born, which was isolated and safe to visit during the pandemic. But first, I was going to spend some time with my daughter and friend at home.
***
Two days later, the driver who arrived to pick me up had the same look of Shonna. Not in terms of physical appearance, but the same bulletproof stare, eyes hidden behind a pair of dark victors. What looked like a scar left from a passing bullet marked her left cheek.
“I.R.A.?” I asked Adam, who was already in the back seat.
“Garda, decommissioned,” he replied.
“Sir,” the driver said as we approached, the 'r' tumbling down a hill.
I was mesmerized. Her pale skin seemed to nearly glow under the fluorescent lighting. Her fire red hair was tied back in a severe bun. She held a sign reading LEARY in her hands.
“At ease, Imogen.”
She relaxed, if only a bit, and led the way out front to the sleek black limo. As we went, I noticed an odd sort of lump under her jacket at her waist. I didn't know much about such things, but I still knew a waist holster when I saw one. I didn't know exactly how it