by B D Grant
Satisfied by my find, I close and lock the kitchen window before leaving out the back door. I catch sight of Jake through the window walking through the back-gate, looking defeated.
“That was fast,” I say from across the yard as I join him outside. “I didn’t find any money.” He’s holding something in his left hand, but it’s too small to be a power tool. “No luck? Did you find any tools?” I ask.
He gives me an annoyed sideways glance. “Can you keep your voice down?”
I shrug, unconcerned. “Sure.”
“I didn’t get any tools because I didn’t want to be arrested for trespassing,” he says as he walks past me. He checks the back door, making sure I locked it.
“Trespassing?”
Wordlessly, he tosses me a balled-up piece of paper and then continues around the perimeter. It bounces off my arm, and I pick it up, careful not to tear the paper as I uncrumple it. The letters are big across the top of the paper. “Dad’s shop was empty,” he says without turning to look at me. “That was on the front door with some foreclosure notices around it.”
I see an auction date for his family home. “But ya’ll haven’t been gone that long. Who took all of your stuff?”
“You’re guess is as good as mine.”
I’m looking down, reading the auction notice in full, when Jake comes to a complete stop in front of me. I walk straight into his back.
“Hey!”
Jake’s arm flies back, stopping me from stepping around him. Ahead, I hear grass crunching. I peer over his shoulder, standing on my toes to do so. A man is in my front yard, walking in our direction. He’s too muscular of a guy to not be a Dynamar and he’s a few inches taller than Jake who’s fairly tall himself at just under six feet.
“Stop right there,” Jake demands, his voice taking on a deeper baritone than normal.
A voice to the right of me answers. “Or what?”
Jake flinches. I jump. Spinning to the side, I see another man walking out of the Landry’s fenced-in backyard that adjoins mine. Jake shifts his weight, his head darting back to the larger man before returning to the closer figure. I recognize the one coming out of my neighbor’s yard from the raid. He was one of the Rogues I saw in the basement leading Cassidy out before it was blown up. He could definitely be a Dynamar as well, but he isn’t as overtly big as the other guy. He closes the fence behind him, making sure it’s latched. Both men are dressed casually wearing tee shirts. The larger guy has on shorts that show off his calves that look to near the size of my thighs. The one coming out of the Landry’s back yard has on blue jeans. Both are wearing running shoes.
The man at Mr. Landry’s fence examines Jake for a quick second once he turns around. “Is that you, Mr. Angelo?” He asks.
“So we do know who this fellow is?” The bigger one asks, walking across my front lawn. He reaches down to his belt, where zip ties are visible under his tee shirt he’s tucked them in his waistband. He pulls out two, letting his shirt drop down to conceal the rest.
I drop the foreclosure paper to rest my hand protectively on the small of Jake’s back. This isn’t good, I think to myself.
“We sure do,” the man at the fence tells him.
The one holding the zip ties fishes in his pocket with his left hand. “You want me to call it in?” he asks, extracting a phone.
“I think we need to finish our conversation with Mr. Angelo,” the man by the fence says. He takes a step closer to Jake, and we both take a small step back. “Would you like to join your old classmates, Mr. Angelo?” the Rogue I recognize from the basement asks. He shares a smirk with his friend who has stopped just past the spot where my mother’s overgrown shrubs end at the corner of the house twenty feet from us. He looks back to Jake. “Or would you rather hand over the young lady and we allow you to go back to wherever you came from? I’ll even give you my word that we won’t hurt her.”
“You two should leave before the police get here,” Jake tells him. “If you don’t give us any trouble I won’t tell the FBI that you two are out here kidnapping underage girls.”
The man with the zip ties chuckles as the other says, “The police aren’t coming.” He looks around us at the houses and empty street, exaggerating to make his point. “I haven’t gotten my eyes tested in a while. I guess I must be going blind, ‘cause I sure don’t see anyone rushing over to help you. You see anyone?”
Jake doesn’t answer.
“You came right to us,” the man by the shrubs says with a smile so big that it makes his eyes squint by his intruding cheeks as if us being here were some kind of joke.
“You were waiting for us,” I say.
The man by the fence looks me straight in the eye. “We were waiting for you, not him,” he says, stepping closer.
This time Jake doesn’t back away with me. “You can’t have her,” he tells him.
The man takes another, more cautious step. “It isn’t up to you, Mr. Angelo,” he tells him. His eyes are fixed on me.
The guy at the fence speaks to Jake in such a familiar way that makes my skin crawl. “You know what we do to Seraphim who get in our way, Mr. Angelo. Don’t you now?”
I step out to the side of Jake taking a fistful of the back of his shirt to better keep him turning to face me. With my other arm, I reach behind me to pull out what I did manage to find at the top of my closet.
“You aren’t going to take him again,” I say, pulling the gun from my waistband. My parent’s would kill me for this, but these men aren’t going to take Jake, not after I just got him back. I’m not going to let them. This is the most unnatural a gun has felt in my hands. If it had been heavy and awkward the first time I handled a handgun under my dad’s instructive supervision as I child I don’t remember it. This one doesn’t feel unnatural because of its weight, it’s a rather compact Springfield that worked well for hiding on my person without any suspicion of the Rogues, or Jake. The reason for my discomfort is coming from what I know I’m about to do with it.
Jake tries to look back at me, but I keep the gun out of his sight while pushing on his back. I need him to face the real threat. The Dyna drops the zip ties with a surprised hiss as he sharply inhales and points his own handgun squarely at me, pulled from a hip holster.
My head snaps to the other man who is drawing his own weapon out more casually. He smiles at me as he takes aim at Jake’s chest. “Do you really want to get guns involved? Because I can promise you that Mr. Angelo will be the first one to drop.”
“Have you had a gun this whole time?” Jake asks quietly out of the corner of his mouth. I loosen my grip on his shirt, but I don’t let go. I might need to push him out of the way if either of these men tries to make a move.
“Found it when I was searching for money.”
The man closet to us glares at his partner. “You were supposed to clear the house,” he tells him.
I should have expected that this might happen, all of it. We could have been much more discrete than walking right up to our old homes. I had been so focused on coming back that I hadn’t thought about it, but Rogues had already been to Jake and I’s houses once and if we were somehow spotted leaving Clairabelle’s than this would be one of the first places I would look if I were them. It proves that Sidney was wrong about the man not knowing that it was me connected with her when he put her in that machine if these guys have been looking for me.
“No,” I say, releasing Jake’s shirt. I step pointedly around Jake, intentionally placing myself between him and the man pointing his gun at him.
He lowers his weapon a little, leveling it at my chest instead of Jake’s. I check to make sure that both men have a clear view. Then, I raise the gun to my temple.
This takes them all by surprise. It doesn’t matter that my finger isn’t on the trigger. Jake tries to say something, but I stop him with a wave of my empty hand.
The Rogue by the fence collects himself the quickest. “Hey hey hey,” he says, setting his features to appear concerned
for me complete with big, doey eyes set on the space between my head and the gun. “You don’t want to do that. We aren’t going to hurt you,” he says in an almost pleading tone.
“Taylor, what do you think you’re doing?” my childhood friend asks in a sharp whisper behind me. He knows I’m winging it.
I don’t answer him. I keep my eye on the Rogue closest to me as I see the Dyna out of the corner of my eye looking to him for direction. “The only way I’m going anywhere with you is if Jake goes free, right now.”
“We can’t let him go,” the larger man by the shrubs says, his weapon still aimed in my direction.
“I wasn’t talking to you!” I yell, making them both tense.
I feel Jake lean in toward me. “Calm down, Taylor,” he says slowly. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“She’s useless if she’s dead. She knows precisely what she’s doing,” the Rogue in front of me tells him. He lowers his gun slowly, pointing it at the ground in front of me. “Fine,” he says, suddenly sounding exhausted. “He can leave.”
“I’m not leaving,” Jake says adamantly.
“Sounds good to me,” the other Rogue says, bending down to retrieve the zip ties from the lawn.
I kick Jake’s ankle with the side of my shoe, turning slightly so that I can look at him out of the corner of my eye. “Do I look like I’m willing to negotiate? They said you can go, so go.”
He grimaces at me. “They’ve probably already called in the make and model of our car. If they don’t have people waiting down the road to nab me, then the cops are going to catch up with me sooner or later.” It’s smart, what he said. If they hear the car was stolen, they won’t link Miles to us. And we really did steal it, so they can’t even catch us in a lie.
“I’d be hunted down the second I drive away,” he says. “I might as well go with you.”
I shake my head at him and turn back to the men. The Rogue by the fence glances at his buddy to give him a sly smirk, his confidence seeming to rebound hearing Jake as if this still might go his way. “You are going to let Jake leave without informing your people in any way. You don’t tell them that he left. You don’t tell them where he’s headed. Got it?” It feels good to be able to make demands, even if I am getting captured in the process.
The Dyna at the edge of the house starts to speak, but the other Rogue answers. “Alright,” the man by the fence says.
It’s not good enough though. I turn to the man with the zip ties; I want to hear it from both of them. He nods in agreement. “I need to hear you say it,” I instruct.
“Yeah, I got it,” he says impatiently. “I won’t say anything about your boyfriend, and you don’t blow your head off.”
He’s trying to push my buttons, I know, but the boyfriend comment throws me. I look around the neighborhood, or what little of it I can see from between the houses. “Are there any more of you?”
“We’re not enough of a welcoming party?” the man in front of me says. The one with the zip ties spits on the ground in confirmation.
I look back at Jake. “He’s told you about us,” the Rogue in charge states. “All good things, I hope.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “How much money do you have on you?”
His head tilts to the side again. “None.”
It’s a lie. I push into it easily. “You have thirty bucks. Give it to Jake.”
The two men look at each other. The Rogue’s eyebrows jump up at the one holding the zip ties as if he’s impressed but he gives me a frown when looks back. No one ever likes being called out on a lie. He pulls out his wallet as he steps closet to us, reluctantly holding out a twenty and a ten. When Jake doesn’t make a move to take them, I do, taking the last few steps to grab the bills with my free hand. I shove them into Jake’s chest, keeping the end of my parents’ gun to my temple.
“Guns on the ground,” I tell the men. “You can pick them back up once Jake’s gone,” I say before either of them have a chance to protest. The Rogue with the zip ties is the last to drop his gun seeming to have more of a struggle letting go of his gun than the guy now standing only a couple of feet away from Jake and I.
“Go,” I say to Jake, once both guns are on the lawn. “They aren’t going to hurt me.” They’ve got what they came for, I think to myself. It’s infuriating to admit even if it just to myself. The bad guys have won. I try not to think about it.
“I’ll make a break for it as soon as I get the chance,” I tell him quietly, knowing full well that the Rogue in spitting distance from us can still hear me. I want to hug Jake before he leaves, but that would mean lowering the gun, and I’m pretty sure that’s the only thing keeping these two guys from pouncing on us. I stare at him instead wishing that he could read my mind.
He reaches out and squeezes my free hand, then whispering almost inaudibly, “don’t let them break you.” He takes off full-speed toward Miles’s car. He blows past the man with the zip ties. He’s fast. When he and I would go head to head as kids he would always leave me in the dust, but once I got a little height to me and made it onto our high school’s track team, I started winning.
The Rogue in charge waves off his partner who stiffens as if he still might go after Jake. “Let him go,” he says.
“You said he would go free,” I remind them both warningly. I point my gun at the Dyna.
“He wasn’t expecting the kid to take off like that is all,” the smaller Rogue says. You have to admit it was rude for him to leave like that, no bye or nothing.”
Jake has to wait on the mailman to pass before reversing out of the driveway. The Rogue close to me takes a few quick steps around me as the mailman glances over at us as he passes effectively blocking him from seeing me holding a gun to my head. This is my chance to scream out for help, but as I think that, the Rogue lifts the back of his shirt with one hand enough for me to see that he’s got a Glock 43 tucked at the back of his pants. I’m such an idiot to not have thought of them carrying more than one gun.
I wish I had met the mailman before today. I wish I knew if he had a family or whether he was brave. I would have to have already known the answers to yell out for help. I would also have to know how fast that tiny mail truck of his could go if I was to run for protection. I could shoot both men, maybe, as long as I got them both in the head. It wouldn’t even have to kill them instantly just subdue them long enough to put some distance between them and me. The possibility leaves my paralyzed as I try to decide if it’s worth attempting.
The Dyna gives the mailman a friendly wave. He waves back and drives on to the next mailbox.
Jake pulls out of the driveway and I realized that he’s still in danger being plenty close enough for one shot to take him down. It would only take a second for either Rogue to grab their gun and take aim, and I don’t doubt that either of them could make the shot across the front yard, through the driver’s window, and into Jake’s left temple. I won’t let myself make eye contact, but I can’t help watching Miles’s car pass us. The Rogue still half blocking me from view gives Jake a similar friendly wave as the Dyna had given the mailman. I can only see the back of the Rogue’s head, but I assume he’s giving Jake an equally smug grin. Jake gives him the finger.
He turns to face me as Jake drives away walking over to the gun he’d dropped to retrieve it. “Do your parents know you’re spending time with such a rude young man?” he asks. I ignore him, lowering my gun to point it at the ground. The Dyna grumbles as he leans down to grab his gun. He takes out a fistful of zip ties.
“She doesn’t need restraints,” the smaller man tells him. “She’s coming with us willingly, because she knows what will happen if she doesn’t.” He holds out his hand, palm open. “Right?”
I give him the gun, wishing I’d tried to at least shoot one of them. “Right.”
The white van that the two Rogues are driving is unmarked. They had it parked at a house that has a for sale signs in its front yard. The driveway it was in had a clear view of my
house but not to the parking spot Jake had picked to park Miles’s car. They wouldn’t have seen us until we had walked out on to the street.
It has all the makings of a van in a scary movie, wide open back and all. I catch the Texas license plate, but not much else. There are plenty of Texas plates in south Louisiana that I wouldn’t have even looked twice if I had noticed it. The windows look as though they’re heavily tinted, but when the Dyna opens the door, I see that they’ve been completely covered with cut out pieces cardboard from inside. I had half hoped that after Jake drove off, an old neighbor might drive by, see what was going on, and call the cops. But aside from a dog barking a few houses down, the block stays quiet. The Rogue I recognize from the raid takes the drivers seat once I’m situated in the back.
As I try to find a comfortable position on the tiny metal bench that lines the left side of the back of the van, the Rogue in the driver’s seat glances at me in the rear view mirror as he puts the keys in the ignition. “I’m Gradney, by the way,” he says turning the key. There’s no need to respond he already knows who I am, so I just stare back at him. He looks over at his comrade in the seat next to him. “You aren’t going to introduce yourself?”
He exhales loudly. “Call me Dex,” he says without turning to look me. Dex still has the zip ties in his hand looping them around his big knuckles. He finally leans across the middle console when I can hear other cars driving around us, blocking any view I would have of the front windshield and outside world. He keeps his eye on me checking over his shoulder to make sure I’m still sitting on the bench not doing anything. I try not to fidget so he’ll get comfortable and quit checking on me, but he doesn’t. He’d said, “Call me Dex,” and not “My name is Dex,” which are two very different things. It must not be his real name or else why wouldn’t he have said the later?
