by Jadyn Chase
16
Epilogue
Eli
I wound back my arm and tossed the ball to Christopher. It made its usual comfortable thumping sound when it nestled into his mitt. He pretended to dodge sideways and ran in a circle before throwing it back on the fly.
I laughed. “Go long, son!”
I lobbed the ball high and hard. He trotted backward keeping the ball in sight all the while. He ran a long way back before he raised his glove and let the ball plummet into his grasp.
“Woo-hoo!” I cheered. “Great catch.”
He called high and loud across the field. “Your turn, Eli!”
He cocked his elbow and fired the ball straight up. It soared into the sun so I couldn’t see it. I swiveled around and dashed down the field hoping to get somewhere near where it would land.
I ran and ran until I finally spotted the minuscule speck blurring into view. When it did, it screamed out of the sky so fast I couldn’t get into position quick enough. I raised my glove and squinted straight into the sun.
The ball whistled at me at terminal velocity. I adjusted my mitt, but not quick enough. The ball hurtled past my ear and pounded into the sod.
“Aargh!” Christopher howled. “So close!”
I picked up the ball. I tossed it into the air and caught it in my glove while I sauntered back toward him. “I’ll never be as good as you, son.”
He ran up next to me beaming from ear to ear. “That was so close! You almost had that.”
I chuckled. “Never mind. It’s time to go home anyway. Where’s your backpack and lunchbox?”
He bolted across the field and retrieved his stuff from the school steps. Then he rejoined me on the long, slow amble home. The sun dipped toward the horizon and cast long shadows from the light poles.
The air smelled soft and inviting, now that spring settled over the desert. In a few months, summer would blast that smell right out of the world. Barstow would smell like burnt dust until winter returned.
Walking home from the baseball field always made me thoughtful. So many things changed since I moved back to this town, but somethings would never change.
Christopher broke away and ran the last several blocks to the house. He got there long before me, but when I caught up, I discovered him sitting on the porch untying his shoes. He kicked his gear into a corner and got to his feet so we entered the house together.
Ruby stood up from the kitchen table when we appeared. Mountains of papers formed towers all around her laptop. She tapped away madly at the keyboard and stacked papers here and there.
“How’s work going?” I asked.
“I just finished for the day.” She slapped her computer closed. “I’m all yours.”
“Perfect.” I kissed her and gave her a swat on the backside. She laughed and pretended to slap my hand away, but her eyes sparkled and her cheeks flushed.
“How was practice?” She ducked into the kitchen and took a pan of lasagna out of the fridge.
“It went fine,” I told her. “Your son is going to be the next Derek Jeter.”
Christopher materialized at my side. “You were pretty good, too, Eli. That was some ball you almost caught.”
I shoved my mitt over his face and rubbed it in hard. “The key word being ‘almost caught’. I almost caught it. I didn’t catch it, but you caught yours, didn’t you? I’m telling you, Ruby. We should get this kid into a better league. He’s too good for the school team.”
“Can we, Mom?” he pleaded. “You know there are Little League teams competing for the Little League World Series. I could go out for one of them. Please, Mom? Say I can.”
She put her arm around his shoulders. “We’ll look into it and then we’ll decide. We won’t be deciding anything tonight, so you better go change out of your uniform.”
He took himself off to his room and Ruby came up next to me. “You’ve been filling his head full of ideas again, haven’t you?” she whispered.
“Why not?” I returned. “He’s way too good to be playing on this team. Why shouldn’t we encourage him to pursue his dreams? He’ll only be young once.”
“What if he isn’t good enough? What if he dreams of playing in the Little League World Series and he fails?”
“Then at least he’ll find out from someone else instead of hearing from us that he isn’t good enough. I never want to tell him that. I want to always be the one to tell him he’s good enough.” I kissed her. “Come on. Let’s get changed.”
I took a shower and put on my nice evening dinner clothes. Ruby changed into a wine-colored dress that floated around her knees. She started to put on her makeup when someone knocked on the front door.
I answered it to find a young woman standing there. She carried a computer case under one arm. “How are you doing, Trisha?” I stood back to let her inside.
“Thanks for having me, Mr. Walch. Where’s Mr. Lewis?”
Ruby hustled out of the bedroom putting on her teardrop earrings. “He’s asleep in bed. He’s been there all afternoon. He almost never does anything but sleep and he never wakes up after eight. I’m sure you’ll have no trouble with him.”
Trisha settled on the couch. “What about the other one?”
“I heard that!” Christopher bellowed from down the hall.
Trisha, Ruby, and I laughed. “You two behave yourselves,” I told Trisha. “Dinner’s in the oven. Don’t let him stay up past ten o’clock and try to keep the yelling to a minimum. I don’t want to get another noise complaint from the cops.”
Trisha bit back a grin. “Yes, Sir.”
Christopher drifted out of his room. “You’re a dead woman. You know that.”
Trisha narrowed her eyes at him, but she couldn’t stop smirking. “Says you, chump. I hope you bought a fresh box of tissues for all the crying you’re gonna be doing.”
I chuckled and grabbed my keys. “We’ll leave you to it. Just try not to get blood on the carpet.”
I held the door open for Ruby. When I shut it behind her, Christopher was sitting down in the armchair across from Trisha with an evil glint in his eye.
Ruby hesitated on the porch. “Are you sure this is a good idea?”
“Why not?” I asked. “They both love that game. It’s just a little friendly competition.”
She shuddered. “I’ve never seen him so….so malevolent. I never thought a game could inspire such animosity.”
“It’s hardly animosity,” I countered. “It’s a friendly game of checkers.”
“A cutthroat game of checkers, you mean,” she muttered.
I waved toward the street. “Are you coming?”
She managed to tear herself away and I escorted her to the curb. I held the door open on our new Hybrid. Then I got into the driver’s seat and motored across town.
Ruby’s eyes popped when I parked in front of the diner. “Here? What did you want to come here for? I thought you wanted to go someplace nice.”
“This is nice, and I thought it would be the best place to celebrate our first anniversary.” I offered her my hand. “Besides, at least here we know the food is good.”
She got out, but she couldn’t stop staring at everything. She hadn’t set foot in the place since she quit.
Stan cracked a grin when he saw us. “Hey, folks! Where have you been hiding?”
Ruby colored. “Suburbia.”
Stan conducted us to a booth in the back—the same booth, in fact, where we ate dinner together so many moons ago. I waited until he took our order before I ventured further.
I slid my hand across the table and took hers. “This last year has been the happiest of my life. I owe you so much for everything.”
She caressed the back of my knuckles. “I feel the same way. I have the life I always dreamed of, and I have you to thank for it. When I think of what my life was before, I don’t know how I survived it.”
“I never want to go back to the way it was before,” I told her. “I want to know we’re going to stic
k together through thick and thin, no matter what.”
She became suddenly serious. “Always.”
I shrugged, more out of nervousness than anything else. “What do you say we make it official, then?”
She frowned. “What do you mean?”
“I mean….” I pulled a small box out of my pocket and dropped on one knee next to the table. “I mean, let’s make sure we never part, that we’re always there for each other, forever. We both want this. Marry me, Ruby. Let’s raise Christopher together and keep making each other happy. Please?”
Tears welled up in her eyes, and her hand flew to her mouth. She blinked down at the ring in shock, but she didn’t answer.
I let myself smile. “I guess that’s a yes.”
I took the ring out of the box and slid it onto her finger. Tears streaked down her cheeks, and she burst into sobs. “Eli! Oh, Eli!”
I clasped that hand, the hand wearing my ring. She really was mine at long last, but I didn’t feel any catastrophic tidal wave of emotion. I didn’t even feel particularly happy at the moment. I only felt a sense of relief, like something wrong finally fitted back into its right place. Now I could rest.
I kissed her, but her mouth didn’t quite work right. I tasted the salt on her lips. She kept sobbing and blinking away her tears to look down at the ring.
I stood up straight and looked around. Everyone in the diner stared back at me. I grinned and shrugged again. “Well, folks, that’s it. Congratulate me. I’m engaged.”
The whole place erupted in applause. Stan, whooped and pumped his fist in the air. People wolf-whistled and yelled, “Yeah!” in the background.
My ears and cheeks burned, but before I could retake my seat, Ruby launched out of the booth and grappled both arms around my neck. She kissed me still crying her eyes out. She kissed me all over my face and down my neck until she hugged me hard around the middle.
I patted her back and kissed the top of her head. We got that out of the way. Now we could truck on the end of our days together without every questioning again whether we would or we wouldn’t. We put that old doubt behind us, and now we could expect clear sailing.”
Snatched
1
Brayden
Carlos sliced his finger through the air. “Take your men around the other side of the bunker. Hold them there until you see my signal.”
“But, Sir….” I protested, “that will leave you with half your force gone. If The Desperados get the jump on us, they could cut you down. We wouldn’t be around to support you.”
He arched his eyebrow at me. “Are you questioning my orders, Soldier?”
I pulled my head between my shoulders and braced myself. Now would be the worse time to get into a head-to head-confrontation with the baddest biker on the West Coast. “No, Sir. Of course not, Sir. I would never do that. I’m just pointing out the fact.”
“Duly noted,” he snapped. “Now, get over there and don’t let me hear another word about it.”
He turned his back on me and raised his binoculars. That left me with no alternative but to take my men and disappear. I blew out a shaky breath and turned away. Ten men crouched behind the barricade with me. They all observed the interaction waiting to see what would happen.
I scanned their chiseled faces. Red bandanas hid their hair, and they all sported identical leather jackets emblazoned with our club patch.
I mustered my resolve and nodded to no one in particular. “All right. Let’s go.”
I stayed in a crouch and scuttled around the retaining wall. When I peeked over it, a flat expanse of bare dirt offered no clue to the bunker hidden underneath. A slight, rounded hump gave any indication the place could be anything but a vacant lot.
The retaining wall ended a dozen yards away and I stopped on the sidewalk. From here, I could stand upright behind the chop shop. I pressed my back against the wall and took stock of my position. Five men lined up next to me. They held their breath, waiting for the signal.
I snuck to the end of the building and stole another furtive glance outside. Nothing moved out there. Did we make a mistake? Please God, I hope Carlos didn’t make a mistake sending us over here. I didn’t like getting shunted to the sidelines when the club needed us the most.
Someone whispered in my ear. “Brayden.”
I didn’t bother to turn around. I recognized Cisco’s voice and I wouldn’t take my sight off the target at a time like this. “What, man?”
“Shouldn’t we be back with the main party?” he rasped. “We can’t do anything over here.”
I didn’t answer. He heard Carlos’s order as well as I did. If we twiddled our thumbs behind the chop shop while The Desperados annihilated our people to the last man, that was Carlos’s problem.
My skin crawled while scanning the lot. I didn’t like this. I didn’t like it one bit. I couldn’t see anything. Where would they come from if they came at all? This whole raid depended on the element of surprise. If The Desperados somehow got wind of our plans, they could be on top of us in seconds. They could turn the tides and wipe us out instead.
Cisco hovered too close to my back. His breath tickled my neck. I wanted to spin around and shove him away, but that would reveal the extent of my disturbance. Carlos put me in charge of this flank. I couldn’t lose my cool now, or all my men would fall apart along with me.
My hand flew to my chest. My sidearm nestled in my shoulder holster under my vest, but I wouldn’t need it. Touching it just made me feel better, but once the shit hit the fan, guns wouldn’t mean a thing.
I dared to sneak another quick look from behind the building. Don’t ask me why. I wouldn’t see anything. The Desperados conducted all their business from their underground bunker, and who could blame them?
They could sit down there utterly protected from any attack. Any club foolish enough to pick a bone with them would end up in this exact situation. They would have to attack blind and disabled while The Desperados hid under thirty feet of Earth and concrete.
No, I didn’t like this at all. I didn’t like provoking another club and for what? The Desperados never did anything to us. They just got a little too big for their britches. They bought a few tumble-down buildings that our club set its sights on. They moved in—not into our neighborhood. That would be suicide. No, they moved into the neutral zone between us and the Chinese Longtails club.
No one took The Desperados seriously. For nearly forty years, they lurked under the radar of every other gang on the block. They dealt a few sacks of cocaine and a few kilos of marijuana—nothing more. They didn’t even carry guns.
Then, out of nowhere, they up and bought out two apartment buildings from under our noses. They snatched them from our fingertips. Within a week of closing the sale, they fixed them up and rented them out to low-income families exactly the way we would have if we had managed to buy those buildings.
If you really want to know my unvarnished opinion, Carlos overreacted. He got a bee in his bonnet and said we had to send them a message. We had to show them this was our territory, and no upstart bunch of teenage hoodlums was going to muscle in and start taking over.
Like they would ever take over. In the first place, they never came near our territory. The neutral zone was…. well, neutral. Anyone could operate there. If the Desperados never called themselves a club or gave their group a name, we never would have known or cared about what they were up to.
Now here we were, decked out in all our regalia, ready to assault their bunker on a whim and a prayer. This whole operation had disaster written all over it.
Cisco touched my arm again. I gritted my teeth. If he said another fucking word to me, I swear I was going to lose it completely.
He whispered under his breath, “Hey, Brayden, man….”
I almost whipped around and roared in his face when, with no warning, a huge section of the vacant lot lifted out of the ground. A motor whined and a massive square of cement peeled up. Dirt clung to it for a second. Then it s
lid off in a cloud of dust.
The instant it cracked open, a greenish-black shape zoomed out of the hole. It spread its black wings to the sun and hurtled toward the retaining wall. Within seconds, ten identical dragons erupted out of the ground. They stretched their serpentine necks and trailed their snaky tails behind. The sun glittered off their scales and their high-pitched shrieks rent the air.
My heart leaped into my mouth. Adrenaline scorched my insides. How did they know? How did I know this would happen? None of that mattered now. Maybe they posted cameras around their perimeter to alert them to enemy attack. They would be stupid not to, and everything leading up to this moment indicated they were anything but that.
One dragon after another soared out of the opening. They screamed across the lot heading for the men we left unguarded. Did Carlos see what I saw? How could he miss it?
Cisco surged forward to blow past me. Tomas jumped into his path and extended his arm. “Hold it, man. Carlos said wait for the signal.”
“Are you out of your fucking mind?” Cisco waved toward the lot. “They’ll tear our people apart. We can’t stay here and do nothing. Come on!”
Tomas rounded on me. “What do you say, man? Should we engage?”
I still didn’t turn around. My gaze riveted to those dragons pouring out of the unforgiving Earth. They resembled a scene out of Hell itself. They thundered to the retaining wall and the lead dragon spat a blistering jet of flame over the barricade.
A piercing scream ripped across the site. Cisco slammed his thick palms against Tomas’s chest. “Get the fuck out of my way, man. You want to sit around here and play with yourselves? Go right ahead. I’m going out there. I’m not letting my brothers die before my fucking eyes.”
The Desperados formed a rank wingtip to wingtip. They pounded their fire behind the wall. No human being could survive that.
All at once, a ferocious red dragon vaulted skyward through the flames. It emitted a spine-chilling shriek. The red-orange fire ricocheted off its scales and set it ablaze for all the world to see. At the same moment, another five red monsters launched out of the inferno.
