No Way Out

by Simone Scarlet

  Struggling out of my grip, she snapped: “Well, you found me.” She sniffed haughtily. “Now what? Take me back to your little boy’s club, like a good little girl?”

  Her eyes were flashing with hatred.

  “You might carry a badge, but you and your FBI buddies are no different to the Knuckleheads. All I am to you is a prop – a piece of meat. They want me ass. You just want my testimony against Coyle. Nobody cares about what I want…”

  I opened my mouth to speak, but I couldn’t find the words.

  “Mason, those two cops killed my father,” she continued, filling the silence I’d left. “And goddammit, I love you – but I’m not going to let them get away with it.”

  Now it was my turn to get angry.

  “So you were just planning to shoot them?” I grabbed her arm again. “That’s what you were planning, wasn’t it? You said as much back at the motel. Buy a gun and shoot them both dead.”

  Yanking her forward, I started roughly frisking her.

  “Where is it?” I demanded, squeezing her hips, checking her thighs. “What kind of gun did you charm your way into?”

  Christi tore herself free, and then she slapped me.

  Hard.

  “I didn’t get a gun, okay?” She was screaming at me, but I could hardly hear it through the ringing in my ears. “The guy in the pawn shop said you needed a waiting period…”

  I looked down at her suspiciously…

  A pretty girl like her? And as ‘talented’ as I’d seen here, back when she’d been servicing the Knuckleheads on her knees, or back…

  As if reading my mind, Christi moved to slap me again. This time I caught her wrist before she could.

  “It didn’t go down like that,” she hissed venomously. “God knows he tried… But I couldn’t do it…”

  I looked down at her incredulously. I’d seen first hand that there wasn’t very much this beautiful, wounded girl wouldn’t do…

  But then she looked back up at me, and the expression on her face wasn’t anger any more.

  It was sadness.

  “I couldn’t do it because of you,” she murmured, and this time my protective instincts didn’t trigger anger. Instead, I wrapped Christi in my arms and squeezed her to my chest.

  Burying her face in my chest, she sobbed:

  “I couldn’t do… do that anymore,” she cried – and by ‘that’ I knew exactly what she was referring to. The wicked, degrading things she’d had to do for a place on the back of one of the Knucklehead’s cycles…

  “I couldn’t,” she repeated, soaking my t-shirt with her tears. “Not after… Not after what we did.”

  And I remembered it all too well. The feel of her long, lithe body under mine, in that rickety motel bed.

  Christi pulled her head from my chest, and looked up at me with those huge, hazel eyes of hers.

  She sniffed, and let out a bitter laugh as she confessed: “You ruined me, Mason. I’d managed to switch off every feeling I had – I could endure just about anything. And then you came around, and ruined me.”

  I looked down at her, and almost couldn’t breathe. She looked so beautiful right then and there, even with her eyes red and tear-filled, and her mascara running down her puffy cheeks.

  I reached up, and wiped the tears away with my thumbs.

  “I didn’t ruin you,” I promised her, feeling Christi tremble in my arms. “I fixed you. Just like you fixed me.”

  And she didn’t argue with that.

  She just stood there in my arms, eyes wide and breath ragged.

  “So…” Her voice cracked. “So… What now?”

  And wasn’t that the million-dollar question?

  Well, first things first. I had to get Special Agent-in-Charge Barron off my back – before he did anything stupid, like put out an APB for Christi…

  “Let’s get back to the motel.” I jerked my head in the direction of La Mediterranean. “I’ll check in with Agent Barron,” and when I saw her wince at the mention of his name, I reassured her: “…and then we’ll figure it all out.”

  And by ‘figure it all out’ I meant me, as much as her. Because I knew what Christi wanted – justice for her father. And, despite the badge I carried, I’d finally come to the conclusion that it was to her I owed my loyalty – not the FBI or Homeland Security.

  I gently curled my fingers around Christi’s elbow, and started leading her back to our motel.

  ***

  It was a short walk back to our hotel, and by the time we’d got there, both Christi and I were feeling much more like ourselves again.

  Hell, she’d curled her arm around my elbow, and we were almost strolling down the sidewalk like boyfriend-and-girlfriend – not two desperate people on the run.

  When we reached La Mediterranean, I wasn’t even thinking about the FBI any more, or Coyle and his gang. I just wanted to get out of the muggy, humid air – and maybe get Christi out of her sticky, sweaty clothes.

  The memory of her body was still fresh in my mind from that afternoon.

  It was that distraction which explained why I wasn’t looking out like I normally would. I’d relaxed enough to get complacent – the sort of thing I’d never have allowed myself to be back in Basra, or Fallujah.

  That’s why they called me ‘Recon’, after all…

  But as I unlocked the door to our motel room, I wasn’t thinking of anything. Well, nothing except Christi’s firm, tight ass and the thought of pulling an ice-cold Miller Lite from the mini-bar…

  That’s why I never expected what happened next.

  I swung open the door to our room, and stepped into the cool, air-conditioned air with a grateful sigh…

  …and that’s when I felt the thud across the back of my head.

  Christ, it hurt like hell. Everything went black for a second… and when I could see again, I found myself on my hands and knees, with stars exploding in front of my eyes.

  It took a second for my rattled brain to decipher it, but I suddenly heard Christi screaming – and when I looked up, I found myself staring into the unblinking black eye of a Police-issue .40 Glock.

  Staring down the barrel was the lean, tanned face of Officer Sanchez – one of the two crooked cops who’d gunned down Christi’s father.

  “Stay on the floor!” He was screaming at me, the gun trembling. “Stay on the Goddamned floor, or I swear to God…”

  He didn’t need to finish that sentence. I knew what he meant.

  Stay on the floor… Or he’d unload that gun right in my face.

  Shit, the way his hand was trembling, it was a goddamned miracle that hadn’t happened already.

  Officer Dempsey was hidden behind the door. He must have been the one to clock me the moment I stepped inside – probably with the butt of his own pistol.

  Now he was pointing his gun at me with one hand, and had the other tightly wrapped around Christi’s elbow.

  He threw her across the bed, and kept her pinned there, while he kept the barrel of his gun on me.

  “Don’t you fucking move, you double-crossing son-of-a-bitch,” Dempsey growled. “You so much as blink at me, and I’ll drag you back to Coyle with a hole between your eyes.”

  On my knees, I stared up at him – and had no doubt in my mind that the scumbag cop would do exactly that, if I gave him the excuse.

  I’d had plenty of guns pointed at me over the years – sometimes even in situations like this. But the difference between some Iraqi insurgent screaming at you in Arabic, and a cop pointing a gun at you, was that if the police officer blew your brains out, he’d probably get away with it…

  Even if it was an undercover Homeland Security agent he was executing.

  So I stayed exactly where I was – and prayed that somehow, I’d be able to figure us a way out of this…

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Christi

  With a grunt, Officer Dempsey threw me onto the bed, and then pinned me there with his knee, right in the small of my back.

/>   I cried out and struggled – but the moment I did so, he wrenched my arm behind my back until I was sure he was going to pop it right out of its socket.

  “Shut your fucking mouth,” the cop sneered, as I gasped in agony. I literally couldn’t breathe – and that made it easy for him to toss his gun onto the bed beside me, and then use his other hand to haul my left wrist behind my back.

  There was the rasp of zip-ties being tightened, and then a painful pinch as Dempsey secured my wrists behind my back.

  Even though my hands were bound behind me, Dempsey grabbed a bunch of my fingers in his fist, and bent them back until I cried out in agony.

  “You struggle, kick me – or even scream – and I’m going to snap your pinkies like they were breadsticks.”

  The way he was twisting my fingers back? I didn’t doubt him for a second.

  “Good,” the cop released my hand.

  Gasping, with painful tears flooding my eyes, I pulled my head out of the covers.

  Mason was on his hands and knees on the floor of the motel room, and Officer Sanchez was looming over him with the barrel of his semi-automatic aimed square between his eyes.

  “Don’t even fucking move,” Sanchez sneered – and, to his credit, Mason was smart enough to listen.

  As he knelt there, frozen to the spot, Officer Dempsey straddled him like a toddler playing ‘cowboy’ on his daddy’s back…

  …only the cop wasn’t play-fighting when he grabbed Mason’s burly arms, and wrenched them back behind his back.

  Mason fell face-first into the carpet, and Officer Dempsey zip-tied his wrists behind him with brutal efficiency.

  Then, as he clambered off of Mason’s back, the cop gave him a firm, hard kick, right in the ribcage.

  “Son of a bitch!” Dempsey screamed, as he loomed over Mason’s prone body. My lover was rolled onto his side now, gasping in agony at the impact of the officer’s boot.

  “Son of a bitch!” Dempsey repeated, clearly tempted to kick him again. “I should have fucking known this was a double-cross.”

  Mason took a big, whooping gasp of air and rasped: “W-what the fuck are you talking about?”

  Thwack!

  Dempsey’s boot landed in Masons ribcage again.

  “Don’t even try to fucking lie, you bastard,” the cop warned. “We know everything.”

  “We’ve got an alert set up for this bitch’s debit card,” Sanchez pointed an accusing finger at me. “Got pinged this afternoon that she’d used it for the first time in months – right here in town!”

  I squeezed shut my eyes and sobbed. How could I have been so fucking stupid? I should have known they’d have been able to trace that!

  “Didn’t take us long to track the slut down,” Sanchez continued, “Ain’t many tattooed little blondes shaking their ass up and down these streets. And when we did, who the fuck was she with?”

  Dempsey kicked Mason again, and this time I could have sworn I heard one of his ribs crack.

  “With you, you son of a bitch. The girl whose marijuana we’re stealing, with the bastard sent here to steal it!”

  Mason gasped for air, and finally struggled to hiss:

  “Y-you got it all wrong. She’s just some slut riding with the biker gang…”

  I knew he was lying – trying to deflect suspicion. But hearing Mason describe me as a ‘slut’ physically hurt.

  But not as much as the fist Dempsey made, which he planted hard into the side of Mason’s face.

  “Nice fucking try,” the cop sneered. He reached into his back pocket, and pulled out a gleaming metal badge. “I might have even believed you, if we hadn’t searched your hotel room and found this.”

  I narrowed my eyes.

  Fuck.

  Dempsey was holding Mason’s Homeland Security badge – the one he’d revealed to me the day before.

  Mason had clearly hidden it in the hotel room – but not well enough for these two cops not to sniff it out.

  “So, what’s the story, Agent Stone?” Dempsey bent down, and hissed into Mason’s ear. “You in town to bust us? Or your buddy Coyle?”

  “You’ve been riding with the Knuckleheads for how long now?” Sanchez kept his gun covering Mason. “Three, four months? And you’re gonna double-cross them?”

  “That’s cold, bro,” Dempsey hissed. “I guess there really is no honor among thieves.”

  Dempsey tested the zip-ties holding Mason’s wrists, and gave Sanchez a nod when he was satisfied they were on tightly enough.

  Sanchez returned the nod, and reluctantly holstered his gun.

  “Go and bring the car around,” Dempsey ordered. Sanchez nodded, and stepped over Mason towards the door.

  “You two are coming for a little ride with us,” Dempsey growled, hefting Mason to his unsteady feet. “We’ve got somebody who wants to see you.”

  ***

  We heard the steady dug-dug-dug of the V8 engine even before Officer Sanchez pulled his Police Interceptor around to the back of the motel. As he pulled the long, low car to a halt, Dempsey wrenched open the door to our motel room, and yanked his gun out of its holster.

  He levelled the .40 in Mason’s direction, and ordered: “Try anything funny and I’m putting one of these rounds right in your belly.”

  Mason winced at the sound of that, and it made Dempsey’s lip curl.

  “Don’t like the sound of that, do you?”

  “Seen one too many people take a gut-shot back in Iraq,” Mason spat back, as he stepped slowly forward. “Most painful way to die imaginable – and it takes a real cowardly son-of-a-bitch to put a bullet there.”

  That wiped the smile from Officer Dempsey’s face real quick.

  Snarling, Dempsey raised the gun and barked: “Outside. Now!’

  Mason didn’t have much choice. Prompted by the unblinking black eye of Dempsey’s semi-automatic, he stumbled through the doorway into the bright, California sun.

  Dempsey grabbed my elbows, and pulled me up off the bed. Fingers digging into my skin, he hauled me outside after Mason, and I blinked as the bright sunlight blinded me.

  Officer Sanchez had pulled his Police-issue Dodge Charger around in a semi-circle, so the big, square trunk was facing the hotel door. As Dempsey marched us outside, the trunk popped open, and Dempsey jerked his head towards the dark, cavernous space inside.

  “Get in,” he snapped.

  Mason stood there, towering over Dempsey, and blinked.

  “Are you for real?”

  He looked around the motel parking lot – where other residents were peering down from the balconies overhead, or peering at us from the sidewalk.

  “You throw us in the trunk, and everybody’s going to know you’re not arresting us.”

  “We’re not arresting you,” Dempsey snarled, “And everybody in this town knows to keep their Goddamned mouths shut about what Sanchez and I do around here.”

  The cop then swiveled his head towards Christi, and with narrow eyes growled: “Everybody except you, that is.”

  “You killed my father, you son-of-a-bitch,” Christi snapped back. “Go fuck yourself.”

  Dempsey snorted, and the corner of his mouth curled upwards.

  “Don’t worry, honey,” he sneered. “You’ll be joining him soon enough.” And then he tightened his grip on his Police-issue Glock and barked: “Now get in the Goddamned trunk!”

  And without any other option, Mason and I awkwardly clambered over the lip of the trunk, and lay down in the cavernous rear of the old Dodge.

  There was a clump as Dempsey slammed shut the trunk lid. Instantly, we were plunged into darkness.

  For a few terrifying moments, neither of could see. We were in total darkness, smothered by the oppressive heat of the sealed trunk, and rattled by the steady reverberation of that big, hemi engine.

  Then the car rocked side to side, and the passenger door clumped shut. Officer Dempsey had clearly climbed inside.

  The wheels spun. My stomach lurched. Without any
idea where we were going, Mason and I were whisked off onto the highway.

  ***

  “It’s going to be okay.”

  Mason’s voice was low and husky in the blackness of the trunk, but I appreciated it. I could feel his massive bulk pressed against me, but with our hands bound behind our backs, there was no way to reach out and touch each other.

  “W-where are they taking us?” I stammered, my chest pounding.

  “To the old mall, out by the Interstate,” Mason murmured back. “I’m sure of it.”

  “H-how do you know?”

  “Because that’s where the Knuckleheads are holed up for the night,” he explained. “I reckon these two cops are bringing us both back home to Coyle.”

  I shuddered at the thought.

  It wasn’t so much that I hated Coyle – I mean, I hated the memory of all the degrading things he’d done to me, and watched me do… But in all the months I’d been riding with the Knuckleheads, he’d been benign enough…

  But that was before I’d clocked Bertha over the back of the head with a 2”x4” and left her for dead…

  That was before I’d run off on the back of a motorcycle with an undercover Homeland Security agent – one who’d double-crossed and betrayed Coyle’s trust.

  Previously, Coyle had considered me nothing but an expendable piece of ass…

  …now I was sure I’d made an enemy of him.

  Even as I considered that, I felt the car swerve off the road, and the smooth traction of the freeway was replaced by the rumbling skitter of dirt underfoot.

  “We’re nearly there,” Mason hissed, detecting the same change as I had. “We’re on a dirt road now.”

  It was a dirt road I knew well. The old shopping mall had been a fixture of my childhood, back when it was brand-new, and packed with my favorite clothing and toy stores.

  But ten years ago or so, when the last economic crash happened, the whole place had closed up – and for nearly a decade the immense shopping mall had stood, empty and crumbling, on the outskirts of town.

  Forgotten. Abandoned.

  The perfect place for a biker gang to use as a hideout.