by Paula Cox
“I don’t have time to explain. I want you to get your stuff and get out of there.”
“Cain, I can’t —”
“Goddamnit! Would you just for once do what I say?” he roared.
I looked at the phone as if had come alive in my hand. “You need to get a grip,” I muttered, in no mood for his shit.
“Alex, I’m sorry. But you may be in danger. I want you to leave. Now.”
I got that rarest of all thrills, the rush of impending doom. “What kind of danger?”
“I don’t know! One of our contacts, someone we use to keep track of the Bulls, said some of the Bulls had left town to hit a soft target. I’m afraid it could be you.”
“I thought you said nobody knew about me.”
“Nobody does! But I don’t want to take the chance.”
“Why would they come after me?”
“Because it has all gone to shit here. The Bulls are rattling their sabers after we screwed their deal. They haven’t hit us yet, but we think they may at any time. I need to come get you and bring you to Dallas so I can protect you. But first I need you to get away from there!”
“Hang on!” I said as I saw Peter walk by. “Peter! We may have a problem.”
Peter stopped and returned to my office. “What kind of problem?”
“This is a… friend… on the phone. He heard a rumor that someone may come in here and start trouble.”
“What kind of trouble?” Peter asked.
I repeated the question into the phone.
“I don’t know,” Cain said. “Only that the Bulls were going to move against a soft target. It may be nothing. It may not even be you. But I can’t take that chance.”
“Okay, hang on.” I repeated much of what Cain said.
“Josh and Randy can handle it,” Peter said with confidence.
“You think?”
“It’s what I pay them for. If someone comes in here stirring up shit, those two will break some heads.”
“Did you hear that?” I asked Cain.
“Yeah, I heard. But I still don’t like it. I —”
Just then I heard two loud pops, then two more in quick succession.
“Get down!” Peter yelled, pushing me back into my office before he shut and locked the door. “Under the desk! Move it!” he ordered as he pulled a nasty looking pistol from under his coat. As he crouched down behind the desk, weapon pointed at the door, I heard six more rapid shots. I could just make out the screaming of men and women.
“Someone is shooting,” I whispered into the phone, too scared to even cry.
“Are you okay?” Cain’s terrified voice asked.
“I’m hiding.”
“Don’t move!” Cain whispered harshly.
“Stay here!” Peter barked as he rose and slowly opened the door. The screams became louder as he moved out and shut the door behind him.
“Cain, I’m scared,” I whispered. I was cowering in the foot well of my desk, trying to make myself small, too afraid to even move.
“I know, baby, I know,” Cain whispered and I could hear the fear in his voice.
“Alex! Get out here!” Peter yelled as he threw my door open. “We have people shot! See what you can do to help!”
“I have to go!” I scrambled out from under my desk, killing the call and leaving the phone behind as I raced down the hall. As I entered the bar I saw Peter on the floor with Randy, his hands on his chest. I looked behind the bar and saw Tina, shot six times. I dropped to the floor beside her and checked for a pulse. Nothing. I rose and looked around, spotting Josh on the floor a short distance away. He was moving so I grabbed all the bar towels and dashed to his side.
“How are you feeling, Josh?” I asked as I pressed a towel to his leg.
“It hurts like hell, Alex,” he hissed as he grimaced.
“I know. Hang in there, okay? Roll over and let me look.” He gritted his teeth and twisted up onto the opposite hip and I dipped my head to look under the injured leg. There was no exit wound. “The bullet is still in your leg. Can you hold this?” He pressed down on the towel, holding it tight. “That’s it. Just hold it there. I need to help Pete.”
I picked up the other four towels and hurried to Peter’s side. “Josh is going to be okay. Tina’s dead. How’s Randy?”
“It’s bad. He’s bleeding badly.”
I pressed the towels to the wound in his chest, leaning into it. I had a little bit of knowledge, but he needed help and right away. “Has anyone called 911?”
“I had one of the girls call.”
“Hand me that other towel,” I said just as I heard the wail of a siren.
Peter handed me the towel then rose and opened the door, holding it open until the police cruiser howled to a stop.
“Hang on, Randy,” I whispered as I fought against my tears of fear and frustration. I knew I had to slow down the bleeding, but I didn’t know if I was doing the right thing. I was so frightened I couldn’t think.
It seemed like only moments later that hands shoved me roughly aside. I fell on my ass then scrambled backwards as the paramedics went to work on Randy, tearing open packages and barking orders to each other.
I was still sitting on my ass, knees up with my arms wrapped around them, unable to move, when an officer stepped up to me. “I need you to come with me. They will take care of your friend.”
I looked up and the officer was holding a gloved hand down to me. I took it and he helped me to my feet then shepherded into the far corner of the club with the other girls.
***
It took almost two hours before the police let me go. Since I had been in the back room with Peter when the shooting happened, I was of little use to them. As we waited I had watched them rush Randy out, a second paramedic team taking Josh out a little later.
As we stood around, the girls told me what happened. Four guys had walked in, shooting Randy as soon as they stepped in, and then shooting Josh a moment later when he turned toward them. They then walked up to the bar and killed Tina, one man shooting her six times, before they left without a backward glance.
That was supposed to be me. The Bulls thought they had killed me. Tina and I looked enough alike that a cursory description, tall, dark hair, working behind the bar at The Cat’s Claw, would fit us both.
The police had allowed me to wash my hands while I waited my turn to be questioned, but I stopped in the bathroom to scrub them again. Then a second time. I wasn’t sure I would ever get my hands clean again. I forced myself to not wash them a third time and wandered in a daze to my office. I sat in my chair and stared at nothing, thinking over what had happened.
I looked at my phone on the desk. There were two missed calls, both from Cain. I had to go. I had to get away. I picked up my phone, my purse, and left, not even bothering to shut the door to my office.
***
I arrived home and went straight to my suitcase. I struggled not to cry in desperation as I threw a few items into the case. I had to get somewhere safe, somewhere where I could protect myself and my unborn child.
I tossed my gun on top of the clothes and zipped it shut. I was almost out of the door when the nausea hit. I dropped my case and ran for the bathroom, just making it before I threw up, emptying my stomach of my lunch. I fell to my knees, gasping and retching. There had been so much blood, and Tina’s eyes, the way they stared at me. I heaved again, gagging and choking.
I knelt on the floor, panting and fighting the heaves, until the nausea passed. I rose and washed out my mouth. I had to hold it together. I had to protect my baby. I gritted my teeth in determination, spat out one last mouthful of water, and walked out of the bathroom. I picked up my bag without even slowing as I walked toward the garage.
***
“Alexandria? What are you doing here?” Grandpa asked as I opened the door to their house.
“I’m in trouble. Bad trouble.”
“What kind of trouble?” Granny asked as she appeared from the back of
the house.
“Someone tried to kill me today.”
“What?” they both cried in unison as they looked at each other.
“Are you okay?” Granny asked as she hurried to take me into her embrace.
“Yes. They mistook someone else for me.” I gasped, but I couldn’t stop the tears. “It was so awful!”
“What happened?” Grandpa asked, guiding me to a chair.
“Cain called. He said someone may be on their way to kill me. I was —”
“Why would someone want to kill you?” Granny asked.
“I don’t know. It was a rival club or something. Cain’s club and this other club are fighting over territory or something. I don’t understand it all. But he called and said the Bulls… the black…” I paused as I struggled to remember the name he had called them. “The Blacktop Bulls. They are trying to take away the Hellhounds…” I paused again. I had given Cain my word that I wouldn’t tell a soul. But did that matter now?
“The Hellhounds?” Grandpa asked, and I saw the way he looked at Granny.
“Yeah. Why?” I waited a moment, but Granny and Grandpa just continued to stare at each other. “What is it? Tell me.”
“Oh, Alexandria, the Hellhounds…that was the club your father was investigating when he was killed,” Granny said.
“What?” I shouted.
“It’s true,” Grandpa added.
“The Hellhounds killed my parents?”
“That is what we think. I know the cops said it was an accident, but…”
“Cain said they don’t kill people. Especially cops. He said it brings down too much heat. Are you sure?”
“No. Nobody is sure. But only a day or two before the accident, he told us that he was closing in on the Hellhounds. He didn’t say what they were doing; only that they were smugglers, and he was going to bust their operation wide open. He was so excited about it. He was the lead investigator and he thought that the case would be enough to get him his Lieutenant bars. Then…they had the accident. The police started an investigation, but then suddenly closed the case. They said it appeared to be an accident. That’s what they said publicly. Privately they said it was the Hellhounds. But they couldn’t prove it.”
I sat in stunned silence. I had finally believed in Cain, that they weren’t a bunch of killers, and his club had killed my parents. “What about his case?”
“We don’t know,” Granny said. “Keith probably shouldn’t have told us even as much as he did. But so far as I know, there were no arrests. Nothing. The case just...disappeared.”
“Are you involved with the Hellhounds?” Grandpa asked.
“No. Not anymore. I didn’t know. Cain, the father, is a Hellhound.”
“Damnit! Can this get any more messed up? How is what happened today related?”
“I don’t know! I don’t know anything! I broke it off with Cain a couple of weeks ago. When the Hounds started having trouble with the Bulls, I broke it off. I don’t know what is going on. I don’t want to know. I don’t know why they were coming after me. Cain said he hadn’t told anyone about me.”
“He’s a Hellhound. He only thinks of himself and his club,” Grandpa snarled.
“I see that now,” I mumbled.
“Well, you’re safe now.” Granny said. “You can stay here with us.”
“But my job? If they find out they killed the wrong person?”
“Don’t go back,” Grandpa said. “We have a little money put back. We’ll help you.”
“But I can’t live here forever!”
“Just until things settle down,” Granny said. “It will be okay. You can move back into your old room.”
“But —” I began.
“Hush now,” Granny said. “Everything happens for a reason. It will work out.”
I sat in Granny’s chair and thought about everything that had happened to me in the last couple of months and how I had made one bad choice after another. “I’m so sorry to drag you into all of this.”
“Don’t worry. Tomorrow, we will call the police and tell them everything you know. Then we can put this sordid mess behind us.”
Chapter 20
I was sleeping in. Peter had called me just before bedtime and told me not to report to work until Monday because the bar would be closed for at least a couple of days. I had just returned to bed, luxuriating in my still rare, but increasingly more frequent sickness-free mornings, when my phone rang. I picked it up but didn’t recognize the number.
“Hello?”
“Alex? It’s Cain. I —”
I killed the call the moment I recognized his voice. There was nothing that man had to say that I wanted to hear. The phone rang again almost immediately and I pressed the button to ignore the call. A moment later, it rang again, and once again, I ignored it. For the next five minutes my phone rang almost continuously. I first set it to vibrate, then silent, so I didn’t have to listen to it buzz. It was always the same number and I finally turned the phone off just so I didn’t have to see the screen light up anymore.
When I finally crawled out of bed an hour later, I turned my phone on. It said I had thirty-five missed calls. That was just from when the phone was on. There was no guessing how many I missed after I turned it off. The phone signaled that I had a voicemail. I actually had seventy-one and my mailbox was full.
The moment I heard Cain’s voice on each message, I deleted it. At about message thirty, I stopped listening and was deleting messages as fast as my phone would allow me. I wasn’t even finished with my deleting when the phone signaled another call from Cain’s new number. I debated ignoring it, but decided he would just keep calling until I told him to leave me alone. I dropped out of voice mail and accepted the call.
“Thank god! Don’t hang up!” Cain cried.
“You can just go fuck yourself!”
“Alex, please! I just want to know if you are okay. Things have gotten out of control and… I just need to know if you’re okay.”
“Great! Peachy! Just another great day when someone tries to kill me! A woman died yesterday because of you. Or me.”
“What? What do you mean?”
“The new bartender, the one that replaced me? You remember her? They shot her, Cain. Four guys came in and gunned her down in cold blood. They probably thought it was me. Because of you, a woman is dead.”
He was quiet a moment. “I’m so sorry, Alex. I never meant for any of this to happen. Things have gotten out of hand. You need to come to Dallas where —”
“I’m not going any place with you. Not now. Not ever.”
“Alex! I can’t protect you there. The Bulls, they’ve lost it. They hit us yesterday and killed three of our guys. We’ve been on lockdown all night. We pulled all the family members together into the clubhouse for protection. I was on guard last night and that is why I couldn’t call.”
“Whatever,” I said. I couldn’t care less about his excuses.
“I don’t know how they found you. It should’ve been impossible. I haven’t told anyone about you or the baby. Only Thad knows that I have something working in New Orleans, but even he doesn’t know what. I got a new phone, a prepaid, in case they somehow had hacked into my phone records or were eavesdropping on my calls.”
“Well, you don’t have to worry over me anymore. We’re done. Finished. I never want to see you again.”
“I know you’re upset, and you have every right to be. I’ve dragged you into a mess that I never intended to. But can we put that behind us at least until we get this shit sorted out? For the sake of the baby? After that, if you never want to see me again, I guess I can accept that. But please, Alex, let me protect you and the baby.”
“Protect me? You have to be shitting me! It’s because of you that I’m in this mess!”
“Don’t you think I know that?” he cried in despair. “I never intended for this to happen! Nothing like this has ever happened before! I don’t understand what is going on! None of us do. The Bulls are bein
g too bold. We can’t predict what they will do next. That’s why I need to bring you to Dallas. I can’t protect you where you are.”
“No. You just stay the fuck away from me. You and your club, you bring nothing but death and destruction. I should never have gotten involved with you.”
“Alex, please. We’ll get this sorted out. We can stick to our plan. I’ll leave the Hounds, but you have to give me the time to get this shit sorted out. We need the club now to help protect you and the baby.”
“Fuck you and the Hounds! You killed my parents and I don’t want to have a fucking thing to do with you!”
