In Style 4 Now (The Jennifer Cloud Series)

by Janet Leigh

  Clyde moved next to her. “Yep, I believe you’re right, Bonnie. I appreciate your help at the bank, but I’ll be taking all the proceeds from our current work together, and I’ll be taking your car.”

  A shot rang from the outside and glass shattered. “They’re shooting at us, the sons-a-bitches.”

  Clyde used the butt of his gun, busted out a pane in the window, and sprayed a round of bullets toward the lawmen.

  “That key belongs to me!” Elma shouted at Mitch as he shoved her into the bathroom and the first round of automatic gunfire sounded through the room.

  Chapter 23

  Clyde dropped to his knees. “They’ve got a chopper!”

  Bonnie hit the floor and I leaped at Caiyan, knocking him over a chair and covering his body with mine. He hit his head on the coffee table on the way down and went lights out. The lawmen had added a tommy gun to their arsenal. Bullets sprayed through the windows, dotting holes in the back wall.

  Everyone was sprawled on the floor, heads down as glass and bullets sprayed over us. Caiyan was starting to regain consciousness. I checked the back of his head; there wasn’t any blood. Good—he would only have a headache to go with his Thunder key hangover. “Stay down,” I whispered. An automatic rifle laid next to me. It was leaning against the wall before chaos erupted and I had knocked it down when I tackled Caiyan. Another rifle rested on the bed. Mitch was on the floor behind the bed. He raised up and took the gun.

  Clyde grabbed Bonnie by the arm and lifted her to her feet.

  “They will fill us full of daylight if we don’t make our getaway. Let’s go Mitch, I’ll cover. You and Bonnie make a run for the car.”

  Bonnie whimpered as Clyde gave her the bag full of money, kissed her hard on the mouth, then pushed her forward. “I’m right behind you.”

  Mitch started after her while Clyde fired shots at the police. Stopping at the door, he turned and looked at the bathroom. Regret flooded his face.

  “You can’t go with them, Mitch,” I shouted at him.

  His eyes met mine, and for a second I thought he might stay. His mouth twisted into an evil smirk, and he fled with Bonnie while Clyde covered them with his gun. Shots rang in return, and as Clyde started out after them he took a bullet in the arm. He moved back into the cottage, applying pressure to his upper arm as blood darkened the sleeve of his shirt. Holding his wound, he continued to shoot the remaining rounds from his rifle. I heard the sound of the car’s motor as Mitch revved the engine. Shouts from Bonnie for Clyde to “come on.”

  Clyde pressed his back against the wall, clutching his bleeding arm as more gunshots splintered the wood in the door. Clyde’s gun was empty. He wasn’t going to make it to the car. Bonnie and Clyde were going to be killed here, right in front of me.

  I grabbed the BAR next to me. When Clyde saw me with the gun, his eyes widened, fearful, searching the room for another weapon.

  “Go, I’ll cover you,” I told him. He looked stunned at first, but there wasn’t any time to argue. He had to get in the car and drive to Wellington.

  I engaged the rifle, stood behind Clyde, and shot high, giving Clyde time to make a dive into the car. The car peeled gravel as Mitch spun out and rammed through the barricade of police cars. The police were temporarily confused. I heard one of them shout they saw Bonnie and Clyde Barrow in the car. Some of the officers piled into the least damaged of the two police cars to give chase, others were taking cover and trying to figure out who was still shooting at them. I watched three more get into one of the cars blocking the garage to Clyde’s cottage. There was a higher bounty on Bonnie and Clyde than whoever was left behind. Good. It made room for us to take Clyde’s car if we could get to the garage.

  I bolted the cottage door. Running to the bathroom, I jerked the door open.

  My aunt sat on the floor, huddled against the toilet, tears threatening to spill over. I tossed the rifle I held aside. “I’m here to help you.”

  Caiyan regained his feet and stood next to me.

  “Stay away from me, you brigand bastard,” Elma hollered at him.

  Caiyan raised his hands in surrender. “No, ye have it all wrong. We’re the good guys.”

  Caiyan’s Scottish brogue had returned full force, and she stared at him, eyes wide as saucers.

  “Elma, I’m a transporter and Caiyan is a defender.” I motioned for her to come with us. “We are here to help you get the key Bonnie wears.”

  “We are?” Caiyan asked, and I gave him the stink eye. He rephrased, “Aye, we are.”

  “If you are a transporter, where’s your key?” Elma asked me.

  I looked down to keep my eyes from trailing to her empty throat and give myself away.

  “It was taken by an evil man,” Caiyan said.

  He wasn’t exactly lying. Jake had his moments, and he was the one who had taken my key away from me.

  “Where are you from?” she asked.

  “The future. That’s all I can say. Now let’s get the hell out of here,” I said.

  “We need to get to Clyde’s car in the garage before the laws,” she said.

  The three of us made haste through the adjoining door. The cottages backed up to a steep hillside. The laws couldn’t get behind the cottages without some effort, so the only way into the garage was through one of the two cottages. I heard brush scrape against the wall as I entered the attached garage. The police were surrounding the place and entering the cottage Clyde had recently vacated.

  “We’ve gotta get out of here.” I looked over at Caiyan. He still seemed like he was fighting a bad hangover.

  “Let me drive,” Elma said. “I’ve got experience running from the coppers. If I can outrun them in my rusty old truck, this V-8 ought to be a piece of cake.”

  “I’ll get the garage door.” I turned to lift the hinged wooden door.

  “No, don’t,” Elma said. “I can bust through that old piece of crap.”

  Caiyan nodded. “We dinnae want to allow them the chance to corner us in the garage.”

  With everyone in agreement, we climbed into the car. Elma took the wheel with me beside her, BAR in hand. Caiyan argued about being assigned the back seat, but considering his condition, he didn’t give us too much grief. Clyde had left the key stuck in the ignition in case he needed to make a fast getaway.

  “Thank you, Clyde.” Elma started the Ford. The motor gave a loud hum, and she cried out as she put the pedal to the metal—a sound I can only assume was the female version of the rebel yell. The garage door’s worn slats fractured and exploded into the air as she rammed the car through it.

  The cops were easing their way toward cottage six and jumped aside as we flew past them. I didn’t need to use my gun. They were caught off guard, and it took a minute before they could fire at the speeding automobile.

  A few bullets pinged off the Ford’s body as we left them standing in the dust, holding their weapons in their hands.

  Elma floored the gas, sped across the small bridge, and gained access to the main road.

  “Where should I go?” Elma asked me.

  “We have to find Bonnie and Clyde. They are headed to Wellington. Do you know where it is?”

  “It’s up by the Oklahoma border. I’ve delivered hooch to some injuns up thatta way.”

  Silence filled the car as she continued down the road. I knew she had questions, but I didn’t have the answers she needed to hear. I glanced in the back seat at Caiyan. His left arm was propped up on the door, a finger to his lips, his eyes lost deep in thought. I knew the look. He was contemplating the possible outcomes of our quest.

  “Why are y’all here?” Elma finally broke the quiet.

  “We came after Mitch.”

  “Why?” She asked, keeping her eyes on the dark road.

  “He’s after Bonnie’s key,” Caiyan said.

  Elma pulled the car over to the side of the road and hit the brake. The jolt flung me against the dash. “Mitch is a brigand?” She was stricken.

 
“Yes, he’s part of a family of brigands that we chase on a regular basis.”

  She looked at us. “Y’all are with the council?”

  “In a matter of speaking, yes,” Caiyan answered.

  “I assumed you knew Mitch had the gift since you um…touched him.”

  “I thought it was love.” Her eyes dropped to her hands resting in her lap.

  “Don’t worry, you’re not the first girl to be deceived by a traveler.” I glanced at Caiyan and placed my hand on her shoulder. Emotions singed my fingertips and swirled through me. A whirlwind of anger, sadness, fear, and disappointment balled and pressed on my gut.

  I had experienced all of those things in my relationship with Caiyan. Anger being first and foremost. His reluctance to give me the Thunder key got us caught.

  Elma placed her hand over mine.

  “You love him?” She glanced at Caiyan in the rearview mirror, surprised. “But you’re angry at him, now.”

  Her ability as a reader threw me. She was several years younger than me, but her reading was far superior.

  I cut my eyes to the back seat. Caiyan stared at me, waiting for the answer. The question hung heavy in the air.

  “Yes,” I said.

  Caiyan let out a slow breath and relaxed back against the seat.

  “But even when we are angry at each other we work as a team.” My emphasis placed on the word team, much like my college professors when they wanted to stress the importance of the information they delivered.

  Elma banged her fist against the steering wheel. “Mitch hoodwinked me. This was the first time I’ve been allowed to wear the key. My parents trusted me, and I’ve gone and given my key away.”

  “Mitch is good at hoodwinking, but we’re better. We’ll get your key back.”

  I could see the wheels turning in her mind. She was not going to let Mitch get off without a word.

  “We need to catch them and get our keys back.” Elma’s eyes lit up, and my inner voice applauded. There was nothing more powerful than a scorned woman.

  “We need to switch cars. The coppers will be watching for this one,” Elma said.

  “If we spend time searching for another car, we will never catch them in time to get our keys before the accident,” Caiyan said, leaning forward from the back seat.

  “What accident?” Elma asked.

  “Clyde drives the Ford at top speed and misses a detour sign of a bridge under construction. He ends up in the bottom of the Salt Fork of the Red River. He’s supposed to have one of his gang members with him, but since we met him at the casino he didn’t go back to Dallas and pick him up. Maybe we changed history and Clyde won’t wreck the car,” I said.

  “Mitch souped up the cars. They are supposed to be in this car, but they took mine, and it’s newer and faster. It could be fatal,” Caiyan added.

  “Can we catch them?” Elma turned to face Caiyan.

  “Not likely. They have a pretty good head start.”

  “Mitch was driving. He knows right?” I asked, looking back at Caiyan. “Surely he knows about the wreck.” If Mitch didn’t do his homework, if he only went by what was written in the journal, he didn’t know about the wreck.

  “Clyde won’t let Mitch drive for long,” Elma said. “He’s always at the wheel, and he only stops for gas, then it’s back on the road going seventy miles per hour. Bonnie always complained to me that Clyde thinks he’s the best driver in the world. We have to catch them.” She jerked the car back onto the road and headed north. Scorned or not, she still didn’t want Mitch to die.

  Chapter 24

  The winding country roads, lit solely by the light of the full moon, were difficult to maneuver in the dark. There weren’t any billboards with neon lights flashing colorful advertising at us or high-powered street lights showing us the sharp turns along the way. A few times Elma veered toward the shoulder, and Caiyan made the male grunting noise of a man wanting to take the wheel.

  Elma shared stories about her life on the farm. The times she spent with my grandfather and her other siblings. I prayed she wouldn’t mention the key Mitch had taken belonged to her father. Caiyan wouldn’t like the fact I didn’t tell him about the key my mamma Bea kept hidden in her shoe box or the vessel she had displayed in plain sight.

  I wished I could tell Elma she was my aunt. I wanted to know more about my grandfather. He was nine years younger than Elma and she told us her ma thought he might have the gift, but he hadn’t come into his power, yet. I wanted to tell her he does have the gift and he was going to marry Mamma Bea and have my dad, and my uncle Buster, and my aunt Loretta, and that something bad was going to happen to him.

  Caiyan leaned forward from the backseat and put a hand on my shoulder. A calm heat massaged the tension in my neck and upper back.

  I reached up and clasped his hand. The anger was gone, replaced with an empathy for Elma. It was hard for me to imagine Elma had already lived a full life in my time. She had battled brigands, fallen in love with Marco’s grandfather, and saw the formation of the World Travel Federation. Caiyan knew her better than I did. She was his transporter when she died. I didn’t know the details surrounding her death. Caiyan knew he had stories he needed to share with me.

  “Weel talk when we get home, yeah?”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  Elma slowed the car as we entered the occasional small towns we passed through on our way to Wellington. We didn’t want the local police noticing our stolen car. Luckily, crime in the small towns was minimal. Elma told us a good majority of the policemen drove their own vehicles and were most likely home with their families until they were needed. I breathed a sigh of relief. If someone saw us and became suspicious, we could outrun them with our V-8 before they would have a chance to call the law. Most wouldn't pursue us because they knew catching our car would be impossible.

  When we cleared the towns, Elma increased our speed. We drove fast, but I knew Bonnie and Clyde were driving faster. Clyde was going to miss the detour sign and barrel through the old bridge that was out and end up in the ravine before we could stop them. A story I remembered from my research revealed a group of farmers were on their front porch eating ice cream when they heard the crash. I knew we had to arrive before the farmers who pulled the couple from the wreckage. I wasn’t sure what would happen if Mitch was the one the farmers found instead of the man Clyde was supposed to pick up in Dallas, but I decided removing Mitch from the scene was the wiser choice.

  Elma slowed the car as we passed a sign indicating we were near the Salt Fork of the Red River. “It’s black as a bull’s ass. I can’t see a thing. The headlights on this car ain’t worth a darn.”

  “I saw a light in the trunk,” Caiyan said.

  Elma stopped the car and we got out. I strained to hear the sound of another motor. Only the rustle of leaves from the trees lining the road caught in a swift wind met my ears.

  Caiyan examined the light he found in the trunk. The red square canister had one large round light built into the front of it. He held it up by a long metal handle trying to figure out how to turn it on. Elma looked pleased.

  “Good it’s a new lantern.” She took the light from Caiyan, examined it, then flipped a toggle switch on the back. The light shone brightly from the metal box. “I gotta give Clyde credit. He steals the best stuff.”

  “Should we walk the rest of the way?” I asked.

  “No, the bridge is still a good piece up the road according to my calculations.” Elma pointed toward the blackness.

  “Maybe they stopped somewhere for the night?” I checked the time. The car should have already missed the detour sign and taken a nosedive into the river bed. There was nothing but black as far as the eye could see. If they stopped, it would change history. If Bonnie didn’t get injured in the wreck they might take another path, rob different banks, murder the wrong people. The keys we needed to find might be lost forever. My life might be lost in time.

  Elma took the light from Caiyan and crawled on
the hood of the car, wrapping her dress around her legs she straddled the greyhound hood ornament. Her petite legs clenched either side of the long nose of the car and her shoes braced against the front fenders.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “Y’all drive slow, and I’ll shine the light ahead. We don’t want to miss the detour sign.” As she said the words, a loud noise broke the silence of the night. A cacophony of metal smashing against wood, followed by a high, piercing scream.

  We ran to the car. Caiyan got behind the wheel and I slid in next to him. We drove slowly as Elma lifted the lantern and shined the light into the night. We passed a slope in the road and Caiyan pointed to a barricade busted clean through. Elma made a motion with her hands and Caiyan stopped the car, aiming the headlights toward the river. A cloud of dust hung in the air and carried with it a sense of tension. A feeling that something bad had occurred recently.

  Elma leaped off the car. Holding the light at arm’s length, she ran a full-out sprint toward the wreck.

  “Damn,” I said, tumbling out the passenger side door.

  “Go after her. I’ll move the car as close as I can, so we can use the headlights,” Caiyan said, placing the car in gear.

  Elma stood on the bank of the dry river, shining the light in the direction of the wreck. I bent over, placing my hands on my knees as I tried to catch my breath. Only one of the headlights from Clyde’s car flickered like a beacon, illuminating the runway created by the car as it flew into the dry, packed dirt. As Caiyan maneuvered our car into the path of destruction, its headlights gave us a better view of the wreckage that waited for us on the river bottom. Elma gasped and steadied herself with a hand on my shoulder. Clyde’s car was lying on its side. Smoke billowed from the engine. There was no movement coming from inside the vehicle.

  “I smell gas,” Elma said, removing her hand from my shoulder and using the lantern to search for a way down to the car.

  I straightened, and the gasoline fumes burned my nose as Caiyan caught up with us.