Armed and Famous

by Jennifer Morey

  “You might like ganja better,” he said.

  Ganja? What was he talking about? She breathed a half laugh to cover her ignorance.

  “You want to try some?”

  Insecurity reared up. She couldn’t agree to anything unless she knew what ganja was. What should she say now?

  After finishing the beer she’d handed him, he set that aside and then reached into his sweatshirt pocket, procuring a strange-looking pipe. He sure was drinking fast.

  Isadora searched for Candra and found her talking close with Rubio. Looking around, she realized she didn’t know anyone other than Candra here.

  Batting down fear, more interested in the exploration, she took the pipe.

  Fumbling some, she glanced at Darius. He was nice. She sensed it. Alcohol scared her, but this wasn’t alcohol.

  When he handed her a lighter, she hid her befuddlement. Of course the pipe had to be lit. She looked at the partially charred contents of the bowl. Some of them were green. Dried, but leafy.

  She lit the lighter and put it to her lips. Inhaling just a bit, she handed him the pipe back.

  “That wasn’t a hit,” he said.

  It wasn’t?

  He grinned in that way, that nice way. “You haven’t smoked before, have you?”

  Isadora had been raised to always tell the truth. “No.”

  Darius took the lighter. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  She thought about it, appreciating that he cared enough to ask. “It’s different than alcohol, right?”

  “Yeah. It relaxes you like that but it’s not as—I don’t know—out of control.”

  That made her feel better. He made her feel better. She put the pipe to her mouth and leaned toward him. He lit the lighter, and his eyes captivated her as he put fire to the ganja.

  She inhaled deep.

  “Hold it,” he said, his voice dark and warm.

  She held her breath.

  When she felt her mind go a little feathery, she exhaled. At first it was okay. Nice, even. Then the smoke sort of engulfed her. She could see everything so clearly but felt so...what was it?

  Slow. Zombie slow.

  She didn’t like it.

  “Yeah,” Darius applauded in a drawn-out way.

  He liked it that she was turned into a zombie. Great.

  “I think I should go now,” she said.

  “What? You just got here.”

  “Yeah, but...” If she said this wasn’t her thing—something she’d just discovered—would it get all over school that she was a bore?

  “Does the weed scare you?” He seemed genuinely concerned.

  “No.” She wasn’t scared. This was just...off somehow. Not right.

  Her parents often talked about drugs and alcohol. They were afraid she’d get addicted or something. Isadora hadn’t understood why they’d hammered it in so hard, but she was beginning to now. Not that she’d ever get addicted. She didn’t like ganja.

  “After you do it a few times it gets nice. Real nice.”

  A few times? She was pretty sure once was enough for her. Dulling her brain didn’t appeal to her. That it did for Darius made her wonder if he was stupid. Then she remembered his low-grades reputation and wanted to go home more than ever.

  She had to figure out a way to get out of here without seeming uncool.

  “Let’s go sit over there.” Darius pointed to a pickup truck someone had backed up to the fire pit. No one was sitting there, as most were close to the warmth of the fire.

  “Okay.” She trailed him to the truck, where he lifted her by her waist to seat her on the back of it.

  If she was thinking clearer, what would she do? She wished she had the answer to that.

  “Hey, your dad is a janitor over at that gun company, isn’t he?”

  Why was he asking that?

  “I read about the CEO,” he said. “He was murdered, huh?”

  “Yeah.” She didn’t pay much attention to her dad’s job, but now she thought of the way her parents had talked that day she’d come home from school. Did her dad know something about that?

  “Has your dad said anything? Janitors can go anywhere in a building.”

  “He hasn’t said anything.”

  “Well, the news said he was murdered at his girlfriend’s house. Some girlfriend, huh?” He smirked a laugh.

  “I don’t watch the news.” And she didn’t find that story funny. Looking toward the fire, she saw Candra walk away with Rubio. Their forms became little more than shadows as they approached some parked cars on the other side of the bonfire.

  At the older model Honda Civic, Rubio moved to stand in front of Candra, putting his hands on her waist and then kissing her. Candra didn’t seem to mind. In fact, she looked as if she was having a good time. She lifted her arms around his neck.

  Isadora had never kissed a boy before. Seeing her best friend do it gave her mixed feelings. Then she realized she and Darius were apart from the crowd around the bonfire, too. And Darius had likely done that on purpose, drawn her away so they could be alone.

  “Hey, Darius.”

  She looked with him to a boy who threw a bottle of something at Darius. Darius caught it.

  “If she doesn’t like beer, maybe she’ll dig that.”

  “Thanks, Aaron.” He caught another bottle Aaron threw with his free hand, a beer.

  Darius rolled the first bottle in his hand until the label was clear. It was a wine cooler. The boy must have been standing close to them when Isadora had tried the beer. Would it be all over school what a baby she was?

  Darius opened the bottle and handed it to her. It smelled good.

  She sipped. It was tangy and fizzy like a soda.

  “Mmm.” She liked it much better than the beer.

  Darius twisted the cap off his beer, foam bubbling up from being jostled.

  “How much have you had to drink?” she asked.

  He shrugged. “Four or five.”

  That sounded like a lot. “Are you drunk?”

  “A little. Not much. It takes a lot for me to get drunk.” He looked down at his body. “I’m not exactly small.”

  Boys were bigger than girls. She supposed it would take more, but five?

  “Is that your sixth, then?”

  After studying her face and apparently figuring she was judging him, he said, “What are you, the sobriety police?”

  “I was just wondering.” She sipped the wine cooler.

  He sat quietly beside her. She had no way of knowing what he was thinking, and it made her uncomfortable. Had she offended him by asking how much he’d had to drink?

  Lights from the road caught her eye. She watched a car drive by real slow. Was the driver looking at them? She didn’t see how they wouldn’t be caught here. Except, that road was pretty isolated. There was a big ranch at the end of it. Was the owner driving by? Or was it someone else?

  “Are you one of those smart people in school?” Darius asked, diverting her attention.

  “I get good grades.”

  “I wish I could get good grades.”

  “Why don’t you?”

  “I try. It’s just... I don’t know. School is so boring.”

  Boring? She didn’t think it was boring. Math and science were fascinating. That things about the universe could be explained with math was amazing. And history. She loved history. It was anything but boring.

  “Is there nothing you like?” she asked. “What’s your best subject?”

  “Gym.”

  Figured. She looked toward her bike and saw car lights go out in the distance. Had the car that had passed disappeared over a road or had it stopped and parked?

  “Did you see that car?” she ask
ed Darius.

  He looked with her. “There’ve been a few cars driving by. Nobody’s stopped so far. They probably think it’s the rancher having this party and wish they could join us.”

  That made her feel marginally better.

  “Don’t get out much, huh?” he teased.

  This was her first time sneaking out.

  He leaned closer to her. “I like that.”

  “What do you like about it?”

  “Is this your first time out without your parents knowing?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I’m the lucky guy who gets to be with you tonight.”

  Flattered, she breathed a laugh. “I wouldn’t go that far.”

  “I would.”

  He was so close. The wine cooler and weed had her head so fuzzy. Was he going to—

  He kissed her.

  The shock of it paralyzed her for a second. When his hand touched her arm, she pulled back. This was not how she’d imagined her first kiss would go.

  “Don’t do that.”

  “What? It was just a kiss.”

  Isadora jumped off the back of the truck. Putting the wine cooler down, she pivoted and ran to her bike.

  “Hey!” Darius came after her. Grabbing her arm, he stopped her a little roughly. “What’s the matter?”

  “I don’t even know you.”

  “It was just a kiss,” he repeated.

  Isadora tried to pull her arm free. “Let go of me.”

  “Come on. Let’s go back to the truck. We can talk more.”

  So he could persuade her to kiss him? No way. “I’m going home now.”

  His brow gathered in an ugly frown. A mad frown.

  “All I did was kiss you.”

  Yeah, and she wasn’t about to tell him that was her first. He was a jerk. She yanked her arm and freed it. Seeing some of the other kids around the fire had noticed them, she turned away in embarrassment. This was sure to get all over school. Why had she even come here tonight?”

  “Izzie?” Candra called.

  Isadora saw her rushing toward her and paused after lifting up her bike.

  “What’s wrong?” Candra looked from Darius to Isadora.

  Darius shrugged in irritation.

  “Nothing,” Isadora said. “I just need to go home. I don’t want to get caught. My mom hasn’t been sleeping very well at night. She’s going to find out I’m not there.”

  Candra didn’t seem to buy that, but she slowly nodded. “You want someone to take you home?”

  She shook her head. She just wanted to get out of here. “No. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  “Okay.”

  Climbing on her bike, she’d never felt more relieved in her life. Getting away from this place was all that mattered. She pedaled hard, riding fast down the dirt road. At the paved road, she headed for home.

  That was when she spotted the car she’d seen earlier. It was still parked there. Her brief sense of relief scattered. She pedaled as fast as she could and veered wide around the car, seeing there were three people inside.

  As she rode down the street, she heard the car roll into motion. Was it coming after her? Feeling paranoid, she tried to calm herself.

  But when the car appeared next to her and both the passenger in the front and back looked at her, all-out fear consumed her. She rode as hard and fast as she could. She wasn’t far from home. Just three or four blocks.

  The car drove ahead of her. Were they going to leave her alone? No such luck.

  It pulled over, blocking her path. The man in the backseat got out.

  Isadora rode to the other side of the street, but the car moved with her and blocked her path there, too. She rode into the field. Her front tire hit something, and she lost control.

  Oh, no.

  She flew off her bike and landed hard on her arm and side. Pain shot up her arm.

  The man who’d gotten out of the car lifted her before she could get her bearings. She screamed loudly.

  “Shut up, kid!” the man growled.

  She kept screaming. “Help me! Somebody help me!”

  The man threw her into the backseat of the car and got in after her. The car moved before he had the door shut. Isadora kicked him with both feet.

  He hooked her ankles one-armed and then blocked her flying punches. Then the man in the front turned a gun on her and said, “Stop moving or it ends right now.”

  Isadora stared at the gun, in a surreal place. This couldn’t be happening. But it was. These men had abducted her. What were their plans? Her mouth was dry and her heart beat so fast she felt light-headed and sick to her stomach.

  “Where’s your daddy?” the man with the gun asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Wrong answer. Where is he?”

  She shook her head frantically. “I swear I don’t know. He left and wouldn’t tell us where he was going. He said he was in trouble.” He hadn’t, but he may as well have.

  The man scrutinized her. “Well, then, you’re going to be staying with us for a while.” He gave a nod to the man in the backseat with her. He lifted a black bag and stuffed it over her head. They didn’t want her to know where they were taking her.

  About forty-five minutes later, Isadora was forced out of the car. She smelled wet ground and heard no sounds of the city.

  A door was unlocked with a key on a chain with a few more, jingling as the lock snapped open. The man holding her shoved her, and the other pulled off the bag. She stumbled into the dark room.

  As the door closed and the lock clicked into place, a light came on, and she found herself looking at a woman. She was older than Isadora by about twenty years.

  “Who are you?” the blonde snapped. She wasn’t afraid. Inconvenienced, maybe.

  “I’m Isadora Kapoor. Who are you?”

  “Tory Von Every.”

  * * *

  Sajal Kapoor started to berate his wife for calling him when her frantic voice stopped him. Tristan could trace these calls.

  “Isadora is gone.”

  Isadora was...

  “What?”

  “She’s gone. She’s not in her room.”

  It was after three in the morning. Where could she have gone? Several possibilities ran through his mind. Had she sneaked out? She was an honor student. Well behaved. That didn’t seem viable. Had someone taken her from her room?

  “I didn’t hear anything,” his wife wailed.

  Just then his phone beeped, indicating a call waiting. He checked the number and didn’t recognize it. Who would be calling him at this hour? With his daughter missing, it had to be related.

  “Darling, I have another call.”

  “Someone is calling you?”

  When she began to cry, he knew she’d drawn the same conclusion.

  “I’ll call you right back.”

  “Come home, Sajal. I need you.”

  Could he risk it?

  “Come home. Now. Please.”

  He could not refuse her. “I am on my way.”

  He disconnected her call and connected the new one. “Sajal Kapoor,” he answered.

  “Ah. Sajal. Ever the polite man.”

  Tristan. Anger began to build in Sajal. He could not allow this to continue. But what could he, a simple man with no experience in these matters, do? He’d do anything to spare his family, including dying for them.

  “I have something that belongs to you.”

  “If you hurt her, I’ll...” Sajal struggled for control of his fear.

  “You’ll do what?”

  As long as Tristan had his daughter, he was helpless. “I’ll do anything. Just tell me what you want me to do.”

  “I though
t that’s how you’d respond. I’m glad, Sajal. I actually like you.”

  “Don’t hurt my daughter.”

  “She’ll be fine as long as you do as I say.”

  “Anything.”

  “I need you to come and meet me.”

  “Will my daughter be there?”

  “Yes. She will.”

  Tristan gave him directions to the same building where he’d been taken the last time he’d had to face off with him. While Sajal wrote them down, he was certain of two things. One, his daughter would be fine until he reached the meeting place, and two, neither of them would be spared. Tristan would kill them both. Sajal knew it in his core. The man was crazy. A mass murderer. Killing for him was simple and easy. He had no empathy. He had no heart. He had only greed. Greed fueled his purpose, and anyone unfortunate enough to cross his path, however briefly, would find themselves in life-threatening peril. As Sajal had.

  But, oh, as a father and a husband, Sajal vowed he’d go to his grave fighting for what he held dear.

  He needed a miracle. He needed help. But who could he turn to? All the way to the building where Tristan had directed him, Sajal despaired. He was powerless against a man like Tristan.

  Passing along the front of the building, he saw two men waiting outside. He couldn’t see any weapons but was sure they were concealed somewhere. They wore jeans and zip-up sweatshirts, hoodlums in a Los Angeles alley. Sajal parked his truck along the street and got out.

  The old building looked cleaner than last time. Trash was picked up, windows were washed and the bum was gone. A sign over the door gave good enough disguise. Easy Pawn, it read.

  The two men approached.

  “Hands up,” the short Mexican man said.

  Sajal lifted his hands while the other man patted him down. Finding no weapons, the two led him inside. The storefront had been renovated. The drywall was repaired, flooring replaced with faux wood and shelves and countertops held a variety of pawned goods, no doubt put there for show. No one stood behind the checkout counter.

  Another hoodlum stood in front of the door that led to the back room. Seeing them, he opened it and stood aside, nodding to the two escorting Sajal. Through the doorway, Sajal searched the room for his daughter. This room had been renovated also, and furnished into a sort of studio, with a seating area and double bed. The only thing missing was a kitchen.