Won't Back Down

by J. D. Rhoades

She shakes her head.

  The narrow-faced man speaks up. “Well, what does that tell you? Who would he go through that much pain to protect?”

  It takes her a second to get it, but when she does, she can’t believe how obvious the answer is. “His children.”

  At that, Khoury’s eyes open, still dull and glazed with pain, and he reaches out to clutch as her ankle. “No,” he croaks. “Leave…them…”

  She avoids his grasp easily by taking a step back. “That looks a lot like confirmation.”

  The bruiser speaks up. “Either it’s the kids or he really doesn’t know. Either way, he’s no use to us now.” He steps forward, raises his weapon, and ends Khoury’s pain with a single shot to the head. He turns to Gray, letting the gun fall to his side and extending his free hand. “I’m Tench. My partner’s name is Waller. Pleased to meet you.”

  She takes the hand. “Likewise.”

  NINETY-THREE

  Keller arrives to find his truck already sitting in Marie’s driveway.

  McCaskill whistles. “Dang. Dented is right. Looks like someone beat the shit out of it.”

  He gets out to survey the damage. The rear bumper is crumpled slightly, but the major dents are in the front right quarter panel and the left rear fender. “Nothing a little Bondo won’t fix,” he calls back to her, hoping he’s right and that they haven’t done something to bend the frame.

  McCaskill comes up to stand beside him. “So you’re going to go in there and…what?”

  He looks into the bed of the truck. A pair of wooden boxes with dirt still clinging to them are resting there. “You don’t really want to know.”

  “I think I already do. And I have to advise you not to do it.”

  “Noted.” He starts for the door.

  “Keller,” she calls out to him.

  He stops and turns around. “The only reason to bring those kids in is to hold them in place. And for what? How much do you want to bet that the next thing that happens is that female spook, or someone worse, shows up with another bullshit paper allowing her to take them away? You comfortable with that?”

  “There’s a legitimate, legal way to go about—”

  “Good. Pursue that. In the meantime, I’m getting those kids out of here.” He knocks on the door.

  When it opens, Marie’s standing there. “Hey.”

  “Hey. How are they?”

  “Shaken. Scared.” She stands aside to let him in and looks behind him. “And you are?”

  McCaskill extends a hand as she comes up the steps. “Addie McCaskill.”

  “My new lawyer,” Keller explains.

  She raises an eyebrow. “What happened to Scott?”

  “Retired. She’s his daughter.”

  Marie nods. “Come on in, then.”

  Alia and Bassim are seated on the couch in the living room. Bassim has his arm around his sister’s shoulder. She’s hugging herself tightly, looking at the floor. Ben’s sitting on the other side of her, looking at her with a worried expression. Meadow’s sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of her.

  “Hey,” Keller said. “How you holding up?”

  Alia looks up and smiles wanly. “I’ve had better days.”

  “Are the police coming?” Bassim asks.

  Keller runs a hand through his own hair. “Yeah. About that.”

  “What?” Marie says. “What’s wrong?”

  He turns to her. “We need to go.” He gestures toward Alia and Bassim. “Quickly.”

  Alia stands up, Meadow scrambling to her feet as well. “What? Tell me.”

  Keller takes a deep breath. “The police are coming here to pick you two up.”

  “It’ll be fine,” McCaskill says. “We can get it straightened out.”

  Alia’s looking at him steadily. “Is that true, Jack? Will everything be fine if we go with them?”

  “I don’t know,” Keller answers her. “I’m not taking any chances.”

  “Wh-why do the cops want to pick us up?” Bassim’s voice is shaky.

  “Some bogus paper they say comes from Homeland Security. Your family’s been placed on the watch list.”

  Alia’s eyes widen. “The…terrorist list?”

  “That’s crazy!” Meadow pipes up.

  “Yeah. I know. Someone’s up to something, and I think I know who.” He looks at Alia. “Is that the money your dad took in the back of my truck?”

  She looks at the floor and mumbles something. Bassim puts his arm back around her shoulder and nods.

  Keller shakes his head ruefully. “An old friend told me on the day we met that a big truck, a bag full of money, and a gun was the American Dream. We’ve got two out of three.” He turns to Marie. “I need to borrow your gun.”

  She stares at him as if he’s grown horns. “You really have gone off the deep end.”

  “Marie, there are people coming after these kids. Not just the cops. Bad people.”

  She looks over her shoulder at them. “You’re frightening them.”

  “Good. They should be frightened.”

  “Jack,” Marie says, “I’m not giving you my service weapon. You’re not supposed to have a firearm at all, or have you forgotten?” She shakes her head. “And do I have this right? The local police have a lawful pickup order and you want me to help you hide these kids from them?”

  “Mom!” Ben says.

  “Shut up, Ben.” She doesn’t take her eyes off Keller. Ben mutter something under his breath and stalks out of the room. “There’s a legal way to do this,” Marie says, “and that’s how we’re going to deal with it.”

  “Sorry,” Keller says, “I don’t have as much faith in the legal way to do things. After all that’s happened, I wonder why the hell you do.”

  “Because I’m a police officer, Jack!” she yells. “What the hell do you expect?”

  “I think I’m going to be sick,” Alia says. She runs from the room, with Bassim and Meadow close behind.

  Francis comes running in. “Mom? What’s going on? Why’s Ben so upset?” Without waiting for an answer, he starts to cry.

  “Now see what you’ve done?” Marie demands. She walks to him and picks him up. He buries his head in her shoulder as she pats him on the back. “I know the local force, Jack,” she says over his shoulder. “They’ve got some good officers. If there’s somebody that needs to be dealt with, they’ll deal with it.”

  “They’ll do what they’re told, Marie. And not give a lot of thought to who’s telling them to do it.” He shrugs. “Fine. You won’t give me your pistol, I’ll figure something out. But…” He stops and inclines his head, listening.

  “What?” Marie says, but he’s already at the door, yanking it open.

  Just in time to watch his truck pulling away, with Ben at the wheel and Alia in the front seat.

  “God damn it,” he mutters, and runs to the driveway. “Addie,” he shouts back, “I think I’m going to need another ride…” He shakes his head as he sees that the front right tire of McCaskill’s car has been punctured. A quick look at Marie’s car shows the same, the tire still hissing with escaping air.

  “My car!” McCaskill cries out as she runs up to stand beside him.

  “They want to make sure we didn’t follow them,” Keller says.

  “It gets worse,” Marie says as she strides up to them. “Ben’s got my gun.”

  NINETY-FOUR

  “Ben,” Meadow says from the front seat, “where are we going?”

  He’s gripping the wheel, white-knuckled. “I don’t know. Away.” He glances over at the silver metal box she holds in her lap, the one he grabbed from his mother’s bedroom before the four of them exited his bedroom window. “You need to figure out how to get that box open.”

  “Why?” Alia says from the backseat.

  Meadow doesn’t take her eyes off Ben. “Because it’s got a gun in it. Am I right, Ben?”

  He doesn’t answer.
<
br />   “Ben,” Alia says. “I can’t let you—”

  “I can’t let them take you!” he blurts out. “There are bad people after you. You heard it. And my mom was going to let them do it.”

  “And what are you going to do? Shoot them?”

  “If I have to.” He feels that dizzy, intoxicated feeling again, like the peak before the roller coaster drops. He’s starting to become accustomed to it. He almost doesn’t hear Alia when she says, “No. I can’t let you do that.” He doesn’t answer, just keeps driving blindly.

  She leans forward and puts a gentle hand on his shoulder. “Don’t I get a say in what you have to do to rescue me?”

  “How about me?” Bassim says. “I get a say, too, right? And I say shoot the motherfuckers.”

  Alia closes her eyes and rests her head wearily on the back of the driver’s seat. “Bassim.”

  “What? I’m scared shitless, Alia.”

  She raises her head. “You think I’m not? But I can’t ask people to kill for me. Especially Ben, who’s been so kind to us.” She sighs. “There’s been enough killing.”

  “I have an idea,” Meadow says. “And it doesn’t involve anyone shooting anyone.” She bites her lip. “Probably.”

  NINETY-FIVE

  “What the hell is that kid thinking?” Keller’s fuming as he hoists the spare tire out of Marie’s trunk. He grimaces as he sees it’s not a real tire, but one of the thin hard donuts of rubber that pass for spares, good only for getting a distressed driver to a store where they can buy an actual fully functioning one.

  “I’ll tell you what Ben was thinking, Jack,” Marie’s face is red with anger. “He’s thinking, ‘what would Jack Keller do?’”

  Keller drops the tire to the ground and glares at her. “So this is my fault?”

  She stands with hands on her hips and glares back. “Can’t you see it? He’s grabbed a gun and run off to be someone’s rescuer. It’s how you’ve spent most of your life.”

  “Guys,” Addie McCaskill says.

  Keller ignores her and snaps at Marie. “I didn’t see you complaining when you were the one being rescued.”

  “He’s fifteen, Jack.” She breaks down and starts to cry. “And he idolizes you.”

  That makes Keller blink in surprise. “I thought he hates me.”

  “Guys,” McCaskill says again.

  “You saved his life. And mine. But the way you did it’s given him nightmares ever since.”

  “I can’t help—”

  “Keller! Jones!” McCaskill’s yelling now. They stop and turn to her. She nods toward a car coming up the long driveway. “We’ve got company.”

  NINETY-SIX

  Fletcher gets out of the car first, Cameron following with his hand poised near his holster. It’s clear to both of them from the posture of the people standing by the vehicles that something’s seriously wrong.

  Cameron’s the first one to see the ruined tires and the inadequate spare. “Fletch,” he says.

  “I see it,” his partner says calmly. He raises his voice to address the people standing in the driveway. “So. I can’t wait to hear what happened here.”

  The three people standing in the drive look at other. It’s Jones, the school resource officer who Cameron knows slightly, who speaks up first. “The people you’re looking for aren’t here.”

  “Ah,” Fletcher says. “And that would be because…?”

  “Detective,” Addison McCaskill says, “I’m going to have to advise my client—”

  “Alia and Bassim Khoury,” Marie interrupts, “along with my son Ben and their friend Melissa…” she hesitates, struggling for the last name and failing, “…stole Mr. Keller’s truck. I don’t know where they’ve gone.” She answers McCaskill’s glare with one of her own. “You do what you want, Ms. McCaskill,” she snaps. “I’m not lawyering up in front of my fellow law enforcement officers.” She turns to them and takes a deep breath. “And my son Ben has my sidearm.”

  Cameron glances over at Fletcher, who looks like he’s aged forty years in the last two minutes. His partner nods. “Any idea where they may have gone?”

  “None. But the pistol’s secured in a lockbox. They took the box with them.”

  “The key?” Cameron asks.

  She reaches inside her blouse and pulls out a small silver key on a chain around her neck. “I’ve got a five-year-old in the house, Detective. I’m not completely stupid.” She sighs. “Just mostly where my eldest son is concerned.”

  Fletcher nods. “So, we hopefully have a little time before your son’s able to do something even more stupid.”

  “You’re a real comfort, Fletcher,” Keller says.

  “Not my job to be comforting, Mr. Keller. Especially since I suspect those kids did a runner, with a firearm, let’s not forget, because you told them we were coming with a pickup order.”

  Keller regards them without expression. “Well, you were, weren’t you? A pickup order. For children.”

  “He said we had one,” Cameron says. “Not that we were coming to do it.”

  “That right?” Keller looks from one of them to the other. “What were you coming to do?”

  Fletcher speaks up before Cameron does. “I don’t need to explain myself to you, Keller.”

  “Maybe not. But you need to pick a side. And you need to do it right now.”

  Fletcher’s had enough at that point. “Listen here, Keller—”

  Cameron breaks in. “Fletch.”

  Fletcher turns on him, ready to snap at his partner to be quiet. Then he notices the car that’s pulled up, and the woman getting out of it. He particularly notices the two hard-faced men getting out with her, the sidearms they wear on their hips, or the automatic weapons they’re cradling at port arms.

  “Well, hell,” Cameron mutters.

  NINETY-SEVEN

  Natalya Dudayev pulls the rented van into the driveway of the Khoury house. She frowns at the sight of the open door and the destruction in the yard.

  “What happened here?” Liza asks in Chechen.

  Natalya puts the car in Park. “I don’t know. Follow me.” The three of them exit the vehicle, pistols in hand. Natalya always enjoys working in the United States, where weapons are cheap and plentiful and men are stupid about a pretty face. The three of them fan out, approaching the house slowly. Nothing moves. There is no sound except the trilling of a bird somewhere nearby. Natalya stops short of the open door, then advances slowly. With the familiarity of long practice, her sisters take up positions on either side. She enters quickly, pistol held out before her, and scans from side to side, looking for threats. Nothing. As she moves in further, her sisters follow, Liza scanning left and Marina going right. They move quickly through the house, clearing room by room, until they come to the back door. It’s Marina who finds the body, lying curled up in a corner of the flagstone patio. She gestures to Natalya, who joins her, followed by Liza.

  Natalya is the first one to speak. “Dermo,” she spits out the curse in Russian, her preferred language for invective.

  “The others got here before us.” Liza shakes her head. “But which one?”

  Natalya feels Marina’s hand on her shoulder. She looks up to see her sister pointing at the backyard. The tumbled cinderblocks and piled up dirt tell her the story. “Whoever it is, it looks like they dug up something and took it with them.”

  “The money.”

  Natalya nods. “The money.” She looks back down at the body of the man they’d come to “persuade” to give up his stolen money. The bullet wounds in the legs tell her more of the story. “Well, at least they saved us the trouble of digging it up.”

  Liza chuckles. “My dear sister. Always looking for the bright side.”

  Marina shrugs, spreads her hands, and raises her eyebrows. What now? the gesture says.

  Natalya ponders the question, then says, “We call the police.”

  Liza looks at her incredul
ously. “What?”

  “We let the police do the work for us. Then we find out what they know.”

  “Why would they tell strangers anything?”

  Natalya smiles. “Strangers, no. The grieving family, perhaps.”

  Liza leans back and laughs in disbelief. “We don’t look remotely Arab.”

  “Not to ourselves. But put on a veil, say a few words in Arabic, and these American fools won’t be able to tell one Muslim from another. Trust me.”

  “Of course I trust you, sister.” Liza smiles. Marina joins her. “Lead on,” Liza says.

  NINETY-EIGHT

  Fletcher turns to face the new people on the scene. His hand drops to his own belt where his pistol rides in its well-worn holster. As discreetly as he can manage, he unsnaps the strap. He feels rather than sees Cameron taking position next to him on his right, and he feels slightly reassured. He hears someone else step up on his left, and he’s less reassured to glance over in surprise to see Keller standing on his left. “You need to step back, Keller,” he whispers.

  “I don’t think I will,” Keller murmurs back.

  “You’re unarmed.”

  “They don’t know that.”

  They’re not blind, Fletcher thinks. And all I need is a goddamn civilian…

  The woman he knows as Iris Gray interrupts his thought. “Detective Fletcher,” she calls out. “I trust you received my fax.”

  “Yes, ma’am. The office is calling Washington right now to check for confirmation.”

  She frowns. “This is a matter of national security, Detective. We don’t have time for the niceties.” She nods to the men on either side of her. “Search the house.”

  They start forward, but they stop in surprise as Fletcher draws his weapon. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see that Cameron’s done the same. He feels the sweat running down his face, feels his heart pounding so loud he’s amazed that no one else can hear it. “Sorry, ma’am,” he says. “Can’t let you do that.”