by Paula Cox
“Easier said than done,” I replied miserably.
Granny pulled me into a hug. “I know, honey. I know. But things have a way of working out if we just let them.”
“I hope you’re right,” I mumbled into her shoulder.
Chapter 21
“Alex! Phone! Line two!” Julie, one of the waitresses, called waving a phone handset at me. I punch the button and picked up the phone. It was early, only six o’clock. I was working the bar again until Peter could find a replacement and I had just come on shift.
“Hello?”
“Alex! It’s Cain! Don’t hang up! I want you to run! Right now! I’ve been trying to call you but you haven’t been answering your phone! The Bulls are coming for you! Right now! Run!”
I felt like I just stepped into a freezer, the room suddenly going cold. I heard the shriek of tires and a blare of car horns through the phone. “Hurry! You’ve got to go faster!” Cain yelled at someone.
“What’s going on?”
“I’m coming for you! But you have to get out of there! Now! They may be there already! Please, Alex, run!”
I was frozen in place with fear. “Stay away from me!” I warned as I gripped the handset tight.
“Alex! I just want to protect you, but you have to get out of there! Now! Please!”
I remembered what happened the last time he had called to warn me, and I made my decision. “Okay! I’m leaving!”
“Where are you going? Stop! Stop!” he called to someone else. “I’m going to have a new address!”
“I’m not telling you.”
“Goddamnit, Alex! I’m trying to help you! You can’t do it alone! Do you want to die?”
I was silent a moment. “344 Jacob Street, Slidell.”
Cain repeated the address. “I don’t care! Another hundred if you can get there before she does! We got it! The driver said thirty minutes. Hurry!”
I slammed the phone down. “Peter!” I screamed at the top of my voice as I dashed from behind the bar. Every eye in the place turned toward me, but I didn’t care.
“Everyone! Get out! Now! It’s for your own safety!” Nobody moved, looking at me like I was crazy. “Out!” I shrieked.
“What’s going on?” Peter shouted from behind me.
“The men from before! They’re coming back! They could be here any moment! They are coming for me! I have to go!”
“You?”
“I’ll explain later,” I said as I started running toward the back.
“You heard her! Everyone out!” Peter roared as he began to hustle people out.
I stopped only long enough to grab my purse before I burst out of the back door and heard the rolling thunder of Harleys, the sound causing my hear to almost seize in panic. I stopped, holding the door open, unsure of what to do. I saw four Harleys round the corner, and I stepped back inside, holding the door open so I could peek out between the door and jamb as I watched the bikes pull into the parking lot. Once they were out of sight in the front of the building, I pushed the door open, slipped through the gap, and closed it quietly before scurrying to my car. I threw my stuff in and, resisting the urge to race out of the parking lot, pulled out as if I didn’t have a care in the world so to not attract attention. I turned away from the front of the building, and as I drove away, I prayed that I wouldn’t hear the sound of gunshots.
***
It was a forty minute drive from work to Granny and Grandpa’s house, but I made it in thirty. I jumped from my car and ran into the house, leaving the front door open.
“Alexandria! What in heaven’s name?” Granny cried as I burst into the room.
“They’re coming for me! The men that tried to kill me before! I saw them at the club!” I didn’t wait for a response as I hurried down the hall, bouncing off the wall with my shoulder but not even feeling it, and began to throw my few things into my bag. I was in a panic and I had to get away.
Granny was standing in the door, pale as a ghost as I whirled and started for the door. I paused long enough to give her a quick kiss. “I’ll call you!” I said as I squeezed by her.
I was just entering the front room when I heard the wail of car tires outside and my heart leapt into my throat. Grandpa was standing in the room with a shotgun pointed at the closed door.
“Get behind me,” he growled as he crouched slightly, his eyes never leaving the front door.
There was a hard hammering on the door. “Alex! It’s —”
The rest of the words were lost in the blast of the shotgun. Grandpa jacked another shell into the chamber. “You get away from here! You’re not hurting her!”
“It’s me! Cain!” he called from outside the door.
“You git! You’re not taking her!”
“I’m trying to protect her! Don’t shoot!”
Grandpa let loose with another blast, riddling the wall and door with shot before racking the gun again.
“Fuck! You crazy old man! Let me help her!”
“You step one foot in that door —” Grandpa shouted, the gun never wavering.
There was a heavy thud and the door jamb splintered and the door flew open. Cain dived behind the wall just as Grandpa fired again.
“Shit! You’re making a mistake! I don’t want to hurt her! I’m trying to save her!” Cain swore from outside.
“Just get away from here, you hear me!”
Suddenly the front window broke and Grandpa let go with another blast, taking out the rest of the window. The sound of the shotgun in the house was deafening and my ears were ringing. I couldn’t help but cover my ears, but the shotgun in Grandpa’s hands never wavered. I saw movement at the door and Grandpa fired again. The metal front door was riddled with holes.
Cain darted across the open door and Grandpa moved, tracking Cain’s path, and fired again. The sheetrock on the other side of the open door exploded in dust. He racked the gun again just as Cain charged through the door. Cain grabbed the gun and with a vicious twist, jerked it from Grandpa’s hand. Grandpa took a swing at him, but Cain ducked it and shoved him hard into a chair.
“Don’t hurt him!” I screamed.
“I’m not going to hurt anyone!” Cain roared. “I came to save you, goddamnit! It’s your crazy ass grandfather that is trying to kill someone! You stupid old shit!” Cain paused panting. “Get your stuff. We have to go,” he said more calmly.
“I’m not going anywhere with you!”
“Alex, they are coming to kill you!”
“They don’t know where I am!”
“Are you sure? Does anyone at the club know where your grandparents live? If they do, the Bulls will find out!”
I thought about it a moment and I didn’t like the answer. “Maybe.”
“Get your stuff. We have to go.”
“The cops are going to be here any minute!” Grandpa growled.
“I know. But they can’t help. The moment she is alone and unprotected, she’s dead. I have to take her to Dallas. It’s the only way I can protect her.”
“You’re not taking me anywhere!”
I saw Cain grind his teeth. “Fine. Then we will all die here. Where are the shells for the shotgun?” Nobody answered. “I guess this is it then. I couldn’t bring my gun on the plane.”
“What are you going to do?” I asked.
“I don’t know. Throw dishes at them, I guess. It’s all I can do. Maybe you three can slip out the back or something. Unless you want to tell me where the shells are.”
I stood frozen with indecision. “Damnit!” I turned and hurried to the hall closet where I knew Grandpa kept his gun. I dug around a moment until I found the box of shells. There was a picture of a quail on the box and a big number eight.
I held the box out to Cain. “Birdshot?” he sneered, not taking the box from me. “Fuck. Hand them to me,” he ordered. I opened the box and began to pass the shells to him one at a time as he slid them into the gun with his thumb. After I passed him five, he jerked the chamber closed, then re
ached out. I handed him another one which he slid into the gun.
“What are you going to do when the cops get here?” I asked.
“Probably go to jail. It will be up to your grandpa to protect you then.” He glared at Grandpa glowering at him from the chair. “You need buckshot! You can’t stop shit with birdshot!”
I fumed. I didn’t know what to do. Grandpa hadn’t been able to stop Cain, so how was he going to stop the Bulls? “Shit! Let’s go!”
He looked at me a moment before he looked at Grandpa. “You two! Go out the back. Go to a neighbor’s house, anywhere, and stay there. Just get away. Leave the doors open. Go! Alex, get your bag. Hurry!”
I picked up my bag, but Cain paused. “I know what you think, but I will do everything I can to protect her,” he said, looking first at Grandpa then Granny. “Keep yourselves safe. When this is all over, I will bring her back to you. If the Bulls come looking for her, tell them everything. Don’t lie to them and don’t try to protect us or they will kill you. When the cops get here, tell them someone tried to break in but you scared them away. Don’t tell them about me or Alex. If I am arrested, she will be unprotected and the Bulls won’t stop until they kill her. Understand? Now go.”
“I love you,” I whispered as I hugged Grandpa. “I love you, too,” I murmured as I hugged Granny. “I will be okay.”
“If you hurt her, I will kill you,” Grandpa threatened.
“If she gets hurt, I will be dead already,” Cain replied as he took me by the hand and dragged me out of the house.
As I ran out of the house and bounded down the steps I could just hear the far off wail of a siren. I started to drag my heels, slowing Cain down, deciding to take my chances with the cops. But then I heard it — closer than the sirens — the heavy rumbles of hard charging Harleys. I jerked my hand free of his and put on a burst of speed for the car. I no longer had a choice. I was putting all my faith in Cain and his ability to protect me.
Chapter 22
I skidded to a stop and jerked the passenger door open and threw my small bag into the floor before I fell into the car and slammed the door. Cain was only seconds behind me, handing me the shotgun as he slid behind the wheel. He started the car and jammed it into reverse, and revved it hard, the car flying backwards as I struggled to snap my seat belt. When we hit the road, he flung the car around, ground it into first, then revving the engine and dumped the clutch that launched us as the tires wailed in protest.
He drove the car hard, revving the engine all the way to the redline before shifting. “Shit!” he muttered as four Harleys rounded the corner one block ahead. He braked hard, and spun the wheel to the right, the car skidding around the corner before we raced down the road.
I twisted in the seat to look behind us. “They’re following us!” As I watched the Harleys rapidly closed the distance between us.
“Hold on!” Cain careened the car around the corner, fighting the wheel, the car on the edge of control, as I gripped the hand hold and held on for dear life.
As soon as the car settled, I looked behind us again. They were quite a bit farther back, but rapidly closing the distance again. “Here they come!”
Once again, Cain tossed my little car into the corner suicidally fast. He clipped the grass on the inside of the turn, nearly taking out the street sign and causing the rear of the car to slide out. He caught the slide but not before we were in the yard of the house on the other side of the road. We crashed through some low bushes lining the drive before blasting back out onto the road.
“You’re going to get us killed!” I shouted over the roar of the straining motor.
“If we don’t lose them, we’re dead anyway!”
I looked behind us again. The motorcycles were farther back than they were, but rapidly gaining. “They’re faster than we are in a straight line!”
“I know! I know!”
I felt Cain lift off the power, and then at the last moment, slam on the brakes before turning hard to the left, just missing a car pulling to a stop at the corner. I whimpered in fear at the near collision, but then looked behind us again. We were slowly, but steadily, inching away from the pursuing bikes, gaining a little bit of ground each time we turned. If we could just stay in the tight narrow streets of the neighborhood, we might be able to eventually lose them.
“Right, right, right, right!” I shouted, but it was too late and Cain couldn’t make the turn. “Shit! This takes us to the main road!”
Cain kept his foot down, my car giving everything it had to our escape. I could see the stop light fast approaching and I pressed both feet hard into the floor, trying to slow our approach.
I was too afraid to even scream as Cain blew right through the red light, never slowing. How we missed hitting anything as we crossed four lanes of traffic at over seventy miles per hour, I will never know. As soon as I could breathe again, I looked behind us. The bikes were just crossing the road, but were way back, obviously held up by the traffic.
“Where to?” Cain asked as we slowed hard and he dodged down another back street.
“Uh…” I grunted. I was getting turned around from the high speeds and all the twists and turns. Then I saw a landmark, the back of a shopping center I was familiar with. “Next stop sign, make a left. Go to the end of the road. Then make a right. Go to the light and make a left. That will put us on 190 headed toward Lacombe. There will be too much traffic for them to do anything there. Left!” I shouted as we roared to a stop behind a minivan, the diver of the minivan taking her own sweet time to make the left. The moment she began to move, Cain darted out on her bumper and passed her on the inside.
“How far?”
“A ways.” I heard the rumble of the Harleys and I could see them pulling out and making the left to follow us. “Here they come again.”
They blew around the minivan as I watched, once again rapidly closing the distance between us. I looked out of the windshield but I still couldn’t see the end of the road. I looked at the speedometer and it was creeping toward one-hundred just as Cain banged my car into fifth. Almost as soon as he shifted, Cain slammed on the brakes and I looked up in time to see a car pulling out from a cross street as my car growled under heavy braking. I braced myself for the impact because there was no way we were going to be able to stop in time. Fortunately the car saw us coming and stopped, allowing Cain to pass in front of it, but we had lost so much speed in our panic braking that the bikes were almost on us.
Cain downshifted and held the throttle down, but our race with the bikes was lost. “Can you shoot that thing?” he asked as he shifted.
“I can try!” I picked the shotgun up, pointed it out of the back, and pulled the trigger. The recoil nearly tore my hand off and I screamed in pain as I dropped the weapon, but one of the riders fared worse. The pellets had passed right through the canvas top of my car and one of the Bulls went down in a tangle of metal and flesh. I didn’t know if I had hit him or just scared him. Either way, it was one less bad guy to worry about.
“Are you okay?” Cain asked, but his eyes never left the road.
“I almost broke my wrist!” I wailed as I held my hand. I worked my wrist. It moved, and it didn’t feel broken, but it hurt like hell. “I can’t do it again, Cain!”
Two bikes pulled up alongside, one on each side. The rider on Cain’s side pointed a pistol at us. Before the gunman could pull the trigger, Cain slammed on the brakes and the two bikes shot past us, the third hitting the back of the car with a hard thump before the rider went down in a rolling, sliding, tumble. Cain then downshifted and floored the car, allowing us to shoot past the two remaining bikes while they were still braking.
“Pump the gun and get it ready! We can’t get away, so we are going to have to stop and fight!”
“No!” I could see the end of the road approaching, but there was so much traffic that we would have to stop before we could turn.
“It’s the only way!” He glanced in the rear view, then once again braked h
ard, and whipped the car to the left. “When I stop, you get as low in the car as you can! Stay down!”
“Cain! No!” I shrieked in terror.
“Get ready!”
I racked the shotgun and held it for him. As soon as I finished he slammed on the brakes and yanked up the parking brake. The car hadn’t even stopped moving before he was out, dragging the shotgun from my hand.
I bent at the waist and cowered, watching out of the open driver’s door as Cain turned to face the pursuing bikers. The shotgun roared and I heard the screaming screech of tortured metal as it slid along the pavement then a thud as the bike hit the back of the car. Cain pumped the gun, but before he could fire again, I heard the sharp crack of another gun. Cain grunted and dropped backwards onto his back. The gun cracked again and I heard a high pitched ping. I saw Cain kicking away but then he popped up again and the shotgun bellowed. There was a moment of quiet then I heard the sound of a motorcycle hitting the ground.
