by Chris Lowry
“Enough?” asked Rob.
“I needed that,” she covered her mouth for a belch. “I'm ready to take on the world.”
“It might come to that,” he said. “What next?”
“We ditch the bike and find a way to Canaveral.”
“Planning is half the battle,” he said.
“Yeah, but which half?”
They both looked at the almost empty parking lot.
There were two ancient pickup trucks, more rust than paint, parked on the edge of the lot.
“We may have to leapfrog it,” she said. “I don't know if anything out there will make it the whole way.”
“Leapfrog?”
“Ride one til it dies, then take another.”
“We're really going to add to that list, aren't we,” he smiled.
“Got another choice?”
He shook his head.
“We'll have to make one on our own.”
46
Harris rolled out of his chair and paced around the office.
He threw himself back into it and spun around to glare at the wall where Baker cowered.
“Options Baker, give me options,” he ordered.
“We could release Riggs,” the assistant suggested timidly.
“Riggs? DC PD will never go for that. Give me something I can use.”
“There are other channels besides the police,” Baker said.
Harris nodded and leaned back in his chair.
“I'm listening wallflower.”
47
Riggs sat in the back seat of an unmarked police sedan.
He hoped there would be a lawyer waiting for him at the courthouse, and he could make bail.
DC had strict gun control laws, and he had been working without ID, so when the police rolled him up he was hauled in.
He made one phone call to an unlisted number that no one answered but it was there for a purpose.
Just in case something like this happened.
He wasn't sure who would get the message, but was just as sure Baker or Harris would pull some strings and get him out.
He settled back into the seat of the car and kept a stoic look on his face, confident in his place despite the discomfort of his hands being cuffed behind his back.
The traffic was almost gridlocked, but he knew it was just a few more blocks to the courthouse.
The police car approached an intersection in the slow crab crawl of congestion.
A military transport truck slid to a stop in the cross street and popped up on the sidewalk.
Freddy hopped out of the passenger seat and four Commandos dropped out of the back.
They advanced on the police car and surrounded it.
The two Officers in the front seat raised their hands.
Freddy opened the back door and helped Riggs out.
He tapped on the driver's side window and held out his hand.
The police officer rolled the window down and dropped a handcuff key into his open palm.
Freddy uncuffed Riggs and escorted him to the back of the transport.
The Commandos off but kept their weapons trained on the police car.
When they jumped in the back, the transport wheeled around and drove away.
The two police officers exchanged glances.
“I ain't even asking,” said the driver.
48
Riggs massaged the red marks on his wrist to get some feeling back into them.
He took a proffered pistol from one of the
Commandos, checked the slide and load in the magazine and stuffed it in his waistband.
“What took so long?”
“We had to wait until they moved you,” said Freddy.
“It takes us an hour to overthrow a third world country, but it takes all day to break one of our own out of jail?”
“And you wonder why they drag their feet,” sniffed Freddy.
“Where's our boy?” Riggs changed the subject.
“They left Georgia. Stole a motorcycle.”
“They? She's still with him?”
Freddy frowned and nodded.
“Need me to find him?”
“That's why you're out.”
“Tell the driver to get us to the airport.”
49
Rob stood with his back to one of the old pickup trucks while Jodi worked the lock.
He fidgeted and would have paced around, but he was afraid that would draw too much attention.
“Would you relax,” she huffed out. “You're making me nervous.”
“I'm trying,” he shot back. “I don't quite have your experience at boosting cars.”
“Boosting cars,” she smirked. “Who talks like that. Just pretend we're hijacking a UFO from your buddies.”
“That helps,” he said sarcastically.
She cracked the door open and leaned in on the floorboard.
She used a piece of metal to jimmy open the drive column until it slipped and cut her palm.
“Ouch,” she cried.
Rob bent in to check on her.
“Are you alright?”
She held the wound to her chest held it tight.
“Let me see,” he said.
She held out her hand.
He took it in his and examined the wound. He took a breath and blew across it.
The air passing over cooled the ow factor and gave her chill bumps.
She shivered.
“Freeze!” a voice from behind Rob commanded.
The Sheriff loomed up over them and aimed his gun at Rob's head.
“Just move nice and slow, partner.”
Rob leaned back and lifted both hands into the air.
“I'm not armed,” he said.
“Back away from the car. Girl, you get out of there where I can see you.”
Jodi slid up and stood beside Rob.
She glanced over to him and after a second raised her hands too.
“Looks like I stopped myself a red handed car thief,” he pointed his pistol at her bleeding palm.
Jodi rolled her eyes.
“I'm a Federal Agent. My credentials are in my coat pocket.”
The Sheriff motioned them to turn around.
“No Fed would be stealing a truck, least not any that I know of. Turn around, put your hands behind your head.”
Rob turned around, but Jodi stood her ground.
“You can check my pocket.”
“You don't worry yourself. I'm gonna check your pockets. Now turn around.”
He stepped up behind Rob and pushed the gun into his back.
“Put your left hand behind you.”
He cuffed Rob with his free hand, then moved to Jodi.
After he had her in handcuffs, he rummaged through her pocket and pulled out her leather bound badge.
He studied it a moment, then slipped it into his shirt pocket.
“Looks fake to me, but I ain't an expert on it. I'll have to check it out.”
He led them to his car and placed them both in the back seat.
50
The Sheriff led Jodi and Rob through the doors of the tiny police station.
The Deputy, Craig was leaned back in his chair, feet propped up on his desk pretending to read a magazine while his head bobbed fighting sleep.
He sat up quickly when he saw the Sheriff.
“What you got there Sheriff?”
“Couple of car thieves. Caught them in the act.”
“Ain't you lucky.”
The Sheriff stopped them at the long counter that separated the two desks from the front of the room.
A cage was bolted into the wall at the far end of the room, divided into two cells with a shared bench along the back wall.
“Put them in holding, will you,” the Sheriff ordered.
Craig took them to the cell and locked them inside.
He made them put their arms through a rectangular cutout in the bars and removed their cuffs.
“The girl says
she's a Fed,” the Sheriff said.
“I'm going to check it out.”
“Want me to do anything?” Craig asked.
“That one won't tell me his name. See what you can find out.”
Craig gave Rob the once over.
“Strong, silent type, huh? You want to do this the easy way?”
Jodi pushed herself in front of Rob.
“He is a Federal Witness under my protection. For his own safety, he will not tell you any information.”
“That so,” drawled Craig.
He looked over Rob again.
“You look familiar to me. You been in here before?”
“He's never been in custody,” Jodi cut in.
“Check them wanted posters,” said the Sheriff. “You look at them enough.”
Craig lumbered back to his desk and settled into the wooden chair with a creak.
He started shuffling through a thick sheaf of wanted papers.
He stopped on one, glanced up and Rob and back down at the piece of paper.
“Hey Sheriff.”
“Don't bother me.”
“Know who you picked up?”
He stood up from his desk and hefted a long nightstick.
He walked over to the cell and dragged the stick along the bars.
“This is a cop killer.”
The Sheriff lunged up out of his desk and grabbed the wanted poster.
He could barely catch his breath as he studied it.
“Shot a State Trooper in Arizona.”
Craig slammed his nightstick against the bars.
“You like killing cops?”
“He didn't kill a cop,” shouted Jodi. “It's a mistake.”
The Sheriff stalked up beside Craig and pushed him to one side.
He eased his nightstick out of his belt.
“I hate people who don't respect the law,” he glared.
“I am a Federal Agent. This man is under my protection. If you harm him in any way, I will-”
Craig slammed the nightstick against the bars near her face.
“Shut up.”
The Sheriff opened Rob's cell door.
“Too bad we can't kill you,” he said in a low voice as he entered the cell.
Rob pressed up against the back wall. Craig followed the Sheriff into the cell.
“But you'll sure wish we had.”
Both men laid into Rob and rained blow after blow down on him.
He tried to cover up his head and take the blows across the meat of his arms.
But an errant shot got through and knocked him senseless.
He huddled on the floor as the Sheriff and his Deputy beat him.
Jodi screamed.
She shook the bars of her cage and tried to reach through to grab either of the law men, but they were just out of range.
She rattled the bars in helpless rage.
51
The black Chevy Suburban is ubiquitous with government agencies.
It holds seven grown men comfortable even when they are suited up with body armor and tactical gear and weapons.
Powerful V8 engines throbbed in unison as three Suburban’s raced up the freeway.
They were packed with nineteen Commandos all ready to destroy the enemy.
Riggs and Freddy sat in the two seats in the second row in the middle Suburban.
Riggs clicked off his phone and slipped it into a pocket.
“Are you sure?” Freddy asked.
“It's what they said. We're twenty minutes out.”
“They're that close.”
“Luck of the draw. I knew we would catch them.”
“We're going to need more luck,” Freddy said wistfully.
“We don't need more luck,” Riggs countered.
He pulled out his pistol and jacked the slide to chamber a round.
“We have these.”
The SUV’s pulled into the lot in front of the small jail in Florida.
The men in the middle vehicle spilled out and formed a perimeter on the building. Riggs and Freddy marched inside with four Commandos.
The Sheriff was sitting at his desk and watched them with a stoic expression on his face.
Craig leaned back with his feet up with both hands on his head.
He looked bemused and arrogant.
Freddy glanced in at Jodi.
“Agent Johnson,” he said.
She showed him her middle finger.
“Gentlemen?” the Sheriff said.
“Release these prisoners to me,” Riggs slapped his credentials onto the ordered desktop of the Sheriff.
Freddy noted the lump under a blanket in the second cell.
“That him?”
“What happened to him?” asked Riggs.
Craig and the Sheriff exchanged a glance.
“He fell,” the Sheriff locked eyes with the Commando leader, two alpha dogs sizing each other up.
“I bet he did,” Riggs answered.
He scooped the key's off Craig's desk and opened the cell door.
Freddy winced as he pulled back the blanket.
“Is he alive?”
Riggs held a hand up to Rob's blood encrusted and swollen face.
It was purple and blue, one eye puffed closed.
“He's breathing,” said Riggs.
He motioned two Commandos into the cell.
They weren't gentle when they picked Rob up and carried him through the door groaning.
Riggs unlocked Jodi's cell door.
“Let's move,” he ordered.
She followed the Commandos out with Riggs on her heels.
Freddy leaned over the Sheriff's desk and locked eyes with him.
“We were never here,” he growled.
The Sheriff nodded as Freddy left the building.
“What was that all about?” gulped Craig.
“Guess he killed the wrong cop,” said the Sheriff.
The watched through the glass door as the three Suburban’s swirled up a cloud of dust leaving the parking lot.
52
Rob slumped between two Commando's in the third-row seat.
His face was wiped clean but that just showed how bad the beating had been.
One eye was almost completely swollen shut, the skin around the socket puffy and purple.
His nose was broken and misshapen, and blood still crusted his hair where a couple of butterfly bandages had been applied to close a gash.
Jodi turned around in her seat.
“How bad are you hurt?”
She held up three fingers.
“Can you tell me how many fingers I'm holding up?”
“Don't talk to him,” said Riggs.
“He needs to go to a hospital.”
“I would worry more about what's going to happen to you,” Riggs threatened.
Jodi didn't turn around though.
She reached out and grabbed one of Rob's hands.
He winced.
She felt the swollen fingers.
Bruised but not broken.
The Suburban’s turned off the main road to a long gravel driveway that curved through a large empty field to a ranch house.
A rustic barn sat to one side of the house, paint peeling under the blistering Florida sun.
