“Hey, pull in at that house!” said Kelton as he pointed across the dash.
Kelton frantically grabbed for Azrael as Dixie applied the brake and everyone flew forward against their restraints.
“Sorry, forgot about Azrael. Do you know them?”
Kelton looked at the truck in the driveway and knew Braxton Greene was home.
“Yeah. Lay on the horn as you pull in.”
She didn’t hesitate. The quiet country fields echoed with the bold honking as she let the car come to a stop just behind the beat up truck. Dixie went to her parking lights, but continued to announce their presence by blaring the horn. Kelton climbed out, and closed his door before his dog could follow. He walked around to the driver’s side and leaned against the hood. Dixie stopped honking to lower her window.
“Are you sure he’s here?”
“He’s here. Keep honking,” he said.
It took another minute, but he saw a light come on inside. He was thankful, for he’d started to have his doubts. That something might have happened to him. But when the door opened, it was the same old Braxton in cutoff shorts and shirt that wasn’t quite all the way buttoned. The old plumber guitarist rubbed his eyes and craned his neck forward to size them up.
“What the hell you doing here?” his tone was curious rather than annoyed.
Kelton shrugged, “I took your advice and was careful. You were right. They tried to move on me.”
Braxton nodded, “There’s something weird afoot. It’s Saturday night and they always want me to play. Even came to my house once and dragged me there when I didn’t show. Beat me over it. Been months and it still hurts inside when I shit. When I got back with Baylee Ann, she went up to see Shep and I went to the cans before starting my set. After a joint I walked out to my truck for my guitar. Rattler met me in the parking lot. Told me to take the night off. Wouldn’t let me take back Baylee Ann. Never made it back inside. Saw some visiting bikes in the lot. They weren’t forcing people out right away, but if you weren’t a patch wearer of the Lowland Outlaws they weren’t letting you inside.”
“Any idea what it means?”
Braxton nodded his head, “Always really bad when he’s clearing outsider witnesses from the mix.”
“I’ve only seen the front of the barn and Shep’s office. What’s at the other end of the building?”
“The far end is the cans. You got to go outside and walk around the building to get to them though. There’s a side entrance about halfway down the building, opposite the road. Sometimes people will go back there for a cigarette and a chat they want no one else to hear. Then it’s just the kitchen.”
Kelton nodded, “Okay, thanks. Sorry to wake you.”
“Ain’t no thing. Sunday tomorrow. What can I do to help? Baylee Ann’s the best thing that’s happened to me in a long time,” said Braxton.
Kelton stared at the ground a second and then called back toward the car, “Dixie, come out here a second. I think I have a plan and we don’t have much time.”
CHAPTER—31
Bambi was washing dishes and watching Baylee Ann while she mopped. The kitchen was in the old milk room which had already been piped and wired for frequent cleanup. Baylee Ann was humming as she squeezed the gray water and disinfectant from the head using the strainer built into the wheeled bucket. Then she rolled the bucket aside and did another section of the worn concrete. By the end of the night Bambi’s knees and back ache usually ached from the long hours standing upon it, and today was no exception. But it was a well equipped kitchen with a galley table, shelves, and reefer units of stainless steel, all of commercial grade quality although bought on the second hand market. Things had come a long way from grills in the parking lot and paper plates when Shep had started.
Baylee Ann had come down earlier from Shep’s room and asked if any help was needed. It’d been busy then with the dinner crowd, so the extra pair of hands had been most welcome. She couldn’t cook worth a damn, but it took pressure off the waitresses running out orders. And it gave Baylee Ann a chance to flirt with everyone without really having anything to fuck up.
But not an hour later, the dinner crowd just dried up. Candi had stood by the grill with her spatula and knitted eyebrows.
“Wasn’t Braxton supposed to play tonight?” Candi croaked out.
“I thought so,” Baylee Ann replied. “He’s not sick or nothing. Just gave me a ride.”
Another half hour later, Rattler had come back to the kitchen.
“Not much is going on tonight, so Shep wants to let you girls go home early,” he said smiling like he’d just made a generous offer.
Never mind that the staff was paid by the hour, thought Bambi.
“Some of us already are home, you know?” replied Baylee Ann.
“Not you two Bitches. Candi and the staff. You two dumb broads can clean all this shit up,” said Rattler shaking his head as he walked out.
Candi had then begun to ready her meal tickets for Shep’s closing time audit. She divided them into piles by waitress on the countertop next to the sink, and then began to tally up on an adding machine. Bambi slowly scraped a plate over a garbage can watching her work. Candi punched the keys slowly, and then did things a second time to be sure. When she’d watched her in past nights, her fingers had flown over the keys.
Fifteen minutes later Rattler stuck his head in the kitchen doorway and challenged, “I thought I told you to go the fuck home?”
“Shep wants to do this new money check with the waitresses every time we close,” explained Candi, showing no signs of being intimidated by his bluster.
But the man known as Rattler would have none it, shoving himself off the doorframe to reach her sooner and striding into the kitchen. But when he drew close to the old lady he softened some. Everyone liked Candi. Even him.
Rattler said in a low voice, “Not tonight he doesn’t. The waitresses have already all gone home. I’ll walk you out,” and turning toward Bambi and Baylee Ann with more force and volume, “Get to work cleaning this shit up!”
Candi let Rattler take her gently by the arm, and she made small steps as she rolled her eyes back toward Bambi and Baylee Ann.
After they’d gone, Bambi put down the plate and turned toward Baylee Ann.
“What’s going on?”
“I don’t know,” said Baylee Ann. “Some car drove by and checked the place out earlier. Maybe Shep is just being cautious. I’m sure he’ll tell us later what’s up.”
“Do you think the guy with the dog will be coming back?”
Baylee Ann stared fixed toward the sink for a while and then shrugged, “I don’t think so. Kelton was nice and all. But he’s not one of us. We’re with our people now and we can let him go on to his.”
Bambi crept to the kitchen’s doorway and snuck a look about the corner. All the patch wearers were assembling quietly at tables and no visitors were present. A couple of them were summoned with a wave from Shep’s balcony, and they quietly rose and made their way to the stairs up front. Baylee Ann picked up a greasy napkin from the bus cart by pinching it between her thumb and index finger, and wrinkled her nose as she dropped it in the garbage can.
Bambi whispered back toward Baylee Ann, “They’ve gotten rid of everyone who isn’t a gang member except us.”
“We’re members,” said Baylee Ann. “They love us!”
“Baylee Ann, I love you. And I love how you are always upbeat and nothing ever keeps you down. And I know you think we belong here, and that everyone has been real nice to us recently. Daddy was always real nice, too, just before he hit Momma and me. It’s like they feel guilty and start making up for it before they do it. I can feel it coming. We need to hide. Stay out of sight. Sneak away if we can,” advised Bambi.
Baylee Ann furloughed her brow and then smirked at her, “Things will be fine.”
Bambi sighed. Baylee Ann had been in her memories since learning that ducks like to eat bread and fireflies don’t last long in a jar. She woul
dn’t abandon her, but Bambi knew she couldn’t help her getting beat or worse beside her. That had happened too many times over the years whether it was bikers, truckers, and once upon a time drunken football players.
“Okay, why don’t you start organizing things in here to make the cleanup easier while I take some of this trash out of our way,” said Bambi.
“Good idea. And I’ll turn the fryer back on, too, in case our boys need a snack later.”
Bambi nodded with her meek eyes that she hid behind and tied the drawstrings of the garbage bag. It wasn’t too heavy to lift from the gray Rubbermaid garbage can as it held mostly butcher’s paper from premade burger paddies and plastic wrap. She took a deep breath and dragged it out the kitchen doorway.
She didn’t want to go out into the dining room, but it was the only exit. The other was blocked by a large stainless steel reefer unit leading to what was now the bathrooms. Ductwork for the ventilation hoods had filled in what had been the only window.
“Hey, get back inside there, Bitch,” snarled Jingles pointing with his bandaged arm.
Several men who’d been quietly sitting turned their heads toward her.
She looked down at the floor, “I’m just cleaning up like Rattler said to do.”
Bambi rounded her shoulders forward, giving her very practiced meek and submissive look.
“Burrito will take that to the dumpster. Get back in that kitchen,” he ordered.
She dropped the bag and turned to slowly walk back toward the kitchen. She’d gotten less than a half dozen steps. Bambi sensed him watching her, keeping his focus on her, until she was back where they wanted her. There were murmurs from the other men, but absolutely nothing she could hear over a couple of choppers outside, the rumbles growing faint as they sped away into the night.
Baylee Ann smiled at her from in front of the dishwashing station as she walked back in. Bambi gave a quick smile back, but her stomach was churning. They had to find another way out. She cocked her head as she heard another pair of motorcycles revving from the parking lot.
“Can you help me move that reefer forward?”
“What the hell we need to do that for?” replied Baylee Ann.
“I just want to see if anyone’s cleaned behind it. Since things have shut down early, it seemed a good time to take advantage,” Bambi explained, her eyes shifting sideways.
It was a commercial unit, wedged between some wire shelving units containing dried goods, pots and pans. There was no gap on the bottom, and no wheels. The design kept filth from collecting in places that were hard to clean, but it sure wasn’t mobile. Not for these two women to move anyway, and the other equipment around it made it impossible to gain purchase. The old doorway behind, which they could escape through, was completely blocked.
“We can ask some of the boys to help us,” suggested Baylee Ann.
“No, they look really busy out there. We should just clean the other parts of the kitchen, and take the time to be really thorough. We’ll do that one another time.”
If they couldn’t escape, Bambi reasoned, their next best chance lay with being useful. No one out there wanted to clean the kitchen. Even to the low bar of their standards. They could slow roll it for a while until it became obvious. Then it would make them really angry.
She began to fill the sink with water, and added detergent to form foamy bubbles. Nearby were a pair of rubber gloves she pulled on. They were a bit too big for her gentle hands. Baylee Ann filled a mop bucket at a wall hydrant and added a disinfectant and degreaser. But after mopping about a third of the floor she turned and walked through the doorway. Bambi heard the angry shout as she crossed the threshold.
“How many times do we have to tell you Bitches? Stay in the kitchen!”
Baylee Ann’s voice was scornful, “I have to piss. Don’t have a cow.”
“Then use the sink in the kitchen,” he snarled and a moment later there was a thud and the shattering of glass.
Baylee Ann retreated back through the doorway.
“He even threw a beer bottle at me, the bastard.”
“I told you,” hissed Bambi. “Now get busy so they think we’re useful.”
Baylee Ann stared at the floor as she came to grips with what Bambi had been trying to tell her and then looked up with angry eyes, “We’re prisoners, aren’t we?”
“Duh. Why do you think I’ve been trying to keep our heads down?”
“I can’t believe they’re doing that to us. Bastards! We’re not surrendering and going along with it,” declared Baylee Ann.
“Well, there’s no way out.”
Baylee Ann nodded, looking at the big reefer unit blocking the backdoors to the bathrooms.
“Then let’s barricade ourselves in.”
“There’s no door. And you know they’ll eventually break down anything we pile up and be really mad when they get us.”
“A lot can happen in that time. Shep wouldn’t be cleaning house unless he’s scared of something. That means someone’s coming. I don’t know if it’s the sheriff or Kelton, or another gang. But no matter who they are, they’re better for us than Rattler out there.”
The stainless steel wire shelving units which flanked the reefer were on wheels. They were wider than the kitchen’s doorway, having to be turned lengthwise to roll through. Baylee Ann rolled the first long ways across the doorway, and Bambi kneeled to lock the castors.
“What the hell are you doing in there?” came an ill-tempered challenge from the dining area.
“Just moving stuff around to clean and mop better,” sang Bambi.
No one else said anything else or bothered to get up to come and look at what they were doing. Shep’s order was they were to stay in the kitchen. As long as they stayed there, no one was apt to show further initiative.
It was a flimsy barrier that would fall over if pushed on. They rolled the second shelving unit behind the first, locking its casters as well. Bambi took a roll of plastic wrap for covering left overs and used a half roll of the clinging wrap to lash the posts of the shelving units together.
The galley table came next. It was too long to wedge between the shelves and the opposite wall so they had to turn it sideways like the shelves. Again they locked the casters, then grabbed all they could to fill the gap between the galley table and wall to pin everything in place. The mop bucket was a good start. So were racks of empty beer bottles. They emptied the reefer of sacks of frozen frying potatoes and hamburger patties, and then used the adjustable shelves inside. Glassware, bottles of cleaners, serving trays, even their purses piled into the gap between the galley table and the wall, to pin the shelves in place against the doorway. The trash cans wouldn’t fit without compressing the top, but they did so to wedge them into place.
Baylee Ann reached for the fryer baskets to throw into the gap and yelped as her hand touched the hot metal, “Ouch that’s hot.”
She smelled the boiling cooking oil and then she looked at the pots on the shelves and said, “Grab me some of those.”
Bambi also realized the value of a weapon for their desperate last stand to defend their makeshift wall. She found a pair of long pointed kitchen knives, and using the last of the cling wrap lashed them as tightly as she could to the end of the mop and the broom handles to form a pair of makeshift spears. They might be good for a single desperate thrust through the open shelving units. Some cleavers remained for when they breached the wall and it was close hand to hand.
She’d been a submissive all her life. But not this night. Bambi could feel the shaking starting in her arms and legs. But it was a different type of shaking. It wasn’t the trembling bunny trying to lay perfectly still in the face of a predator. It was the relaxed trembling of a prize fighter pacing and dancing before the bell rang. The adrenaline of a competitor. She turned toward Baylee Ann.
Baylee Ann’s face was set and determined, but loosened enough to display a look of shock when she met Bambi’s gaze. Bambi didn’t back down her hard stare. Bay
lee Ann recomposed herself in a second, nodded as she gripped the mop stick tightly, and faced the barricaded doorway. Game on, you dirty, greasy, pieces of crap, biker thugs. We don’t need you anymore and you don’t own us, thought Bambi.
They waited by the barricaded kitchen doorway and listened. Every few minutes they heard a couple of men rise and walk toward the front, their boots echoing on the wooden planks. Baylee Ann eventually climbed onto the galley table so she could squat over the suds in the wash sink and finally relieve herself. Bambi herself yawned and she rubbed her eyes. The adrenaline of anticipation had faded, and they felt tired.
Yells and flying gravel clearly audible over the roar of an engine, a car’s engine, suddenly came from the front parking lot. It was followed by the crunching of steel. A second later there were gunshots.
Rattler’s confident and commanding voice boomed through the barn, “Jingles and Burrito, watch the kitchen. The rest of you apes, come with me!”
The women heard the car’s engine rev to a vibrating roar, like someone was flooring it in neutral. Another volley of shots popped over the mechanical thunder and Jingles leaned his head around the doorframe to peer inside the kitchen.
Bambi thrust with her spear between the shelves, arms extending and legs springing off the concrete floor. It caught Jingles above his right collar bone, just to the side of the voice box. With all her weight behind it, it sunk deeply with only the weakness of the plastic wrap splicing preventing the full transfer of momentum to penetrate out his back. When she drew back, the wrap gave way and she was left holding the broom handle as the blade remained embedded in his body.
Jingles stepped back from the shelves he had tried to fight through, his weathered face turning ashen. His eyes widened and his bandaged arm came up to grasp at the blade stuck in his body. He took his hand away, looking at his crimson fingers and returned to grasp the hilt. Burrito turned toward him, placing his hand over Jingles’ to prevent him from trying to pull it out. As the light faded from Jingle’s eyes and his knees buckled, Burrito helped him fall gracefully to the ground.
K-9 Outlaw: A Kelton Jager Adventure Book 1 Page 27
