by Naomi West
My fingernails are crusted black by the time I’m finished. It’s worth it, though. When I dab the toothpick into the cup and bring it to the paper, I’m able to write out a crude message, the words jagged, but words all the same. I write: They Know You’re Coming. Stay Away. Then I place it on the bed and wait for the “ink” to dry. I wait for a long time, not waiting to smear it against the glass. When it’s done, I kneel down next to the window and press the piece of paper to it, knowing that it’s going to hurt my arm but having no other option.
I turn on the lamps in the room when it gets dark so that the sign will be visible. My shoulder is already throbbing with the effort, my forearm aching, but I can’t let it go. I can’t let Spike get hurt. Holding a piece of paper shouldn’t be this hard, but I’m exhausted. All I want is sleep.
I knew a girl once who grew up without a father and it really screwed her up. It screwed her up so badly that when she finally found her father, she went to him even though he was an evil psychopath who killed her mother. It screwed her up so bad she forgot who she was for almost a year. I won’t let that happen to my kid, ever.
Night comes and I change my arm. I can only hope Spike sees it in time.
Chapter Nineteen
Spike
As the sun sets, my men surround the compound, hiding in the woods and watching and waiting. From the number of bikes in the parking lot, we know there’s at least forty or so men in there, which is around the same number of men we have. I’ve posted scouts at our rear to watch for dogwalkers and lovers out on a stroll, as well as watching for the off-chance that some Scorpion come walking by. If there’s anything I learned in the army, it was always to watch your back.
I stand with Justin, watching the windows of the dormitory wing. I remember creeping across to there what feels like a hundred years ago, spying into the window and seeing nothing but the finest piece of ass I’ve ever laid my eyes on. It’s mad how life can switch up so quickly. She was the finest piece of ass and now she’s the mother of my child, the love of my life, somebody I can’t stand the idea of living without. Life can be damn strange like that.
I’m watching the window and loading my weapon at the same time. It’s nine o’clock. In two hours we’ll hit them, and hit them hard. We’ll wait for them to get drunk and sleepy and then storm in there with all the sudden violence of an air bombing. I’ll kill every man who stands between me and Yazmin. I’ll never stop. I’ll never give up. I’ll kill and kill and kill until each one of the bastards is dead. I’ll—
“I still don’t think this is a good idea,” Justin says, shifting from foot to foot.
“You’ve said that.” I’m getting goddamn tired of his grumbling, but there are men all around us and having them see the president and the VP at each other’s throat hours before a raid ain’t a good idea. “Your opinion is noted.”
Justin sighs. “Come on, Spike. Doesn’t this seem like a bad—”
“Is there something you wanna say to me?” I lead him away from the men with a nod, standing out of their hearing beneath a massive tree. “What is it, man? What is this shit? If you’re scared, stay at the back like I told you. But don’t start questioning my decisions where the men can hear you. The fuck’s wrong with you?”
“I don’t want anymore of our men dead, is all.”
“This will work. It’s time. It’s past time. Knuckles was right.”
“If he was right, why didn’t you agree right away? The only reason you’re agreeing now is because your girl’s at risk.”
“So what?” I snap. “She’s carrying my fuckin’ kid. I didn’t expect to get shit from you about caring about family.” I’m about to go on when I see something strange in Yazmin’s window: what looks like a white piece of fabric, or a piece of paper, with what could be her arm shaking against the glass. “Wait a sec.” I return to the men. “Has anybody got a scoped rifle?”
“Boss.”
One of the men hands me a scoped M16. I return to Justin, make sure the safety’s one—it’d be a cruel joke if I came this far just to accidentally shoot her—and then look through the scope. I was right. It’s her arm, the paper fluttering as she trembles. She must’ve been holding that sign up for ages. The words are written in what could be tar, thick and black and sticky-looking. They Know You’re Coming. Stay Away. I toss the rifle to the undergrowth, cursing under my breath.
“Fuck,” I whisper. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”
But how?
“They’re expecting us,” I tell Justin. “The fucking Scorpions are fucking expecting us.” I’m about to kick my bike when I remember that there’re men everywhere. In the army whenever we saw the officers showing emotion it was always a bad sign. They were meant to be tougher than us.
“Maybe they saw us riding in. Maybe they had lookouts.”
“Maybe,” I mutter, but that pisses me off because I sent men out beforehand exactly for that purpose. If they’d had lookouts we should’ve known about it.
“What now, boss?” one of the men asks from the darkness.
“We return to the clubhouse,” I say, knowing it’s the only smart move. We can’t hit them now, not if they’re ready for us. We have to wait until morning, make them think we’ve given up. “Justin, gather the men. Get the order out to return to the clubhouse. And get the order out that at 0700—” I cut myself off, wondering. If they know, it could be lookouts, or Snake could’ve paid one of my men to tip him off. One of the lower-ranking men, somebody who needs the cash and doesn’t feel allegiance to the club. “Get the order out that the men need to be ready to hit the club at any time. I want them on standby all night and all day tomorrow. We’re gonna hit these bastards with everything we’ve got. Just let them relax first. And Justin.” I turn to him. “If you say one more word about backing out of this, I’m gonna smash your teeth into the back of your skull.”
Before he can reply to that, I climb on my bike and kick it into a growl, staring at the rectangle of light and the shaking sign. I’m coming back for you, I promise her. I’m not leaving you. Just stay strong.
Back at the clubhouse, I sit in my office, staring at the clock, Desert Eagle resting against my knee. I watch as the seconds tic by, trying to picture the Scorpions getting sleepy, the Scorpions getting drunk. At two o’clock in the morning I lie down on the cot, getting a few hours of fitful sleep. I wake at six with my belly growling in hunger. But I won’t satisfy it, not until my other hunger has been satisfied.
I stand up and roll my neck in my shoulders.
“Time to go to war,” I mutter.
Chapter Twenty
Yazmin
At around two o’clock in the morning my arms are so tired I can’t hold them up anymore. I crawl away from the window, leaning against the bed and hoping that Spike saw my message. Dad mentioned that they were going to attack tonight, so I can only assume Spike has seen my message and retreated. Otherwise the shooting would have started by now. I climb to my feet and sit on the bed, wondering if I should try and get some sleep. I want to, but I feel wired, as if somebody has slipped a stimulant into my system. My body is weary but my mind is on speed.
I stand up and go to the door, pressing my ear against it. I’m not sure exactly how many hours I spent like this during my time here, listening to the men in the hallway, saving the information for a rainy day. Or in the bar, pretending to just be sitting, looking pretty, when really I was listening to every word spoken.
“. . . boss might be paranoid.”
I hold my breath. The men are down the hallway, at the end of it, their voices quiet.
“Yeah, right.” The man scoffs. “You shouldn’t say things like that, not if you value your life.”
“Oh, come on, man. They were meant to hit, what, at like eleven or midnight? Maybe his mole has fucked him over.”
“Well, we’ll see, won’t we? I’m sure we’ll get word when they’re really coming to hit us.”
“Yeah, I hope so. I ain’t dying today. I’ve seen
how I’m gonna die, in a dream.”
“Is that right?” The man laughs. “And how’re you goin’?”
“In bed, surrounded by women, and when I bust my nut into the back of her throat, it’s lights out. Oh, and I’m one hundred and ten years old.”
The men chuckle, their laughing growing quieter as they leave the hallway. I stay like that for a long time, waiting. Sleep tries to drag me to bed, but I can’t sleep at a time like this, when at any moment Spike might return and the shooting might start. I think of soldiers waiting for battle, wondering if this is what they feel like. I don’t hear anything else for the rest of the night. I lie down. I might as well try and rest, if not sleep. I lie there staring at the darkness of the ceiling forcing my eyelids open every time they fall closed.
Despite my efforts, I must sleep for an hour or two, because I open my eyes to the sound of gunfire. It’s like hell has been unleashed on the clubhouse. All around, the guns are being fired, bullets ricocheting loudly off metal and wood, man roaring, men screaming, men calling out for their mothers. I roll off the bed, hardly able to hear myself breathe for the sound of combat, and crawl under the bed, hands over my ears. I don’t think it’s possible to know how truly terrifying gunfire can be until it’s all around you.
I move to the center of the bed, knowing how much danger I’m in. All it’ll take is one of Dad’s men to find me instead of one of Spike’s, and that could be the end of me. Or a stray bullet. Or a piece of unlucky shrapnel.
“Get the fuckers!” somebody roars, their voice just audible below the unceasing tat-tat-tat and boom-boom of the bullets. “Get the fucking bastards!”
When I was a girl I would often hide under my bed like this with a book, so small that the dark place beneath the bed felt like a whole separate world. With a flashlight and a profound sense of peace, I would turn the pages until I was sinking into the world of the book, the dark place forgotten. Now I’m large and unwieldy, a grownup with too-big arms and too-big legs. The bed isn’t a large one. I’m squashed beneath it, my chest tight. It gets tighter when the door squeaks open. I notice that more than anything. The door squeaks open. It isn’t kicked open. Which means whoever’s opening it has the key.
I tuck my legs up, tuck my arms in, trying to make myself small. I wish I could turn back into that tiny girl. Nobody would find that tiny girl. The man is wearing thick boots, but that doesn’t tell me much. All of them wear thick boots. He snorts and spits, but that doesn’t tell me much. Many of them snort and spit on account of how much they smoke and how much coffee they drink. When the man starts talking, though, there’s no doubt about how he is.
Closing the door, he says, “It seems your boyfriend is smarter than I guessed. Maybe he rooted out the mole. Maybe he worked around the mole. In any case, the mole was useful to us and now he’s not. Oh, you’re wondering to yourself, why isn’t he panicking? Why isn’t he looking for me? Let me tell you something, little slut.
“I met up with your mother once or twice over the years, more like nine or ten times if I’m being honest. You see, despite what ended up happening between us—she never should’ve borrowed that money; it’s not my fault she was bad with her finances—despite what happened, she still liked the odd fling. She couldn’t help herself. That’s probably where you get your sluttiness, I reckon. I think she wanted me to love her, poor woman. Sometimes she would sit up and prattle on about this and that. The only reason I let her do it is because—” He pauses as what sounds like a shotgun blast tears through a hunk of metal, maybe a bike. “Don’t worry. I’ve got good ears. If anybody comes down the hallway, I’ll see them.
“Where was I? Oh yes. The only reason I let her is because she still looked good naked, despite her age. She would go on and on about her boring job and her boring friend and her boring life and, once or twice, her boring daughter. Oh, my daughter did this, my daughter did that, until I wanted to put a bullet in her head. I guess I did, in the end. Life’s funny like that.”
I feel tears sting my eyes. I want to roll out from under the bed and attack him, flail at his face, disfigure him, and hurt him. But even though I’m sure he knows I’m here, there’s still that one percent chance that he’s bluffing, or that somebody will get to him before he gets to me. So I stay where I am, despite the rage working its way through me.
“Once she told me about how her sweet boring daughter would lie under the bed with a flashlight and a book, reading until the sun came up sometimes. She told this to me like I was going to be so proud I’d sweep into that apartment and give you a kiss on the head.” He snorts out a laugh. “What a stupid bitch. Anyway.” His boots move to the edge of the bed. I’m so close I can see how the laces crisscross, that one of the lace-holes has worn away, so the toe of his right boot is scuffed. “Time to get out of there, Yazmin. Hellfire is raining down all around me and I need some leverage. Don’t make me kneel down.”
I keep quiet, holding my breath.
He sighs heavily. “I’m going to give you three seconds. Let me explain to you what’s going to happen at the end of the three seconds. I’m going to shoot into the bed. This is a heavy-caliber pistol, by the way, so there’s no chance of the mattress eating the bullets. They’ll go straight through. I’ll shoot until my clip is empty, and then count to three again, reload, and shoot until my clip is empty. So either you crawl out breathing or I drag you out dead. One . . .”
I don’t wait for him to get to two. I know he means what he says. Even if it means his own death, he’ll kill me. That’s just the sort of man he is. I crawl out from under the bed, standing up and facing him. I’m so tired I can hardly think. Tears stream down my cheeks, unbidden, but I can’t fight them away. Dad tilts his head at me. The left side of his face is cut and bleeding. Otherwise he’s okay.
He darts his hand out, grabbing me by the elbow. “Those Viper fucks have us surrounded,” he snaps. “But let’s see them keep shooting when I’ve got their leader’s beloved little hole as my personal shield, eh? I think it’s time you finally did something useful as a daughter instead of leeching off of me. All right?” He drags me into the hallway, gun pointed forward. I want to fight him but it’s as much as I can do to keep up with him. I wish I’d had a full night’s sleep. I wish the tears would stop. I wish I was stronger. I wish, I wish . . . Wishing will get me nowhere. I have to look for an opportunity to do something.
He kicks through into the bar, ducking low as bullets smash into the wall above our heads. Dead men like all around, stinking of gun smoke and blood and shit. I try not to look at their slack, empty faces.
“They’re all around us, boss!” Rust says, crouching behind an overturned table and aiming out of the window.
“I’m taking her through the kitchen!” Dad snaps. “Keep them occupied.”
“Boss!”
Dad pulls me into the kitchen, which is a windowless room where the gunfire hasn’t reached yet. The attack started amidst the preparations for breakfast. Pans and pots are scattered all over the floor, milk pooling in one corner, the fridge door swinging back and forth, egg yolks splattered on the table.
“The whores ran,” he mutters. “The fucking whores ran.”
“Of course they did,” I say. The next time he tries to pull on my arm, I summon all the strength I have left. The tears stop. I make myself cold. I pull backwards so that we come to a standstill. A painful standstill, since he almost wrenches my shoulder out of its socket. “Why would they stay for a man like you?”
He grins at me madly. “You don’t want to do this now.” He points the gun at my belly. “I won’t kill you, sweet daughter. I’ll just put a bullet right here and see what happens.”
He prods the barrel of the gun against my baby. Rage seethes inside of me, rage unlike anything I have ever felt. It’s like all the anger which has built up over the course of my life has culminated in this one moment of anger. I feel far braver than I ever have before. Perhaps it’s because a mother ought to be brave where her child is con
cerned.
“If you do that, you die,” I say. “I’ll make sure of that.”
“You’re living in a dream world. Sure, they’ve hit us, but we’re fighting them back. A few of ours are dead. A few of theirs are dead. You better be careful about what you say. I’m taking you out the back and—”
It’s a child’s trick, but sometimes the unexpected plan is the only plan that’ll work. There are two doors to the kitchen, the one we came in through which leads to the bar, and the one which leads to the bins and the back of the clubhouse. I look at the door which leads to the bins and scream. I scream loudly, panicky. I scream like there’s a man with the biggest gun I’ve ever seen aiming at us. I scream so convincingly that Dad turns around, swinging his gun to the door. I don’t think as I pick up the biggest pan nearby. I don’t think as I swing it down at his head with all my strength. I just do it.
