Going After What's Mine

by Weston Parker

  Rose shrugged a shoulder. “I don’t think it’s fair to any of us. It just is what it is.”

  I nodded, not quite as accepting of the situation, but knew it was probably a good attitude to take. We couldn’t change it. We were at the mercy of Colton, Kevin, and Axel. They were the ones in charge of our fate, which was one of the hardest things to swallow about all of this. I hated having no control.

  “Thanks for hanging with me.”

  She laughed. “I don’t know that I had a choice, but I would have done it anyway. You’re my best friend, my sister from another mister. I’m here, thick or thin. I got you.” She winked at her over-the-top cheesiness.

  The signature knock on the door alerted us to Colton and Kevin’s return. I jumped up, checked out the window first, and then opened the door. I was overly cautious, but I had to be.

  “Is it over?” I asked hopefully.

  Colton shook his head. “We’re going to wait until nightfall.”

  Dread, thick and heavy, filled my stomach. I wanted everything to go back to normal. I wanted to go back to my shitty job at the diner. I looked up, meeting Colton’s eyes and had the sudden realization I didn’t want everything to go back to normal.

  “What happens if you don’t come back?” I whispered.

  “We’ll be back,” he said, then went to sit by Abby, making it impossible for me to push the issue.

  Later, as Kevin and Colton were clearly preparing to leave, I asked again.

  “Seriously, what if you don’t come back?” My voice was harsh as I cornered him in the far corner of the room, my back to everyone else. It was impossible to have any real privacy. I could hear Kevin and Rose talking too loud. They were trying to be loud enough to drown out our conversation.

  He took a deep breath before reaching out to take my hand. “Then you and Rose take Abby and get the hell out of town.”

  I shook my head, tears filling my eyes. “What about her grandparents?”

  “She doesn’t have any. I’m it. If I’m gone and Kevin doesn’t make it back, I would appreciate it if you got her out of here. I know it’s a lot to ask, but please make sure she’s safe.”

  I hated this conversation and didn’t want to have it. I was profoundly sorry I’d pushed the issue.

  “I don’t want to talk about this,” I said, shaking my head.

  “I understand. I’m leaving you some cash to order takeout. If we’re not back by tomorrow morning—”

  I shook my head and held up a hand. “Don’t say it.”

  He nodded, pulling some cash out of his wallet and handing it to me. I took it and put it on the table, exchanging a look with Rose. I gave her a weak smile, letting her know I was okay.

  “You know the drill,” Colton said to me from across the room.

  I nodded, watching as he dropped to his knees and motioned for Abby to come to him. She immediately walked into his arms. I watched him embrace his daughter as if it would be the last time he would get the chance. I felt a lump in my throat and had to turn around to avoid breaking out into an all-out crying jag.

  “Be a good girl and listen to Jenna. If she says you need to leave, you go with her. I’ll find you.”

  “Where are you going, Daddy?”

  He cleared his throat. “Me and Uncle Kevin have to go do some stuff. We’ll be back soon.”

  Colton stood and looked at me and then Rose before heading for the door.

  “Be careful,” I muttered as he walked out.

  Kevin waved as he followed Colton out the door. I stood there staring at the closed door for several seconds, wondering if that would be the last time I ever saw him.

  “Throw the lock,” Rose whispered.

  I nodded and did as she said, then took a deep breath and turned to face Rose and Abby, doing my best to look normal.

  I clapped my hands together. “So what are we going to order for dinner?” I asked, trying my best to sound cheery.

  Rose picked up the various brochures that had been left in the room. We were on the edge of town and had slim pickings.

  Abby looked at Rose. “Pizza?” she asked.

  Rose smiled. “I love pizza. Good choice. Jenna?”

  “I could go for some pizza. I’ll make the call. I’ll get some soda and breadsticks as well.”

  I ordered a couple pizzas in case Kevin and Colton were back early and wanted dinner. I had to think positive. With the pizza ordered, there was nothing else to do. I looked over at Abby, she was sitting on the couch, her feet dangling as she kicked back and forth. She was bored. The pizza wouldn’t be delivered for at least thirty minutes. We had watched cartoons all day and I knew Abby was burned out. I looked at Rose for help.

  “Hey, I think we should have a makeover party!” Rose exclaimed.

  “What’s a makeover party?” Abby asked.

  I remembered then that Rose had brought her very well-stocked makeup bag that rivaled that of a professional stylist.

  “It’s a slumber party where we paint our nails and put on lots of makeup and—” I was at a loss as to what to do next.

  “Dance! We dance!” Rose jumped in.

  Abby jumped off the couch, her eyes bright as she clapped her hands. I turned the TV to one of the music stations and turned it up.

  “Let’s dance! We need to get our wiggles out.”

  Rose jumped up and raised her arms in the air, waving them while wiggling her fingers and bouncing around. Abby quickly imitated her. I joined in on the fun. It felt good to get our heartrates up while we danced around the room.

  Before long, we flopped down on the couch, worn out by our exertions. There was a knock on the door, which sent a shiver of fear racing through my body.

  “Pizza!” a woman’s voice rang out.

  “I’ll check,” I whispered.

  I rose from the couch and peeked through the curtains to find what appeared to be a woman carrying a pizza delivery bag. I grabbed the cash from the table, paid for the pizza, and quickly locked the door.

  “Let’s eat!” I announced.

  “What about our nails?” Abby asked.

  “We eat first and then do our nails,” Rose explained.

  After finishing off almost an entire pizza ourselves, we were too full to move. The dancing part of our party was over. I would blow up if I tried to bounce now.

  “All right, let’s pick out our nail colors!” I said after we washed our hands and cleaned up after our feeding frenzy.

  Rose grabbed her bag, unzipped it, and revealed the contents to Abby. The little girl’s eyes bulged.

  “Wow,” she gasped.

  Rose was beaming as she unzipped the see-through plastic and revealed even more cosmetics. “I like to experiment with lots of colors.”

  “That’s a lot of nail polish,” Abby said with awe in her voice.

  “What color do you like the best?” I asked her.

  She seemed overwhelmed by the many choices.

  Rose pulled out a light shade of pink. “How about this one? It’s one of my favorites.”

  Abby grinned. “Okay. It’s my favorite too.”

  I picked a dark blue color, and Rose, who already had another pale pink on, decided to skip the nail portion of the night.

  “Why don’t we find a movie to put on?” I suggested.

  We spent the evening painting nails, dancing, and watching a movie. Just having a good time. At least, I was faking it pretty well. I couldn’t stop worrying about Colton. Questions filled my mind. What was happening? Was he okay? Was he dead? Was he being tortured?

  I covered my mouth when another yawn escaped.

  “We better get you in bed little lady,” I said to Abby, who looked like she was exhausted.

  “I’m not tired,” she argued.

  I laughed. “I’ll make the bed and you can watch TV.”

  “Okay.”

  She would be passing out before long, no doubt.

  Rose stood and stretched. “I think I’m going to lay in bed and watch TV
too.”

  I wanted to wait until they got back. I didn’t think I could sleep without knowing Colton was safe. I got Abby tucked into bed and lay down next to her to watch Moana. She was asleep in no time. I carefully removed my arm from around her and climbed out of the bed.

  “She’s out,” I whispered.

  When Rose didn’t reply, I turned to look at her and found that she was asleep as well.

  “All right then,” I mumbled. “Way to be a party animal.”

  I was left alone to worry and stress over what was happening back in Beatrice. Colton wasn’t perfect. He had baggage. I didn’t care. I had fallen for him and all of his flaws. I had run out on him and he’d still rescued me. We still hadn’t talked about that situation. I didn’t think there was much to say. He had lost his cool and I had overreacted. If we never talked about it, I would be okay with it.

  He had to come back though. He had to be okay. I began to pace the room, though it was a little difficult to get a good pace in with the hide-a-bed stretched out into the room. I glanced at the clock. It was almost midnight. They’d been gone for hours with no word. I didn’t dare call him and risk revealing his presence.

  I changed into a pair of shorts Rose had lent me and climbed in bed next to her, leaning against the headboard. I flipped through the channels, finding nothing of interest. I finally settled on some old reruns of Friends.

  Midnight.

  “Come on, Colton,” I whispered into the room. “Call me. You have to be okay.”

  I could feel my eyes drifting closed. I fought against the sleep that threatened to pull me under. I didn’t want to sleep. I lost my fight and slid down, resting my head on the pillow, silently praying Colton would be doing the special knock any minute.

  Chapter 31

  Colton

  We’d been sitting in the Tahoe for hours. My legs were stiff, and I could feel my feet falling to sleep. I had debated calling or texting Jenna but stopped myself. If I did, I had a feeling she would try and talk me out of what I had to do, just like she did that morning she took off.

  I knew she was worried. I couldn’t deal with her worry and my own stress over the situation. If I did walk away from this, I was going to grovel. I had made up my mind about that the first hour we had sat inside the SUV.

  I was going to apologize and do what I had to do to make it right. At some point, I had decided I wanted Jenna in my life, long after this was all said and done.

  “I’ve got to get out of here,” I said to Kevin, who was reclined in the seat next to me.

  “We haven’t seen any action for a while,” he calmly replied. “Maybe they’ve finally settled in for the night.”

  I turned the key to check the time. “It’s two. We said two.”

  Kevin put his seat up and looked out the window at the dark warehouse up the road. We had staked it out on foot earlier. Two men had been inside on our first inspection. Axel and his buddy Zane had shown up a few hours ago carrying bags of food. By the looks of things, they were staying put. We had waited to go in, making sure no one else would show up and take us by surprise. We were confident we could take them as long as we were the ones doing the surprising. We had to get to them before they had a chance to get a shot off.

  “You ready?” he asked.

  I took a deep breath. Hell no, I wasn’t ready. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a choice. One shitty decision had led me to this field and I had been paying for it for too long. It ended now.

  “I have to be, don’t I?”

  He shrugged. “If you are not committed to this, it isn’t going to work. You can’t go in second-guessing yourself and what you have to do. The world is going to be a better place without these guys. I know it sucks and I know it goes against your morals. It goes against mine as well, but we need to do this. You said it yourself. We get him, or he gets us. All of us. Abby, Rose, and Jenna will all be killed. You know that.”

  I let out a long sigh. I had been wrestling with the decision all night. I knew I would lose a piece of myself if I had to kill another man.

  “You’re right. Let’s do this. Kevin, I know I already said it once, but thank you. If we get out of this alive, I owe you big.”

  He nodded. “Yes, you do, and I am going to collect on it one of these days.”

  We got out of the SUV, quietly closing the doors behind us. I stashed the key in the center console in case I wasn’t able to make it back. I wanted Kevin to have a chance to escape. Together, we walked through the cornfield that bordered the warehouse. There was only a sliver of a moon out, which did little to illuminate the area.

  The weight of the nine in my hand was comforting. I couldn’t believe I was going to have to use it in a violent manner, but ultimately, it was self-defense.

  “On the count of three,” I whispered.

  He nodded. He stood to the left of the door while I stood on the right. I took a deep breath to calm my nerves, finding that mental quiet zone that allowed me to completely focus on what I had to do and not worry about anything else around me. It was a Zen-like state that I used in fights. I blocked out the pain and focused on delivering blow after blow to my opponent.

  I opened the warehouse door, doing my best to make it quiet. We stood to the side, waiting to hear anything. There was no sound.

  Nodding, I gestured to move inside. I went first, with Kevin right on my heels. The warehouse was almost completely pitch black. I reached out and tapped Kevin on the shoulder, wanting him to stop moving.

  I could hear the soft sound of a man snoring near my right. I reached for the knife in a sheath on my side and pulled it. I stared in the direction of the snoring, slowly moving closer. Soon enough, I could see the outline of a man lying on the ground. Without thinking twice, I used my knife to eliminate the threat.

  One down, three to go.

  I gave Kevin a thumbs-up as I moved back toward him. We made our way deeper into the warehouse where Jenna had been strapped to the chair. I froze when I heard what sounded like whispering. It wasn’t me and it wasn’t Kevin, which meant our presence had been made.

  Sheathing the knife, I switched my gun to my right hand. A flashlight clicked on. I aimed directly for the light and pulled the trigger. I heard the bullet hit a second before I heard another shot. I hit the floor, my elbows slamming into the concrete along with my knees, shouting at Kevin to do the same. There was rapid gunfire and I could feel bullets flying overhead. I heard the click click click coming from my gun and knew I was empty.

  “Shit,” I muttered before realizing there was no more shooting.

  Either we had all emptied our clips or everyone except me was dead.

  “Kevin?” I asked, hoping I hadn’t just given away my location.

  “Here.”

  “Are you hit?”

  There was a pause. “Not bad.”

  “Fuck.”

  I scooted across the floor on my stomach toward the sound of his voice. I reached out for him, the dim light from the flashlight beam shooting into the air allowing me to see his outline. I stared into the void, convinced I saw a figure moving about thirty feet in front of me.

  “Axel?” I called, knowing the man wouldn’t answer me even if he could.

  “Fuck you,” I heard him grunt, the sound strained, telling me he had suffered at least one hit.

  That was a good sound. I liked hearing him in pain. I reached into my pocket, moving slowly as I pulled out my spare clip and quietly locked it into place. Axel was injured, but he was alive, which meant he was coming for me.

  A blinding beam from a flashlight moved over the room. I got to my elbows, waiting for the beam to land on me next to Kevin. I pulled the trigger the second it shone over me and Kevin lying on our stomachs against the concrete floor of the warehouse. I heard a thud and the flashlight dropped to the floor, rolling across the smooth concrete.

  “I think you got him,” Kevin said in a harsh voice.

  I had no idea if Zane and the other man were alive, waiting for
us to stand and make ourselves easy targets.

  I stayed on my belly, making my way toward the flashlight. With the light in one hand and my gun in the other, I shone the light around the area, hoping I wasn’t making myself a target. When no bullets slammed into my head, I got to my feet and walked toward the place where I had shot Axel. My light found him. He wasn’t going to be a problem ever again.

  I moved around the area and found Zane’s body a few feet away from Axel. The other guy was off to the side, clearly very dead.

  “It’s clear,” I announced.

  “Good. I’m out of bullets,” Kevin replied.

  “Can you walk?”

  “Yep. Going to be a little sore I think, but I’ll live.”

  “Let’s get out of here.”

  With the flashlight in hand, I headed in Kevin’s direction, helping him to his feet. I shone the light on his face, looking for injuries. I knew he was hurt. I just didn’t know how bad. He was a tough guy and would play it off.

  “Get that out of my damn face,” he grumbled.

  I could see blood streaming down the side of his face.

  “I got grazed,” he mumbled.

  “Are you sure? Let me check.” I shone the light over the area.

  “Well?” he asked.

  I smiled. “Yep. I think you’ve gotten worse in a fight. You’re bleeding like a stuck pig, though.”

  We walked back to the SUV, neither of us talking as I used the flashlight to guide us back through the cornfield. The heavy weight of what had just happened was like a ton of bricks on my shoulders. I hated what I had done and knew it was going to haunt me for the rest of my life.

  Once we got back to the SUV, I pulled out my first-aid kit and did my best to clean up Kevin’s head.

  “You’re going to have to hold that bandage on there. You can’t go back to the room with blood pouring from your head.”

  “Pardon my bleeding,” he sniped.

  I laughed. It was a nervous laugh. “Uh, do you think we need to wipe our fingerprints off anything?” I asked, suddenly realizing I could have dodged the real bullet to be hit with another one—prison.