The Heart's Dangerous Trek

by Maya McMillan

  They watched from down the street as 80s Rocker man and Squat man left Tara’s apartment building, got back into their car and peeled out. It was just past 1 AM

  “Hamilton, or Lily, are probably in your apartment; most likely they have Greta with them. She is their best tool right now so they need to keep her close. Given how those two peeled out, I’m guessing they aren’t happy. They got yelled at and have to return to your studio in case you show up there.”

  Tara nodded, staring after the departing SUV. Then she made herself look up at her apartment. Only hours earlier she wanted nothing more than to get in there; now, looking up at her living room window, the place seemed more like a terror trap than a home.

  “Y-you set this up,” she said as realization dawned on her. “That’s why you insisted I call her and tell her we were headed to my apartment while we were still on the road. You thought maybe she was in on it. That maybe I was the one they were after, not you.”

  “This is the best time to go in and get Greta,” Nick said, ignoring the implied accusation. “They are off balance, forces split. We’re gong to add to that, then I am going to go in and get her.”

  Tara was shaking her head. Nick, now focused on a plan of action, was as powerful and intense as she’d ever seen him, but she doubted he was fully recovered from Lily’s attack. The same woman who was, most likely, waiting for them inside her apartment.

  “H-how are we going to unbalance them more?”

  Nick nodded to the passenger side door.

  “There’s a catch in the pocket there, just a loop of fabric. Find it and tug.

  Tara did. The interior panel of the door popped loose and a wad of bills, two knifes, a handgun and three cell phones tumbled into her lap.

  “Call her, tell her you’ve been to the studio. You know what’s up. You’re leaving town on the bus. Say I abandoned you. That you don’t want any trouble. Then hang up.”

  She stared at him.

  “This stuff was in here the whole time?”

  “Yes.”

  She shuddered. “I don’t like guns. Well, handguns.”

  “Do you like hammers?”

  “What?”

  “Do you like hammers, wrenches?”

  “What? What the hell do I care about….” she went silent and the cold chill she’d felt earlier returned. “They are just tools,” she said tonelessly, “like my best friend’s life.” She was surprised that she felt no tears coming.

  Nick nodded silently.

  Tara took several breathes and recalled her time teaching equestrian skills. She knew sometimes you had to trust the expert. She nodded her head, then picked up the gun and handed it to Nick.

  “Tell me what to do.”

  Nick pressed the gun back into her hands. “First you check the safety...”

  ~​​~​​~

  Tara snapped the phone shut, fighting down the urge to scream in rage at the pain she must have just caused her best friend. She took several deep breathes, then turned to face Nick who was looking at her with fierce intensity.

  “It’s done. Nick, if they think I’ve abandoned her, won’t they just kill her?”

  “No. Dead she’s absolutely useless. With you in the wind, and them thinking I’ve left you, they are going to be scrambling for a new plan, but they are also going to be overjoyed that I’m out of the picture.”

  Tara steeled herself and asked the obvious question. The one that had been in her mind since they’d left her studio.

  “Why don’t you leave, Nick? Actually leave.” Her mouth became so dry that when she spoke again, it was a frog’s croak. “You did the honorable thing--the very honorable thing--when you thought I was in trouble because of you. Now we know it’s not you. This whole thing was barreling down on me this whole time and I didn’t know it. It’s not your fight. It never was. Why not go? You’re the one who looks at people as tools, as leverage. Why aren’t you cutting your losses? Going should be easy for you.” As much as fear of Hamilton and his crew made it hard to breath, Tara realized it was fear of losing Nick that was bringing tears to her eyes.

  Nick’s eyes, impossibly luminous in the dark of the car, drilled into her. Without saying anything he adjusted himself, turning away from her and grabbing the steering wheel.

  “No!” she yelled, slapping at his arms. “No, you tell me. You tell me why you are still here. You’re a killer and a mercenary and a…a…miscreant. You tell me why you are still here!!”

  The man was still as stone as Tara, unsuccessfully, fought back tears of rage and shame.

  “There’s no explaining,” he finally said. Tara was shaken out of her own skin by the lost hollowness in his voice. When she spoke again, she was surprised at the softness of her own voice.

  “Try, Nick. Try.”

  He held his almost inhuman stillness for more long moments.

  “The people aboard Candlelight 101. They died because they were the exact opposite of what you think I am.”

  With no response, Tara could only wait for him to continue.

  He turned to face her again.

  “But let me ask you this. While they were helping other people, do you think they were more alive?”

  Tara balked at the odd question.

  “I think they were,” Nick continued “They had a passion. They were devoted to something other than themselves. It made them larger, better people. It’s the exact opposite from the all engulfing passion for power, or wealth, or fame. The first one feeds the soul whereas with the second one, the soul is the price.”

  “Nick…I still don’t...”

  “Can we just say….just leave it at this, Tara. Please. That I finally think I really know how those people felt. How their lives were warmer and richer for caring about someone else.”

  He glanced at her, held her gaze for just a moment, then looked back out towards the empty street. In that glance Tara knew all the unsaid words at once. The knowledge left her stunned to the core, her mind completely numbed with the overwhelming import of the mysterious mercenary’s confession.

  “Now we wait,” Nick said, settling back as though he had not just unleashed a bomb. That what had just happened, hadn’t. “And you describe the route they will probably take to the bus terminal.”

  Tara had not gotten very far when the entrance to her apartment building banged open. Hamilton stepped onto the sidewalk, lit a cigarette and stood smoking for a minute before something jerked his attention back and he opened the door.

  Tara’s heart jumped into her chest when she saw Greta being shoved out. Her handler was a burly man with a marine haircut and sloped shoulders.

  They were followed by two nondescript men in priestly frocks, and, bringing up the rear was Lily.

  “I hate that you have to be a part of this, Tara, but I don’t see another way. There are a few things they could do, but basically the longer they have her the more leverage they have. We need to make our play sooner rather than later.”

  Tara nodded. The odds were now five to two. If two men had not been lured away to The FullMile studio, it would have been worse.

  “Nick, I know you can handle yourself in a fight, but that woman…she’s good too, and that man…he’s huge.”

  “There’s fights and there’s fights, and before I didn’t have a gun.”

  Tara was silent. She really hated guns.

  The two nondescript men disappeared down the street; the remaining four people stood in the cold dark night, their breath steaming, for several minutes then two cars appeared. Hamilton, the huge man and Greta got into one, Lily got into the other. Nick clucked.

  ”Good luck on bad luck.”

  Tara didn’t know what to say to that. The man she knew seemed submerged and the man siting next to her was a little scary in the coldness that seemed to emanate off him.

  The cars took off. Nick didn’t move until they rounded the corner. Then he turned to her like he’d been hit with a live wire.

  “You have to drive. I w
ant you to trust me,” he said, unbuckling his seat belt. “No matter what I say, trust me and don’t hesitate.”

  He was out of the driver's side and sprinting around to her side of the car before Tara could answer. She lifted herself, slid into the driver's seat and was about to set the mirrors by the time he jumped in beside her.

  “Take the route you think they’ll use to go to the bus terminal. They will probably be going off of Greta’s directions. It’s late at night, there's no traffic so if they see our lights more than once we may have a problem.”

  Tara nodded, sure she knew the best, most likely route to the terminal. She put the car in gear and reveled, for just a moment, in the power that rumbled under the hood.

  “At the same time, our best bet is to catch them as soon as they arrive at the bus station, so we don’t want to be too far behind them,” Nick continued.

  Tara bit her lip. Her city had grown up a lot over the years, but downtown, where the bus station was located, was a throwback to the 40s, with narrow, short start-and-stop streets.

  She took several deep breaths, screwed down on her resolve, put the car in reverse and peeled out.

  “Wait! What..” Nick began. “We have to follow them.”

  “You want us there right on their heels, but you don’t want them to see us,” she said gripping the wheel for courage. “Trust me, Nick.”

  Tara whipped the wheel to one side and backed around the corner, then she shifted into drive, trying to ignore the tension that seemed to light up the car’s interior. She relaxed only a little when Nick let out a large heavy breath and sat back in the car.

  He was going to trust her.

  Tara swore to herself she wasn’t’ going to let him, or Greta, down.

  Making good use of the vehicle’s demonic power, Tara raced through the empty streets, glad for once at how much her home town still retained its old fashioned American values. In the small hours of the morning there was not a soul out.

  She felt Nick stiffen when she pulled onto the interstate, but then relax again as she took the next off ramp. He sat up as she pointed.

  “That’s the bus station right there.”

  Tara’s heart swelled with pride at Nick’s stunned silence.

  “How much time do you think we have?” he asked her.

  “Maybe two minutes,” she said.

  Nick was silent for three far-too- long breaths.

  “Alright, pull into the parking lot there. Facing the street. If they are planning a grab-and-go on you, they’ll park somewhere around there. Remember what I said.”

  “Do whatever you say, as soon as you say it.” She paused and forced a little levity into the moment. “We will have to try that next time we have sex. Might be fun.”

  The laugh the comment elicited from Nick repaid ten-fold the energy it took to snap her out of her tense mindset. She started forward slowly and pulled into the lot.

  “Kill the light, keep the engine going. Make sure your seat belt is snug. Lean the seat back a few inches. Remember I had the airbags taken out of this thing because if they deploy during defensive driving, that’s the end of it.”

  Tara had a bad feeling about what that portended, but, per their understanding didn’t ask.

  “We slouch down and wait.”

  They did. It was not long.

  “Low gear,” Nick growled from beside her in the dark as two cars came down the street. His powerful muscular form seemingly collapsed in on itself as he half lay scrunched down. He reached up and made sure the cab light was turned off.

  “When I say so, gun it. If you can, turn sharp right at the little patch of grass.”

  Tara didn’t respond. It was all too absurd to think about.

  The cars pulled up, nose to rear. Lily got out of the first one and stood studying the bus station. It was a huge ornate structure built when the world still cared more about form than function--stained glass, graceful arcs, stone work. After a moment Hamilton joined her.

  “PUNCH IT!” Nick’s voice reverberated through the small compartment, jarring Tara into action without thinking.

  The car jumped forward with a slight complaint of rubber on asphalt and Tara had the exhilarating, terrifying feeling of seeing closely-placed lamppost, trash can and markers flying by. Then the car was slamming over concrete stops, the heavy suspension taking them in relative good humor.

  Her eyes barely above the dashboard, Tara could see Lily and Hamilton’s heads whip around, then she saw the giant of a man pushing out of the back door of the second car.

  All three scattered as Tara’s car, sparks flying, floundered over one last partition, through a low shrub, and slammed right where the rear of Lily’s car almost touched the front end of Hamilton's.

  Tara looked over at Nick to make sure he wanted her to continue on through and saw the passenger side was empty, the door just starting to swing closed.

  The ugly sound of tortured steel and fiberglass still in the air, Tara found she was on the other side of the parked cars and careening down a side street. She twisted hard to the right to avoid a fire hydrant on the corner, missed it head-on but heard the horrible sound of metal scaring metal as she scraped along side it.

  She looked up in the rear view mirror, not sure what she expected, or wanted to see.

  She saw a dark blur unfolding from the grassy area she’d aimed for at Nick’s request.

  The dark blur unfolded into human shape as Nick came to his feet into a dead run only a few steps from the big man who still stood at the open door of his vehicle.

  Nick slammed into the shocked man, knocking him back, almost off his feet. Then, in a graceful pirouette-like movement, Nick placed one hand on the ground, flew into a brief handstand, wrapped his legs around the man’s neck and slammed him to the ground.

  Tara’s breath held in her throat as Nick was able to use the momentum to carry himself the rest of the way to the car that held Greta.

  Clenching her jaw, Tara pushed out of the driver’s side door, noting it stuck. Holding the gun with both hands she rested it on the roof of the car and began firing in the general direction of Hamilton and Lilly just as the pair were pulling out their own weapons.

  Their attention was diverted from Nick to the unexpected attack down the street. They turned to fire at her just as Tara ducked behind the bullet-proof vehicle.

  Tara cringed with every ping and poink of bullets. Then realizing cringing would not help she forced herself, rigid with fear, to climb back into the still-running vehicle. She brought it halfway around then flipped on the headlights to make it a more likely target. She gunned the engine.

  The gunfire continued and Tara told herself she accepted death if it meant saving Greta.

  There was a screech of tires and the whine of tortured metal and Tara saw that the car holding Greta was pulling, with painful ugly sounds, away from the curb and towards her. She let her foot off the gas, threw the car into reverse and began backing away slowly, allowing the damaged SUV to catch up.

  With an ugly sound the struggling SUV whipped to the side, blocking off the narrow street. The passenger side rear door burst open and Greta tumbled out, hands bound in front of her. The usually vivacious blond crumbled to her knees onto the pavement. Tara glanced down the street, saw that Hamilton and Lily were no where to be seen, then heard the engine of the first car, not nearly so damaged from her ramming start up and pull away from the curb and towards her.