THE BABY OATH

by Sophia Gray

  Her stomach growled encouragingly.

  Gabe walked in with Rodolfo behind him, and the jitters in Maggie's belly went into overdrive. Gabe waved at Adamo and walked over to Maggie with a big smile. “Sorry if I'm late,” Gabe said.

  “If you are, you're worth it.” Maggie wrapped her arms around Gabe and planted a long kiss on his lips. He seemed taken aback at first, then relaxed into it slowly, his hands caressing her back.

  “You look amazing,” Gabe murmured.

  Maggie leaned forward to nibble on Gabe's earlobe playfully. “You'd better be able to find a way for us to be alone together later,” she whispered. “I can't wait.”

  Gabe pulled away from her, and she saw that his eyes were full of concern and regret. “Yeah, um...about that.” He turned to Rodolfo. “Can you give us a moment alone, please?”

  Rodolfo scowled at him.

  “You can watch us from across the room, okay?” Gabe sighed angrily. “Look, there's Adamo. Go see if he knows any good jokes or something.”

  Rodolfo rolled his eyes and loped over to where Adamo was sitting.

  Maggie looked at Gabe as the first hints of worry crept into her mind. “What's wrong?”

  “Look, what happened between us at the end of the last date...that can't happen again, Maggie. It never should have happened to begin with. It was disrespectful to you—”

  “No it wasn't!” she protested. “I had a wonderful time. I thought you did, too. I thought it was special for both of us.”

  “Sure it was. And I did have a wonderful time, honest.”

  Maggie frowned. Her heart felt like it was plunging down a cold, dark, bottomless well. “'I did have a wonderful time, honest.' Wow. That sure sounds convincing.”

  “It was a mistake. On some level, you have to realize that. I mean, it was our first date, for Christ's sake. All I'm saying is, let's take a deep breath, relax, enjoy a nice dinner together, and take things a little more slowly.”

  “I don't think it was a mistake.” Maggie felt her face getting flushed, and her voice was starting to tremble. “I don't understand. Was I...that bad?”

  “No, you were incredible. I had a terrific time. This isn't about that.”

  “Do you not respect me anymore because I did that on the first date? Do you think I'm some kind of slut or something?”

  “It was disrespectful to your father, okay?” Gabe snapped. “He trusted me to take you out on a date, and I abused that trust. If he found out, he'd be pretty pissed about it. And even if he never finds out, that still doesn't mean it was the right thing to do. He and I are going to be in business together, and I don't want it to start off like this. He's an honorable man, and I need to show him I'm one, too.”

  Maggie blinked back tears. “This is because of my father? You're so afraid of upsetting him and ruining your business together that you'll just toss me aside?”

  “No one's tossing anyone aside. Just relax, okay?”

  “No, I won't relax.” Maggie sniffled as she felt the first hot tears traveling down her cheeks. Some of the other patrons were starting to stare at her, but she didn't care. “I thought you were different. I thought you really cared about me instead of sucking up to my father and trying to marry your way into his family. But you're just like all the others, aren't you? A slick, spoiled, greedy bastard who'll say and do anything to get my father's approval.”

  “This isn't like that,” Gabe protested.

  “Of course it is,” Maggie shot back, grabbing a napkin from a nearby table and dabbing at her eyes. “I should know. I've certainly seen it enough times.”

  “I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you. Let's just go over to our table and talk this out...”

  “Why? Are you upset about jeopardizing your big payday? Don't worry, my father will marry me off to you whether I like you or not. So go on, make your important deals with him and keep kissing his butt. I guess I'll see you on our wedding day.” She pushed past Gabe, storming out of the restaurant.

  Once she made it outside, she collapsed against the wall of the building, sobbing uncontrollably. Just a few minutes ago, she'd been eagerly awaiting the happiest night of her life. Now she wished she were dead.

  “Miss Margherita? Are you all right?” Adamo was next to her, staring at her with his crab-like eyes and holding out a handkerchief.

  But Maggie felt like she'd never be all right again.

  Chapter 18

  Hammer

  The muddy stream in the bayou came up to Hammer's knees as he trudged through it carefully, trying to make as little noise as possible. Splinter, Lash, and Cobra walked behind him in a line, dutifully matching his pace like a trio of ducklings behind their mother.

  Instead of their usual biker duds, the Saints were wearing black commando gear, paintball masks molded to look like leering skulls, and plastic body armor they'd bought from a costume shop a few towns away. It wouldn't stop any bullets, but it still achieved the desired effect.

  They looked frightening as hell.

  And unlike the armor, the AK-47 assault rifles they carried—and the bullets in their magazines—were very real.

  “What's the point of all this crap?” Cobra had asked as Hammer gave the clerk at the costume shop a wad of cash. “It ain't like we're goin' up against real hardasses or anythin'. It's just Morrow an' those inbred cousins of his.”

  “First of all, we can't have them knowing who we are, or even that we're bikers,” Hammer explained. “Putting aside the fact that half of us are supposed to be dead and the other half are supposed to be gone, Morrow's dealt with the Saints and other MCs lots of times. That won't scare him off. If he thinks we're an X-factor he's never encountered before—like some super-commando squad from God knows where—then he'll be a lot less likely to give us any pushback. Besides, Murray Morrow's a fleabag piece of shit and I've never liked him, so this is gonna be a lot of fun. By the time we're finished with him, he'll feel like the Grim Reaper stuck a finger up his ass and twisted it.”

  It had been almost a week since Brock's second date with Maggie. During that time, Brock had talked on the phone with Ricci a handful of times—first to say he'd wired the money to the rebels in Myanmar, and then to tell him that no, he hadn't received any word back from them yet. Hammer wasn't known for his patience, so sitting tight for so long hadn't made him too happy. But Brock had assured him this next step in the plan relied on perfect timing.

  And now that it was finally time for him to act, Hammer had to admit he was having a hell of a lot of fun.

  As the four Saints made their way through the mangroves and tall grasses, Hammer pushed aside a curtain of peat moss. He knew it was childish, but in his mind, he kept pretending he was Martin Sheen in Apocalypse Now—stalking through the steamy jungles of Vietnam with his finger on the trigger and murder in his eyes, delivering grim inner monologues about the beauty and horror of war. It had been his favorite movie since he and Brock had cut class in the fifth grade to rent it.

  “I wanted a mission,” he murmured under his breath in a gravelly voice. “And for my sins, they gave me one.”

  “What?” Cobra whispered.

  Hammer smiled under his mask. “Nothing. We're almost there. Remember, when we bust in, let me do the talking.” Unlike the others, Hammer had also opted for a cheaply-made voice changer from the costume shop, which he'd tucked into his mask.

  A dilapidated tar paper shack stood a short distance ahead of them with battery-powered lamps in the windows. Hammer motioned for the others to remain silent and follow him. Then he crouched down and continued his approach.

  Once they were close enough, Hammer peered into one of the windows.

  Murray Morrow stood in the shack with his cousins, Kenny and Louie Wells. Kenny was in his late twenties, with watery blue eyes and scraggly blonde-white hair that looked like dirty corn silk. He wore a patched, stained pair of overalls. Louie was a bald, squat, troll-like man in his mid-thirties, with thick black hair on his arms and warts all over hi
s face. He sported a filthy yellow t-shirt that said “Time To Rub One Out,” and a pair of cutoff denims that were so short his scrotum was almost visible.

  The three men were ladling heaping amounts of white powder into styrofoam bowls of heroin and stirring them around sloppily, as a Country/Western station played between bursts of static on a battered radio in the corner.

  “Didn't this asshole have three cousins?” Cobra whispered. “Or was it just the two?”

  “Pretty sure it was just these two,” Hammer answered, re-adjusting the weight of the rifle in his arms. AKs were sturdy and reliable, but man, were they heavy.

  “I ran out of baking soda,” Kenny announced with a belch.

  “So use some of the detergent or rat poison to cut with.” Louie paused in his work to scratch his balls and sniff his fingertips. “An' let's hurry it up, okay? I gotta take a shit the size of a wedding cake.”

  “I told you before, just go an' do it outside,” Murray said. “You ain't gotta hold it in. We got plenty of toilet paper.”

  “An' I told you before, I ain't shittin' in no swamp. Had me a girlfriend who tried to do that once. She squatted down, an' the next thing she knew, she had a mud snake hangin' from her pussy by its teeth. You shoulda seen her come runnin' outta the bayou screamin', with that thing swingin' between her legs like a big black dick!”

  The men in the shack guffawed loudly.

  “I dunno why we're out here fuckin' around with this shit anyhow,” Kenny pointed out. “You still ain't heard nothin' from Ricci, have you, Murray? For all we know, he's found some other source.”

  “He'll call,” Murray insisted. “If there was someone new slingin' this shit around here, I'd have heard about it. Naw, he's just playin' it up like he's some kind of big man so's he can watch me sweat about it. Them wops an' their bullshit power trips, man. They think us good ol' boys are nothin' but a bunch've dumb pig-fuckers who can be pushed around.”

  That sure is what it looks like from here, Hammer thought.

  Hammer looked around to make sure the other Saints were in position. Then he unclipped a stun grenade from his belt, yanked the pin, and tossed it through a window.

  “What the—?!” There was a scramble of confusion inside, and a second later, the grenade went off with a blinding white flash and a thunderous bang.

  Hammer kicked down the door of the shack and burst in, followed by the other Saints. Murray and the Wells brothers were sprawled on the floor, blinking up at them and moaning in pain.

  “Murray Morrow. Kenny Wells. Louie Wells.” Hammer pronounced their names like a judge handing down a death sentence. With the voice changer set to its lowest setting, he sounded like Darth Vader.

  He had never felt cooler in his life.

  “Your sins have caught up with you at last,” Hammer intoned.

  “You want the H?” Murray asked, his voice quivering. “Take it! It's yours!”

  “You think you can bribe me with your cheap poison?” Hammer picked up one of the bowls of powder, flinging it at Murray and crumpling the styrofoam into a ball. The heroin caked Murray's face and he coughed.

  “I am your Fate, Murray Morrow. I am your Angel of Death. There is no bargain. There is no escape. There is only penance.” He pointed a finger at Murray dramatically.

  Murray dragged himself to his knees. He brushed the powder from his face, gagging and retching. Then he laced his fingers together like a man about to pray, looking up at Hammer pleadingly.

  “Please...I'm so sorry...I never meant to hurt no one...my daddy left when I was two an' I got led astray, you gotta know that...but I will be good, I promise, I'll do whatever you want, whatever it takes, just don't drag me down to hell, Mister Skull Face, please...”

  Suddenly, there was a deafening mechanical roar just outside the door, followed by a yowl of pain from Splinter.

  Hammer turned in time to see a hulking figure in a tattered cloak that looked like it had been stitched together from varmint pelts. His face was broad and lumpy, and one of his eye sockets was sunken and empty. His snarl revealed a mouthful of broken teeth that looked like crooked fangs.

  He brandished a large chainsaw.

  Splinter was still yelling and clutching at the small of his back as dime-sized drops of blood hit the floor.

  “Kill 'em, Shredder!” Murray hollered over the sound of the machine. “Kill 'em all!”

  Shredder stepped forward into the room, swinging his weapon and mewling incoherently. Cobra and Splinter were already backing away from him, but Lash appeared to be frozen in mute horror.

  “Get down,” Hammer commanded, raising his rifle.

  Lash didn't move.

  Splinter and Cobra lunged at Lash, tackling him to the ground. Shredder raised the saw, preparing to bring it down on one or all of them as he cackled madly.

  Hammer took advantage of his clear shot, firing a burst from his AK directly into Shredder's chest.

  The brute looked down at the bleeding holes in his body, the saw still raised above his head. Then he let out a shriek and turned, fleeing into the swamp again. The sputtering roar of the chainsaw followed him until it faded in the distance.

  As Lash and Cobra silently inspected the wound on Splinter's back, Hammer turned and advanced on Murray and his cousins menacingly. Their butts skidded across the floor until all three of them were backed up against the wall in a row.

  Hammer's blood was up and he badly wanted to pump these dickheads full of bullets, but that wasn't the mission he'd been sent on. Brock had said it was important they just disappeared without a trace, so Hammer couldn't risk leaving evidence they'd been killed instead.

  “I shoulda warned you,” Murray sobbed. “I forgot he was out there, okay? I just forgot!”

  Hammer slammed the butt of his rifle into Murray's torso savagely. Murray screamed, and Hammer heard several of his ribs snap.

  “If you want to live, here's something you shouldn't forget,” Hammer growled. “Louisiana is off-limits to you and the rest of your demented family. Find someplace else to be a drug-peddling redneck. We'll be watching for you, and if you ever come back to this state again—even if you're just passing through—we'll know, and we'll make sure you're the one who dies with a chainsaw in his guts. Do you understand?”

  “Y-Y-Yes,” Murray stammered.

  “Good. Now go.”

  Murray pulled himself to his feet, clutching his busted ribs and hissing in pain. Kenny and Louie got up as well, breathing hard, their eyes bugging out of their heads. For a moment, they stood, staring at Hammer and the other Saints.

  Hammer pointed his rifle at the ceiling and fired off another burst. “Now!”

  The three men pelted toward the door as fast as they could, running off into the bayou. Hammer looked down and saw trails of urine on the floor, marking their paths.

  “How bad is it?” Hammer asked Splinter, pulling his mask off. The others took theirs off, too.

  “Could've been a lot worse,” Splinter said, wincing. “This plastic armor may be cheap, but it still kept the saw from going in as deep as it could. A few stitches, an' I should be okay. Thank God he missed the spine, though.”

  “Jesus, that was some fucked-up, horror movie shit!” Cobra turned to Lash, who was pale and shaking. “Where the hell were you, anyway, huh? What happened?”

  “I, uh...just wasn't expecting a dude with a chainsaw, is all,” Lash said, licking his lips nervously. “I got kind of a thing about chainsaws. Do you think he's dead?”

  “He took at least five rounds in the chest before he ran off,” Hammer answered. “If that didn't kill him, there's about twelve different infections he'll get from the swamp that should do the trick. And we know for damn sure the other three ain't gonna be a problem anymore.”

  Okay, Brock, Hammer thought. Mission accomplished. What do you have up your sleeve next?

  Chapter 19

  Maggie

  Maggie had been watching her father pace around their house for almost a week.
She'd never seen him so nervous before—muttering to himself, wringing his hands, jumping every time the phone rang. Even when she was lying in bed at night, she could still hear his footsteps traveling from floor to floor, room to room. He'd always taken tremendous pride in his appearance, but now he was forgetting to bathe or comb his hair for days at a time, and his expensive outfits always looked rumpled.

  She knew whatever he was waiting for had something to do with Gabe. She'd even heard him call Gabe several times, but after each brief conversation, he continued to roam the house nervously.