by Neliza Drew
Craig called back as I waited at an intersection. “I just got pulled over leaving Beaufort. Still want to meet up?”
“Since when do you speed, Craig?” I got in the eastbound lane.
He was quiet a minute. “I think Charley’s house is on fire.”
“Excuse me?”
“It was on the fire-rescue channel.”
“Who pulled you over? What were you doing?” My bad-things-are-coming senses were working overtime.
“I don’t know. Guy’s checking my license. Why?”
“You weren’t speeding? Swerving?”
“No, Davis. What’s going on?”
“Get out of there. Just get the hell out of there. Don’t stop to get the license. Just go.” I picked up speed heading toward him. Rain started, fat drops hitting faster and heavier.
“Davis, don’t be ridiculous.” His tone changed. He had seen something. I heard him put down the window and the guy tell him to put down the phone. Craig didn’t hang up, just set the phone down. Then I heard the guy ask him to step out of the car.
I floored the rental. I wasn’t sure what I thought I was going to do. I wasn’t sure what was happening, but as I listened to the guy arrest Craig without mentioning a specific charge, I knew I was about to get my prom date killed.
• • • • •
The wind buffeted the car going over the high-rise bridge. The rain blew horizontal. The rental car said the outside temperature was in the low thirties. And night had fallen as I raced through Morehead.
When I saw the lights in my rearview mirror, I wasn’t surprised. We were on the causeway, between towns, but close to both. And I was indeed speeding.
The rental car’s tires sank in the icy mud as I turned off the asphalt and the windshield wipers tried to clear the sleet-rain mixture from the darkness ahead of me.
I called Tom, put the phone on speaker and set the phone upside down in the notch under the radio.
The cop got out, a bright yellow slicker flapping behind him like something out of horror flick.
I sat and watched him in the rearview and the side mirror. When Tom answered, I said, “Don’t talk. Just listen carefully. Record if you can. Won’t hold up in court but it may not need to.” I rattled off a location.
I put the window down and glanced up, offering innocence and a willingness to cooperate. He was already pointing his gun at me. “Get out.”
“Officer, what is this about? Was I speeding?” Sweetness.
“Get out. Now.”
I hadn’t been arrested since I was thirteen. Not really. I stepped out cautiously. By the time I was half-standing, I was drenched and shivering.
He grabbed my arm and twisted me, slipped on the first handcuff quickly like he’d been practicing. I could’ve stopped him, but I’d have ended up full of bullets and bleeding out in the rain. I was tired of bleeding in winter.
He banged me into the side of the car.
I shouted, not because it was hard to hear, but because the window was still open. “You can’t arrest me for speeding. I wasn’t even going that fast. That bridge is huge. It’s not my car. I can’t be responsible for rentals. It’s raining.”
He leaned in close. “Nothing personal.”
“What’s not personal? What the hell? Where are you taking me?” I twisted enough to catch his nametag through the gap in his slicker. “Fuck you, Murphy.”
He marched me toward his car, my opportunity to feed Tom more information lost. He tossed me into the back seat and climbed behind the wheel. “It’s not what you think.” He turned in the seat so he could get a better view of me, sprawled and wiggling into an upright position. “I don’t want to be doing this.”
I planted my feet on the floor and righted myself. Ordinarily, sitting on handcuffed hands was uncomfortable, but my hands were so cold and numb I barely noticed.
“I’m sorry. You have to understand. I just don’t do things like this.” He wiped his face and looked weary. “You should know I didn’t mean your sister any harm when I arrested her. I had to. She was there. She was covered in blood. What did you expect me to do?”
“And the other girl there?”
“I’m sorry.” He started the engine.
I kicked the partition. Hard. Hard enough to hurt my teeth. “If you’re carting me off to get executed, you owe me answers.”
“I’m sorry.”
I looked around at the doors, the windows. All standard police fare. No handles to grab. No cracks in the seats big enough to find hidden weapons. I kicked the partition again. “Talk to me!” I angled myself so I could kick the Plexiglas. Having my hands under my ass gave me enough leverage to kick it where it had been bolted to the metal partition.
“I have to.”
“Who called you that night? Amber or Vince?” I kicked again, both feet.
His answer was quiet, so quiet I almost didn’t hear him with the storm raging outside. “I was told to wait nearby.”
I kicked and kicked. “Where the hell is Craig Silvano?”
“Who?”
I leaned sideways and twisted around for a different angle. “The guy you kidnapped earlier this evening. The one your little puppet masters told you to grab like you did me.” I kicked the window. The glass spider-webbed but didn’t shatter completely. “The innocent father you plan to murder if you haven’t already.” I kicked again and the pane turned to confetti. Cold, wet wind whipped into the back seat.
He slowed. “It wasn’t like I wanted to.”
“Fuck you and your fucking conscience.”
“We were gonna lose the house.” He had to say it louder than he wanted to because of the wind and rain now swirling into the car. Outside, thunder and lightning fought the sky for airtime.
I sat up, so I could scream near his ear. “Live in an apartment. You don’t murder people over the fucking mortgage.”
He gripped the steering wheel. Ten and two, like a good boy. He had great posture for someone who claimed he was doing things under duress. “I can’t let my kids be homeless.”
“It builds character.” I rolled and kicked out the other window. When I sat up again, I positioned myself in front of the rearview mirror. I noticed I’d managed to crack the Plexiglas where it was bolted to the metal partition. Another weakness to exploit.
“How can you say that?”
“Because living in a car didn’t kill me.” I kicked. “Apparently you thought that was your right.” I kicked.
He stopped at a light.
I could’ve gotten out. I didn’t. I needed to know where Craig was.
“Where the fuck is Craig?”
He turned and looked at me, his face etched with worry by the dull glow of the street and dashboard lights.
“Why take him? He’s not part of this.” I kicked the partition.
Murphy was silent.
“Where?” I kicked and watched the tiny spider web crack grow.
He hit the dashboard with his fist. “Dammit!”
I rolled into my back, straightened my legs in front of my face and slipped the cuffs over my butt. Sat up and pounded the Plexiglas with the sides of my fists.
He was young. He didn’t deserve what had happened to his family. He didn’t deserve what I was doing to him. I didn’t deserve any of it either. It just was.
The Plexiglas began to give. My hands were bleeding. My wrists were bruised and circled with grooves and cuts. I kept pounding.
He opened his door. Opened mine. Grabbed my shoulder and dragged me out into the rain. We were both already soaked. Both shivering, but maybe neither of us from the weather.
“Why?” His face was next to mine. I could’ve pulled his gun and shot him. I could have kneed him in the balls. I could’ve broken his nose with my forehead.
I stared at the tears in his eyes.
He went for his gun.
I bent, hit him in the gut with my shoulder.
We landed on the median, skidded in the icy rain into the oncoming
lanes, but we were the only ones on the road. The area too rural. The weather too rough.
He pulled the gun free, managed to shoot his own window out of the car.
I bit his hand, sank my teeth deep into his tendons using my hands to hold his arm somewhat steady.
He grabbed my neck with his free hand, squeezed until I saw spots.
I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t swallow. I couldn’t keep my grip on his hand. I pulled the cuffs up, wrapped them around his arm and tried to tighten them as the world went black.
Chapter fifty-five
I woke up in the trunk. It was warmer than the backseat, but that was my own fault for kicking out the windows during a nor’easter. The trunk was sturdier than the backseat, but my hands were still in front of me.
I found the taillights. Took what seemed like forever, but I found one and kicked it out. It was black, wet and freezing outside.
Under the spare tire I found the tire iron, but couldn’t pull it free without getting the handcuffs caught on something. Every time I yanked on the tire iron, the cuffs dug deeper into my wrists. I should have been in pain, but I was too cold and too angry to feel more than the dullest ache.
The car stopped and I fell forward, hitting my head on a random metal piece of car. I struggled to prop myself up again, to roll over, and to finally pull the tire iron free. I settled for one of three as the trunk popped open.
Vince stared down with a flashlight in one hand and a dark, long-barreled handgun in the other. “Hi, Davis. So nice to see you again.”
He backed up and motioned for someone else to grab the handcuffs and yank me out. I kicked him in the crotch and took off running into the darkness.
The bullet hit me in the back of the left thigh, high, almost my ass. It was a fluke, a lucky shot out of the half-dozen he made. I tumbled, skidding in the mud until a rock stopped my face. It sliced open my forehead and tore out a chunk of eyebrow.
I lay still. Mud in my eye, left pinky twisted backward from the fall. Waited as male voices echoed in the air.
“Get him out of there.”
“What the fuck is this shit?”
“Hold him.”
I could barely make out words in the pounding rain.
The next gunshot was singular.
My heart stopped, but not because the bullet had hit me.
I wanted to stay there, pretending to be dead, hoping they’d think I was. I knew I’d roll over to find out who’d they’d shot. I knew it wasn’t over.
I took a deep breath, willed myself to ignore the pain, the fear, the baggage. I closed my eyes and took in a long, slow, slightly muddy breath and sent it to my fingers and toes and aches. I let it out slowly, bubbling the puddle under me, releasing everything but my will to survive long enough to take some of them down with me.
Then I rolled over.
Chapter fifty-six
Craig stood next to a younger version of Rayford Jackson, staring at the ground. On the ground would be Murphy. I couldn’t see him, but I knew. Craig, even from a distance, looked terrified.
I pulled myself into a sitting and then standing position. My left leg refused to work properly, but I convinced it to at least support the rest of me long enough to hop my right leg forward.
They couldn’t see me yet. Couldn’t hear me.
Vince pointed his gun at Craig’s chest.
“No!” In my head, the noise was a roar, but what came out couldn’t make it past the rain and wind.
Vince pulled the trigger. Craig stared at the hole, high on the right, and sank to his knees. Vince aimed, pressing the long barrel to Craig’s forehead. My immediate thought was selfish: everyone who cared about me died.
I swallowed my pain, the raw emotion clawing at my throat, and stopped in my tracks. “You think you’ve broken me?” My voice came from some rage-filled part of me that rarely saw anything but the inside of a gym or a dojo. “Leave him alone! You wanna dance, motherfucker? Come dance! You promised to fuck me up, right? I’m still standing, you sonofabitch!”
Barely standing, maybe, but he couldn’t make out the wobble in my stance from where he stood. My heart thudded in my ears and my breath kept catching on the way in.
Craig turned his head to look at me, but I couldn’t make out his expression. He sank to his knees and fell forward. My heart sank into the mud with him.
I had nothing left to lose.
I took another hop-step toward Vince and Tanner, my leg a strange mix of fire and ice. “What are you waiting for? You killed him, right? Big boys. Killing unarmed men. You should be so proud.” The only thing keeping me upright was adrenaline and anger. I was sure of it. Maybe too sure. Training maybe helped.
Phil’s voice in my head telling me I wasn’t done yet. My sparring buddy, Franco, taunting me to push harder.
The two men I’d let push me, punish me on purpose, when we sparred, trained.
Vince motioned for Tanner Jackson to stay by the car, walked toward me. At first I thought he’d just shoot me like he had the other two, but as he got closer, his face betrayed him. He stepped in with a single blow. I blocked it as best I could, but my arms were inefficient as a team. The gun collided with my cheek and pain exploded in my head.
Chapter fifty-seven
I came to as we boarded a boat. My head ached like a bad hangover. My face felt swollen, disconnected. My legs didn’t work right so they dragged me over the side, banging my shins on the cleats. I kept my eyes shut and fought the urge to vomit.
They dropped me on the deck. Footsteps walked away.
“I got this, boss.”
Hands unbuttoned my jeans.
Panic rose from my toes and blossomed in my head. Memories banged on the bars I’d hidden them behind.
Rough hands yanked my jeans over the wound in my thigh, let them catch on my boots, and left them there.
You were a whore for years. You want to get upset about this now? Phil.
Get up. Fight them. Franco.
Hands grabbed the front of my shirt near my throat. A knife slipped under my collar and down the length of my shirt. When the knife reached the bottom, I jerked my hands up, wrapped the handcuff chain around his wrists and rolled to plant my knees in his ribcage. I turned my wrists, my arms, until the knife pointed away from me and bucked upward, using my body to force the blade in to the hilt.
My feet kicked frantically at the boots and pants but couldn’t seem to break free of the laces.
The face over me belonged to a younger version of Rayford. It held fear and pain, but also surprise. Mine must have bordered on animalistic, a lumpy mask of purple and red.
I jerked one foot free, rolled, and wrapped my right leg around his neck, followed him over until I was looking down at him. I tightened my grip on his neck and pulled out the knife. His arms grabbed my elbow, tried to push me off. I brought the knife down into his chest, where he’d have pledged allegiance. Yanked it out and brought it down again between his collarbone and neck.
I watched the light go out of his eyes and felt the weight of what I’d done hit me. Felt the cuts on my arms and hands, felt the thick wound to the muscles across my stomach.
A hand yanked me backward by my hair.
“Dammit, bitch.” He hurled me around into the wall of the cabin. It wasn’t hard. I was cold, bloody and broken. I tripped over the pants hanging from my left leg, which still leaked blood.
“Always in everyone else’s business. Always where no one wants you.”
I tugged my hands against the cuffs. The metal dug into my skin, ripped at the flesh. I pulled harder.
“Just give up. Give in.”
“Never.”
He smiled. “Good. Don’t make it easy. Let me tear you down slowly.”
He held a pistol, what looked too much like a SIG Sauer P226, at his side. Uncle Phil’s missing gun. My missing gun. He held it out slightly and fired three times at the deck. Two kicked up splinters near my bare feet; one took off my smallest toe before hitting the w
ood below.
“Ah, saw you flinch.” He grinned.
My ears rang. “Did you kill Eric?”
“Eh. It’s tragic to lose a lover like that. But he was weak. Couldn’t handle changes in the business model.”
“Why hurt Charley? Why bother?”
“Men always want to protect their women, daughters, wives. They’ll do anything you ask if you threaten the people they want to protect.” He leered at me. “Women? They won’t even fight to save their own kids.”
“You had Charley confused with a mother?”
He held up a small, white pill. “I suppose you recognize this? Well, maybe not. GHB and ketamine are easier to spike coffee with.”
“Why? Look at me. You need drugs to kill me?”
“I still hear your spirit. I want to hear it break.”
Don’t panic.
Kill him.
He rested the barrel of the pistol on my nose, on a bruise I didn’t remember, and left a burn. “Open wide.”
I shook my head slightly, my own actions earlier that day not lost on me.
“Oh, you’ll take it. And then we’ll have some fun, you and I. Or, maybe just me.”
Run.
Fight.
“Ah, maybe you’re thinking you’ve been here before. That I can’t teach you anything new. But that’s the point, isn’t it? You need everything to be on your terms. You need to be in control.”
I stared at him, evaluated which parts of my body could still respond to commands. Which parts of him were vulnerable and within reach.
“Even now, you’re thinking you’re strong enough.”
He leaned into the gun, pushing my crooked cartilage until it gave.
Pain erupted in my face and I cried out involuntarily.
His hand slipped past my lips, my teeth, like I was a dog in need of heartworm medication. His fingers shoved the pill into my throat.
I bit, clamped down on his fingers.
He jerked free, hard enough to dislodge a tooth. His stance shifted.
I stepped to the side, brought my arms up and hit his forearm with mine. The gun discharged. The bullet tore through the top of my ear. I kneed him in the crotch, nearly blacked out, kept the gun off to the side as best I could.