[Adventures of Anabel Axelrod 01.0] A Date With Fate

by Tracy Ellen

  Glancing in her side view mirror she shouted in enraged disbelief, “That van rammed us!”

  At the word “van”, I whipped my head around. It was dark. I couldn’t see past everyone’s heads in the back, or through the tinted van windows. I could only see headlights racing up behind us again.

  “He’s coming after us! Hold tight everyone!” I shouted. Tre J was scowling with concentration. “Can you get us back up on the road and go faster?”

  “Oh, hell yeah!” She instantly wrenched the wheel to the left.

  The passenger side of the Chrysler followed and shot up over the ledge of the blacktop shoulder.

  We were level on all four wheels again, but were soon shrieking and yelling in terror because the van went barreling across the middle line and into the headlights of oncoming traffic. Tre J immediately compensated by punching it while sharply yanking the steering wheel back to the right. Fishtailing wildly at first, the van straightened out. We’d made it back into our own lane right before a semi-truck bearing down on us had sailed past in a whoosh of rushing air. The semi’s blasting horn sounded off angrily. The truck had narrowly missed creaming us by a split second.

  Swiveling to look behind, I snapped off my seatbelt while cheering on a white-faced but determined Tre J. “You’re doing great! Go, you wild woman! He’s right on our tail- GO!”

  Jazy screamed a rebel yell while Mac shouted over her, “What’s going on, why is this guy after us?”

  Anna screamed frantically from the back, “It’s the man in the van from today! He’s trying to kill us!”

  I had the duffle bag in my lap, but had to fall on it to keep it from flying when another smack hit us from behind as the killer van crashed into us again. The hit was hard on the back left bumper and caused us to swerve sharply, but not hard enough to knock us off the road this time. Thankfully, Tre J has experience driving big rigs. Now that she knew what was happening, there wasn’t a better person to have behind the wheel. She didn’t panic. She held the van steady and we were pulling ahead while flying at over ninety.

  Jazy yelled out a warning. “Curve’s coming up soon!”

  Tre J nodded grimly. She reluctantly eased her foot off the gas pedal. “Damn! He’s catching up again!”

  There were no headlights in sight coming towards us, so Tre J kept to the middle of the road.

  The three girls in back cried out, “Hold on!”

  The van was rocked violently from the left side, rear bumper once more. The back end tires were hopping and stuttering as they slid out to the right. Tre didn’t hit the brakes, but again took her foot off the gas and went with the slide, only lightly steering. I thought we were going off the road and would flip this time for sure, but then the tires gripped and shot us out forward in the right direction. We all held on for dear life, and then cheered in noisy relief while screaming encouragement to Tre.

  She kept ahead of the van behind us, swerving back and forth in a random pattern to not be such an easy target. There were no oncoming headlights, but the curve was fast approaching. We couldn’t take it going this speed without serious problems.

  Tre was chanting furiously, “Shit, Shit, Shit!”

  I finally had the duffle opened and my Glock out. I slapped in the full magazine and racked the slide to chamber a round. I hit the button to lower my window.

  At the sudden blast of cold wind, Tre J dared a quick glance over at me. A beaming grin the size of the Mississippi broke across her tense face at the sight of the gun in my left hand.

  Jazy saw it and pounded her seat. “Yes! Shoot the crazy fucker, Bel!”

  Mac sat forward to see around my chair. “Get him, Sister!”

  Shouting to be heard over the sound of the air screaming in through my open window and the louder screaming coming from behind me, I instructed Tre. “Go ahead and slow down. Keep to our right to lure him. Let him almost catch up, and then I’m going to hang out the window and shoot back at him. When he gets close you have to swerve to the middle of the road so I have a better shot at him. Got it?”

  Eyes on the road, Tre J let loose a war cry. “Got it!”

  Jazy unbuckled in a flash, knelt between the seats, and faced back. “Don’t worry, I’ll tell you when to shoot!”

  Anna and Mac yelled they’d tell me, too. I quickly turned to the open window and sat on my right knee, angling myself to face backwards. I put my left leg straight out and down, sticking it into the space between the seat and the door, planting myself. I held the gun tightly in my left hand, resting the barrel on the window ledge. I held onto the top of my seat with my right, hugging the headrest.

  Tre slowed down abruptly. The wind had whipped stray strands of my long hair into my face. It was a good thing it was up in a ponytail tonight, or I’d be blinded.

  Anna was saying prayers and shouting play action from her lookout seat in the back. “Let her get him, let us be okay, here he comes, let her get him…here he comes! Oh man alive, Junior, HERE HE COMES!”

  Pulse racing, I was amazingly not scared or nervous. I visualized how I was going to shoot back at the van and where I was aiming. Then I was AWOLing, wondering whether it was possible a person could use up all the adrenaline in their adrenal glands before the body could produce more. I focused abruptly when I felt the van veer over to the left. Bracing myself, and holding tight onto the headrest to prevent falling over between the front seats, I heard three yells of “NOW!”

  I leaned out with the gun. Aiming behind us and to the left, I started pulling the trigger with no hesitation. When shooting, my gun makes the expected booming sound. The noise was deafening without ear protection. That was the last thing I heard for a while.

  The gun jerked in my left hand with the small recoil from each shot, but I knew what to expect. I religiously practiced shooting my weapon on the range at the Dakota County Rifle Club. I held on as steadily as possible with just one hand and fired behind us until the ten shooter clip was empty. I saw tracers from bullets meeting metal or pavement. I couldn’t tell where they were hitting in the blinding mix of glaring headlights and black darkness of the night.

  I leaned back in and ejected the empty clip. I snatched the half-full magazine off the seat under my knee, and prepared to keep shooting.

  That was when I realized our van had slowed to a stop on the side of the road. We were parked under the pool of light cast from one of the infrequent lamp poles along this lonely stretch of highway, about twenty yards past the curve.

  When I had first started to shoot, I’d felt a hand slip down the back waistband of my slacks and firmly clutch a bunch of fabric to hold me steady. I didn’t believe I’d been in danger of falling out of the window, but I now had one heck of a wedgie.

  Squirming on my knees in discomfort, I felt a tap on my right arm. Mac’s face was relieved and smiling. She was motioning behind us.

  I read her exaggeratedly enunciating lips. “He’s gone! He turned around and left!”

  I nodded, grinning widely. I took my finger off the trigger, but still kept the gun in my clenched grip. I wasn’t ready to trust he wouldn’t come back. After a few moments, my hearing was returning a little. Everyone was exclaiming over what had happened and talking at once.

  I raised my voice. “Did I hit him?”

  Anna was jumping with excitement. “I saw sparks bouncing off the van, so you hit that. I don’t know if he got hit, but the maniac slammed on the brakes and turned around. He drove off like a bat out of hell right as we came out of the curve.”

  I grinned over at Tre resting across the steering wheel. “Guess who now has to be sober cabbie all the time? You were unbelievable, girl!”

  Tre J blushed while we all extravagantly complimented her driving skills.

  Jazy smacked my shoulder, laughing. “Speaking of sober; good thing you didn’t drink your tequila tonight or this could have ended much differently.” She shook her head in wonder. “To think we have Candy to thank for stealing your gun in the first place!”

/>   I swore so fluently, Reggie would have been proud. They all burst out in hysterical laughter.

  Tre J calmed down enough to say, “My sister isn’t going to be happy.”

  That set us all off again, and we let out our relief with laughter and jokes about what we’d tell her sister. Seriously, I reassured Tre J that I would take care of her sister’s deductible and rental car if need be. That set off another round of debates, but I held firm. Since I was probably responsible for the man in the van trying to smash us to pieces, I’d pay for any resulting out-of-pocket costs. Tre J’s a struggling student without a pot to piss in until she finishes her schooling and starts work in her field.

  Not knowing when the man in the van had started following us, Mac called and checked in with Stella. She told her an abbreviated version of what had happened. Her friend, Eric George was over, and Stella promised the door was deadbolt locked. She’d put a chair under the knob for insurance.

  We all then climbed out shakily to inspect the damage to the van. I still clutched the Glock tightly in my left hand, but with the barrel pointing down along my thigh.

  Circling the vehicle, we were pleasantly surprised to see only minor damage; a broken left taillight reflector, a few small dents, and white paint scrapes on the back bumper. It had felt much worse.

  In the silence, we all stared at the white paint scrapes. It brought home how close we’d become to being road kill tonight. Strangely, no cars had passed us since the semi that had almost crushed us, and it was eerie standing out in the cold night on the deserted county road. We were all crammed together, so close our arms were touching.

  Tre asked, “Did anyone call 9-1-1?”

  We all looked at each other, nobody saying a word.

  Groaning, I said on a laugh, “Ah, we are SO in trouble!”

  Again, everyone started speaking at once. Mac finally had the loudest, definitive last word. “It happened so fast and we had to save ourselves. It wasn’t safe to try to call the police! What would they have done? Talked us through it?”

  “Good, then you can call Jack and tell him exactly what happened,” I suggested magnanimously. “A call to the police might have nabbed this guy before he could drive away in his killer van and disappear.”

  In the hushed quiet of the night, we stood contemplating our close call and the call we knew we needed to make to Chief Jack. The loud ring tone made everyone jump. By habit, I’d slung my purse over my shoulder when we’d exited the van and it was my phone.

  I saw who it was and answered, “Good God, it’s only been two minutes and I was going to call!”

  Jack Banner’s reply was brusque. “What are you talking about? Never mind, where are you, Anabel? I’m calling to advise you to stay home and locked in tonight, preferably not alone. Make sure your gun is nearby and loaded.”

  He hadn’t heard my news yet, but his didn’t sound so good, either. “Why, what’s going on?”

  “We think we’ve identified the man from today in the van. I have a mug shot for you to check out. If it’s this man, I don’t want to take any chances you might become a target after he saw you in the parking lot today.” Jack’s voice was deadly quiet, a clear indicator of how serious he considered the situation. “He’s a very bad customer, Anabel. He’s a known homicidal-serial rapist.”

  “Holy Crap! Okay Jack, listen to all I have to say before you freak out. First off, we are all fine. I am on the side of Highway 3 a few minutes from Castle Rock. I’m with the girls in Tre’s sister’s minivan. We were going out dancing. On the way, this van came out of nowhere and tried to run us off the road. To make a long story short, I think I’m a target.” Jack was no longer calm. He was swearing loud and long under his breath. “Wait, let me finish. I had my gun in the van because Candy had dropped it off over at Mac’s after she …uh… borrowed it from me, so I shot at him after he rammed us. I shot a full clip. He drove off. We’re alive and the van is okay. What should we do now?”

  “Hold on a minute.” I thought Jack was going to be irate that I was in trouble again, but I heard only concern in his voice. This psycho must be really, really bad. I heard the sound of a door closing in the background. Jack spoke again. “It was lucky for you girls that you had the gun tonight. Christ almighty, why did Candy have your gun in the first place? Have you lost your mind? You know what, never mind. I don’t want to know right now.” I rolled my eyes at Jack’s impatient, unflattering assumptions. “Are you out of ammunition? I assume you didn’t kill him?”

  “I have five rounds left, but he’s gone. Like I said, he took off, so he probably wasn’t dead.”

  Jack sounded irritable. “Let me rephrase. Did you hit him?”

  “No way of knowing.” I was feeling equally irritable.

  “Okay, okay, you did right.” He sighed. “Note where you are for my team and then go to Castle Rock’s. I want you all safe off the road. Stay in the van double-parked near the entrance. I’m sure the man is long gone and you’ll be fine, but keep your eyes out and your gun handy. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

  “Police are on the way,” I told everyone. They had all silently listened to the phone call from my end. I cleared my throat. “Jack said the man is a majorly bad dude, a killer-rapist.”

  We all scurried into the van and locked the doors.

  Tre started the engine and turned on the heater.

  “Jack’s crime fighters will probably need to do whatever they do to the van. I bet we can’t drive it tonight.”

  Tre groaned at my comment while pulling onto the road and heading north once again. I held the loaded gun in my lap. My gun permit is for Concealed Carry, but I don’t believe anyone minded the reassurance of seeing the weapon.

  “Should we keep a look-out in all directions to be sure he doesn’t sneak back? Until the cops come?” Mac suggested.

  “YES!” was the unanimous answer. Everyone was happy to have something to do, even if it was to watch a dark road and the darker fields around us.

  Mac brought up a point I was silently mulling over. “He had to know forcing us off the road while going that fast could kill us all.” She caustically added, “Not that I am complaining he didn’t try to rape us first, but I wonder why he wanted us dead?”

  Anna’s voice was raised and angry. “If he’s partners with that Ron Hansen butthole, I think he wanted to get Anabel for saving Larissa today.”

  “He’s a fucking insane individual, that’s why,” Jazy stated.

  “In a nutshell!” I agreed wholeheartedly, shivering. I peered down the black road behind us, in case talking about the killer conjured him up again like in a Jeepers Creepers flick. Nothing would surprise me tonight.

  There were no further sightings of the van the last couple of miles to the bar. We followed Jack’s instructions and stayed in the van without parking, although we stopped down a few car lengths from the entrance.

  Mac was on the phone with Diego. Jazy was also talking to someone. Tre J and Anna were staring diligently out their opposite windows, scanning the lot and people around us.

  I kept watch out on my side while I was silently debating if I should call Luke. Jack had said I shouldn’t stay alone, and I sure agreed with him. I was seriously freaked out by all that happened. The idea of being stalked by a killer serial rapist was terrifying, even with a loaded Glock 9mm in my hand.

  As if reading my mind, Jazy ended her call and spoke from the back. “Reggie’s insisting we go to his house after we’re done here. I don’t feel like dancing anymore, even if Jack says we can. What do you think? Reg’s having a poker party tonight.” She grinned. “The idea of being surrounded by lots of men sounds appealing.”

  Tre J chuckled. “When doesn’t it? I’m spooked as all hell right now. I vote for your brother’s house.”

  Mac ended her call and had been listening to us. “Diego is picking me up. He’s offered to have one of his employees drive my car here if they are keeping the van. You girls can have wheels,” her big sister gene won
out and she went on, “or maybe you all should come home with me? It’s too bad our night out is cut short, but I agree with Jazy. I want to feel safe at home with my man.”

  Jazy coughed into her fist, “Your boy.”

  Mac stared her down. “What did you say?”

  “I didn’t say anything.”

  “I know you said something.”

  Helpful middle sister that I was, I piped in. “She said ‘your boy’.”

  Mac glared at Jazy with slitted eyes.

  Jazy grinned in return. “Oh, don’t give me that look. You call me your baby sister, right? Is Diego not younger than me?” Jazy continued triumphantly, “Ipso Fatso- he is ‘your boy’!”

  I helped again. “Now she’s talking fancy smack. She’s calling your boy toy a ‘fatty’ in Jazy Latin.”

  Anna burst out laughing while Mac and Jazy turned on me.

  I held up my hands in defense. “Just translatin’…”

  Tre turned in her seat and growled a scary “back off” warning at my sisters.

  We all laughed. It lightened the tense atmosphere in the van. Jazy told Mac she wanted to borrow her car for the night and head for Reg’s. She loved poker. Mac agreed and texted Diego our plans.

  Anna spoke up from the far back, “Mac, if you could drop me off, I want to go home.”

  Tre J peered at her worriedly through the rearview mirror. “Anna, what’s up with that? You don’t want to go to Reg’s and be surrounded by seven or eight dudes with bulging muscles?”

  “Not when I can have Aunt Lily and her cane,” Anna deadpanned.

  We were still snorting when Jack pulled up in his SUV, a uniformed cop riding shotgun. I was relieved to see his craggy, grumpy face. With this psycho on the loose and gunning for me, I was more worried about my sisters and friends then I realized. I didn’t know why this man was after me, but I’d never forgive myself if they were hurt because of something I did. I unloaded my gun and zipped it away in the duffle.