by Paula Cox
I feel like a dog that’s been kicked. Jager has never admonished me before, especially not in front of my inferiors. I bow my head, looking at my fingers and palms for answers. “I hear you, Jager. I hear you.” My hand knots into a tight ball, which I slam down hard on the wood table top, “But I can’t just sit here and wait. That’s my daughter!”
He reaches over and places a hand on my shoulder, trying to ease me back down. “Walton, do you know where they are keeping her or not?”
Walton’s stringy, high-pitched voice fills the deep stillness of the room, “Well, Cal managed to talk to Maddie for around eight minutes and two seconds. I needed him to go for at least nine to get an accurate location—"
“DAMMIT! DAMMIT! DAMMIT!” I am on my feet again pacing. This is not the news I expected.
“But! I do have an area to target. And luckily, part of that area is covered by a highway.” He turns the screen my way, and a map pops up. He has drawn a large red circle over the area, and, as he said, most of the area inside the boundaries is a stretch of highway I’m very familiar with.
I lean in closer, noting all of the street names and the mile markers. In my head, I’m piecing together bits of my regular rides as if it will help me spot where the Coyotes would have taken her. “I know that part of the highway. I used to ride it to get to Chris’ repair shop to do inventory and check-ins. That is, until I burnt it down a few days ago with Ryan.”
“That has to be where she is, Cal.” Ace stands next to me, pointing towards where the repair shop is located on the map. “Maddie said something about it being smoky. Maybe she meant it smelled like smoke or the air was still smoky. If they are holding her at a part of the repair shop that wasn’t destroyed, it will still reek of the burn. And most repair shops have those underground areas to do oil changes. That could explain why there isn’t any windows.”
I look at him, totally deadpan, before I burst out at him, “You’re right! You’re motherfucking right. They have to have her there. There’s nowhere else on this map that would fit that description.” A million thoughts are racing through my head as I rummage through my jacket for my keys.
I’m nearly out the door before I turn around. No one has moved or begun to follow me. They are all still sitting there waiting for Jager to make the call. I stand by the door pleading with them, “What are we waiting for? What are we doing?”
“We can’t just go in there. That’s what they are expecting. They’ll execute them before we can get through the front door. We need a plan.” Jager turns back to his men. His hands rest upon his head as he leans back lazily. “What do you have, guys.”
There’s silence as everyone hunches down a bit lower. Finally, Red Dog clears his throat. “If we can’t charge in, we have to go in bit by bit. We’re in a war right now, there’s no doubt about it. This is our chance to lay it out all on the line, our chance to say no more. I say we go in for a three pronged attack.”
He pulls the computer out of Walton’s hands and types in a web address. A map again pops up, but this one has three points designated. I walk towards the table to see what he has in mind.
“First, we send our main crew, the young guns, and some of the newer enforcers out to attack their clubhouse again. The attack lasts two hours. After the first half hour, enough time for them to inform the other Coyotes what’s going on, we send the seconds and main enforcers to head out towards the warehouse where they do the main distributions. It won’t be guarded, but as soon as we make our move, their seconds and top teams will respond leaving Chris’ repair shop open. That’s when we go in – the Alpha Squad. We go in quickly, quietly, and we take down Addison Bell and the Mountain from there.”
Jager looks at him long and hard before leaning forward in his chair and reaching out his hand. “That’s brilliant, Red. They won’t see us organizing and hitting three at once.” He begins writing down a list of names and placing them in columns. A large map of the city is pulled out from his supplies in his basement office. He circles spots, drawing lines. It’s as if we are a football team getting our plays right rather than motorcycle club members on the attack.
He uses sticky notes to place men at each of the spots. Red Dog and Ace stand next to him arguing who goes where and the vantage points to be used. But I stay in the background. I’m too emotional to make this my mission. This needs men who have their head in the game, not men who are transfixed on the idea that the two people he cared for most were getting slaughtered in the down time.
There’s another part of me, though, that is longing to jump in. That part of me aches knowing those names and the people they belong to won’t be making it out of the places we are sending them to. I feel like I should be the one putting their name down in that black ink, the one condemning them to being shot at, to being taken, to being killed. I’m signing their funeral receipts. I’m the one issuing them to say goodbye to their own daughters and women. But the ultimate sacrifice is worth it for this club. And these are the decisions that have to be made. So I keep my head down, my mouth shut.
When Jager is done, he stands and holds the paper up with the three columns. Each of us, his main crew, gets one final look at it, and we nod our approval solemnly. No one is going to argue about any of it now that Jager has set it in stone. This is Jager’s call, and questioning this death list would be like questioning George Washington as he sends his troops to battle.
When we all confer, he hands the list to Walton, who begins the phone, email, and text message chain. Road captains slowly file into the clubhouse as Red Dog runs through the plan over and over and over again, making sure everyone is clear on what is supposed to be happening when and where they are going to be positioned at. There are lookouts, guards for our clubhouse, men to drive the ammo cars. Even some of the more fierce women of the club are recruited to take part by helping back at the clubhouse with the wounded who are brought in. Three of them even offer to take over if the shit gets too hot.
But when everything's said and done, within two hours time, everyone has been alerted. Everyone knows their station. We’re ready to ride. Red Dog, Ace, and I, the members of the recovery team positioned at the repair shop, set our watches to synchronize. At one o’clock, we ride out to rescue my daughter. At one o'clock, we save my girls.
I walk silently towards my motorcycle parked near the rear. The clubhouse has gone quiet in anticipation; the windows are, again, boarded up in case of another attack. The only souls left outside are my team. Before I rev up my engine, I place my hands on the bars and grip tightly. I look up towards the sky and ask that whatever higher power that’s up there is listening to me now. This is my chance to do what I said I would do. If it takes my own life to bring Maddie and Michelle back home to me alive, so be it. I just hope that sacrifice is enough in the end.
Chapter 30: Metal on the Ground
MICHELLE
It’s back to pitch black. No sights. No light. No bit of hope for any of the three of us down here. Outside, I can hear the men screaming at one another, each of them shouting louder than the next. There are a couple more shots of the gun, each one of them sending shivers down my spine and shaking me to my core. I cover my head with my hands, trying to drown out the noise with my sweaty palm, but they still come, unpredictable and chaotic.
And then there’s Maddie. She’s hysterical now, crying out for her dad as if her saying it loud enough will make it come true. Her sobs are heavy and full of tears I can practically hear as they fall down her face in the dark.
She still hasn’t moved from the spot they dropped her at as far as I can tell. But I can’t seem to make myself to find her. I am too afraid that if any of us make a sudden movement, the men upstairs will hear us and have reason to put us next on their hit list. Though, realistically, I already know we are.
I can hear a man standing above where I am sitting. It’s the same man from before, the one who walked in on Maddie taking that phone call. His voice echoes off of the plank and through the broke
n pipes loud enough so it even catches Maddie’s attention. “What the fuck do you mean they’re at the clubhouse? Who is there? Who is guarding it?”
I sit up straighter as he goes on raging. “If those fuckers think they can mess with us in our own turf, they have another thing coming from them.” He pauses as he plots his counterattack. “Tell the boys at the house to hold it down until I can get ahold of some reinforcements. Send Pedro and Tom-Tom their way to flank them in the alleyway. Then call in Yazoo and his boys to take care of them from the back. They’ll never know what is coming for them!”
He laughs long and hard, the floor shaking as he beats his foot into the ground. The idea of laughing over a war is beyond me, let alone gleefully sending in troops of friends and family to do the dirty work. But the man above me isn’t just a regular guy; he isn’t even like Cal. The invitation of death is like a calling for him, and I can tell how eager he is to get out there and join them just from the dripping tone of his voice. But he’s disappointed. He’s got to pull rank here to guard over us. After that phone call, I doubt he can trust any of his men to obey his orders completely, especially when it comes to an innocent little girl like Maddie.
I, on the other hand, should be excited, even thrilled. The attackers going after the clubhouse with such force have to be Cal and the Mustangs. But my heart is sitting at the bottom of my stomach as I think of the men dying for absolutely nothing. They’re at the wrong place, probably at least five miles away from us! While they are attacking the empty clubhouse, we’re probably closer to death than ever. And what will happen when Cal finds he comes up empty handed? I shake my head, trying to erase the thoughts of him seeing us lifeless and long cold.
“Michelle? Miss Springer?” Maddie is whispering low. I turn my attention back to her and crawl slowly towards her voice. “Where are you? I can’t see you.”
I shh her, like the practiced teacher I am. She can’t be heard right now. It’s more dangerous than ever for us to get any bit of attention. I quickly find my way through the dark to where she is laying, her head facing the ceiling and her arms clasped tightly around her waist. I sit up next to her, finding a support beam to rest my back on. I grab her arms and lay her head on my lap as I say, “We can’t talk loudly down here. If we can hear them, they can hear us. And we don’t want to make any noise. Do you understand me?”
She nods her head yes and rolls towards my stomach, talking as low as possible in my shirt so even I have to bend lower to hear her. “Did you hear what that guy said? He said someone was attacking the clubhouse. Do you think it’s my dad?”
I hesitate. Should I tell her her dad is headed towards a horrific death and that he’s not anywhere near us or should I save her hopes? I go with the best answer I can muster. “I don’t know for sure, Maddie. But whoever is attacking the clubhouse is making them very nervous and mad.”
A flicker of light from the window dances near us as I get a quick sparkle of her tear filled eyes. “It has to be them. The Mustangs wouldn’t just leave me here. Right?”
“I am sure your dad is doing whatever he can to get you and Erin out of here as fast as possible.” My voice cracks as I try to get the last words out, “We just have to be patient.”
Maddie scoffs, “Patient? My dad would never be patient. We should be attacking them…you know, kicking them in the butt and stealing their guns and stuff. My dad wouldn’t let them do any of the shit – oh, um, sorry, crap – that they’re doing to us.”
I try to hold back a little laugh. But she’s right in theory. With Cal miles away from us and distracted by the war he just started, it’s up to us to save ourselves. No more damsels in distress. I think back to what I saw the moment the men dropped Maddie back down in the basement. There was a glitter, a glimmer, something shiny that caught my eye. My hands run through her hair, almost immediately finding it.
I yank the hairpin out, her curls going flying. She lets out a small yelp as her hands shoot to the knots I accidentally pulled. “What are you doing, Michelle? That’s my hair!”
I hold my hands over her mouth. This little object is our biggest weapon, and if we were going to use it, we were going to need the art of surprise on our side. No giveaway, nothing. I find Maddie’s hands in the dark and hold them up towards my face. I place the hairpin in and begin rocking it back and forth, twisting it side to side, just as I had seen in all those movies. Nothing. No clicks, no movement, no loosening.
Maddie pulls her hands away and sits up next to me. She takes the pin out of my hand and I can practically make out the corners of her lips shooting up into a smile. “Miss Springer!” I shh her again as she excitedly whispers into my ear, “You’re amazing! Red Dog taught me how to pick locks when I was three years old! I can do this.”
I’m frozen as she takes the pin and places it into her own lock. She fidgets around with it, even placing the cold metal to her ears. Her eyes squint as she concentrates on finding just the right spot…and click. The cuffs fall to her lap as both of us look at one another, dumbstruck by how easily it worked. She pauses before wrapping her arms around me tightly, pulling me into one of the most important hugs of my life.
After a few beats, she lets go of me and places the pin in my lock. But I shake her off. “Not me. Not yet, at least. We need to get Erin out of her ASAP, and we can’t do that easily if we don’t have her cuffs off. Can you do hers, too?”
Maddie nods as she crawls to where Erin still lies still, just feet from us. I take her discarded cuffs with me just in case we need them and then follow her stealthy moves. This time, she talks me through her lock picking. “Red Dog always said to start by using the big part of the lock to bend the pin back, then take zigzag part of the pin and bend it in half there so the zigzag faces the inside. Like a real key! Then you just need to figure out how to line the zigzag part up with the pins and stuff inside…” She looks down at Erin’s wrists as she twists and turns it repeatedly. “...and then it comes off!”
Maddie holds Erin’s cuffs above her head, high enough for me to see them. I grab them out of her hand and place them back on Erin’s wrists, being careful not to click them into place. I give Maddie hers back as well and explain that she has to keep them on her in case a guard came down. “They can’t know about this, or we are in big trouble. Just keep one of them on like a bracelet.”
She nods as she holds on tight to her pair. She then sits down across from me and pulls my arms towards her. “Your turn!” she says almost brimming with excitement.
But I stop her. Something has changed. The man upstairs is yelling again. This time, he isn’t as joyful as the last time we could make him out. “So what you’re fucking saying to me is that the Mustangs managed to not only attack the clubhouse but also the warehouse? Who the fuck let this happen? Where are Yazoo and his guys? What do you mean they’re at the clubhouse? Who the hell is guarding the warehouse?” He pauses, listening to answers we cannot hear. “Well then you better have a damn good plan, because if even an ounce of product gets messed with, I am going to kill each and every one of you peon amateurs! Do you hear me?”
Another man enters, his voice much more subdued than the other. I stand up a bit, ducking to avoid hitting my head, “Addison, what would you like us to do, then? Should we stay here or help the guys at the warehouse?”
Addison, their apparent leader, screams right back at the man, “You’re going to go down there and see that those pussies get their fill of lead today. But before you go, we’re going to take care of the cargo here. Go get the nearly dead one first. She’s nothing to Cal or the rest of the Mustangs. She’s going first. We’ll send them pictures of her head.”
My heart jumps as I hear footsteps approaching. I hurriedly say to Maddie, “Don’t make a sound. No matter what happens. Don’t take those cuffs off, and don’t make a sound.” I stutter for a second before I grab her messy hair and head in my hands and pull her in for a quick kiss on the forehead. “I love you, Maddie. Erin and I love you. Your dad loves you.
And you’re going to be fine. We’re going to get you out of here.”
The door opens as Maddie and I both quickly shuffle away from the bottom of the stairwell and out of sight of the man walking slowly down the stairs. He pulls out a flashlight and points it down at the ground. He spots it on Maddie first as she is lying in a heap on the ground, pointed away from him. He then finds me up against the same wall I was before, my head resting upon my knees as I pull myself tightly in. Then, he finds Erin and he makes his move.
He kneels down to examine her, taking her pulse and brushing the hair from her eyes. He then drapes Erin’s body over his shoulders, as if they were partners doing a ballroom dance. The man turns back to face Maddie and I, his light flashing back and forth at where we lay. As he and Erin’s body goes to turn to take the first step, there’s a clink as something metal falls to the floor.
I look on in horror as I see Erin’s handcuffs drop at his feet and his eyes dart up towards where I am sitting, stunned and more fearful than ever. We’ve been exposed.
Chapter 31: Ramshackle
CAL
The rumble, the noise, the sound of shouts and screams – it all hits me instantly as I pull up my cycle to the action. I’m about thirty feet back from the frontline where the boys wearing Mustang jackets are ducking behind bushes and trees, discarded truck tires and shot out cars. Weren’t we just here weeks ago at the other side of the broken glass windows?