by Nicole Fox
“Now back away,” he continued, and, slowly, my mind whirling for options, I did so. Distantly, I heard the ding of my phone as it went to voicemail.
With me defenseless, the driver leveled his gun at my chest while the second guy finished stuffing Thunder into the back. He slammed the doors and wiped his hands with a satisfaction that boiled my insides with anger. Then, he marched around and hopped into the passenger seat.
“Your friend is ours now,” the driver sneered, backing to the door, his gun trained on me the entire time.
The first flicker of panic––real panic, not controlled fear––surged through me.
“Why?” I demanded, lunging forward. “What do you want with him?”
The driver grinned and jumped into the seat. “Go back to the room we stole him from,” he growled. “An old friend is waiting to speak with you.”
“An old friend? What the hell does that mean?”
The asshole winked, slammed the door, and with that, they drove away. I forced myself to watch, even as they disappeared into the distance.
“Don’t worry, Thunder,” I murmured. “I’ll find a way to get you safe.”
My heart and my mind set, I turned around, and jogged back to the clubhouse.
# # #
When I arrived, the club was in an uproar.
“Dominic! Jesus Christ!”
It was Tristan, running towards me as I entered through the doorway.
“What happened?” He demanded, as the rest of the group surged around me.
“Thunder is gone,” I said dryly. “He’s been kidnapped.”
“Why?” “By who?” The questions bounced around the room like bullets.
“I can’t be sure, but I’m guessing the Crooked Jaws. I don’t know why. They must want something from us.”
“But what?”
“Hey boss, over here!” It was Fernando, emerging from the back room where Thunder had been kidnapped. I rushed over, thinking he had found a clue, and was surprised when he handed me a cell phone.
“This was on the table,” he said, “right where Thunder slept. I don’t recognize it.”
“Me, either,” I admitted. “It’s not Thunder’s.”
I scrutinized it, holding it close to my eyes for examination, and yet I found nothing remarkable. It had no saved contacts. There were several missed calls.
“Hey, Fernando, do you know this number––”
Before he could answer, the phone began to ring.
I hesitated, glanced at Fernando, and then answered.
“Hello?”
“Hello, Dom, old friend,” a rough, growling voice replied. “I’d wondered when you’d pick up.”
My heart skipped a beat.
It was not an old friend, but my oldest enemy. Marco “La Gancho” Herrera.
The Hook.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Dominic
Marco’s voice hit me like a bucket of icy water, and all at once I felt my memories overwhelming me, from all those years ago when I, Dominic Molina, nothing but a young prospect for the Broken Spires, burst my way through the barroom door, like a cowboy entering a tavern. Back then, my leather jacket was still new and shiny, without the ten years of violence and road dust to dampen its impressive glistening. I was skinnier then too––less muscular, but quicker for it. And man, did I have attitude. You could see it in my swagger, in that stupid, cocky grin, and the way I drew all eyes towards me as soon as I entered the room. It would take me several years to learn that ostentation is not the same as impressiveness.
That night, I walked right up to the other prospects of the Broken Spires, and lorded over them, already confident in my place of authority.
“This bar was a good idea, hey guys?” I gloated, sitting beside them and ordering a double whiskey. “Not even full members yet, and already we’re staking out new bars as our own.”
The rest of my friends grinned and raised their glasses to me––all except one, who shifted nervously in his seat. It was Thunder––a version ten years younger––and he sipped his rum without smiling.
“I would be careful, Dom,” he said quietly. “This was not on the club’s orders. If things go wrong, the Broken Spires won’t protect us.”
I––the younger version of myself––scowled at him, but I tucked away my peacock feather preening and sat down nonetheless. Thunder was wise even then. Wiser than most of us.
Still, I could not be contained. My energy and my ambition would not allow for it. So, this time, I leaned in and said in a much quieter tone, “All we need to do is make sure that they are more scared of us than we are of them. You all got your weapons?”
Nods and grunts of affirmations around the table. We did not have guns yet, but each of us had been armed with some sort of bladed weapon.
I’d had an ox-bone-handled knife. It had been my father’s before he’d died, and I’d gone running to the Broken Spires, armed with his weapon and an attitude.
“Good,” I said. “Be prepared for trouble. And if you see a Crooked Jaw, you know what to do.”
This really was what I was telling them. To attack first and ask questions later. To deliberately start a barroom brawl, with dozens of innocents surrounding us. This was how young I was. How naive.
We continued to drink, laugh, and exchange bawdy stories, getting louder and more reckless with every round we consumed. Eventually, Thunder prodded my shoulder to get my attention.
“That guy over there,” he whispered, surreptitiously pointing. “He’s been watching us for at least an hour.”
I glanced over. It was just some young guy, sipping his drink and glaring at us in silence. My first instinct was to laugh. He was about five-five and probably weighed fifty pounds less than I did.
“So what?” I snapped at Thunder. “I’m not afraid of that skinny litter fucker.”
Thunder glowered at me. “It’s not the skinny little fucker we should be afraid of. It’s what he might represent.”
“Oh, fuck it,” I said, rising to my feet. I could feel my aggression surging through me, muddled and yet amplified by the booze, and I marched right over to the man Thunder had pointed out.
“Hey, asshole,” I said, slamming my boot down on the chair next to him. “You have a problem?”
He looked up at me with cold, calculating eyes.
“That depends,” he growled. “If you and your buddies get up and leave this bar right now, and never come back, then no, we have no problem. If, however, you insist on staying, then we are going to have to talk.”
I scowled, then threw back my head in terrible, mocking laughter. “Who are you to make us leave, huh? I’m enjoying myself, and I’d like to stay. How about you, boys?” I turned to call back to me fellows. They all cheered approval and raised their glasses. Emboldened by their approval, I decided to turn this little bastard’s demands over on their head.
“So, little buddy,” I said scathingly, “I think it is you who is going to have to leave.”
The man smiled. “Pity,” he said. “You seemed smarter than that.”
And then, he drew a gun.
“Watch out!” Thunder cried, charging up behind me and knocking me to the floor just as the gun went off.
BOOM!
It was not the first time I had heard a gunshot, but it was the first time a gun that had been leveled at me had gone off.
People screamed and started running. Distantly, I noticed the sparking as the bullet hit a light, and the bartender dove behind the bar. Thunder rolled away, freeing me, but rather than rushing towards safety I reared up like a snake and threw myself right at the man’s ankles. With a grunt, he toppled to the ground, firing wildly into the air. The hand holding a gun struck a chair, dropped it, and I saw the gun skitter away beneath the seats.
By this point, two shots had been fired, the bulk of the bar’s customers were streaming or had already streamed through the exit, and the bartender was crouched behind the safety of the bar, frantica
lly dialing 911. Thunder was with me, but all the other prospects had fled with the crowd.
I leaped to my feet. So did the man. Our eyes met, and I saw my own brutal calculation mirrored in his own. Our thoughts matched: what to go for––the exit or the gun?
A flicker of hesitation crossed his eyes, and I seized my chance.
“Run!” I roared, grabbing Thunder and hurling the two of us towards the closest door: the one that led to the kitchen. In a flash, I saw the man diving for the gun behind me.
We burst in. A chef, emerging with a tray-full of burger patties from one of those huge, walk-in freezers, screamed, threw his load into the air, and bolted for the exit––all the way across the kitchen.
“Come on!” Thunder said, urging me forward, but I hesitated. It was a long, open stretch of space, with little protection. And the armed man would be bursting his way through the kitchen door any second. I didn’t think we would make it.
“Wait!” I cried. “I have an idea!”
I grabbed him, seized the handle of the open door to the freezer, and flung myself behind it. There, I saw a heavy tower of cookware, and I ordered Thunder behind it.
“Push when I say go,” I hissed, and the two of us crouched, out of sight, just behind the freezer door.
A second later, the armed man burst in. He looked right, towards the back of the kitchen, straight ahead, towards the freezer, and then left, across the kitchen to the exit, whose door was still swinging from the chef.
He grinned, and marched slowly towards the exit, his gun raised.
“Ready?” I mouthed to Thunder. He nodded.
Any second, the man would pass next to the freezer door, the fog spilling from it licking his heels. He even sidestepped, closer to its threshold, to avoid the frozen burger patties, scattered all over the floor…
“Now!” I roared, and threw myself at the door with all of my strength. It swung, catching the man in the shoulder and sending him stumbling into the freezer. I kept up my momentum, slamming the door to close him in, with Thunder and his steel tower to block the door once he was inside–
No! The guy was fast! His hand shot out, catching himself against the frame of the door before I could knock him down. He steadied himself, regaining his balance, while all the while the door kept closing.
“Argh!” It slammed, with all the force I could muster, against his hand. Even over his scream, I could hear the cracking of bone, while blood spattered the floor in the deep ravine the impact had opened across his knuckles.
The door bounced back. It could not latch with his hand there. And while he was injured and roaring with pain, he was still armed. And dangerous.
“Get back!” I cried, ramming against the door again. It closed upon his hand again, crushing it, so that blood now flowed freely from the cut. His fingers twitched and curled, and white splinters poked out from his blackened skin.
“Let go!” I cried, and with every scream, I bashed the door again. “Let go! Let go!”
Why did he cling on? I’d close him in, and we’d all be safe.
And then I noticed. His sleeve, caught on the latch, keeping the mutilated remains of his hand pinned there.
I lunged forward, sneaking out from behind the cover of the thick metal door just long enough to grab it and yank it free. I seized upon it. The man roared, and for the briefest moment, our eyes met.
Hatred is what I saw there. Pure, unadulterated hatred.
BOOM! The door slammed shut. A split second later Thunder was there, shoving the tower of cookware forward so that it blocked the door to the freezer.
Thump! I heard a muffled cry of agony as the man threw himself against it, but our barrier held. He did not fire his gun. He must have been afraid of the ricochet.
“I’ll kill you for this!” He bellowed, his voice muffled by the door. “I’ll fucking kill you!”
I stared, momentarily frozen, at the door frame. It was splattered with blood, as if someone had brought a hammer on a tomato on the very spot.
Now, it was Thunder’s turn to save the day.
“Come on!” He ordered, shoving me away from the ghastly sight and out through the kitchen. We burst into the free night air, leapt upon our bikes, and were outta there.
If I had seen my own face that night, as we were riding away, I would not have known if I were wearing a smile or a grimace of terror. I had just had my first real sip of violence, my first real drink of blood. It had made my heart thunder, and made me sick to my stomach,
And yet, I’d found I’d liked the taste.
# # #
Back in the present, my own heart thundered. That’s how powerful this memory was––and all brought up by that single man’s voice. The president of the Crooked Jaws. A once-lowly prospect, who had had his hand brutally mutilated in a barroom brawl, by another lowly prospect––one who’d had no business starting that fight at all.
By me.
And now, all these years later, I was paying for it.
“What do you want?” I demanded. Despite my terror, the phone was steady in my hand.
“Oh, no, dear Dominic. It’s what you want,” Marco sneered. “You see, I have two people you love here with me. And if you ever want to see them alive, and uh, unspoiled, again, you must come alone, unarmed, to the Crooked Jaw Compound at midnight tonight. Understood?”
My thoughts were whirling. “Two people?” I gasped. “What do you mean, two people?”
I heard a chuckle. If a death’s head could laugh, that was what it would sound like.
“Midnight, Jasy-Baby,” he sneered.
Click.
I stared at the phone, now dead in my hands. Two people? Two people? What did he mean?
I glanced around at my men, all assembled to find out what was going on, to see if anyone else was missing. Fernando. Dorian. Tristan. All of them. Who the hell was he talking about?
Suddenly, my heart stopped. Erica!
Frantically, I dug for my own phone, wanting to call her, to prove that my fear was unfounded. As I ripped it from my pocket, I noticed a little blinking light––that voicemail from before.
“No…” I murmured. I pressed to play it back, and held it to my ear. This time, my hand was trembling.
“Dominic? Dominic!” A terrified, jumbled voice slurred. “Please, I need your help! They’re after me, and––”
A muffled jumble as the phone was yanked from her hand. Then, I heard something even worse than Erica’s desperate cry: Marco’s laughter.
“Better hurry, Jasy-Baby, or your little piece of ass is gonna have a new cock to suck.”
Click.
“You bastard!” I roared, clutching my phone so hard in my fist that the screen cracked. “You filthy, evil, motherfucking bastard!”
Tears of rage in my eyes, I hurled the phone across the room, where it shattered against the wall. Marco’s phone––the one he had used to call me––followed a split-second later.
My men looked at me in horror.
“Boss,” Tristan murmured. “What is going on?”
“They’ve got Erica and Thunder, that’s what,” I gasped. My voice sounded harsh and ragged. I had never heard it sound like that before.
“So what are you going to do?” Asked Dorian.
“They want me to go to the compound, alone and unarmed.”
The group gasped in alarm.
“But boss, you can’t! They’ll kill you!”
I replied, “Yes, they probably will.” This time, my voice had steadied. Of all the horrors that were tearing through my thoughts at that moment, the threat of them killing me was so trivial it almost seemed comic. “But I have to go.”
“Why? You don’t need to. Thunder will understand.”
I inhaled deeply, and studied the trail of blood leading out the shattered window. “It’s not about Thunder anymore,” I murmured. “Or even Erica. I love them, and will do whatever I can to rescue them. But that’s not why I must.”
I closed my eyes, thi
nking back on that memory that had just flooded my consciousness. A useless fight picked with an unknown enemy. His hand, crunching and snapping in the door jamb like no more than dried kindling. The look of hatred, when I finally met his eyes.
“No,” I continued. “I must do it because I started this fight. I need to be the one to end it––and to rescue the ones I love.”