by Paula Cox
“No one knows I’m here. I’m not part of Miranda’s gang,” I lie, moving myself closer into the room. “But I don’t have much time. I’ve gotta get out of here soon to go back to my job.” I hook my hands in the belt loops of my jeans, revealing more of my skin and hip bone. Riley flicks his fingers and the men slowly gather their things, pushing past me with loads of second glances and once overs. I move to the side of the wall, knowing what would have to come next.
As the hood of my jacket falls, the noise in the hallway changes from the dead silence of before. I hear Mack shout for the men to stop, but one has already charged him. A gun goes off and someone falls without so much of a scream. Mack screams, “Get down! Now!”
I turn to look, but he’s on me. Riley grabs me by the stomach, forcing me inside the small basement room. The places smells like vinegar, but his hand around my neck reeks of blood and sweat. “You had to come find me, Anna?” he says into my ear. “You know I have to kill you now and your little bitch boy.”
Mack storms in the room, a gun in his hand. “Let her go, Riley!” His large chest caves in and out as he wipes away a bit of sweat from his forehead. Zeke is nowhere in sight. Is he the person I heard fall to the ground? I try to shift my way out of Riley’s grip to see, but he pulls me away again, this time pressing his own gun to my forehead.
“Well, well, well… Look what we have here. I should have known you would be a damn fool to come find me after the stunt you pulled earlier today. I will say it was impressive of you to manage to kill my guys on the road like that and somehow manage to make it look like an accident. When I started the Knights, they told me that you were going to be the one I need to look up to. I guess I’m going to miss out on all your little secrets when I shoot you through the head.”
“Let Anna go, and you can do whatever the fuck you want to do with me.” Mack keeps his eyes on me, readjusting his finger on the trigger every second or two.
“This whore? You’re really falling for this skank?” He lets out a guttural, belly laugh that rocks up against me. His grip grows tighter around my neck as he spills, “I’m guessing she spread her legs for you like the little bitch that she is? Good. At least you got to enjoy that pussy before I kill you both. It’s a shame to let a piece of tail and a nice set of tits like that go to waste.” Riley’s hand scoots under my shirt and towards my bra as I cry out.
“Oh, don’t worry, Anna,” he says, backing down slightly. “I’m not even thinking about touching you like that. Now that I’m president of my own motorcycle club, I’ve got so much better hoes on speed dial. None of them have those perky tits like yours, but they sure do fuck better than you.” He looks straight at Mack as he asks, “Has she ridden you yet? Did she tell you about how we had sex on that bus to California. Right in the daylight too… the girl didn’t hold back for a dick like mine. Mmmm… Or that time we were in the shower, and I—”
“Shut the fuck up, Riley. Let Anna go and let’s deal with this like men.”
“Touchy, touchy. Someone must be a little jealous of me claiming this chick first. You can have her, Mack—or at least what’s left of her.”
Suddenly, I feel myself falling fast towards the ground. I manage to catch myself with the palm of my hands, but a searing pain shoots through my wrist. I turn back to see Riley standing above me, his legs straddling my hips. The gun is still pointed right at my temple as he squats down before me. I press my arms together, protecting myself. I hear Mack scream something incoherent, but all I can make out is Riley saying, “This is all your fault. If you would have stayed with me, I wouldn’t have had to kill you… or him.”
I watch in horror as he turns the gun away from me. I have no choice but to take the dagger I hid in my hands towards him. I strike his arm first and pull back. It’s covered in blood, but he still manages to shoot. I don’t even look. I continue to slash and slice my way at him. Pieces of his black shirt stick to the side of my blood-soaked hand. He tries to retreat, but I corner him. “No! No! No!” I shout, avoiding looking back. I can’t bear to see it… to see him…
“Anna, we’ve got to go. They’re coming.” Mack takes me by the shoulder, forcing me off of Riley who has fallen in a ball. In my red rage, I haven’t really seen the damage I have managed to make, but the streaks of blood covering my arms, chest, and jeans tell the story. I did my job. I defeated him. The knife drops to my side as I feel my legs buckle. Every bit of energy I had, every stored up dash of adrenaline shooting through my body went to the carnage on the floor. Over the noise, whether in my head or real, Mack cries out my name again. “Anna! Let’s go!”
He tears me away, pulling me back towards the hallway where we came so that I am being dragged on the ground. I hit something hard, a boot and a leg. I look over just in time to get a glimpse of Zeke sitting against the wall, his mouth covered in blood, his hand across his chest near his heart. “Zeke! Oh my God! Zeke!”
“Go…” Zeke calls weakly towards us. Mack doesn’t stop moving. We both listen as he calls towards us, “They’re coming. They’ll be here.” He can’t go on anymore. The color of his skin mutates from tan to pale and purple. I see the life leave him second by second.
Mack cries out, still pulling me alongside of him, “We’ll see you on the other side, brother.”
“I can’t wait,” Zeke says softly before looking away and down at the ground. His head slumps and an arm falls to the side next to the bodies of two men I don’t recognize.
We pass by the room where we came in from. It’s empty now, all except for the girl the man was with earlier. She grabs hold of the strap of her halter dress and dashes for the door. She looks down at us clutching one another and says dreamily, “They’re upstairs getting their guns. If I were you two, I’d be running.”
“Anna…” Mack says, trying to get through to me, but the woman’s warning was enough. I let go of my grip of Mack’s sweatshirt and pull myself forward, throwing myself into the first room. Grasping at the wall, I follow Mack up the stairs and through the open door, Mack pulling me down before the first shot is fired. It ricochets off the metal handle, just inches from where I am.
“They don’t know it’s us! Get the fuck down so I can call them.” He takes out his phone and begins to dial. It rings loudly over more gunshots directed at our only way out.
“We don’t have time, Mack! They’re coming!” I whisper urgently. “We have to go!”
Mack turns his head away and places a finger to his ear. “It’s me! We’re in the basement trying to get out. Stop shooting for a minute and just cover us. I need a car at the entrance right now. Do you hear me, Rico?”
The phone drops to the ground, shattering at his feet. Mack spins towards the entrance of the door to shoot at a shadow I didn’t even notice. It falls with a yell I’m not sure is even human. Mack doesn’t look back as he screams at me, “You need to run, Anna! Get the fuck out of here!”
“I’m not leaving without you!” The sound of men tearing down the basement steps becomes louder. Their boots echo off the cinderblock walls and through the long tube of a hallway. I grab hold of Mack’s neck, making it clear that I’m not going anywhere unless he’s with me. It’s the promise he made me, and I’m going to give up just yet.
“Anna! Now! Move it!” He pushes me aside and with the back of his boot, slams the basement door open. Outside, I hear them shouting—Mack’s club surrounds the building with tribal yells and signals I am guessing are directed to their president. With Mack firing his gun again, this time striking someone square in the chest, I have no choice to go anywhere but up. I pull him with me as I climb the stairs, Mack shooting off his gun until the last bullets left.
Outside, it’s begun to rain again. The smell of soaked autumn leaves, acid, and warm copper settles around me as the wind picks up. For a moment, I stand there in the dark, soaked and disoriented. Mack grabs my hand, pulling me into him. I feel his hand slide down my shirt and to my pants. He pulls out the gun I had forgotten I had, and then
pushes me away. Over the rain hitting the tin roof of the porch before us and the shouts of men coming in every direction, he says, “You’ve got to run, Anna! I’ll be behind you! Don’t look back, and don’t stop!”
I spin and find two headlights in the near distance. It’s about a two-hundred yard sprint, and I don’t look away for one second of it. My mind closes to everything but those lights. I blank out the sound of Mack screaming, the pings of bullets striking the fence and home, the blue and red streaks of police coming from down the hill. I just run. I run for Zeke who still lies on the bottom of that cement floor, for Riley whose flesh is in my fingernails and on my clothes, and for Mack who disappears from my side with my gun as his only companion.
I run until I find those two lights. Without even thinking, I slip myself into the backseat and turn towards the lawn. Everyone is running now, trying to make it out before the police can nab them. Black figures dart across the street and through puddles. It’s hard to tell if anyone is your enemy or your friend. Rico turns the heat up of the old beat-up Mazda before turning back to me to say, “We’ve got to go Anna.”
I pull myself forward, grabbing his shoulder. My stained hands leave red marks on his cream colored shirt. “No, Rico! We’re not going without him.” I hold him there in a makeshift chokehold, knowing that he could overpower me if he tried, but he doesn’t and together we stare out at the grass until he appears at the back door of the car.
“Anna!” Mack screams at the door, his hands pressed against the glass as he attempts to see in through the tinted window and the streaking rain. His fists pound again into the side of the car. “Anna!”
I push the door open, slipping out of the car. “You’re alive! Mack! You’re alive!” Despite everything, he wraps his arms around me and pulls me in as tight as he can. And I say the only words that I can manage, “I love you, Mack. I love you so much.”
CHAPTER 17
It’s funny how fast life seems to bounce back and forth between pure, unadulterated hell and whatever you might think is “normal.” One minute, you’re watching your girl slaughter her old boyfriend in his drug den mansion while your best friend lies spread eagle in a pool of his own blood, and the next, you’re sitting in your sister’s new restaurant with a cold beer in your mug.
It’s not that those images from Riley and the Knight’s hideout will go away. Even for a guy like me that has seen his fair share of blood and gore in person, some things stick with you like the marrow on your bones. It just grows and spreads until it becomes a part of who you are. You walk around with shit like this juggling itself in your mind, pretending that it isn’t haunting you at night.
Anna, on the other hand, hasn’t been able to take it all in like me. Even when we’re out and around town like a normal couple, she looks as if she’s walked out of a war. She’s lost at least five pounds since that night, which look like twenty on a skinny thing like her. Her face looks sunken in on itself, while her cool eyes look tired and worn down. Sometimes, her ruby red stained lips open as if she wants to scream, but nothing comes out.
She sits across the table from me, drumming her hands on the white linen tablecloth. Occasionally—usually due to the sound of the door closing behind a new customer—she turns quickly in her chair like a cornered animal. It’s insanely physical: her whole body spins while her hands shoot up and lock around her neck in a defensive posture. This time, I reach over for her hand, preventing her from losing sight of me.
“Anna,” I said soothingly, “it’s okay. We’re at my sister’s restaurant. We’re getting a meal. You’re out of work. I’m with you. Everything is fine.” I regret saying the last part as soon as it leaves my mouth. I said that to her before, a few days after we had escaped that death basement with Riley’s blood on both of our hands. She had woken up from a nightmare with tears streaming down her eyes. I placed my arms on her shoulders and said gently, “I’m with you. Everything is fine.”
Without a pause, she whipped her head towards me, her hands pushed up against my chest and away from me as she cried out wildly, “Are you fucking kidding me, Mack? It’s not fine! Of course it’s not fine! Nothing is fine! Zeke is dead, Mack, and… and I killed a man. I killed Riley! And who knows who else we hit when we left that place or if they’re after us!” Her head sunk low as she asked herself frantically, “What are we going to do? How did we get here?”
That night, I packed up our home in the locked up subdivision and sent her away. She left behind the new pots and pans that she had bought days before and the pink and turquoise bath mat that I complained about as too girly for a safe house. She pointed all of these out in her nightmare haze, so I told her I would bring them to wherever she settled next—without me.
That was part of the deal. It made her feel better for us to be apart. The first night in the new place on Rodmore Hill, just outside the city, she sat near the door, a butcher knife in her hands. She was on the phone with her mom, giving her the new address. Her mother must have said something about “her new boyfriend” when that triggered everything. She hung up quickly and turned towards me. Sobbing, she commanded me, “Go! You have to go, Mack! You can’t stay here.”
Confusedly, I demanded of her, “What do you mean that I can’t stay here? You’ll be alone, unprotected in the house? I thought this is what you wanted?” She had said those three magical words, words I had never heard before. She confessed she loved me just as I had to her. Had something changed between now and then? I couldn’t decide if I should be enraged or worried. Her tone was completely unreadable when she was this panicked.
“What… what…” She stammered over her words, struggling to keep up with her racing mind. I could see then how her eyes darted back and forth from the ground to my chest and then towards the wall from behind me. She was avoiding whatever it was she was trying to face until she couldn’t hold it in anymore, “What if Riley isn’t dead and they come after me? They’ll find you too, and they’ll kill you!”
“I’m not leaving you,” I tried to reassure her. “I don’t give a fuck what those guys want to do or what their plans are. My prerogative is keeping you alive and that means staying with you until we know the danger has passed.”
She turned her back at me and looked out one of the windows in the new home’s sunroom. Outside, an autumn Portland storm brewed with the rolling blue and black clouds and the streaks of rain staining the window. A flash of lightning illuminated her frail body as she held her arms tight across her chest. After a long moment, she looked over her shoulder and pleaded, “I need you to listen to me, Mack. I won’t stay here if you are here. I will still work the tattoo shop. I will still see you during the day. But at night, I need to be alone… just in case. I can’t bear thinking that something would happen to you like it did back at the headquarters.”
I tried to defend myself, “Nothing hap—” but I caught myself quickly. Something did happen. It may not have been that much to me—just another gang fight and brother lost, but to Anna, that was something horrible. Minimizing it was how I got here, to this new home on the hill, in the first place. I had to let this go. I had to trust that she was smart enough to protect herself if need be.
I instead chose to say nothing. I placed my hands upon her bare shoulders, straightening the straps of her shirt. With a small peck on the head, I said my goodbyes. But before I left, I placed my gun, the same one I carried into that old mansion’s basement, on the bare wooden entry table. The noise of the metal on wood felt more like a crashing boom in the silence, enough to make her turn back to me for just a few seconds. Her blue eyes welled up, the red lip quivered, and her hand rubbed against the small of her neck. I wondered if she would say something to make me stay or at least tell me that she loved him. But she kept her eyes on the gun until I let myself out into the storm.
The rest of the week passed quickly. I went back to my old apartment in headquarters. The four-hundred square foot studio seemed to loom large like an empty cave. It was dark, dingy, and s
lightly moldy. A box with some of my old clothes sat on the side of the bed. It was the few things I had yet to bring over to the house we had started to share before the tattoo convention happened.
The next morning, she was there in her tattoo parlor. After the convention, her reservation sheet had filled up, along with those of her new artists. She was still filling in for Ian’s reservations at the old shop as well, but you couldn’t tell when she was in the zone. Nothing seemed to faze her when she was bent over a body part with the buzz of a tattoo gun blasting through. Her artwork seemed to blossom as well. Her customers walked out of there glowing with color and life.
For lunch, she sits in my office, snacking on whatever she grabbed on the way over. We don’t talk much, but every day is a little better. Every day, she manages to make a little more eye contact with me until this afternoon when she reached over and grabbed my hand and held it tightly. When she pulled away, I managed to get up the nerves to ask her to dinner. It was as if I was asking out a chick on a first date, or at least I imagined it to be like that. I’d held my breath as I waited for her to answer.
She wasn’t committing, but I could tell she wasn’t going to show it. She had a slight smile that gave her away, and when she left, she remembered the time to confirm it. That blushing, bashful grin was still plastered on her face when she showed up at the restaurant. It matched the pale pink dress she had worn, another indication that she had wanted to be here with me as much as I had wanted to be with her. The bottom of the dress billowed as she walked slowly to the table, still looking over her bare, alabaster shoulder to examine each and every diner.