“Listen,” I whispered as I shifted my eyes back and forth between Vee and Katie. “There’s a man with a gun. Do not walk around the other side of the car. Is that understood?”
“Oh my God,” Katie whispered.
“I’ll be right back,” I said as I leaned forward and kissed her.
She pulled away and glared at me. “Alec, no. He could kill you. I’ll just call the police.”
I glanced through the windows again. The man continued to hold the gun at Shane’s head and seemed to be mumbling demands. There was no time to argue, and there was no time for the police. In a city like Austin, the police wouldn’t arrive for half an hour, and a robbery like this ended – one way or another – in less than five minutes.
“I’ll be right back,” I said.
“Please,” Katie begged.
“Go,” Vee whispered as she wrapped her arm around Katie.
“Alec…”
“I’ll be right back,” I assured her.
As Katie began to softly cry, I slumped my shoulders and sauntered to the other side of the SUV.
As I walked around the back side of the vehicle, I could clearly see everyone and everything. Half of the parking lot lamps were broken, but the illumination from the adjacent building’s lights was enough for me to see what I needed to. The man, wearing a dingy black hoodie and dirty jeans, appeared to be holding a semi-automatic pistol with an external safety. My intention was to take it from him without him shooting me or anyone else during the process. With his back slightly to me, and Shane, Kace, and Ripp facing me, I raised my right index finger to my lips as I slowly approached them.
“Give me all your muh muh money, boxer man,” the man stammered.
“Give him whatever he wants,” Kace shouted.
Quiet down, Kace.
Apparently he knew Shane was a professional boxer and had probably seen us going into the bar and recognized Shane. His two-hour wait let me know he was determined to get what he came for.
“Babe. Just settle down, I’ll give him whatever he wants,” Shane said.
“Well, get get get to givin’, muh muh motherfucker,” the man stuttered.
With the gun an inch from his forehead and his hands held in the air at each of his sides, Shane responded. “I’ll give you what I’ve got but…”
I cleared my throat lightly to get his attention. “But, I carry the money. I’m his bodyguard. I’ve got all the cash.”
You need to focus on me, motherfucker.
“Duh duh don’t walk up on me, Mr. fuh fuh fucking bodyguard. I’ll kuh kuh kill this boxer lickety split if you do,” he said as his eyes darted back and forth between Shane and me.
As I continued to study the pistol, I walked in a wide sweeping pattern around the four of them and stepped beside Shane. I wanted the man to be as comfortable as he could be considering the circumstances. Having his attention diverted to behind him may have caused Ripp to attempt something, or possibly even Shane, neither of which would end well for anyone.
“Listen. I’ve got the money. So, you’re going to need to talk to me. But we’ve got a little problem,” I said as I shifted my eyes to the pistol he held.
Colt 1911 A1, cocked and locked.
Thank God.
He’ll have to release the safety.
The pistol he held would require two steps before it could be fired. First, the safety would have to be flipped to off. Second, he would have to pull the trigger. The entire process, if performed by an absolute idiot, would take one second. A second didn’t sound like much time, but it was all I needed. The extra step of flipping the safety provided me just enough time to do what I needed to do.
I shifted my focus from the pistol to his eyes. “He pays me to keep his money safe, you know, protect it. Now, I can’t just give it to you or he’s going to fire me as soon as you’re gone – and I’ll lose my fucking job.”
“So for me to let you have it, I’m going to need you to point the gun at me and threaten me,” I said.
I needed him to move the gun directly in front of me, preferably either at my chest or directly at my head.
“I ain’t duh duh dumb. He’ll buh buh box my ears when I muh muh move the gun,” he stuttered.
His eyes told me he was long overdue for whatever drugs he intended to buy with his proceeds from the robbery. He was a time bomb waiting to explode.
Eliminate his perceived threat, Jacob.
I shook my head lightly. “No he won’t. I’ll make sure he doesn’t do a god damned thing. It’s my job to keep him safe, and keep you happy. You’re just going to have to trust me.”
His eyes remained focused on me while I spoke, which at least let me know he was more concerned with getting paid than anything else.
“He’s got seventeen bucks in his wallet, and I’ve got ten thousand bucks, so you need to pay attention to me, not him,” I said.
His eyes fell to my feet, quickly raised the length of my body, and eventually he met my gaze.
“Dekk, slowly put your hands in your jeans pockets. And I mean slow. Kace, I need you to take four steps to your left, babe. Just four. And stand there quietly. Ripp, Brother, don’t you dare fucking move,” I said calmly.
“Now, as soon as he gets his hands deep in his pockets, you’re going to need to point the gun at my head,” I explained.
“Alec, no!” I heard Katie scream from the other side of the car.
“It’ll be just fine Katie,” I said. “We’ll all be sipping slurpies at the 7-Eleven in five minutes. I promise, Baby.”
As Shane lowered his hands and pushed them into his pockets, the robber’s eyes shifted downward and then quickly raised. As they darted back and forth between Shane and me, I gave my next command.
“Dekk, step four steps to the side slowly, and stand by your girl. He’ll move the gun when you do. Just make it slow, Brother,” I explained.
“I uhhm…” Shane began.
“Just move slowly. He doesn’t want you, he wants me because I’ve got the money,” I lied.
Shane slowly stepped to my left and wrapped his arms around Kace. Ripp, still standing to my right, was potentially in the danger zone. Normally, there would be a few ways I could disarm the man, but with the people I was trying to protect on my left, there was only one way to do it, and it was the least favorable.
“Ripp, move to my left and stand with them. I really need you to go over there, Brother. Being behind me like that makes me nervous, and I know it makes him nervous too. You’re just too damned close,” I said flatly.
“Wuh wuh what about thu thu the ten grand, fucker?” the gunman asked as he moved the gun directly in front of my forehead.
As he stood and stared at me with uncertain eyes, I slowly raised my hands as if I was scared, stopping them in front of my chest.
“I’m going to reach for my wallet with my left hand. I’ll do it slow. Hell you got that piece pushed into my forehead, so you know I won’t try a damned thing,” I assured him.
Come on, Ripp, get your big ass over there.
As Ripp stepped beside Shane and Kace, I continued.
“I’m nervous as hell, but I need you to be calm, okay? You okay with that? Me reaching for my wallet?” I asked.
I needed a reason for him to allow me to move my hands, and hoped my movement in a direction he wasn’t expecting would be much quicker than his mind could process a threat.
He nodded his head. “Yup. Suh suh slow.”
Every combat trained Marine had learned the maneuver in CQC training. It wasn’t always effective, nor was it an assurance of not being shot, but considering the location of the people I needed to protect, it was my only choice.
With my eyes fixed on his, I slowly began to move my left hand slightly forward. As soon as I noticed his eyes didn’t follow my hand, I swung my open left hand into the barrel of the pistol, and my cupped right hand into his forearm.
Instantly, he was disarmed, and I held his pistol in my right hand.
“Get on your knees,” I demanded.
With wide eyes and shaking hands, he slowly lowered himself to the ground.
“Holy shit!” Ripp shouted.
“It’s all good over here, Katie,” I shouted as I followed the man’s head with the barrel of the weapon as he crouched to his knees.
Katie and Vee came around the end of the SUV, and Vee gasped as she saw what was going on.
“I’ll call the police,” she said.
“Fucking punk ass bitch. Now, I’m going to beat your ass,” Ripp said from behind me.
“Stand down, Ripp,” I said over my shoulder in a stern tone. “And Vee, don’t call the cops. Our man Dekk has to fly out for a fight in less than 48 hours, and he doesn’t need to be on the ten O’clock news, or sit in an interrogation room for eight hours.”
Katie stood and stared with her hands covering her mouth, clearly scared.
“Don’t worry, Baby. Everything will be just fine. Vee, get everyone in the car and go around the block. Just go around slowly and come back and get me,” I said.
“Go around the block?” she asked.
Without shifting my eyes away from him, I responded. “Just load everyone up and go around the block. Do it quick. I don’t need to be standing here with a gun any longer than I have to be.”
“I’ll stay here with A-Train, just roll around the block. Nobody needs to see this guy get his ass beat,” Ripp said.
“Just like you always say, Brother Ripp, I got this. Just go with them. Give me ten, alright?” I asked as I glared down at the would-be thief.
Reluctantly, they got in the SUV and backed out of the parking stall. As they pulled away, I lowered the pistol, shoved it into the waist of my jeans, and sighed.
As he stared up at me, his eyes filled with wonder, I planted the heel of my boot into his forehead, knocking him onto his back.
“That’s for pulling a gun on the father of my nephew,” I said. “If you move, I’ll break your fucking neck.”
I reached down and helped him to his knees. Blood trickled down along his face from the massive cut on his forehead. There was no doubt he was half delirious, but I didn’t have much time to make a decision, and I needed his undivided attention.
“You’re going to need to listen, and listen carefully,” I said.
He nodded his head eagerly. As with many people who terrorized others, he had obviously never been on the receiving end of a violent situation and it was apparent by the level of fear his eyes projected.
“As you might have suspected, I’m not new to this shit. I’ve killed motherfuckers like you and walked away without even giving it a second thought. But something tells me I don’t need to kill you. I’ve always said I give everyone a chance, and I guess this is yours. If you’ll give me your solemn word that you’ll never do something like this again, I’ll let you walk away. If you don’t, or if for some reason I don’t believe you, I’ll blow a hole in your head the size of a grapefruit. Now, you haven’t got much time, so I need an answer,” I said.
He fixed his eyes on mine, swallowed, and responded.
“Wuh wuh wuh won’t happen. Eh eh ever ah ah again,” he said.
Well, he maintained eye contact.
“Will you ever do anything like this again?” I asked, wanting to see where his eyes went when he responded.
He shook his head from side to side and maintained eye contact. “No.”
“Why?” I asked.
I didn’t care to hear his stuttering response, but I needed a little more reassurance.
“Buh buh because I’m guh guh giving my word,” he said, his eyes locked on mine the entire time.
It appeared he was being truthful.
“Stand up slowly and turn around with your fingers interlocked behind your head, just like you were getting arrested,” I said.
He slowly stood and complied with my request. After patting him down and finding not even a wallet, I pressed my hand against his right shoulder.
“Turn around,” I said.
He turned to face me. His eyes told it all. He was scared shitless.
“Go sit beside that truck, out of sight. Don’t move until you’re sure twenty minutes have passed. Not five, not ten, not even fifteen, but twenty, Understood?” I asked.
He nodded his head repeatedly.
“Go,” I said as I tilted my head toward a truck parked thirty feet away.
He stumbled to the truck, walked to the far side of it, and hunkered behind it, well out of sight.
I gazed down at my feet as I waited, realizing it was the first time in my life I had let such a man walk away. I was undoubtedly taking a risk, but my objective was to protect the people I loved, and I accomplished it without resorting to killing a man.
A tremendous improvement on my part, I felt proud knowing I was a more compassionate man than I had been in the past. I realized I would probably never know if my decision to let him go was a good one, but it was my decision nonetheless. As the SUV pulled up in front of me I knew one thing for sure.
At least he would never harm one of the people who were important to me.
Although I realized that particular fact wasn’t all that mattered, it was all that seemed to matter at the moment.
And I had lived one more day without taking a life.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Early Winter 2014, Austin, Texas, USA
At one minute and fifty-seven seconds into the third round of the fight, Shane Dekkar knocked out Tick-Tock Brock and became the new Heavyweight Championship of the World. Not once did I doubt his ability, I only questioned his devotion. From what he said, he won the fight for Kelsey, who claimed to have never trained a fighter as great as Shane, and had never trained a champion.
Shane’s father was a former Marine who was killed in the line of duty in Afghanistan, a fact that may have played a part in my devotion to Shane as a friend and brother. His father, however, had abused his mother, and his mother left when he was as small boy. He was raised by his grandfather while his father was away at war, and his mother never returned.
His grandfather trained him as a boxer, and the sport was Shane’s outlet for a lifetime of frustration, anger, and slight hatred toward the actions of his father for what he had done to his mother. Shane never forgave his father, which was something else I could completely understand, because I had never forgiven mine fully either.
One night, after one of his fights, Shane’s grandfather had a heart attack and died, prompting Shane to move to Texas from Compton, California for a new start in his career.
Kelsey trained Shane, and in many ways, became the fatherly figure he always wanted but never had. I admired Kelsey for being exactly what each fighter needed, but never allowing them to understand he cared about them as deeply as he did.
He was, to the fighters in the gym, exactly what I was to my combat Marines.
A true leader.
“Listen up, Jarhead,” Kelsey said. “This gym has people beating the door down to be trained by the great Shane Dekkar, and if you can’t make a fighter of this Justin Bieber look-alike, we need to send his skinny ass down the road.”
“He’s getting there, Boss,” I said.
Kelsey shifted his eyes into the ring, studied Austin for a moment, and shook his head in exaggerated frustration. “He needs to stick to dancing and sashaying around like a princess.”
“Two more weeks, and we’ll know,” I said, referring to Austin’s first scheduled fight.
Ripp met Austin one day in a street race, and the two became quick friends. Austin was a dance instructor, and agreed to trade Ripp dance lessons for boxing lessons. Somehow, after the birth of Ripp’s daughter, I became Austin’s trainer. I enjoyed training him to not only box, but to protect himself, and to have the proper mindset to compete in a match.
I had no doubt he had the ability to win against any comparable opponen
t, and the last thing he wanted to do was let any of us down, so I was quite certain when the time came that he’d apply everything he had learned when fighting.
“The kid’s a fucking weirdo, you’ve got two weeks, Jarhead,” Kelsey complained as he turned away.
I glanced into the ring. Austin’s opponent connected a right uppercut, sending him reeling backward to keep from falling.
Turn your body, Kid. Just like I taught you.
He twisted away from the other fighter as he stumbled, making himself more difficult to hit.
Suddenly, he had his footing. He raised his hands slightly, obviously ready to continue. As the fighter approached him, certain he was a few punches away from a win, Austin lit into him with a barrage of jabs.
The punches caught the other fighter off guard, and as he fought to keep his footing, Austin swung a slightly wild but extremely effective uppercut. It was, without a doubt, his most effective punch.
The fighter collapsed onto the mat, flat on his back.
I shifted my eyes toward the locker room. Kelsey stood beside the entrance intently watching the fight. As my eyes met his, he flipped me his middle finger and turned away.
You grumpy old fucker.
I shifted my eyes into the ring. The fighter was unsuccessfully attempting to get onto his feet. Austin shifted his eyes toward me and shrugged his shoulders.
“Fight’s over, fellas,” I said as I ducked under the ropes and entered the ring.
Training Austin was not only good for him, but it was good for me. It gave me a sense of accomplishment, and a means of measuring my success through his wins or losses. To date, he hadn’t lost a fight, but everything so far was nothing but sparring, and not an actual boxing match.
As I helped the other fighter to his feet, I shifted my eyes toward Austin.
“I had my doubts, Kid. You need to protect that chin of yours or someone’s going to knock it off,” I said.
He nodded his head.
“You alright?” I asked the other fighter.
Incapable of responding legibly with a mouthpiece in his mouth, he blinked his eyes and nodded his head.
“Alright, hit the showers,” I said as I tossed my head toward the locker room.
Hard Corps (Selected Sinners MC #7) Page 17