by Mark Parragh
“You’re not him,” Yanis said. “There’s two. Who are you?”
“The other one really tore you up, didn’t he? How many of your boys are still standing?”
Crane moved a step to one side, and Yanis scrambled to keep Romy between them.
“None of them here to help you anyway,” said Crane. “They’ve got their own trouble to deal with. You’re on your own.” As long as he kept Yanis off guard, kept changing up the threat and the situation, sooner or later, Yanis would make a mistake, and then Crane would put a bullet through his skull.
Suddenly Yanis moved the gun down from Romy’s head and pressed it hard into the back of her right hand. Her fingers splayed out against the wooden arm of the chair.
“You want her back with that hand, you drop the gun!” he shouted.
Romy gasped behind the tape and looked at Crane in terror.
“I’ll do it,” said Yanis. “I’ll take her apart, and you get her back in pieces. Like you said, man, I got nothing more to lose.”
Then Georges was moving fast in the corner of Crane’s eye.
“No!”
Georges dropped the shotgun and stepped into Crane’s line of fire. He held his hands out to his sides.
“That’s enough! No more shooting!”
“Georges, what do you think you’re doing?” said Crane.
“Stay cool, John. Lower the gun.”
“I’m not putting the gun down.”
Crane moved, but Georges moved with him, blocking his aim at Yanis. Crane sighed.
“All right damn it, what’s your plan then?”
“I remember the day all this started,” Georges said. His eyes were locked on Yanis, but he seemed to be talking to all of them. “When my mother was still in the hospital, someone told me the way to help her wasn’t to fight. That was your game, not mine. He told me if I wanted to help, do something smart. I’ve been trying to do that ever since, but I’m not very good at it. I’m not as smart as people think I am.”
Georges stepped forward and gingerly reached out to touch his sister’s cheek. Yanis tensed but did nothing. His attention was focused on Georges as much as Crane’s and Romy’s.
“But I know the smart thing to do now. Look at us! There’s a man out there that wants us all dead. Bullets are flying. Your boys are shooting at each other because they’re so scared they don’t know which way’s up. And we’re stuck here pointing guns at each other. That’s not smart, man. The smart thing is to get the hell out of here.”
Crane slowly moved the gun lower and to the side but kept it ready to fire if Yanis did something he didn’t like.
“You’ve had enough, haven’t you?” Georges said. “I know I’ve had enough. This is no place for me. I don’t think it’s the place for you either. So let’s get out. All of us. What do you say, Yanis?”
Yanis looked up at Georges, suspicion struggling against hope that there might actually be a way out of the situation he was in.
“What are you saying?” he said, so quietly Crane could barely hear him.
“We all put down our guns,” said Georges. “And we get out of here. That simple. When we get to the cars, we take my sister, we all go our separate ways. And that’s it. This…feud is over.”
Crane noticed Yanis’s gun had drifted from Romy. This would be his moment if Georges wasn’t in the line of fire. But Georges had taken charge of the situation, for better or worse. If this was how he wanted to play it, Crane would let him.
“What about her?” Yanis said. “You speaking for her?”
Georges carefully pulled the tape from Romy’s mouth and threw it aside.
“He’s got to pay!” Romy spat as soon as the tape was gone.
“He’s paying!” said Georges. “He’s paying. We’re all paying. Look around yourself! Enough, Romy! You don’t get your life back by throwing it away. Enough. It’s over.”
Romy said nothing. Outside, Crane heard a burst of fire, closer than previous ones.
“If we’re going to do this, we better do it fast,” he said.
“All right,” said Yanis, “all right.” He stood up and looked past Georges at Crane. “He drops his, I’ll drop mine.”
“Not how it works,” said Crane. “The deal is, you drop yours, I don’t shoot you with mine. We’re not partners here. Take it or leave it.”
Georges started to protest, but then realized he wasn’t going to win that argument. “You can trust him,” he said instead.
Yanis slowly put his gun on the floor.
As they were cutting Romy free, there was more gunfire, sustained this time. A handful of stray bullets slammed into the front of the house. They pierced the wall and the roof, and shafts of sunlight lanced through the dimly lit space. Whatever was happening out there was moving in their direction.
“Out the back,” Crane snapped. “Past the shed and run for the treeline.”
The approaching gunfire got them moving. Crane scooped up the shotgun as he passed and tossed it to Georges. Then they were out the back door, and the others were running for the trees as Crane brought up the rear to cover them. He scanned the clear area around the house, sweeping the ground with his pistol. Nothing moved. There were no gunshots. But Crane knew someone was nearby.
When they reached the trees, they moved in a tight group as Crane steered them back toward the car. Yanis had completely abandoned his aggressive role. He was acting like another victim in need of rescue. But Crane wasn’t taking responsibility for him. He could come with them if he didn’t cause any trouble. Having him there might prove helpful if they ran across one of his gang. But once they got back to the car, Yanis was on his own. Maybe he had the keys to the van his gang had arrived in, or maybe he didn’t. That wasn’t Crane’s problem.
They crossed the drainage ditch they’d crossed on the way in. This time Crane turned them along it. He was more interested in finding the shortest route back to the car now. They’d gone about a hundred yards, past long rows of cocoa trees receding into the distance, when Crane spotted movement.
He turned and shouted, “Down!” as a figure emerged from behind a tree on the other side of the ditch. In an instant he took in the bloodstained canvas pants and dark shirt, the rifle, and the close-cropped blond hair of Einar Persson.
“Get down!” he shouted again, but none of the three he was escorting were trained to deal with combat situations. They froze or panicked as Crane spun and aimed his pistol. Einar’s rifle cracked as he ran toward them. Another shot. Crane heard Romy scream, and saw the rifle’s muzzle pointed at him and the focused rage on Einar’s face.
Then Yanis whirled and ran. He passed in front of Crane, blocking his shot. The rifle cracked two more times. Yanis jerked as the first round hit him. The second took him in the throat, and blood sprayed a fan of red mist into the air. Yanis spun and fell to the ground.
On the far side of the ditch, Einar tried to fire again, but he was empty. He dropped the rifle and went for a pistol in his belt. But he was out of time. Crane steadied his aim and shot him in the chest. Einar’s momentum carried him forward, and as Crane fired again, Einar stumbled and fell into the ditch.
Georges had pulled his sister to the ground and now crouched over her, guarding her with the shotgun. Five feet from her, Yanis lay on the ground, his eyes staring blankly at her.
“Is he dead?” she asked Crane.
There was no question about that.
“Yeah, he’s dead.”
“Good.”
Georges was trembling from a huge dump of adrenaline. Crane was glad to see he had his finger alongside the trigger instead of on it. Crane reached down to help Romy up.
“I’m done here,” she said. “Let’s go home.”
Georges put an arm around her. “Yeah,” he said, his voice quavering. “Let’s go home.”
“Car’s that way,” said Crane as he pointed. “Let’s go before we run into someone else.”
Crane scanned their perimeter one more time. Noth
ing was moving. There was no sound from the bottom of the ditch. They turned and ran for the car.
Chapter 55
High above the Atlantic in a chartered jet, the world looked very different.
Crane sat in the back nursing a whiskey sour. The pilots had managed to hook up a satellite phone link, so Georges and Romy were up front talking to their parents. There had been a great deal of crying, and Georges stood with his arm around Romy as she held the handset.
The change in Romy was remarkable. She had stepped out of her old life to become a violent executioner driven by vengeance. Then, once that vengeance was complete, it was as if she’d simply stepped back across the line. She’d put down Romy the killer like a tool she was finished with, and now she was the old Romy once more. She told her parents how she missed them and how sorry she was to have made them worry. She was enthusing over all the things they would do to make up for lost time.
But Crane knew the ruthless avenger was still in there, even if Romy had concealed it behind a happy exterior. He’d seen what she was capable of, and how far she would go.
That one would bear watching.
Georges detached himself from his sister’s embrace and left her with the phone. He came back and sat beside Crane.
“I think she’s going to be all right,” he said.
Crane nodded. She was headed back to a more comfortable life now. He hoped it was enough to protect her from the kind of trauma that had set her on her violent path. Time would tell.
“Your parents must be happy,” Crane said at last.
“Over the moon.” Georges smiled. “I haven’t heard my mother sound that happy since…before.”
“That’s good,” said Crane. “Your mother’s going to be okay. Romy’s coming home. You did it, Georges. Your family was smashed to pieces, but you found a way to save them.”
“I’m sorry about before. I ask so much of you, and then I keep getting in your way. I’m sorry I ditched you. I told myself I should have trusted you, but then I did it again. I’m sorry I stepped in front of you. Yanis had a gun. He could have done anything.”
Crane put his glass down on the tray beside his seat. He laughed. “You finally did something smart,” he said. “Not turning Yanis and Einar against each other. That was clever. Not quite the same thing. And it didn’t really work that well. Your parents will freak when they see your face.”
Georges laughed as well. “Maybe we’ll stay in New York a few days until the bruises fade.”
“But I mean when you spared Yanis. You must have hated him as much as your sister did.”
Georges looked away, at the screen that showed the icon of their plane over a satellite view of the sea.
“Yes,” he murmured. “Oh, yes.”
“But you gave up what you wanted to get what you really needed,” Crane continued. “That was smart. I would have killed him right there before I trusted him to put his gun down. What you did was better. You wanted revenge, but what you needed was to save your sister. That choice restored your family in a way killing Yanis wouldn’t have.”
“Yeah,” Georges said. “I guess it did.”
Georges had healed himself as well, Crane realized. The pain and guilt that began when Yanis’s gang had destroyed his old life had finally lifted.
“Some advice?” Crane said.
Georges turned to look at him.
“Stay the hell out of the field,” Crane said with a grin. “It’s not your natural habitat.”
Georges laughed. “No, it isn’t, is it? You know the first time I ever saw you? It was when Josh showed me the tape of you in Oakland. You saved that man in the shipping container. I needed a hero, and there you were. I was going to arm you with the best equipment I could make and send you out to fight the things I couldn’t. That was going to be my smart thing.”
“That was smart.”
Georges laughed. “Except I keep screwing it up! Whenever something goes wrong, I think I’m to blame and I charge in and make it worse.”
“You didn’t do so bad. But we do better with you back at Myria. We make a hell of a team that way, Georges.”
Georges looked at him and Crane could see he was touched. “Thank you,” he said softly.
“Georges! Georges!” Up front, Romy was beckoning him back to the phone.
“You better go,” said Crane.
Georges got up from the seat and headed forward. Crane watched him go, then turned and looked out the window as the sun-drenched clouds slid past.
Georges and his family would be all right. But there were still loose ends for him to worry about. He didn’t believe Einar Persson had been acting alone. Going to Cameroon had been a spur of the moment decision. Einar couldn’t have known beforehand. But he’d followed them there, and within a day he’d been able to locate them as well as setting himself up with weapons and even a safely isolated place to take Romy for his ambush.
There was no way he could have done that on his own. Certainly not as quickly as he had. Someone was helping him. Most likely, someone who was after him and found Einar a useful weapon to attack him with.
He had an enemy out there somewhere. One with widespread resources and excellent intelligence. Crane needed to find out who they were and deal with them before they tried again.
The plane flew on, chasing the sun west toward home. For now, Crane could afford to rest and restore his energy. In a few days, he would take his suspicions to Josh and they would get to work once more.
The police had gone over the orchard, but they weren’t trained for this. They’d carted off the bodies, collected the scattered weapons. By twilight, they were gone.
When he’d heard no human sounds for half an hour, Einar rose from the muck, slowly, painfully. He’d been hit twice. One had gone through, puncturing a lung. He was pretty sure the second was still in his shoulder.
He needed medical attention, but he would survive. He would make it out of here. He had unfinished business.
Einar heard the sounds of insects in the gathering darkness. Above him, a root stuck out of the side of the ditch. He grabbed it and pulled. He groaned at the agony in his wounded shoulder, but he made it upright, leaning against the packed dirt. His breathing was shallow, and he could feel the blood bubbling in his chest. He paused until the pain faded enough for his vision to clear. Then he pushed with his legs and grabbed at the dirt at the top of the ditch. Slowly, painfully, he hauled himself up over the lip and fell flat on the ground beside the ditch.
He was visible here. If the police had left anyone to watch the scene, he would be easily spotted. He crawled into the tall grass and collapsed, breathing fast and shallow. He tried to place himself on his mental map of the orchard. His car was hidden in the trees, well off the approach road. He looked around until he was sure of the direction. That way. About a thousand yards through the grass and rows of cocoa trees. There was a first aid kit in the trunk. That would keep him going until he could find a doctor who wouldn’t report gunshot wounds to the police.
Einar knew he would make it. He was tough, resilient, a survivor. This wasn’t going to kill him. He would make it out. He would recover. He would rebuild his strength and make careful plans.
He would find John Crane and watch him die screaming. That was the purpose that would get him through the agony of the next few hours.
Einar fixed John Crane’s face in his mind, gritted his teeth, and began to crawl.
THE END
John Crane will return in
The Vengeful
Coming Soon…
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Also by Mark Parragh
The John Crane Series
Rope on Fire
Wrecker
Shot Clock
Aftershocks
Collected Editions
John Crane: Double Tap
John Crane: The Skala Archive
Standalone Novels
Rumrunners
Contact Mark Parragh
Mark Parragh’s web site is at markparragh.com. There you can find a complete list of his books and much more. You can also find him on Facebook at facebook.com/MarkParragh, or email him at [email protected].
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— Mark Parragh
Aftershocks
by Mark Parragh
First Edition – May 2019
Copyright © 2019 by Waterhaven Media, LLC. All rights reserved.
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Editing and Production Coordination
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to events or locales is entirely coincidental. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.