First Drop

Six

I took the steps back up to the room two at a time and knocked on the door twice in the time it took Trey to get his skinny backside off the bed and let me in. He took one look at my face and backed away from me.

“What was it?” he demanded, but he looked like that was a question he didn’t really want an answer to.

I didn’t give him one. Instead I grabbed the thin plastic bag out of the unused rubbish bin and swept the remaining snacks off the bed into it.

“Come on,” I said, twisting the top of the bag shut. “We’re leaving.”

Trey didn’t say anything further as we walked out of the room. I slipped the key into my pocket on the way out, even though I had no intention of using it again.

As we reached the bottom of the stairs a crowd of people had gathered round the doorway to the ground-floor room on the other side of the car park. A fat woman in the kind of loud check trousers you normally only see on a golf course pushed to the front to have a better look, then started screaming when she got what she was after. Trey faltered. I hooked my hand under his elbow and kept him moving all the way to the Mercury, which was still sitting behind the diner next door.

It was only as we pulled out into traffic that he finally spoke.

“There were people in there, weren’t there?” he said, curiously neutral. “Are they, like, dead?”

I took my eyes off the road briefly to glance at his set face in the flashes of reflected light from the shop fronts and restaurants along the sides of the road.

“Yes.”

He nodded and swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. Then he said, “Why would Chris and Mr Whitmarsh do that?” and his voice was nearly plaintive, as though it wasn’t fair.

There wasn’t an easy way to say it. So, better to say it fast and get it over with. “Because they thought it was us.”

I’d come to that conclusion almost as soon as I’d walked in on the scene. In the split-second it would have taken Whitmarsh to take a bead and fire, he wouldn’t have had time to recognise that the girl who’d just got out of the shower wasn’t the me he’d been told to expect. Not with a towel covering her hair and shock distorting her face.

And after that? Well, maybe they were just being tidy. It still didn’t tell me if they were trying to take Trey alive, or if they’d wanted him dead from the outset.

“If they’re the ones trying to kill us, why did you call them and tell them where to find us?” he asked now, and the sudden anger in his tone made me wary.

“Trey, I didn’t know they were going to do that and anyway, I thought I’d directed them to the room above,” I said, not liking the defensiveness that was creeping in when it should have been cool command. “I thought I’d sent them to a room that was empty.”

“Yeah, you thought,” he threw back, half twisting in his seat to face me. “Jesus!” He shook his head. “Just how long have you been a bodyguard, Charlie? How many VIPs have you saved, huh?”

I waited a beat before I answered. The temptation to lie was great, but I knew in the long run it wouldn’t get me anywhere. “Well, if you count,” I said, “then you’re the first.”

He slumped back, letting his arms lift then flop back to his sides as though weighted down with despair.

“Oh man,” he muttered, “we are so screwed.”

***

For no particular reason other than the fact I recognised the road number, I headed north on A1A. We were travelling parallel with the Atlantic and somewhere over to my right endless rollers crashed and broke in the darkness.

For a time we drove in silence. I kept strictly to the speed limit, indicating religiously whenever I changed lanes and stopping for amber lights as well as reds. I was being so legal it was downright suspicious but I suddenly couldn’t remember how to drive any more casually.

I don’t know what thoughts were tumbling around inside Trey’s head. I was too occupied with my own to care.

The first couple of times I’d seen dead bodies I’d been physically sick. At least that hadn’t happened this time. Perhaps my stomach was hardening with experience, or perhaps it was simply because the murdered couple in the motel room were complete strangers.

Then I thought of Sean, who was so much more than a stranger to me, and felt the familiar twist in my gut, the hollowness up under my ribcage and the slight buzzing in my ears. I dropped the window a couple of inches and gulped at the blast of warm air it allowed into the car.

Trey recognised my moment of weakness mostly for what it was. “You gonna hurl?” he demanded.

“No,” I said firmly. I took a final breath and wound the window back up again. The Mercury’s air conditioning immediately returned the interior to its former temperate state. The moment passed.

We were moving further out of the built-up area now. The buildings had thinned out and were punctuated by longer and longer clumps of scrubby trees and palms. I found my fingers had locked into tense claws round the steering wheel and I flexed them a few times, trying to relax a little more with every mile we were putting between us and the motel. I’d almost begun to think we might have made it clear.

And then, just at that moment, I saw the flashing lights come on in the rear-view mirror.

The cop didn’t switch his sirens on straight away, as though he didn’t want to spook us into running. He started out just with the lights. It was only after I’d ignored the first three or four convenient places to pull over that he hit the loud button.

Trey jerked upright as the screeching wail started up and squirmed round in his seat to stare out through the back screen.

“Aw shit,” he said. “You gonna stop, or what?”

“What, probably,” I murmured. I reached behind me, awkwardly, with my right hand and pulled the SIG out from under my shirt. I wedged the wheel with my knee just long enough to yank back the slide with my left hand, snapping the first round into the breech. Then I stuck the gun just far enough under my thigh so that it was out of sight of anyone leaning in through the window, but within easy reach.

I glanced over at Trey. He was staring transfixed at the little bit of the pistol grip that he could see peeping out from between the seat cushion and my leg. When he lifted widened eyes to mine they were suddenly a whole lot more guarded than they had been.

“Keep quiet and leave it to me. We’ll try and talk our way out of this first, hmm?” I said tightly. “But be ready to make a run for it.”

Then I indicated and pulled over onto the sloping dirt shoulder of the highway.

I let the car roll slowly to a halt, raising dust as we did so. There was a ditch and a post and rail fence to the right-hand side of the car and beyond that I could just make out a sandy piece of waste land, probably an undeveloped building plot.

On the other side of the highway were lock-up industrial units with chain link fencing round the boundary and orange sodium lighting. A little further on I could see a stuttering neon sign advertising a small bar.

The cop brought his cruiser to a halt about three or four metres behind our rear bumper. He cut out the siren but left his lights on, which made it impossible for me to tell what car he was driving. All I knew was that the red and blue light bar meant he was with the county police.

I palmed the Mercury’s column gearlever up into neutral, keeping the engine running and my foot on the brake pedal so our lights cut down his visibility into the rear of the car. Then I released my seatbelt, put both hands on the top of the steering wheel and faced forwards. All the time I was covertly watching his approach in the driver’s side door mirror.

Any hopes I might have been harbouring that this was just a routine traffic stop went out of the window as soon as the cop got out of his car. When you ride a motorbike you’re used to being pulled over, but this guy didn’t swagger up with all the confident bravado of someone who has the power at his disposal to take your driving licence away from you and the temperament to abuse it.

Instead, he came out in a fast nervous crouch, his gun already in his hands, and started to crab towards my door.

“Out of the car! Out of the car!” he was yelling, his voice pitched high and close to breaking point. Even in the poor light he didn’t look old enough to shave, let alone drive a car or graduate from a police academy.

Trey had started to fidget in his seat.

“Keep still for God’s sake and stop giving him a good excuse to shoot you,” I snapped under my breath. The kid froze.

I didn’t move either. The cop’s advance stalled about four or five feet away, reluctant to come any nearer. He was only too aware of the possibilities of my trying to make a break for it by thumping the car door into him. He didn’t want to come and get me, and I didn’t want to go to him.

Stalemate.

Closer to, I could see he was holding a large-calibre Glock semiautomatic and his hands were shaking. He was still bawling at me, sounding breathless now, as though he hadn’t stopped to draw in air.

Because of the lights from the cruiser I didn’t immediately see the second car pull up softly behind the pair of us.

When I did notice it my first reaction, with a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, was that the cop had called for back-up. If we were as dangerous as his manner clearly suggested, he’d been taking a huge risk stopping us on his own to begin with. I reckoned that a keen and youthful brand of inexperience had probably come into play there.

In my mirrors I saw the car doors on both sides of the newcomer open. The young cop whirled round but he didn’t look relieved. Not more cops, then. He seemed unable to decide which of us now presented the greater threat. He ended up dancing a fretful jig in the middle, the barrel of his gun swinging wildly between the two of us.

“Stay back!” he barked. “Remain in your vehicle!”

I ducked my head a little, trying to see what was going on behind me without actually turning but I couldn’t make out anything clearly. The cruiser’s lights acted as a shield.

The cop cast another look at me, still sitting immobile behind the wheel and made his decision. He took a couple of steps back towards the newcomers. That was as far as he got.

Both men from the car behind the police cruiser opened up at the same moment. Small arms, probably, but I couldn’t see what they were using.

At least four rounds hit the young cop in the head and upper torso. In the rotating swirl of the lights I saw his body jerk like he’d just been wired to the mains. He dropped to his knees, giving a soft surprised gasp as his lungs emptied for the last time. He let the pistol trickle from his lifeless hand, then he pitched forwards very slowly onto his face in the dirt.

I had the gearlever rammed down into drive almost before the cop realised he was dead. I stamped my foot down hard onto the accelerator, sending the car scrabbling for grip along the earth shoulder while I wrestled with the wheel, trying to steer us back onto the highway.

The two men who’d shot the cop started pouring bullets into the back of the Mercury. The rear screen shattered and Trey gave a squeal, balling himself up in the seat.

Either by luck or by judgement, our attackers took out the passenger side rear tyre when we’d barely made fifty metres. The car reacted immediately to the hit, lurching onto the rim. I lost my battle with the ditch. We slithered into it nose down and the passenger side front corner slammed into one of the upright fence posts, tearing it out.

The charges in both the Mercury’s front airbags exploded instantaneously. I’d always assumed those inflatable white sacks were soft and pillow-like, but they’re not. It’s like being hit in the face with a bag of wet cement. Still, considering I’d taken off my seatbelt, at least mine saved me from heading straight out through the windscreen.

The bag started to deflate at once. I paddled it away, aware that the whole of my face was burning and there was blood coming out of my nose. I shook my head to try and clear the ringing in my ears but it wouldn’t go. Even so, I heard the sound of an engine revving up behind us. Shit!

I twisted round in my seat and saw that the two men had jumped back into their car and had swerved out round the cruiser and the fallen cop. They were now bearing down on us with the doors still wide open.

I clutched at the boy’s shoulder, shaking him. “Trey, come on, we’ve got to move now!” I was rewarded with a dull groan. He wasn’t going anywhere.

I reached under my thigh and found, in spite of the crash, that the SIG was still wedged there. I hauled it out and tried to open the door. It was jammed and I had to hit it twice with my shoulder before it gave way with a sharp crack. Because of the cockeyed angle we’d come to rest I had to wedge it open with my feet so I could struggle out on the uphill side.

I dropped straight onto my hands and knees on the sandy bank of the ditch, just as the other car squealed to a halt at a slant on the road above us. It was a light-coloured Buick. Either the bikers I’d set on the two men who’d tailed me from the Pelzners’ place had failed to catch their prey, or they hadn’t inflicted any lasting damage when they had. More’s the pity.

I held the SIG in both hands with my elbows resting on the ground, keeping low as I waited for my chance. The guy in the passenger seat was closest. He was big and still wearing the suit that had made him look like a salesman when I’d seen him outside the house. He got out first, so I shot him first. Two rounds high in the chest. He let go of his gun and fell backwards into the car with a kind of heavy grunt.

The driver came out with a hell of a lot more caution, using his door for cover and firing through the open window so that only an inch or so of his head was visible. The bullets thunked into the Mercury’s bodywork, much too close for comfort. The noise alone was terrifying.

I carefully lowered my aim and planted two rounds through the door panel itself, right in the centre. I knew I should have kept firing until I saw the driver go down but I didn’t have the ammunition to spare to go by the book. As it was, hit or not, he stopped shooting at me and that was enough for now.

And then, in the distance to the south of us, came the unmistakable sound of police sirens. Lots of them. I glanced back at the dead cop and knew that staying here was just about to get a lot more dangerous.

The driver of the Buick must have made that decision, too. I saw the nose of his car bounce as he put it into gear and wheelspun for the first thirty metres. The force of the takeoff slammed both doors shut, carrying both him and his fallen colleague away from the scene.

I jumped up, reached back into the Mercury and grabbed hold of Trey by the front of his shirt, yelling at him to move. This time he responded, scrambling out after me.

I ran, dragging Trey behind me with my hand fisted into his collar, uncaring of his cries of protest as we went. I fled like an animal, looking for darkness, looking for somewhere to hide. Across the highway, through a narrow alleyway that formed an access road between the industrial units and into cover on the other side. The sodium lights didn’t reach this far back and it was all the darker for being just outside the scope of their glare.

The sirens were growing louder all the time. I just prayed that when the cavalry arrived they didn’t have dogs with them, otherwise this was going to be over very quickly. I’d deliberately chosen not to head onto the waste land because our footsteps would be too easy to track across the soft sandy surface. Asphalt would make it just as easy for a dog.

The first of the reinforcements slid to a messy stop alongside the cruiser. I stopped, struggling to make out the sounds of pursuit over the drumming of the blood in my ears. My breath was coming harsh and loud, so I had to hold it in when I was trying to listen. I wasn’t a sprinter any more than I was a long distance runner but I’d given our short flight everything I’d got and it had shattered me.

Gradually, as I stood there in the darkness, I felt my body begin to put aside the shock of the assault I’d just inflicted on it. My heart no longer seemed about to rupture with every beat. The balmy night air dried the sweat on my skin without chilling it and my eyes were sharpening.

We were hidden for the moment but vulnerable to anyone with methodical determination and a powerful torch. I remembered the way the cop had fallen. Whoever came looking for us would bring both, backed by shotguns and anger. It would be best if we weren’t here for them to find.

I lifted the tails of my shirt and slipped the SIG back into my belt. Having it in my hand would only encourage the law to shoot me and, anyway, I wasn’t planning on killing anyone else tonight if I could help it.

Behind me, Trey was snivelling quietly into his hands but I daren’t soften towards him. Survival was all that mattered now. Compassion could come later. Roughly, I urged him on.

We picked our way through the debris that littered the backs of the units until we came to an area where the chain link fencing was sagging enough to climb over. Beyond it was the car park behind the bar I’d seen earlier.

It was a single-storey building with wooden siding and neon signs for Bud Light and Coors beer that flickered intermittently. I spent a moment watching the bar entrance but it wasn’t exactly bustling. The kind of place where the regular clientele arrive as the doors open and have to be persuaded to vacate at closing time, usually with each arm across someone else’s shoulders.

There was an array of vehicles parked up outside, mainly pickups. I worked my way along them, trying all the handles, but nobody had been in such a hurry to get a drink that they’d overlooked locking the doors when they’d arrived. I could have simply smashed a window but even if I did I’d no idea how to hot-wire a car.

And then, just when I’d almost given in to despair, I caught sight of the line of motorbikes against the far fence. Now bikes, on the other hand, I was much more familiar with . . .

I hustled Trey behind the bar itself, keeping him out of sight of the highway. I could still see the flashing lights reflected from the industrial buildings.

“Stay here,” I hissed, then made my way over to the bikes. There were a dozen or so of them, parked up neatly, noses towards the fence like cowboys’ horses outside the saloon. I ducked down into the shadows as I checked over each one.

“What are you looking for?”

I turned. Trey had followed me out and was standing a few feet behind one of the bikes. In plain view.

“A way out of here,” I bit back in a savage whisper. “Either stay out of sight or find me one that isn’t chained up. No mechanical locks and no alarm.”

He looked at me for a moment as though he was going to ask questions, then he shrugged and moved away with a lack of urgency that almost made me want to scream at him.

As I went through the bikes it seemed that most of them had additional security of some form or another. I couldn’t blame them for that. I carried a roller-chain wherever I went with my bike and I always used it to hobble the rear wheel. The end one of the machines here was tied with something very similar, except it was also threaded through the side bull bars of the nearest pickup truck. I hoped the respective owners knew each other, or things were going to get rough at chucking-out time.

When I reached the other end of the line I found Trey hovering, hands shoved into his pockets and shivering like he was cold.

“Will this one do?” he asked. I gritted my teeth but said nothing as I quickly checked it over.

The bike was a Kawasaki GPz 900 Ninja, not in the first flush of youth and much abused if the dirt-engrained scars in the fairing were anything to go by. The counterweight on the end of the clutch lever was missing and one indicator dangled by its wiring. Not exactly somebody’s pride and joy, then. Well, that was good.

Better still, there were no extra locks or chains and no warning stickers for an alarm system. Just the steering lock, which held the handlebars cocked hard over to the left.

“Yes, it will,” I said at last, trying to force my lips into an encouraging smile towards the boy. “Well done.”

I straightened up, put one hand on the pillion seat, reared back and kicked the scuffed bar end with as much force as I could put into it, given the angle. The bike lurched on its side stand like it was shying away from the blow. As soon as I could be sure it wasn’t going to go down, I hit it again.

This time the whole of the front end bucked as the steering lock sheared. The bars rebounded off the far side of the fairing as they broke free. I had to grab the body of the bike to stop it diving forward off the stand. My muscles cramped as I took the full weight of it, straining to keep it upright. It was like slapping a particularly nervous racehorse round the muzzle and then having to stop it bolting afterwards.

Trey stood mute, looking puzzled, not making any attempt to help as I wheeled the Kawasaki out of the line. I cast him a single vicious glance as I set the bike back onto its stand, then flipped the fuel tap on and fumbled in my pocket for my Swiss Army knife. I folded out the slot-head screwdriver bit and rammed it into the ignition, using the leverage of the handle to break up the inside of the lock and twist it to the run position.

“OK,” I said to Trey, “get on the back. If this works we might have to get out of here fast.”

He climbed onto the pillion seat without a word. I closed my eyes briefly, then hit the starter.

The Kwak, good reliable old hack that it was, fluttered and caught. The neglected engine was rattling like a bag of old spanners and the exhaust can was in dire need of replacement, but at least it ran.

No-one came rushing out of the bar to rescue their trusty steed.

I toed the bike into gear, feeling weird to be riding without a helmet for the first time in my life. Trey wrapped his arms round my waist and clamped himself to my back like a monkey as we trundled across the uneven car park.

When I got to the highway I checked both ways carefully before I pulled out. The cluster of cop cars was about a third of a mile further back down the road. As I turned in the opposite direction I tried not to look too hard, and I made sure I went up through the Kwak’s gearbox slowly and smoothly enough not to attract their attention.

As I rode north into the subtropical night I could see the visual disco of their lights behind me for a couple of miles before they finally disappeared from view.