Cowboy Ending - Overdrive: Book One (34 page)

The tingling at
my neck never abated. Just stayed there, like a beacon out of site.
Chilly impulses were shooting down my limbs which didn’t help with
the twitchy feeling.

Breathe. Just
keep breathing. Stay calm.

The two
members of the
Native Posse
training guns on me were slight men, youngish but weathered.
This wasn’t their first time in a rough situation. Odds are they’d
been dealing with some measure of violent activity since they were
barely out of elementary school, assuming of course they went to
school at all. The one on the left was focused on me, my every move
and eye twitch. Wasn’t going to bluff him out. The one on the right
a little more concerned, he kept glancing over to Keimac and Shawn.
Clearly engaged in the power play going on there.

Both kids
holding Cathy were just that. Kids. Somewhere in their middle
teens, young guys earning their stripes with the
Posse
I figured. Doing the scut work
and taking orders. Holding a hundred and thirty pound Jewish
reporter tight might’ve been the highest profile assignment they’d
ever been given. Had to be better than being a drug
mule.

The speaker –
Shawn, apparently – turned his focus away from the now cowering
Keimac and brought it back to me. Seeing my compliance at his
request to not move he lowered the pistol, pointing the barrel away
from Cathy’s head and down to the floor. The whimper of relief was
audible, though in honesty I’m not sure whether she or I made
it.

Shawn eyeballed
me coolly. He was in control and he liked it; that much was clear.
I’d met many power tripping fools in my time working in clubs, guys
who got off on being able to tell others what they could or
couldn’t do. It’s scary watching people like that, seeing them
analyze you in terms of numbers. Or items. Or whatever it was they
did to compartmentalize you into being something less than a
living, breathing person.

I returned his
gaze just as coolly, even though my insides were screaming at me to
run. Fight. Something.

He was older
than the others, roughly of an age with me. Early to mid-thirties I
pegged him at. Wearing the colors of his crew but not feeling the
need to advertise his thug life with a ton of bling or crazy
clothes. Plain jeans, sneakers. A black hooded sweater. Tattoos
running up his neck. His hairline was receded up to the top of his
head and he’d wisely chosen to get the rest buzzed right down. He
had the look of a man who’d done time and come out of it stronger,
literally as well as figuratively. No stranger to physical
activity. No nonsense with this guy.

The gun hand
rose, angling slightly towards me. Like a professor making a point
in class with his baton.

“You,” he said
quietly. That voice still deathly cold, his face expressionless.
“You should not be here.”

I said nothing.
Sure, witty retorts piled up in the psychotic portion of my skull
wanting to be spat out sarcastically. But I ain’t a damned hero and
Shawn wasn’t joking.

He used the
silence as a weapon, staring me down. It hurt worse than if he’d
tried hitting me. Made me question my motives for being here. My
conviction that this was something I needed to do.

I was terrified.

Silence.

He motioned
toward me again with the gun, his expression blank. “You got
nothing to say?”

My belly
quivered. I did
not
want to
get shot again. I did
not
want
anything worse to happen to Cathy.

But I remained
silent.

This dragged on
for another half minute or so.

Shawn’s eyes
narrowed slightly, his gaze focusing on my face. “I know you,” he
muttered, peering even harder. Thugs don’t get their eyes checked
much, I figured. He motioned again with the gun, my guts twitching
nervously every time he did. “Yeah, I know you. You’re the bouncer.
The one Keimac popped.”

Somehow I
managed to deliver my small smile in response, my jaw still
creaking with strain.

Shawn responded
with a small, thin lipped smile of his own. He motioned around to
his crew. “Look at this, boys,” he said mirthlessly. “Bouncer boy
is back from the dead. Thinks he can come into our ‘hood, throw
some muscle and get back his cred. Even brought his girl along to
witness.”
The two boys holding Cathy chuckled amiably, eager to please. The
two training guns on me stayed silent, though the one on the right
was starting to look nervous. His eyes flickering between myself,
Shawn and Keimac.

“Ain’t that
right?” Shawn took a step closer to me, just out of reach. His gun
hand still doing all the gesturing in time with his words. “I say,
ain’t that right? Big man looking for payback, eh?”

No response. My
jaws ached like mad. The shooting sensations from the back of my
neck raced in time with the blood hammering through my veins.

Shawn was tired
of silence. He raised the pistol decisively until it pointed dead
centre of my forehead again. “I said ain’t that right, big
man?”

“Not quite,” I
muttered, somehow managing to keep my voice level.

Shawn smirked.
“Well I say it is.”

“Then you’re
wrong.”
Cathy gasped at the firm and decisive tone I took. The nervous
gunman twitched slightly, his gun arm wavering. No doubt his arm
was getting sore from holding the piece out for so long.

Shawn’s smirk
grew. Instantly I hated him. The prime example of what happens to
bullies who go through life unchecked and without repercussions end
up being guys like this. Not necessarily criminals, but always
arrogant egomaniacs who think they’re untouchable and completely
right in all of their actions.

I maintained my
small smile, but now my fear was slowly turning into rage. A white
hot ember of rage that awoke the Neanderthal in my belly, sending
him running for firewood with a howl.

Shawn waved his
pistol in a small circle, tracing the outline of my head
presumably. “I ain’t wrong.”

My body
screamed at me to move. Lurch forward. Fly into motion and rush
this motherfucker. It took everything I had to ignore those
impulses. There’s a difference between speed on a track and being
faster than a speeding bullet.

Would I have
acted differently if Cathy wasn’t there?

If she hadn’t
been there I wouldn’t have known to find this place.

My shoulders
shrugged minutely in response. “Okay. You ain’t wrong.” I stared
him down, dropping any semblance of a smile. “So shoot me. Be the
tough guy.”

Yeah, I really
said that. I can’t believe it either.

My heart was
hammering. I had to get Cathy out of there.

“You think I
won’t?” Shawn asked, smirking the whole time.

I stared him in
the eye, giving him my fullest attention. “You woulda done it by
now if you were gonna shoot.”

Shawn’s finger
tightened slightly on the trigger, sending my heart rate to a place
I didn’t know existed. But my cards were close to the vest and my
poker face was firmly in place. Time to call the stack.

It was a tense
moment.

When he finally
lowered the pistol to his side and motioned for the other two to do
the same I couldn’t restrain a quiet sigh of relief. Sweat coated
my back and my clenched tight palms.

Shawn’s smirk
was gone, pistol still in hand but now aimed down to the floor.
“You have two minutes to tell me why we shouldn’t finish the job
Keimac started at the club, whitey.”

“Let her go,” I
said regaining more of my voice and motioning to Cathy with my
head. Her captors tightened their grips even more if that was
possible. “Let her go and then we’ll …”

“Fuck you,”
Shawn replied, motioning towards the non-existent watch on his
wrist. “Ninety seconds.”

My teeth ground
in frustration again. The Neanderthal inside me raged, screaming at
the sky in impotent fury.

“Fine,” I
growled. “Let’s talk about missing women.”

Nervous gunman
looked nervous again, his feet shuffling from side to side. Keimac
peered up at me from his position at the wall, his eyes wild and
redrimmed.

Shawn’s
expression went cold.

“What do you
know about that?”

“I know
you’ve got pictures of missing women in the basement with names and
everything.” Nervous guy kept shuffling, I tried to keep an eye on
him without looking like I was keeping an eye on him. You know,
acting casual. “I figure most of them worked the streets at first,
maybe working with your
Posse
?”

“You don’t know
shit.”

“I know about
Candace.”

“Of course you
know about her!” Keimac exploded, lurching up from where he’d been
crouching on the floor. Even in the dim light, the handprint on his
face was clear from where Shawn had slapped him down. His
expression was outraged, tears in his eyes. The dream catcher
tattoo distorted.

“”
I told
you to ...”

“I will not
shut up! That fucking club turned my sister into a white man’s
whore and killed her!”

Chapter
32

Okay, I hadn’t
expected that.

“What?” I
muttered incredulously.

“I’m
gonna kill you
all
for what
you …”
“Keimac!” Shawn thundered, his voice booming in the small room.
Keimac pulled up short, cringing like a whipped dog. He turned away
from Shawn’s glare, staring brokenly at the floor. His shoulders
shuddering with silent sobs.

I stared down
after him. My mind on fire.

“What’s
he talking about?” I growled.

“Fuck you, I’m
asking …”

“What’s he
talking about?” I asked again, my voice rising. I can only imagine
what my face looked like. The nervous gunman started to creep back
away from me, closer to Cathy and her captors.

“How do you see
this playing out?”

“What is he talking about
?” I shouted, all sense
of calm gone from my manner. My body was quivering now. The
adrenaline. My heartbeat. The surging from the back of my neck. In
the periphery of my vision I could see Cathy’s eyes widening again,
silently begging me to settle down.

We were past
that.

“That’s it,
whitey. I’ve had enough of your face.” Shawn changed his stance,
stepping forward with one leg, raising the gun again. “See you
..”

I moved.

I didn’t plan
on it.

I didn’t think
about it.

In the middle
of Shawn’s epithet I felt the surge of white hot energy from the
back of my neck race down my limbs. My hand snapped out, catching
Shawn’s rising gun arm by the wrist. He’d made the final step
forward, bringing him just in range of my grip. And my body reacted
faster than thought.

The arrogant
and superior look in Shawn’s eyes evaporated in a flash as my palm
smacked loudly onto his wrist. Pain flashed in his eyes at first,
then his grimaced expression convulsed with pain as I squeezed. The
pistol twisted up and away from my face and turned towards the
ceiling.

Beneath my
fingers I could feel his bones grinding together, his heart beat
pulsing off time from my own. My flesh buzzed all over, the tingle
at the back of my neck now a flood. Washing me in cool sensations,
feeding me confidence and energy.

It took no
effort to pull Shawn forward and bend his wrist unnaturally to the
breaking point. He cried out, lurching forward and dropping to both
knees in front of me. His free hand was on mine, trying to get a
grip under my fingers. With my free hand I negligently took the
pistol away from his limp fingers; leaving him trapped, immobile
and unarmed.

This took all
of a second. Maybe less.

The other two
gunmen blinked in surprise. Things had changed for them so quickly
that they could only stare at me now, looming over their front
man.

I gave them my
best glower. It wasn’t hard to manufacture emotion, I was
completely incensed. How dare these criminal motherfuckers lay
their hands on Cathy? Point guns at me? The back of my neck buzzed,
sending still more energy down my body. My fingers tightened
further around Shawn’s wrist, causing him to gasp in greater pain
as his bones ground together. The knuckles on my free hand whitened
as I gripped the pistol, holding it by the barrel down at my
side.

Nervous
Guy stepped slightly away, clearly unnerved and trying to back out
of the picture. His gruff demeanor completely shattered even though
he still had distance and a pistol in hand. The other
Posse
member recovered after a moment
and snapped his pistol upwards.

“Drop it!” I
snapped, my voice crackling in the air. I pulled upwards on Shawn’s
arm, forcing him to rise off his knees slightly against the
pressure. His voice crying out in pain.