No Perfect Hero(105)

We’ve been baking in here ever since the sun went down, holding perfectly still, a bag in the front seat containing the guns and a thin layer of money on top of dummy bricks.

It’s not the plan that has me afraid.

It’s Hay.

Fear that I won’t be enough, just like I wasn’t for Jenna.

Fear that Stewart will betray me yet again, outwit me somehow, and rip away another person I love.

Fear that I'll lose my redemption, the best thing that ever happened to me, my whole future.

And that fear amplifies into an adrenaline spike as the radio on my hip crackles. “Guys? I’ve got sight of him,” Blake whispers. “He’s coming in from town. Moving slow.”

I don’t dare move or signal, nothing to disrupt the false bottom acting as a roof over me and Doc, but Blake’s been warned of that. His job is to relay info, ours is to stay silent.

In the darkness, Doc and I exchange glances. All I can see are the faint whites of his eyes. I can tell he’s as grim and determined as I am.

Let’s fucking do this.

Once Stewart drops off the girls and leaves in my truck, he’ll have us with him. Blake will collect Hay and Tara and get them to safety.

Once we’re sure the girls are out of the crossfire, we’ll pop out and take this bastard down, drag him in, make sure he confesses every damn dirty thing he’s done over the last thirty years to the police.

Including murdering my sister.

It’s hard to miss the rumble, the growl of Stewart’s engine in that souped-up monster truck of his.

I hear it coming long before it spills into an overwhelming thunder that echoes in my ears, the vibrations rattling through my Dodge, shaking me and Doc against the truck bed.

Then the engine cuts, and I hear the door of his truck open. Followed by his voice, hissing and harsh in a way I’ve never heard it.

“Out!” he snaps. “Pull anything funny and I’ll shoot the kid.”

“Then you’ll have to shoot me too,” Haley bites off, her voice muffled and distant through the wood and plastic over me – but so resolute, so brave, and even now I can’t help but admire her. “Because I’m a witness. And I’ll never forget.”

“Don’t get smart,” Stewart snarls.

I don’t hear Tara at all.

If I were her age in this situation, I’d be frozen into white-faced silence, not even crying. But her silence still worries me.

She must be alive, though. Or Stewart wouldn’t be threatening to shoot her – and making my blood boil with rage – to keep Haley in line.

With Stewart so close, it takes every shred of willpower I have not to burst out the back of the truck right now and mow his ass down. Too soon.

I have to wait until the girls are safe.

So I pause and listen, sweat rolling down my spine, heart in my throat, as footsteps scuff in the loose dirt and grit behind the billboard. There’s a door slamming – Stewart’s truck.

Then the sound of my own truck opening. A small bounce ripples through me, and I can tell Doc feels it too.

Please, fuck. Please just let him leave the girls and drive off with us, none the wiser.

My radio crackles, and I tense, my gut plummeting, as Blake’s voice whispers. “Something isn’t right, War. I can’t see—”

“What the hell?” Stewart snaps, and the truck shakes as the door slams shut again. “Get the fuck back in the truck.”

“No,” Haley bites off. “Warren? Warr—”

She cuts off in a crash of flesh on flesh and I see red.

Goddammit!

We’re compromised.

He’s going to run. Doc and I barely glance at each other before shoving upward, hurling the false bottom aside just in time to see Stewart flinging Tara, screaming, into his truck, grabbing Haley by the handcuffs around her wrists and lifting her up by the chain to throw her in after.

But as Doc and I stand, Stew whips around, snaring a pistol from the holster and firing quick shots. Doc and I both dive over the side of my truck, landing hard in the dirt but with the truck bed shielding us.

There’s one more cry, another slam of the truck doors, and then a grinding, massive roar as Stewart starts the engine and peels out like a tornado.

Pulse pounding, I dart for the driver’s side door of my Dodge and climb in, barely waiting for Doc to dive into the passenger side before I switch the ignition on and slam on the gas.

We spin out from behind the billboard in a haze of dust spraying from my tires, crashing onto the road after Stewart.

He’s not getting away with my girls.

Blake comes over the radio. “Fuck, did I—”

“Doesn’t matter now,” I snap, grabbing the walkie off my belt loop and barking into it, keeping my eyes on the road. “We're going after him.”

Stewart’s a block ahead and charging on, ripping through town, that souped-up engine giving him an advantage in speed.

Not enough. He won't fucking shake me.

This asshole might have speed, but he’s also got bulk, and that’s going to slow him down in the long run. “Blake, listen – we’re gonna do a pincer. There’s only one road out of town that way, but you can take the highway intersection to meet him. Circle around and see if you can cut him off from the other side.”