Between the Cracks and Burning Doors: Book 2 of The Extraction List Series (13 page)

He half smiled. “I know.”

“You know? And you’re still helping me?”

“Darn right. Blame myself for her, though. I was there.”

“What do you mean you were there?”

He looked me square in the eye. “Your momma could barely lift you, let alone your father. When she found out what you did, she called me.”

At first, my stomach tried to escape through my mouth; now it sank to the floor.

“She got you outta the house that night, then called me. Told me to just help her put him in the car. Told me to put him in the passenger seat, to throw a blanket over him. I was so shocked, it didn’t even occur to me to ask what she planned on doing with him. Before I knew it, she was speeding away. Then I saw the news.”

My knees gave out and the man had to jump from his chair to catch me. He slowly lowered me to the floor. “Cain, your mamma loved you. Maybe she didn’t show it as much as she had planned, but none of us ever do. When I saw the news that day, I know she blamed herself for what happened between you and your dad. But she loved you, never forget that.”

All I could do was nod. “Thank you.”

He got up and went over to his soldier collection. “Ah, just about dry.” He folded up all of them into a piece of leather, carefully wrapping each one, keeping a layer of fabric between them. The last one, he handed to me. “This one’s for you. The leader. Keep this one close to you.”

I squeezed it hard and put it in my pocket. “Thank you.” Before I knew it, I was hugging him. This man had saved me more times than I could count, despite what he’d known I’d done.

“Go on now, you better get back. Steer clear of those policemen.”

I swallowed hard. “I really hate to ask, but that’s the thing…we need to leave but we can’t fit—”

“Say no more.” He dug into his pocket and tossed his keys at me. “She doesn’t smell too good but she runs great. Now get out of here.”

I smiled at him, carefully closing the shop door behind me. When I glanced back, he was back to his desk, painting faces on his nameless soldiers. I squeezed the one he had given me and hopped into the van.

I had one more stop to make before I went back to the church. We would have to wait until the next day to get supplies ready for our journey, so I wanted to make sure I talked to Maureen before then.

When I got to her house, she was sitting on the couch, reading a book. I sat down across from her.

“You aren’t on shift today, why are you here?”

I grabbed her book straight from her hands and threw it across the room. “We’re leaving and you have to come with us.”

A loud laugh, almost a yell, left her mouth. “Leave? Are you crazy?”

I grabbed her by her shoulders and pulled her out of her chair. “They want to kill you, don’t you get it? For killing their friend. I’ve been protecting you but I can’t protect you anymore.”

“What are you talking about?”

“They know. I stabbed Keegan tonight. They know I’m never going to tell them where we buried their friend. We have to get out of here.”

She freed herself from my grasp. “I’m not afraid of them. I can take care of myself.” She gestured around her as a maniacal smile that I’ll never forget stretched across her face. “I’ve built this. Myself. Look around you, I have an empire. A
fucking
empire. They can’t touch me.”

“Maureen, please, what you have is a whore house and what you’ll be is dead if we don’t leave.”

As soon as the words escaped me, I knew I had lost. She just stared at me, stone cold and silent, all feelings drained completely from her face. “We have no more to say. Get out.”

When she slammed the door behind me, I remembered the words I had said and prayed that when the door shut it wouldn’t be for the last time.

A noise danced in the air as I made my way up the steps and back inside the church. No lights were on, but I could hear feet scurrying around, making plans and readying themselves for their journey. When I saw Dominic, I smiled. “Van’s in the back.”

He embraced me. “We will have to wait until the cover of night tomorrow, but if you and I load the van during the day while Nick keeps watch, we should be ready by nightfall.”

A knock on the front door of the church startled us both. I didn’t move fast enough, because as I took a step toward it, Jordyn flung the door open and marched toward me. Dom glanced at me with a who-the-hell-is-this expression. Before I could explain, Jordyn turned to him and stuck her hand out.

“Name’s Jordyn. I’m coming with you.”

“Um…okay? How about we start with where you came from?” Dom extended a cautious hand and Jordyn shook it vigorously before she turned to me.

“I heard what you said. At the house. I was listening.”

I didn’t have time to be irritated that she had eavesdropped. I remembered the promise I had made Maureen. “I’m sorry, Jordyn, but I can’t let you come with us.”

Jordyn smiled. “Look, dude, I don’t remember asking. And besides, you really think you won’t need me?” She looked over at Dom. “Your friend doesn’t look so hot and I darn well know you don’t want to have to deal with a bunch of kids by yourself. Besides, you can’t go all the way to the coast without stoppin’ once or twice. My parents have a big house with a big field. We can camp out in the woods there and they won’t even be the wiser.” She paused. “Please, Cain, I can’t do it anymore. That house…I just can’t be anywhere near it anymore.”

“Dom’s fine.”

Dom signed then looked at me. “She’s right, Cain, anything could happen between now and the farm. We might need her.”

I stared at her, arms folded across her chest and one hip popped out to one side. She wasn’t about to let it go. Sucking in my breath and dreading how I was going to make it up to Maureen, I nodded.

I woke up the next morning with a knot in my stomach. I curled up in a ball and tucked the blanket over my head.

If I can avoid today just a little longer, maybe I can fix this.

Denial is a powerful drug.

I could have stayed there forever, except Dom was already up and pulling things out of the closet, digging under the bed, and throwing things in bags. I don’t know where he had all those bags hidden away but they were there all the same. He saw me stir. “Make yourself useful and start emptying the cupboards. My brother doesn’t have enough pots and pans for an extra dozen people, so we need to bring it all.”

Picking up a plate in the sink, I started washing it. And washing it. And washing it again. Dom finally noticed me scrubbing the same plate, just staring into nothingness. I felt a hand on my shoulder. “Okay, out with it.”

I didn’t even bother pretending I was okay. “It’s Maureen. She needs my help but she’s never gonna forgive me. That was her one rule: don’t mess with her girls. The second I said yes to Jordyn, I lost her.”

Dom turned me away from the sink. “You know how I feel about that girl. But I know you care about her so I’m trying to ignore it. Come sit for a second.”

We sat down on the bed, ignoring the masses of stuff that still needed to be done. “Just go talk to her. If she’s any kind of woman, she’ll understand.”

“I asked her to come with us.” Dom swallowed hard. “She said no.” I could almost see the muscles in his body relax. “But that doesn’t mean she’ll forgive me.”

“She may not. But isn’t it worth one more shot?”

I hesitated, looking around at all we had left to do. Dom pushed a hand into my back.

“Go, you stubborn kid.”

I smiled with cautious hope as I ran out the door.

I found Maureen in the kitchen, hunched over the sink. When I came in, she didn’t look up. I noticed a knife in her left hand.

“Maureen, I’m sorry about yesterday. I didn’t mean to say that.”

“Say what?”

“You know.”

She looked up, grip tightening. “No, repeat it for me. Tell me again about my whorehouse. Oh, but remember to throw in the part that you’re stealing one of my girls from me while you’re at it.”

She turned to face me, knife thrust out in front of her.

“Whoa, put the knife down.”

“Why? You know I’ll use it. I have before.”

“But you won’t on me.”

The blade started to shake in her hand. “Well I should. I should kill you for what you are doing. I thought I could…”

“What?”

She dropped the knife onto the floor. “I thought I could trust you.”

I stepped toward her but she backed away. Keeping her eyes on me, she went further into the kitchen. “You’re just like everybody else. Just pay for what you want, then leave. Just like them.”

I kept stepping toward her. “Please, you can come with us. I don’t want to leave you but I can’t stay here anymore. I’ll end up in jail or dead and so will you. You have to come with us.”

Suddenly her eyes widened. A soft giggle parted her lips. She picked up the phone that was hanging on the back wall. “It’s perfect, you know.”

My stomach turned. “Who are you dialing?”

She smiled. “I can stay here. You’re going to leave anyway. I can stay here. It’s the only way, the perfect way.”

Suddenly, I knew. “Maureen, you can’t.” I lunged toward the phone.

“Try all you want. Even if you break it, the minute you leave I’ll just walk to the police station.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Why not? It’s over. You can’t stay here and I can’t leave. At least this way, I can save my girls.”

“Stop it. They’ll just arrest them too. You can’t trust Keegan.”

She threw the phone against the wall. “Don’t you dare talk to me about trust. You’re as bad as he is or worse.” She lunged toward me and slammed me into the kitchen table. Even after I wrapped my arms around her, I felt her fists slamming into my chest. “At least I always knew what he was. But you? You got me, Cain, you fooled me good.”

She stopped. Her punches became taps and her sobs came in waves. I sunk to the floor with her in my arms. “They’ve all been mean. But you…it was supposed to be different. All of it was supposed to be different.”

I squeezed her tight. My muscles ached and I realized I was holding her for the last time. There was nothing I could say to get her to leave what she loved.

She looked up at me and brushed my cheek with her hand. When I felt her lips reach mine, I almost gave in. I’m ashamed to admit it, but I almost gave the whole thing up. I almost left the children I had saved to their own devices. I almost let them go back on the streets to be picked up by the police I had been shielding them from. I almost let Dom face his parishioners alone after all he had done for me.

But I didn’t.

Instead, I kissed her and then released her. She held my hand as she walked with me toward the door.

I didn’t look back. I couldn’t. Because if I had, I may have ran back inside and locked the door behind us forever.

We waited until midnight to start loading supplies into the van. The original plan had been to load the van during the day, but even with Nick as a lookout, there were just too many people around to make very many trips safely.

The van was fairly large, big enough to carry a very small car, but with as many children and supplies as we had, the children had to sit on each other’s laps, taking turns sitting on the hard, bumpy metal floor. Some of them complained about it hurting their butts, but Nick told them to “zip it.”

He had become a little version of me. I wasn’t sure if I felt proud or ashamed.

Jordyn, Dom, and I locked the children in the van and went back inside for one last look around. When we shut the front door behind us and locked it for the last time, tears streamed from his eyes.

I hugged him, as did Jordyn. “I’m so sorry, Dominic.”

He squeezed us back. “God has a plan for everyone. Apparently, his plan for me doesn’t involve this place anymore.” We released each other and just stood there, understanding that the next few hours would change our lives forever.

We were still on the porch when I saw her emerge from her car along with the rest of her girls. They slowly made their way toward us, and I grinned and had to stifle myself to keep from screaming when I realized that Maureen had given me a gift. She had decided to sacrifice what she loved more than anything in the world so that I didn’t have to choose. I could have her—we could have each other—without sacrificing the children’s freedom. Her eyes glistened in the beam of the streetlight, and a slight smile formed on her lips, as if she was afraid to think for even a moment that it was possible that we were going to be okay. It was the cautious smile of someone who knew that our new start could be taken away in an instant.

She was right.

I don’t know if Maureen even heard the truck coming up behind her and the others. Black rifles protruded from the windows like long, spindly fingers, ready to strangle the last breath from all of them. The fingers pointed straight at Maureen.

It was a firing squad.

I was heading toward her when I found myself on the ground. I looked up and saw that Dominic had thrown himself on top of me. I pushed my hands against him, struggled to free myself but he used his weight to pin me to the porch. I glanced to my left and realized that Jordyn was also using all of her strength to help Dominic.

All I could do was listen.

The screaming echoed through the air: some had the timbre of fear, and others were filled with maniacal glee. As I heard each girl’s body hit the ground, the voices quieted one by one.

The last thing I had seen before I hit the ground was Keegan’s face.

Once we heard the van speed away, Dom finally released me. Nevertheless, when I got up, a part of me wanted to plummet back to the porch, back to the before, when I didn’t know the damage Keegan had caused. Once I got up, there was only the after: eight women lying still on the ground below us.

I ran straight to Maureen.

She was curled up in a fetal position on one side. When I got to her, she looked up at me with wide, terrified eyes. She coughed out words; when she spoke, she choked on the blood in her mouth. “So much for starting over, huh?”

I stroked her cheek. “Don’t talk; we’re going to get you help.” I said the words even though I knew it was too late. She had been hit in the abdomen twice, and her wounds pulsed with every heartbeat.