Iron Goddess (9 page)

When Shea came to, her body was slumped against a wooden crate. Her head and chest throbbed. Hunter and the guys were nowhere to be seen.

Thoughts drifted through her mind—some urgent, telling her to get the hell out of there, others suggesting she stay put until the room stopped spinning. She coughed and spit up blood. Her bottom lip felt fat and tender.

She scanned the room. Half a dozen bins full of hex were missing.
Street value must be a few mill, easy,
she thought.
The Jaguars'll be pissed when they find out it's gone.
She'd already pushed her luck with Oscar. If they found out she was here, God knows what they'd do to her and those she cared about.

A blinking red light near the ceiling caught her eye. A security camera on the wall had recorded the whole damn thing. “Oh fuck.”

The urgent need to destroy the recording energized her. When she pulled herself into a wobbly stance, the room spun and a wave of nausea caused her knees to buckle. Shea grabbed a nearby shelf to steady herself.

Where would they keep the security recordings?
Dizziness kept sliding thoughts out of her grasp.
On the computer in the office, most likely
. Using the shelves for support, she shuffled across the room.

She spotted her Glock underneath the rear tire of the forklift. She eased herself into a crouch, grabbed the gun, and put it in her waistband. The shakiness faded as she continued to the hallway.

When she reached the office door, the distant roar of an engine disturbed the silence.
Not a motorcycle. A truck.
Whether it was Hunter returning for more hex or the Jaguars themselves, the growing rumble lit a fire underneath her. She tried to pick up the computer, but it was bolted to the floor. She was out of options. Time to get out of there.

Shea raced out the back door and took cover in the woods. Her pulse pounded in her ears, merging with the thrum of the approaching truck. She scrambled through the underbrush around the side of the building as a black Nissan Pathfinder backed up to the garage door. Was it the same SUV that chased them earlier? She wasn't sure.

Two men got out. The driver was Oscar Reyes. No surprise. The other man had a hippie-turned-bank-executive look. His silver-gray ponytail and goatee contrasted with the precise cut of his tailored black suit.

“Well, well, Uncle Victor,” she whispered to herself. Absently, she traced a scar on her cheek as she remembered the last time she had seen him. Victor Ganado, the president of the Jaguars, was one of Ralph's former business associates.

Shea remembered him as a sweet grandfather of a man who spoke with a funny accent and smelled of cigars. But the kindly
abuelito
persona was a façade to hide the ruthless Latino gang leader who'd left countless mutilated bodies hanging from bridges. He'd wiped out entire families as a warning to anyone who might consider crossing him.

The two men approached the warehouse's side door. Oscar turned the doorknob, opened the door, and shouted excitedly in Spanish, while pointing at the lock. Victor turned, scanning the woods in Shea's direction.

Panic swept through her as she ducked down.
Did they see me?

When they entered the building, Shea barreled through the woods, like a deer running from wildfire, down the hill to where she had parked her bike. The Thundermen's vehicles were gone. Her motorcycle lay on its right side—a final fuck-you from Hunter.

With her heart racing, she set the side stand down, then crouched down, with her butt against the seat. She extended her legs out as far as she could without losing balance. Her left hand grabbed the handle bars and her right the chassis below the seat. She took a deep breath and pushed up with her legs. But instead of rising, the bike slid sideways.

“Fuck!” Her head pounded, making it hard to focus.
Gotta get outta here now
.

She heaved again, angling her shoulders to get traction underneath the tires. The bike slid further across the loose surface.

Her jaw clenched while she struggled to maintain control against the rising panic. She scrutinized her surroundings and spotted a flat, two-foot-long rock on the side of the road. Shea lobbed the rock toward the bike and pushed it flush against her back tire.

Once again, she crouched down against the bike and lifted, her body screaming in pain. The front tire shifted a few inches, then got enough purchase to lift the bike.

She laid it over on the side stand, gasping for air. The Jaguar's Pathfinder would be charging down the road any minute. Drawing on the last of her energy, she adjusted the side mirror that'd been knocked loose and pulled on her helmet. She pressed the starter, put it in gear, and raced down the hill.

Her mind swam as she attempted to retrace the route back to civilization.
Left turn, then another left, followed by a right, or was it a right followed by a left?
She thought she had figured it out until she hit a section of road filled with deep ruts and large rocks.
Crap! Wrong turn somewhere.
She flipped a u-ey and charged back to the last intersection.

While she made the turn, the Pathfinder roared from a side road, bearing down on her. Her heart stopped.

She twisted the throttle, skidding around the SUV, before racing down the road. She glanced in her left mirror, adrenaline pumping through her system. The tires rumbled over the gravel, vibrating the mirror and blurring the reflection of the Pathfinder, only a few feet from her rear tire. She focused back on the road in front of her and swerved, narrowly missing a large, half-buried rock.

Ahead the road curved sharply to the right. Shea eased up on the throttle to avoid taking the curve too fast. The Pathfinder kissed her rear fender. The bike wobbled, but stayed upright. She leaned hard into the corner, hanging way off the bike, and accelerated through the turn. The bike skidded across the road, sending up a rooster tail of rocks before straightening up again.

She glanced back. Several cracks spider-webbed across the SUV's windshield. It now hung back about fifteen feet.
That'll teach 'em to ride my ass.

Shea approached another turn—a hairpin to the left with a sheer wall of rock on one side and a fifty-foot drop on the other. A loud bang behind her made her duck. Her right mirror shattered.
Those fuckers are shooting at me!

She turned on the speed, pulled to the left, then pressed hard on the rear brake an instant before coming into the hairpin. Her back tire fishtailed. She whipped left into the turn, then pinned the throttle in the corner. Behind her, the Pathfinder skidded and slammed into the cliff face with a loud crunch. Before she could breathe a sigh of relief, it roared back to life and resumed the chase.

Over the next mile, the truck caught back up with her. Large rocks and potholes forced her to weave left and right, while someone in the truck fired another three rounds at her. Her back tingled in anticipation of the bullet that would kill her.

Shea rounded another corner and glimpsed paved road in the distance. If she could make it to the blacktop, she'd have the advantage over the top-heavy Pathfinder. She pushed the tachometer into the red, pouring on speed, closing the distance between her and the paved road.

Without warning, an elk bolted out from the side of the road. Shea jerked the handlebars to avoid it. The back tire slid out, causing the bike to lowside on top of her right leg. She screamed in pain while gravel tore away at the fabric of her jeans and bit into the flesh of her leg.

At the last second, the elk retreated, clearing her path. She turned the handlebars and accelerated. The front wheel caught the lip of the pavement. The bike jerked upright. She flew down the road once again.

She glanced at her left side mirror. The Pathfinder spun out at the spot where she had dropped the bike, but soon corrected and resumed chasing her. However, on the pavement, the advantage was hers. The high-performance engine roared as she leaned hard into the curves like a MotoGP racer. The Pathfinder couldn't do the same without flipping over.

By the time she reached the main highway, the SUV had disappeared behind her.

As the adrenaline wore off, the throbbing on her right leg intensified. The pain became distracting. Shea forced herself to take slow, even breaths until a stoplight on the outskirts of Bradshaw City brought her to a stop. She looked down at her leg. Her Kevlar jeans were black and wet with blood. She didn't have time for this. She pressed on into town, groaning in agony every time she had to use her right foot on the rear brake.

She was growling Pink Trinkets' tunes to keep her mind off the pain until she pulled into the Getaway Motel's parking lot. Potholes filled with pea gravel reminded her of the grit imbedded in her leg, making her wince.

The bike rumbled to a stop near the stairway to Wendy's room. Shea would have preferred parking someplace a little less out in the open, but that would mean a longer agonizing walk to the room.

A jolt of pain took her breath away when she lifted her right leg over the back of the bike. She gripped the handlebars, standing on one foot until the worst of the pain subsided. She looked down at her injury. The side of her leg from her ankle to her knee looked like raw hamburger mixed with dirt and rocks. Blood dripped onto the pavement.

Gingerly, she limped up the staircase to the room where she'd left Wendy a couple of hours earlier. She pounded and waited. No answer. She fumbled in her pocket for the key Wendy'd given her and opened the door to the room.

“Wendy?” There was no response. “Wendy?” She hobbled into the bathroom, half expecting to see her sister passed out on the floor. But Wendy wasn't in the room. “Goddammit, where'd you go?”

The words summoned a childhood memory she'd suppressed until now. Mama and Ralph had left her to babysit Wendy. Instead of keeping an eye on her, Shea had disappeared into her room and cranked up the latest Ramones album. When her folks got home around midnight, Wendy wasn't in the house. After three hours of calling neighbors and hospitals, Ralph found her wandering in the desert. She'd heard a pack of coyotes yipping and wanted to “sing along with them.” Ralph had beaten Shea bloody until Mama threatened to call the cops. Fifteen years later, Wendy was still wandering off, while Shea was taking a beating.

“Fuck her.” Her focus shifted from finding Wendy to treating her injuries.

She set the Glock on the back of the toilet. When she pulled off her boots and dropped her tattered, blood-soaked jeans, the pain took her breath away. Shea draped her bleeding leg into the tub, gritted her teeth, and turned on the spigot, which only had one flow setting—firehose. She bellowed when the water hit the chewed-up flesh. The room swayed.

After a moment, the cold water numbed her leg. The pain became almost bearable. She looked for soap; there wasn't any. No surprise in this sleazy motel. She was probably increasing her risk of infection by coming in contact with the tub.
Who knows the last time it was cleaned?

After a few minutes of white-knuckling the spigot, she turned off the water and looked again at the wound. It looked cleaner, but raw, angry, and still seeping blood. She grabbed the cleanest towel from the shelf above the toilet and pressed it to her leg.

The front door of the room creaked open. Was it Wendy or had the Jaguars tracked her down?

Her fingers wrapped around the Glock's grip. With her hand trembling from the pain, she pointed the gun at the bathroom door.

Wendy popped her head in the bathroom and jumped when she saw the gun. “Jesus Christ, Shea! What the hell?” She seemed less jittery, eyes more focused. The clammy flush of fever was gone. Her hair was brushed, makeup not quite concealing the shiner Mackey had given her.

“Sorry. Didn't know it was you.” Shea tossed the Glock onto her jeans, piled on the floor next to her. “Where the hell you been?”

“I got hungry. Where's Annie?”

Shea shook her head. “She wasn't there.”

Tears filled Wendy's eyes. She collapsed onto the toilet seat, burying her face in her hands. “What are we gonna do? I want my baby back.”

Gritting her teeth against the pain, Shea pivoted toward her and put a hand on her sister's knee. “We'll get her back. Just gotta figure out a way to get the ransom.”

Wendy looked up at her. “Where's Hunter?”

“I don't know. We, uh, parted ways at the warehouse.”

“What's that mean?”

“Ask that asshole you call a husband.”

Wendy tilted her head with a confused look on her face. Her gaze dropped to where blood seeped through the towel Shea held on her leg. “You're bleeding.”

“You noticed.” She peeled the towel away and bit her lip to keep from screaming. Looking at the wound made it hurt worse.

“Shit, how'd that happen?”

“Learning how not to drive on gravel.”

“Maybe we should go to the Church. One of the guys is a doctor.”

“Can you drive?” The sudden departure of Wendy's withdrawal symptoms made Shea wonder.

“Whaddya mean? Of course I can drive. I have a car.”

“I mean, are you high?”

“No!”

Shea couldn't tell if she was lying or not. “Uh-huh.”

“I took some medicine to feel better, but I'm fine.”

Shea thought about asking her for some of whatever she'd taken to help with the pain. “Then drive me to the hospital.”

“The Church is closer. Our doctor, Dopey, knows his stuff.”

“Club's got a doctor named Dopey? No, thanks. Drive me to the fucking hospital, okay?”

“Okay! Jump down my throat, why dontcha?”

“Sorry. My leg feels like it went through a wood chipper.” With the black pocketknife she kept clipped inside her waistband, she cut off the lower half of her right pant leg.

“What're you doing?”

“Don't want my jeans pressing against the road rash. You got anything clean I can use to cover the wound? Something you don't mind getting blood on?”

Wendy retrieved a purple nightshirt from her suitcase and handed it to her. “You can use this. It's kinda ratty, anyways. Had it since I was pregnant with Annie.”

Shea looked it over. The words
MAMA IN TRAINING
were printed in faded letters on the front. The hems were ragged in spots, but it looked clean. “Thanks.”

She wrapped it around the wound and cut strips on the end to tie it off. She gingerly pulled on her tattered jeans, followed by her boots, then holstered the Glock.

Wendy helped her to her feet. “Can you make it to the car?”

Again, she thought about asking Wendy what she'd taken, now wondering if she had some to share. Her pain tolerance had neared its limit. “I can make it. Is there an elevator?”

“Yeah, but it's at the other side of the building. The staircase is a lot closer. Just lean on me.”

It felt weird relying on Wendy to help her walk. Shea was always the one looking after her sister. She kept reminding herself not to trust Wendy, not to like her. But right now she needed her help.

Wendy held open the passenger door as Shea lowered herself into the Mustang's bucket seats with help from the oh-shit handle above the doorframe. Getting her right leg inside required some gymnastics.

“You in?” asked Wendy.

Shea nodded and put on her seatbelt. Wendy shut the passenger door, climbed into the driver's seat, and drove south toward Cortes General Hospital.

“You hear from the kidnapper?” Shea asked through gritted teeth.

“Ummm…no, not really.”

“What do you mean not really?”

“I got a call from Margaret's brother, Eduardo.”

“Why'd he call you?”

Wendy shrugged, keeping her eyes on the road ahead of them. “Well, we kinda know each other. I mean, he's her brother. Or was.”

“You
kinda
know him? There's something you ain't telling me. I can hear it in your voice. Were you dating him?”

“Ew, no! He's just a teenager. We're just friends. Not even friends, really. He's just the kid brother of a friend. I barely know him.”

“So what does he have to do with the kidnapper?” Shea thought for a moment when Wendy didn't respond right away. “Shit, he's a member of the Jags, isn't he?”

“You know, I really don't want to talk about this right now. I gotta concentrate on driving.”

“Is he the one who took Annie?”

“No, he ain't like that.” Wendy's voice became choked with emotion as her eyes filled with tears. “He was upset about his sister getting killed. He was calling me asking if I knew anything.”

“He should be talking to his fellow gangbangers.”

“That's what I told him. But he swears the Jaguars ain't got her.”

“Yeah, that's a load of crap.” Shea's leg began to throb more as she became angrier. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. She pulled out her phone. Jessica had left a voicemail message. Rather than listen to it, she called Jess directly.

“Tell me the truth, Shea. Are you seeing someone else? I'm tired of these crazy stories.”

She took a deep breath as the throbbing in her leg intensified. “No, sweetie. I ain't seeing no one else. I had a minor accident on the motorcycle.”

“Oh my God, are you all right? Where are you?”

“Wendy's driving me to Cortes General now. Got a little road rash on my leg. I'll live.” A pothole on the road sent a jolt of pain through both her leg and head. “Fuck!”

“I'll meet you there.” Jessica hung up before she could tell her not to bother.

“She coming?” asked Wendy.

“Guess so.” Shea lay back in the seat, relaxing into the pain.

“Interesting. I get to meet my sister's old lady.”

“Don't call her an old lady to her face. She might not get the context.”

“Why not?”

“She's an insurance adjuster who moved up here from Scottsdale. The whole biker scene's new to her.” Shea opened one eye and looked at her sister.

Wendy grinned. “This oughta be fun.”

“Oh yeah. Tons.”

“What happened at the warehouse?”

Shea didn't feel like talking about it, but as Annie's mother, Wendy deserved to know. “All we found was a shitload of hex. Hunter decided to commandeer it. When I objected, the three of them jumped me.”

“Hunter did this to your leg?”

“Not directly. He just left me for the Jags to find. Barely got out of there when Uncle Victor and one of his goons showed up. They were the ones in the black SUV that chased us.” The car hit another pothole, sending Shea's pain level through the roof. “Gah! Tore up my leg getting away. Fucking gravel roads.”

“Damn Hunter! You see why I ran away from him?”

“Seemed awful cozy at the diner.”

“I wasn't feeling well. I was hoping he could hook me up with something.”

“Sounds fucked up, if ya ask me.”

“Well, I didn't.”

Shea's phone rang. “Hello?”

“Panterita?”

“Goblin! You hear anything about my bikes?”

“An associate of mine got a visit from a couple guys looking to unload some pink bikes.”

“Fucking A! Best news I heard all day. He got 'em?”

“Not yet. He supposed to check 'em out in the next day or so.”

“What'd the two guys look like?”

“My associate said one was a cholo with Jag ink. The other guy was bald and talked like a cop. My guy's not sure about doing the deal. Might be a sting.”

“A sting with my stolen bikes? Doubt it.” She wondered if the cop was Deputy Commando. “Tell your guy to set up a meet. Give me the details and I'll be there.”

“I'll pass the word, amiga.”

“Thanks, Goblin.” She hung up.

“Who's that?” Wendy asked.

“A friend from back in the day. Might have a lead on who's got my stolen motorcycles.”

“You think it's the same people who took Annie?”

“Could be. One of the guys sported Jaguar tattoos. My friend'll call me when they set a meet.”