Motown Showdown (27 page)

Even with my head, heart and soul fucking twisted up in pain, it calmed me.

Fifteen minutes. Twenty. Forty-five. Then I see him through the window in the kitchen…cooking dinner. What the fuck? Sliding my phone out, I dial again getting voicemail, and that isn’t right. Packing up to move in closer, I stow my bag next to the air conditioner and take my .45 with me. Checking the windows, I see no threat, feel no threat. Coming back to the window I hear it first then climb up to see him…singing Barry White?

Slowly sneaking in through the sliding door, when he sees me, he was about to speak when I hold my hand up for quiet. Whispering, “Are you alone?” he guffaws and goes right back to flipping his fried bologna. “Does it look like I’m having a party?”

“Pilgrim said he had sights on you,” I tell him lowering my gun.

“Sounds to me like he wanted you here because he’s where you ain’t.”

“Lock it down,” I order and noticed my palms were sweaty. “Your service is out, cell jammer. Resort to the throwaway, call Whisky and check in every fifteen.”

“Pepper,” he says gently and I freeze up. He hasn’t called me by my name since I was thirteen; he also didn’t do gentle. “Focus. It’s happening, and you’re trained for this. I’ll lock it down, doing my part but, you can’t afford to worry about me. He needed you out of the way, so if you’re here then he’s…”

“I know where he is.”

“He fears you for a reason,” he booms. “Show him why.”

“You kill for those you love,” I tell him standing taller.

“Vengeance is yours,” he says pulling me into a hug.

“Vengeance is
mine
.”

“Make me proud, Camo.”

“I love you, grandpa,” I tell him while memorizing him right here in the kitchen. The same kitchen he cooked for me in, taught me the rules of the game in. If I never made it back to this kitchen, I wanted to remember this. My grandpa who became both mother and father when they were taken from us. Kissing him on the cheek, I grab my bag and haul ass back to Roman’s place praying I’d make it in time. When I was finished with Pilgrim, even God himself wouldn’t be able to identify the body.

If I survived it, I planned on shooting Gadget in the chest and taking my heart back.

She told me she loved me a lot, my Camo did. Tonight though, her ‘I love you’ was also, goodbye.

Dropping my old body to the couch, I did something I never did.

I hung my head and prayed for a miracle.

Since the night, she lost her parents she’s blamed herself for failing them. In her heart, she believes this no matter what I say. Since that night, she’s hell-bent on saving what she loves at any cost. I knew this when Gadget came on the scene. One look at that boy and you saw it in her. Love that shone so fucking bright it hurt your eyes. That girl misses her folks, but she found someone else that needed saving. Thing is, the stubborn asshole didn’t realize how much he did, in fact, need saving or how much it cost her to do it.

I was shaking, scared down to my soul.

My granddaughter’s greatest fear, only fear, is, not making it in time.

The worst happens, and Gadget falls, she will not survive it.

Camo will not only go rogue, she will do it going out in a blaze of glory.

Making the call, when he answers, I keep it simple. “Camo is hunting, call off all units.” After giving him coordinates, knowing I bought her some time, I hang up then walk over to my closet and load up.

She was all I had left. I started this game forty-three years ago, and I was going to help her finish it.

“One day I won’t make it in time,” ~Camo

That bastard waited until we were vulnerable, until she was out of the way. Which was my fucking fault for saying what I did, doing what I did and forcing her hand. I ran into the house avoiding fire, finding two pissed off lovebirds, and while they were verbally kicking my ass, another bullet lodged in the wall next to my fucking sister’s head.

Whoever was out there was there playing with us but I couldn’t leave them alone inside. Unless I had help, I was literally stuck. Sporadic gunfire from different angles told me Pilgrim had done some recruiting. Camo had the players on her team secure which meant whoever was out there was an unknown. The lovebirds were safe inside of the master bedroom closet but, if the house was breached, we were fucked.

I was outnumbered, I was losing and never in my life did I need Camo more than I did right now. Not just to save our asses but to know she was okay, that she was safe, away from Pilgrim.
Jesus, I needed my partner
.

The enemy was closing in; panic was building inside of me with nowhere to go. I did not want to die like this. “Camo,” I whispered to the sky. “Where are you?”

Like my body was zapped with energy,
I felt it
, her presence, she was close.

She was also
pissed
.

Our bond was not what it once was. It was there, but it was altered. She was letting me know she was here, nothing more. Right now the relief I felt was palpable so I’d take whatever she was willing to give me. With her here we stood a chance. A small one, but in any situation she held the power of a dozen men. But with her out there she was in immediate danger. Taking a chance at calling her once again it went to voicemail. Shit.

Setting up shop, I pulled out two grenades, two pistols and my Barrett M107 setting it to the side. I understood tossing a hand grenade in a residential neighborhood wasn’t smart, but to protect the ones I loved, I’d do it gladly. When a round went through the window, the hallway wall inches from my head and straight through the kitchen I found it hard to swallow.

Infrared and armor piercing rounds, shit. These bastards weren’t playing around.

Yelling to Rome to cover my sister, I hit the steps to get a better view from up top and what I saw froze me in my tracks. It was Camo, out in the open. Exposed, spoiling for a fight, taunting death. She takes one knee, aims, fires. Looks to her right about 90 degrees, aims, fires. Looks straight ahead, aims, fires. Then she sprints, and I lose her behind the house. Running back down the stairs and crawling to the kitchen, I frantically search for her and can’t find her anywhere in the darkness. Feel her yes, find her, no. Camo doesn’t fire blindly so based on what I saw she dropped three players. I knew in my gut none of them were Pilgrim. I knew this because she was saving him for last, wherever he was.

My phone buzzing startles me, swiping it I ask breathlessly, “Camo?”

“You fucking prick,” Pilgrim says quietly which meant he was close. “You think she can save you? She can’t.” Then he disconnects. Camo had him rattled; he was unpredictable when he was rattled.

Staying completely still the next shot that came through the window grazed my thigh and sent me to the floor with a grunt. I could hear my sister screaming for me but ignoring it, I get back up and take position. Something had to give; someone had to move. There… just to the east I see movement, male, the enemy.

Dialing it in, I take a slow deep breath and fire.

Down.

Another runs out from the cover of the bushes to the right, single shot, down.

Jesus Christ, how many were out there? Another bullet zings me this time tagging my shoulder sending me from the countertop back to the floor. This time there was no holding my sister back when she came running into the kitchen to help me. The second Kandace made it to me the front door was blown open and two men appeared. “Stay down,” I whisper. “And no matter what happens, what you see or hear, you stay
silent
.”

Staying in the shadows, I waited until he was within grabbing distance, then I eliminated the first threat.

From the safety of my tree, I watched the two men approach the house. They split apart, one taking the side and the other the back. Had my mom caved and let my dad buy me a cell phone like my friends had, I’d be able to call and warn them. But I couldn’t because she didn’t cave. Instead of a phone she bought me more piano lessons. She said it was for the best. Now I was stuck in a tree with no way to tell her that she was wrong; it wasn’t for the best.

I could save them. I needed a gun. I had the gun in my hands; I rounded the corner, but I was too late.

I didn’t make it in time. The proof was at my feet, dead and unmoving.

I followed them outside and from the safety of my tree I heard it. “Merlin has been eliminated, spouse too. No kid, threat contained,” I smiled because I was a threat, they just didn’t know it yet.

After they drove off, I climbed back down, went in through the back and saw my parents on the floor. Bloody, eyes open, gone.

Hearing Bobo’s truck, I run out, scale the tree and wait.

Several minutes later two vans pull up, twelve men exit, entering the house. Bobo calls out for me, I jump down and into his arms. “Tell me you didn’t see, Pep.” He says checking me over.

“I didn’t see,” I lie.

“You saw,” he grates out. “God dammit, you saw.”

He was right, I did, and it changed the course of my life. Because no matter which way these fucking memories play out in my head, some details sharper than others, but the ending is always the same.

I didn’t make it in time.

I didn’t make it in time.

I didn’t make it in time.

For him, I would make it in time.

Who are these guys? Thug school drop outs? Clearly Pilgrim paid them a few bucks to take target practice at the house to keep Gage occupied but they were sloppy, and as of now, dead. Between my shots and Gage’s the sporadic fire stopped. I was pretty sure the term suicide mission applied to these morons. They were set up to be slaughtered, and they were.

That left Pilgrim.

The cagey bastard was probably close but until I zeroed in, I couldn’t risk further exposure. This time I chose to stay low in case I needed to run. Let it be known, I hated running. I had already run once tonight and wasn’t looking forward to doing it again.

Pilgrim (whose real name was Paul Walker, I shit you not) was toying with Gage knowing he’d be protecting his family from the inside. He also sent me on a wild goose chase, and I did not appreciate that,
at all
. Pilgrim’s biggest weakness was impatience which was why he was a handler, not a field operator. All I had to do was wait, and he’d cave, he’d call because not calling would be having said patience.

Minutes later my phone buzzed, and I answered, satisfied that as usual I was right. “I was napping, Pilgrim. This better be good.”

“Walk away and they live,” he says in hushed tones. “I’ve already tagged Gadget twice and if he’s not dead, he’s wishing he was. Next will be his sister and that stunner,
I’ll toy with
.”

“She would whoop that old ass,” I say smiling because she would, Kandace was a badass in her own right. “Come out and play with me, Pilgrim. Not that I don’t like playing with myself… ”

“You leave me choice,” he says smugly. Then from twenty yards behind me he uses a grenade launcher. No fucking joke, a grenade launcher at the back of the house in a God damn residential neighborhood that hits the deck shattering it, leaving a hole that once held a patio door. Now the house was fully exposed to attack.
So much for the stick in the door
…If that didn’t get the DPD’s attention nothing would. Either that or the neighbors would fire back with their own artillery, and I did not want to be out here if that happened.