JON

 

Ivory was a small enough town that I knew the streets like the back of my hand. There wasn’t a place I didn’t know how to get to. There wasn’t a shortcut I didn’t know about.

My phone was tucked away in my pocket. Hopefully, they weren’t smart enough to notice that she’d kept me on the line. I had to know she was okay. I had to know that I would be able to get to her.

I sped through the city until I got to the shelter. When I arrived, the older woman I’d seen before was being tended to by some of the other residents. She looked like she was in a daze, a slight bruise on her cheek. As soon as she saw me though, it was as if everything cleared in her head. She glared at me and I immediately knew that she’d already put it together.

“Hey!”

One of the men in the shelter walked up to me. He didn’t look much different from the other homeless men.

“What’s going on?” I said. “Where’s Anna?”

“They took her. Those guys in the fatigues. They took her and they sped off in one of their trucks. Down the street.”

I didn’t need to hear another word.

I ran outside and got on my bike. I sped off down the street. I didn’t know if I would be able to get to her. I didn’t even know where they were heading.

I knew they weren’t going slowly. All I had to do was keep moving until I could hear the sound of a truck forcing its way through traffic.

Tires screeched in the distance. Horns followed. The sound of police sirens filled the air.

I knew I was on the right track.

My bike never failed to get me to where I was going. Today would be no different. I weaved in and out of traffic. I was moving so quickly that I barely noticed that I was heading toward the outskirts of town.

The buildings started to disappear. The roads started to empty. The sound of police sirens grew distant. But just when I was about to turn around, I saw them.

Speeding down the lone highway out of the city, I saw the pickup truck weaving back and forth like the driver was drunk. Rowdy shouting came from the phone in my pocket.

I’d never driven so fast before. A truck couldn’t beat my ride. I started gaining on them. We were the only two vehicles on the road, so I was more noticeable than I wanted to be.

One of the men climbed out the window of the passenger seat and raised his gun up.

“Shit!”

I swerved out of the way before he fired. I never got used to the sound of bullets whizzing by me. I nearly spun out on the road but managed to remain on two wheels.

Anna screamed on the phone in my pocket.

Nothing was gonna stop me from getting to her.

I straightened up and ducked as the man continued to fire at me. The bullets ricocheted off the road.

I pulled my pistol out and fired into the air. I couldn’t risk aiming at him and hitting Anna. But it was enough to make him climb back into the truck and stop trying to hit me.

I slowed down enough to put some distance between the two of us. Eventually, the truck pulled up to what looked like abandoned farmland. I could barely see them hopping out and grabbing Anna along with them. There were three of them in total. Their entire gang wouldn’t have been enough to stop me.

They disappeared into one of the barns. The sound of Anna’s shaken voice was still on the phone in my pocket.

I got up to their truck and hopped off my ride. My pistol at my side, I walked forward to the barn they just wandered into. I pulled my phone out and put it to my ear.

“Hey,” I said. “You hear me? I know you hear me!”

“What is that?”

“Check her pockets… Shit… Her phone is on… Stupid bitch…”

“Listen to me, motherfucker. I know you hear me.”

“Reaper… Walk away.”

“Let her go. Let her go and I promise I won’t kill you.”

“Ha! I’d like to see you try.”

“You’re making a mistake. I’m giving you one last chance. Let her go.”

“I’ll let her go. I’ll let her go right after I finish having fun with her.”

The call ended before I could respond.

I was doing everything I could to not let my emotions get the best of me. I had to stay focused. One wrong step would mean the end for Anna and me.

I raised my pistol up and slowly inched toward the barn. I couldn’t hear anybody inside. I raised my hand up to pull on the door when it suddenly burst open.

“Shit!”

I squeezed the trigger but not before the man who appeared knocked my hand away. The bullet fired into the distance. I lowered my gun down but the man tackled me and sent me to the ground. The pistol went flying off to the side.

As I struggled with the man on top of me, another man appeared out of the barn.

“That’s it! Kick his ass! Give Gail some time with his old lady!”

I managed to get on top of the guy and level him with a fist across his temple. But he wouldn’t go down so easily. He wrapped his hand around my throat and started choking.

“You’re gonna pay for what you did, Reaper.”

I was struggling to breathe. I could feel the life getting choked out of me. With my last ounce of strength, I raised my fist up and hammered him on the side of the head. His hand loosened around my throat. Another punch loosened his hand again.

I kept punching him until he finally released me.

I rushed back up to my feet and put my hands up. The punk on the ground staggered to his feet with the help of his man.

The two of them looked identical. Shaved heads. Fatigues. White undershirts. Even the tattoos on their arms looked the same. Like a couple of reject military dropouts.

The man I bloodied wiped his nose with the back of his fist.

“You fight like a bitch,” he said.

“Come on, Eric. Teach this motherfucker a lesson,” the other man said.

I pointed my index finger at Eric.

“I said I’ll give you a chance. You still have it. Get in your truck and drive away. This is your last warning.”

“You just gonna let him talk to you like that, Eric?”

“Let him talk. I’ll shut him up.”

Eric didn’t have any intention of taking my offer. He cracked his knuckles and walked toward me with his fists balled.

He was a big man but I wasn’t intimidated. I knocked down guys twice his size and walked away without a scratch on me. Today wasn’t gonna be any different.

Eric charged at me with a massive swing. I ducked out of the way and raised up with the hardest uppercut I ever threw. His head snapped back and sent him in a daze.

“Eric!”

Cheering on his friend wasn’t going to help him.

I raced forward as he tried to regain his bearings. Before Eric could respond, he was met with another hard fist right on his jaw. It didn’t matter how big he was. His chin was still smaller than my fist.

I rotated his head with my punch and sent him down to the ground for good.

I looked at the other man. He stared in disbelief at the man I just knocked out.

“I gave you a warning,” I said. “I told you to walk away.”

The confidence he just had a few seconds ago had disappeared. His eyes wide, he frowned at me with his hands in the air.

“L-look, man. I was just doing what Gail told me to do. It was a mistake. I-I didn’t mean it. I swear—”

He swung at me but I was ready. I moved out of the way and clocked him on the jaw. I took a second to search the two of them and grab their weapons. I found my pistol before heading back to the barn where I knew Anna was being held.

I moved forward and slowly opened the door. The sunlight shined through the open windows, giving me a full view of the barren barn. It was completely empty except for Anna.

She was tied to a chair. Her shirt was undone like it had been cut in half, her bra exposed. Her head was down.

Behind her, the man I just stood face to face with the other night held a gun to her head. I pointed my gun right at him as I called out to Anna.

“Anna! Anna, are you all right—”

“She can’t hear you. She won’t be able to answer you until I’ve had my fun with her.”

“I’ll give you one more chance. Let her go and I won’t kill you.”

“You’re in no position to make threats.”

I stood a couple of meters away from him but not far enough that I couldn’t take the shot and hit him.

“I’ll kill you right where you stand,” I said.

“I’ve got my finger on the trigger. You kill me, you kill her.”

I clenched my jaw. I was fuming. And the way he grinned at me, he knew he was the one calling the shots.

“Drop your gun, Reaper.”

I kept my weapon pointed at him. He rubbed the barrel of his pistol against Anna’s temple.

“Drop your gun—”

“Okay! Okay…”

I tossed the gun on the ground in front of me.

“You kill me,” I said. “You kill her. You won’t get away with it. You’ll start a war that you can’t possibly win.”

He laughed in response.

“Me and my boys live for war. We were bred for it. We were born for it. Your MC won’t be anything we can’t handle.”

“You’re making a mistake.”

“Speak for yourself. You’ve already made more mistakes.”

“What do you want?”

“Ah. Finally. Some reason…”

He lowered the gun down from Anna’s head.

“The Triads were going through us,” he said. “We were the ones moving their product between the south and the big city up north. We were making good money. Those Chinese motherfuckers are rich. And you had to go and fuck it all up.”

“What are you talking about?”

“We were the ones taking all of the risk. We negotiated a proper deal with the Triads. Then your president decided to low ball us. As rich as those chinks are, they were always looking for a way to cheap out on us. So they took your offer. They made a deal with the Reapers and cut us out.”

“Is that what this is about? Because we’re moving weight for the Triads?”

“You took our deal—”

“The Chinese made their own decision. You can’t put that on us. You can’t put that on her.”

“Oh, I think I can… You see… If I kill every single one of you Reapers, the Chinese will have no choice but to turn back to us.”

“There are other MCs in Ivory they deal with. Are you prepared to deal with all of them?”

He grinned at me with the confidence of a maniac.

“I told you me and my boys were prepared for war.”

He picked his gun up and put it back to the side of Anna’s head.

“Now… Let’s put an end to this.”

I clenched my jaw, trying to think of a way out of this. He was fully intent on shooting both of us.

Shit.

“I’ll show you some mercy,” he said. “I’ll kill you first so you don’t have to see what I’m gonna do to your old lady.”

He turned and pointed the gun at me.

“Any last words, Reaper?”

I exhaled a deep breath through my nose. If this was gonna be my last moment, I wanted to spend it looking at her.

I stared at Anna.

“Say something!” the man shouted.

I kept looking at Anna and noticed that she was beginning to stir. She slowly tilted her head up and looked at me. As soon as our eyes met, I knew that she had regained her senses.

“Anna!”

I shouted her name.

She got my signal.

Despite being tied to her chair, Anna managed to rock back in it and distract him. It was just long enough for me to rush up to him and grab his wrist.

Anna screamed as a shot rang through the air.

Both of my hands on his wrists, I freed the gun from his hand and sent it flying. I got on top of him and leveled him with a punch. Another punch made his eyes roll back.

I kept punching until his face was bloodied and my hands hurt.

“Jon! Jon! Jon, stop!”

I slowly turned and saw Anna helpless in her chair. The rage I just felt quickly disappeared when I looked into her eyes.

I moved to her and started undoing her binds. As soon as she was free, she wrapped her arms around me.

“Are you all right—”

“I’m fine. I’m fine. Let’s just get out of here… Please…”

“Okay…”

I double-checked to see that the man was still out. Then I put Anna’s arm around my shoulder so I could help her walk out.

Just before we left the barn, I heard something outside.

“Shit.”

I’d been hearing police sirens all my life. The sound was so familiar that I could tell how close they were. And right now, they were so close I knew I couldn’t get away.

I walked out of the barn with Anna and we were greeted with police cruisers and cops pointing their guns at us.

“Hands up where I can see ‘em! Now!”

I followed their instructions and Anna did the same. The cops rushed up to me and put my hands behind my back.

“Wait!” Anna said. “What are you doing? Are you arresting him—”

“It’s all right,” I said. “You don’t have anything to worry about. This will all be over with soon. I promise.”