CHAPTER 23
Noelle
When I burst in through the doors of the Rusty Pelican, I wasn’t expecting the scene that I saw. The music was still loud, the place was still smoggy with cigarette smoke, but everyone seemed to be in a panic.
I could see a crowd of Bad Disciples members crowded around the center of the bar, and drinks were being passed around. But as I weaved through the crowd, I also saw that Tank’s friend, Gunner, was sitting on a bar stool with his head thrown back and his eyes pressed in pain. Kylie and Brooklyn were crouched in front of him, screeching and panicked.
“I don’t know what to do! I’ve never done this before!” I heard Kylie yell as I stepped towards them.
“Please, just do something to stop the bleeding!” Brooklyn screamed, and I could see that she was crying. I hadn’t seen Tank yet, even though he was the one who had called me and asked me to get there.
I was worried that something had gone wrong, that he was hurt. I had come rushing to the bar, and now I couldn’t even see him anywhere. I squeezed through people’s shoulders till I was standing directly in front of Gunner.
He had a big deep wound on his calf, from what I could see and he was bleeding. I was reminded immediately of the horror of seeing Tank on the gurney in the hospital. I knew what that wound was from, he’d been shot.
“Noelle!” Brooklyn screeched when she saw me and came rushing to my side.
“Oh good, Noelle, you’re here. I wasn’t sure what to do,” Kylie straightened up from in front of Gunner, and I heard him groan.
“He’s been shot,” I said, still in a daze and Brooklyn burst out crying again.
“We don’t know if the bullet’s still in there. He needs to get stitched up,” she whimpered.
“I’m not trained in this. I’m a physical therapist,” Kylie explained and I stared at the blank terrified faces of the two women. I knew that they needed my help, and time was of the essence if Gunner’s leg was to be saved. I was a trained professional and had dealt with thousands of emergency situations, and yet, right then, I felt like I was frozen.
The only thought going through my mind was concerning Tank. Where he was, if he was safe and that he had promised me that he would keep himself out of danger.
“Where’s Tank?” I asked as I walked towards Gunner. Adrenaline started to kick through my veins.
“Noelle, you need to help Gunner,” Tank’s voice cut through the noise and panic in the bar, and I whipped around to find him weaving through the crowd towards me. I felt a jolt in my body. A sudden relief washed over me when I saw him.
“Tank!” I yelled and lunged at him, just as he threw his arms open for me.
“I’m fine, princess. Gunner is the one who needs your help now,” he said, and I nodded my head.
“Okay, okay,” I cried, and I turned around and crouched down in front of Gunner. My hands trembled as I reached for his leg and he yelped. There was too much blood for me to see what had happened, or how deep the wound was or if the bullet was still in there or if it was just a graze.
“Is he going to be all right? Is he going to be all right?” Brooklyn couldn’t stop screaming. All the noise and the music and the loud voices were destabilizing me. I was unnerved and frozen to the spot. My years of training had vanished, and all I could think about was that I was bringing a child into this world. That the father of my child was going to put his life at risk like this every day.
“Noelle,” Tank placed his hands on my shoulders, and I looked up to find him staring down at me.
“I’m fine. You have to believe that I’m fine,” he said, in a low whispering voice. I stared into his eyes as he held my gaze. He wanted me to see just how strongly he meant every word he was saying. I parted my lips, and a sound like a cry rose up in my throat.
“We needed to save the lives of two women,” he said, and I could feel my shoulders heaving.
“I’ll make sure you meet them and talk to them later. Right now, you have to take care of my friend,” he continued, in a soft, calm voice. The sound of Brooklyn’s cries rose in the background, snapping me out of my thoughts.
I turned back to Gunner, placing my hands on his legs. He was losing consciousness, and his body twitched from my touch. I peered into his wound, wiping the clotting of blood that was forming around it. I trusted Tank. I loved Tank. If this was what he wanted me to do, this was what I was going to take care of. The panic was replaced by adrenaline, and my body finally responded to me.
“I need a list of things,” I said, to nobody in particular.
“Give them to me,” Tank’s friend, Glock, had appeared at my side and I started calling out the things I needed to stitch up Gunner. After I was done, Glock ran to go and collect them.
“And I need lights if we’re going to do this here, and everyone needs to stay silent. I need to pay attention,” I said, looking up at Tank.
“Turn on all the lights. Bring all the lamps and torches you can find, and everybody shut the fuck up!” Tank was barking orders, but he was looking at me at the same time and had a wide smile on his face.
***
The two girls were about my age, and their names were Joan and Candice. They were sitting on two bar stools now, their makeup running wild down their faces and every now and then, one of them cried.
After I had stitched up Gunner and given him a cocktail of the painkillers that he needed, Brooklyn had tucked him into a makeshift bed in the back office, because I told her that he needed rest. He needed to make sure that he moved as little as possible for the next few days till the wound healed. He was very lucky, just like Tank had been, and the bullet had only grazed his leg. I didn’t need to perform any actual surgery. Brooklyn had hugged me tightly, crying as she thanked me for helping Gunner. Even though it had not been a tricky thing to do at my end, I understood why Brooklyn was so emotional. I would have been the same way if it was Tank.
Once I was done with Gunner, Tank had brought me over to the girls he said that they had rescued. He allowed them to tell me their stories and I listened in horror.
I felt so small and insignificant and foolish for being wrapped up in my own privileged world that I had no idea that there were women living this way in the same city as me. They could have been regular girls, with regular lives and a job like mine…instead, poverty and desperation had pushed them into life on the street. People like the Four Skulls and the Dragon Knights had planned on taking further advantage of that.
I sat listening to their stories, which they ended with how Tank and his friends finally reduced them from being traded off to the Dragon Knights. After they were done talking, I looked at Tank, who had been standing by, leaning against a wall with his hands stuffed into the pockets of his jeans.
“I’m sure Rebecca and the other girls will make sure that you’re taken care of,” I said to them, and they nodded and stared down at their laps.
“Yes, Rebecca is arranging for a place for them to stay as we speak,” Tank said, and he came over and pulled me into his arms. Together, we walked towards a somewhat quiet corner of the bar.
Because the Bad Disciples had successfully taken down members of the Dragon Knights and the Four Skulls gang, everyone was in a celebratory mood. Also, other than the casualty with Gunner, nobody else was hurt so everyone was in a good mood.
While everyone else was celebrating, Tank and I talked.
“I know you were worried about me,” he said and placed a protective hand on my belly. I couldn’t meet his eyes because I was at war with myself.
I knew what they had done was a good thing, it was the right thing to do. If Tank, Gunner and the other two guys hadn’t stepped in when they did…those girls would have passed into the dark web of prostitution tonight and in all likelihood…would never have been recovered or found. That logic was at odds against my desperation to see Tank safe.
“I was worried because I didn’t know what was going on,” I said, as he stroked my belly. His voice had become softer, and his hazel eyes were dimmer now too.
“But I promised you that I was going to stay safe tonight,” he said, and I gulped and nodded my head.
“Yes, I know…but you still ordered an attack, you still walked into a fire of bullets. Your friend nearly died from it!” I argued, and instead of getting angry, Tank reached for me, pulling me by the back of my neck and forcing me to place my head on his chest. He rocked me gently in his arms, and even though I wanted to scream and cry, he had managed to calm me down.
“I’m sorry, Noelle. I agree, all that happened. I’m apologizing to you today, but princess, at this rate, I’ll have to apologize to you every day,” he said, and I forcibly drew away from his chest, to find that he was smirking as he stared down at me.
“I don’t…I don’t…” I stuttered with my words and Tank’s face darkened.
“You can tell me what you want to say. If you want out, I’ll let you go. I don’t expect you to change your whole life around for me. As long as you let me be a part of my child’s life in some way,” he said, releasing me from his grip.
The moment Tank stopped touching me, that panic returned. I could feel it in my soul that I would never feel safe when I wasn’t in his arms, that I would never be happy without him. I would just have to get used to worrying about him; the way that Rebecca, Kylie, and Brooklyn had become.
I reached for him, throwing myself back into his arms again and I voluntarily placed my head on his chest.
“No. I want to be with you. I want to live with you, and I want to raise our child together. Just give me some time, Tank, to accept my reality,” I said, and he placed a finger under my chin and raised my face up towards him.
When he kissed me, I felt warm and safe, happy that I was in his arms. Happy in the knowledge, that no matter what happened during the day, Tank would try his best to come back to me at night, and take me into his arms.
“You can take all the time you need, princess. I’m never going to push you to accept anything you don’t want to,” Tank said, gently prying his lips away from me. I could feel my cheeks flushing, the way they did every time Tank kissed me.
“I’ve already accepted that I’m in love with you and that I wouldn’t want to be anywhere but with you,” I said, and we hugged tightly, in everyone’s view, as his friends started clapping and congratulating us with joy.