Blood Brothers (38 page)

In his periphery, he saw Stephanie blanch and
jump back. The Kimber was knocked from his hand before his mind
could understand that he was caught. It dropped to the ground with
the same thunk as the rod and Michael heard it sliding across the
floor. He raised an elbow, fully intending to smash it down in
Jerry’s ribs. There was a bite at his neck and the pressure
increased. It was the tip of a knife blade. An all too familiar
voice was in his ear.

“Old buddy, old pal. We’re together again.”
Jerry’s voice sent a shiver up Michael’s spine.

“Let him go, you bastard. Let him go!”
Stephanie had spunk, Michael had to give her that, but it wasn’t
going to help them. Nothing was going to help them.

“Mrs. Cole, if you’d be so kind, to step out
of the bathroom and take a right.” She hesitated. “Don’t worry,
dear, we’ll be right behind you.”

Slowly, as if moving through warm oil,
Stephanie did as instructed.

“This knife is a centimeter above your
jugular. Move, it comes slicing down. Nothing and no one can save
you then,” Michael heard his old friend say. But he didn’t nod,
didn’t so much as breathe.

Jerry pushed towards him and he took a step,
following his wife.

They walked several steps and Jerry spoke,
“Stop here. The door to your left.”

While Michael hadn’t been able to remember a
bathroom from a closet, moments ago, he did remember this door.
There was no way he could forget it. This was the room in which
Dalton Garrett and subsequently, Shelia Beavers had been murdered,
essentially in cold blood. You could call it a crime of passion,
but that wasn’t what it was. It was cold blooded, premeditated
murder.

Opening the door for the trio, Stephanie
stepped in. “Home sweet home, Mikey. Home sweet home.” Christal
wasn’t in the room. That meant one of three things: she was being
held somewhere else in the house, she wasn’t here at all, or the
third, which chilled him, she was already…

Enough of this bullshit, Michael thought. I’m
not a freaking hog being led to slaughter. I’m a man, with a family
to protect. He looked at Stephanie one more time—God she’s
beautiful—and then he went into action.

* * *

It took Christal close to half an hour to
make it less than a quarter mile. By the time she broke from the
trees to the rear of an old cabin, she was covered in scratches and
cuts and scrapes. Red welts covered her where the skin wasn’t
broken and she was more than a little uncomfortable. Brer Rabbit
she wasn’t.

Despite the close proximity of the cabin to
the house, she had to try it. She knew that time was of the
essence, and already the sun had turned from golden to red and was
sinking lower and lower into the western sky with each passing
minute.

The yard wasn’t much better maintained than
the house she’d just left and the place was in need of some serious
repair, but there was an old, rusted Ford parked at the side of the
cabin and she could hear voices, most likely from a radio or TV
coming through an open window.

She looked down and saw the red stains across
her pants legs. She wiped the tears from her eyes and the saltiness
of her sorrow burned the cuts on the back of her hand.

She walked slowly. She hadn’t come this far
just be recaptured by her kidnapper. If she did that, there would
be no help for her mother. The yard was short, only about twenty
steps from the trees to the backdoor. And although she moved
slowly, she was at that door too quickly for her fears to
settle.

Christal raised a hand to knock on the door
but she didn’t get the chance before the gruff voice behind her
said, “What you think you a-doin’?”

Startled, Christal spun around—

And looked up at the old, grey-haired man in
overalls. His wild, crazy hair and the twitchy look of his eyes
isn’t what scared her the most, no, what scared her most was the
long, double-barreled shotgun he held in his hands. One end against
his shoulder, the other—the business end—pointed down at her.

Now

The fight, unfortunately, didn’t last
long.

Slipping his hand up between himself and the
blade, Michael stomped down on Jerry’s foot and twirled at the
exact moment, shoving the blade away from his neck and jugular.
Caught off guard, Jerry was knocked backwards and almost tipped
over.

But not quite.

And when he came back, he came back with a
vengeance. He moved like a prizefighter. The blade he held was
indeed a knife. A very ornate, very sharp looking straight knife.
“You son of a bitch,” he said as he arced the blade within inches
of Michael’s face. “Can’t you do anything easy?”

Michael felt the wind as the blade shushed
by. “Not when it comes to you, Jerusalem.”

Swinging out wildly with his right, Michael
got a taste of the blade’s bite. Slicing through the flesh of his
arm like cutting through warm butter, the knife dug in at least an
inch. Pain like white hot fire erupted in his arm. But he didn’t
falter. As Jerry advanced, Michael realized he was being backed
into a corner. That was nowhere to be.

Keeping his eye trained on the knife, Michael
ducked his head low and rammed his attacker. The top of his
shoulder struck Jerry right above the stomach and drove him back
several feet. But there was still a lot of fight left in him. He
rained blows down on Michael’s back. They hurt like hell, but
Michael was determined and he took them in stride. They knocked
against a wall. Using his uninjured left hand, he landed three good
kidney punches in quick succession.

But despite adrenalin and determination, he
couldn’t ignore Jerry’s next move. Jerry brought the knife high, as
far as he could reach and then slammed it down, not burying the
blade into his foe, but cracking Michael’s skull with the
handle.

Michael dropped then and didn’t move. Not at
all.

* * *

Stephanie looked on. She wanted to do
something, but she had no idea how to help. Both Michael and the
attacker were large men, but Michael didn’t have the advantage of a
weapon. He was taking a good beating, but he was landing a few
strikes of his own. Still, it didn’t look good for her husband.

When he dropped, unconscious, she realized
the end had finally come. Michael had indeed tried to rescue her,
but there was little he could do against the well prepared
abductor.

Then she remembered the gun he’d been holding
in his hand when she’d swung the shower rod at him.

She saw the same spark of realization in the
man with the knife and they both, at the exact same instant,
started off. Though she’d been the first one to enter the bedroom,
the fight had brought the kidnapper deep inside as well. As it was,
she was the closest and she used every ounce of speed she had to
propel her through the door. She heard him slam against the doorway
at her heels but she didn’t stop. She could see the gun. So close.
Less than ten feet away.

Eight feet.

Six.

Three.

And then she was pulled away from salvation
like a chick plucked from its nest. She landed hard on her back.
She felt a hand dig through her hair and then she was yanked back
into the bedroom. She fought…hard. She flailed and bucked and
screamed but it made no difference. In fact, the harder she
resisted the more intense the pain in her head became. So, though
her will was strong, she found herself actually helping the
kidnapper, using her feet to slide her in his direction. When they
reached the bed, he pulled even harder. She thought her hair was
going to pull free from its roots before she got to her feet.

“You stupid bitch! You foolish, pill-popping
whore!” He slammed her down in the bed. Dust billowed out from the
sheets. Bugs scurried this way and that. Stephanie didn’t have a
moment’s time to rebel because his forearm was already across her
throat, squeezing down on her windpipe. This was one strong man to
be holding her down with one arm, but he was doing just that and it
didn’t look like it was giving him too much trouble.

“Let me go,” she tried to say but it came out
like frog talk. It was harder and harder to draw breath.

He laid his knife down on her stomach,
apparently confident that though it was so very close, she could do
nothing. He was right. Stars began to twinkle in her eyes. The
light of one single lamp on the bedside table seemed to grow dimmer
and dimmer. Before she knew it she was out. She knew she was
passing out. She tried to take in air through her nose, through her
mouth, but it was fruitless.

When her eyelids sealed themselves against
the impending horror of her own demise, Stephanie Cole had but one
thing on her mind. Had Christal reached safety?

* * *

Darkness.

The sensation of movement. Being tugged and
then swaying side to side like a ship at sea.

They say that motion sickness is a defense
mechanism against
neurotoxins
.
The brain is responsible for inducing vomiting when poisons are
detected, and for resolving conflicts between vision and balance.
When feeling motion but not seeing it, the inner ear tells the
brain that it senses motion, but the eyes tell the brain that
everything is still. As a result of the disagreement, the brain
will determine that the eyes are
hallucinating
,
and then it decides that the hallucination is due to poison
ingestion. In response, the brain will induce vomiting to eject the
poison. If Michael had any coherent thought he would have agreed
because he was not in a car, not on a boat, and not in an
airplane.

But his stomach felt just as horrible and his
body begged relief.

His eyes were shut tight and they were not
about to open themselves.

In that chasm between conscious thought and
unconsciousness, Michael Cole wasn’t really Michael Cole at all.
Just brain activity within a husk of organic material. His thoughts
did not transfer into actions and he felt nothing but that horrible
sensation of movement. He felt neither the floor beneath him nor
the hands dragging him by his ankles.

He just was, and if he didn’t wake soon to
protect and defend himself, he wouldn’t be even that for long.

Now

“Wake up!” someone screamed. The shout was
repeated twice before Michael could fully rouse himself. When he
did, he saw that it wasn’t good old Saint Peter’s angry voice he
awoke to, and no pearly gates waited beyond. Nor was he in the
underworld about to begin his sentence in Hell. He was, however, in
his own personal hell, just as he had been before blacking out.

Michael was tied to the bed. Stephanie, who
still clung to life as well, was tied in a sitting position next to
him on his right. The irony was not lost on Michael. This was
exactly the same way in which Jerry’s father and girlfriend had
been restrained just before…

“Morning, folks,” Jerry said. He was standing
at the foot of the bed. The room was draped in shadow, with only
the bedside lamp’s weak glow. It looked like a new one, cheap, but
new.

Michael instinctively tested the bindings. He
wasn’t going anywhere soon. Realizing he and Stephanie were not
gagged, he softly asked, “Are you okay?”

She had the strength to look up at him, but
that was about it. Nothing more.

“I’m sorry,” he said even softer.

“Well, well, since we’re all together now I
believe it’s time for introductions. You see, Mike, I haven’t been
properly introduced to your beautiful wife here. Would you like to
do the honors or shall I?”

“Where’s Christal? Where’s my daughter? If
you’ve hurt one hair on her head I’ll—”

“You’ll do nothing, Mikey. Absolutely
nothing.” Jerry was angry, his voice was raised.

Michael merely glared.

After calming himself, he spoke again. “Mrs.
Cole, I’m sure your husband has spoken of me. My name is Jerusalem
Garret, Jerry for short. Me and Mikey go way back.” It looked as if
he were searching her face for any indication of recognition.
Finding none, he continued, “Nope? Mikey, I’m truly hurt. We were
friends for a long time. Had a lot of fun together. Now, I find you
haven’t even told your wife, your life partner about me?”

Michael bit his lip, fighting back a wave of
nausea left over from the strike to his head.

“Not really surprising, I suppose. You are a
man with many secrets, aren’t you?” Jerry turned his attention to
Stephanie. “Many secrets. And not just those involving infidelity,
I assure you.”

“What’s this got to do with anything?”
Michael asked.

“Oh, hold your horses, old pal. I’ve worked
hard and sacrificed a lot for this moment. I plan to enjoy it as
much as absolutely possible.”

“This is between you and me.” Nodding his
head to his wife, he said, “She’s got nothing to do with it.”

“Chivalrous to the end, eh? Isn’t this what
started the whole fucking thing?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, don’t you? Twenty years is a long time,
but not nearly long enough to bury the memory of betraying your
best friend, your blood brother, and kill a man.”

Regardless of how weak she was, Stephanie
looked up. She didn’t say a thing. She didn’t have to.

“That was an accident. You know that.”
Michael was seething.

“Accident, mistake, or planned. It makes no
difference. In the end he’s just as dead. And then her.” He slurred
the last word as if Shelia wasn’t important enough to give name
to.

“Hard to believe that was twenty years ago. A
lot of things change in twenty years, don’t they?” He stopped for a
moment. He wasn’t expecting an answer, but paused as he stepped to
the closet, where it looked like he was retrieving something.
Michael couldn’t see what it was until he was back at the foot of
the bed. A five-gallon plastic gasoline container. “You become the
richest man in town, probably in the state, and I, well, I’ve been
to hell and back.”