Page 45 of Fight for You
“Nothing. I have a bad feeling about this. No sudden moves.” I pulled to the curb in front of a Taco Bell, slow and steady. Hands on the wheel. Engine idling low. Amid the commotion, teens exiting the fast-food restaurant pulled out their phones to record.
Good.
At my side, Jordyn’s eyes went round. “The backpack. We-we have guns in the backpack.”
“I didn’t forg?—”
The woman on the loudspeaker barked. “Driver! Turn off the engine. Throw the keys out the window.”
Crap. This was the basic protocol for a stolen vehicle. I killed the engine, tossing the keys onto the asphalt. In the mirror, officers were already crouched behind the open doors of their vehicles, weapons drawn.Yep.Stolen vehicle protocol.
Way too aggressive. Something was seriously wrong.
“Driver, exit the vehicle. Hands up!”
I moved slowly with purpose. Every muscle screamed, I’m not a threat. Hands held high, I stepped out into the sunlight. All was dead silent except for a dog barking somewhere nearby and the murmur of people who had their phones out.
Six guns trained on me. I’d been in this predicament before but didn’t have a PID, not with the fine cops standing before me. At least, I distinguished what others might overlook. The twitchy blond cop to the left. An auburn officer drumming the fingers of one hand against his leg. A calm Black officer stood behind him,and farther out, stood a heavyset officer who stayed behind the door of his vehicle. The glint of a rifle muzzle rested atop the cruiser door.
“Turn around, walk backward.” The second I complied, the officer ordered, “Passenger, exit the vehicle, hands up!”
I shot back. “She’s afraid, office?—”
“Passenger, exit the vehicle now!”
I turned my head and glanced at the badge of the officer nearest me. Walsh. “Talk to your team! Let them know I’m fully prepared to comply with?—”
“Turn back around,” he ordered. “Get on the ground!”
As the female officer issued another command to Jordyn over the loudspeaker, I dropped a knee, prepared to go full prone and eat cement. I just needed them to understand that if I complied and did everything they asked, they could look at my registration and confirm this was a mix-up.
But just as my second knee touched the ground, I heard a familiar click. A tiny sound. Lost to most ears.
Not mine.
Walsh had disengaged the safety of his Glock behind me.
Yeah, Walsh—had to be him. But why would he shoot me? Was he the same cop who falsely reported my Gladiator stolen? Crooked. Paid off by Aleksandr Chelomey? Didn’t matter, I needed to kill this problem quickly.
My mind went clear. Except for the calculations spinning fast.
As Walsh approached, the service weapon drawn, he removed cuffs—as if that was his intent. No. He didn’t need those cuffs. Didn’t want me alive. I waited for a tell.
Walsh yelled, “Suspect going for?—”
That was it.That crooked cop. I knew he’d call out a lie, then shoot. I shifted sideways just as the gun exploded in his hand. I caught the officer’s wrists as the bullet the liar intended to shoot me in the back of the head with went wide. In one fluid motion, Iremoved the gun from his hand, twisted his arm behind him, and pivoted around him to shield myself from possible incoming fire.
“Why did you try to shoot me, Officer Walsh?” The cop yelped when I applied more pressure to his arm. “Tell them who you work for. Tell them that this is not a misunderstanding. That this was a perfectly crafted execution attempt.”
“You on drugs?” The police officer scoffed, the vein in his neck on a rampage. His voice dropped, “That’s what I?—”
“Tell the truth,” I shouted.
“Don’t move!” Another officer hollered.
My eyes snapped to the Black man, whose presence and demeanor seemed the most stable. Why was he just a uniformed cop? Maybe ex-military too? I said, “I’m a vet, Corporal Jamie Mack. Trust me, brother.” Though the man’s head tilted at the term, I could tell I’d gotten through to him. “I want us all to go home today, unharmed. So, let’s figure this out. And it starts with Officer Walsh. Again, I ask, why did you claim I was going for a weapon when I had complied all along?”
The Black cop shifted forward. “Nice to meet you, Corporal Mack. I’m Officer Brown. I was in the Army in my heyday, Grenadier Company. And I’m glad we see eye to eye on how we want things to go down.” Another step. “Unfortunately, I didn’t see what happened before Walsh made his assessment. We do, however, have uniform cams that can clear this up. We can handle the issue of the stolen vehic?—”
