Page 36 of Bear (Rebel Saints MC 6)

I was left standing behind the counter with this feeling of dread still hovering over me.

A crack across the sky made me jump out of my skin as lightning struck like a whip. An illuminated jagged fork of energy lit up the sky momentarily, causing me to gasp. The violet and navy-blue skyline was so beautiful to look at. Beautiful and ominous.

Not a single car or bike was at the pumps. The clock sounded like a time bomb for some reason and my throat started to thicken and coat as discomfort ran through my system. I opened the cash drawer and checked the money. Raking my hands over the quarters, I counted them up to calm myself.

My dread abruptly flipped to horror as a large, bulky man in black with a balaclava moved like a shadow across one of the pumps. I knew it. Rocky. Without hesitation, I pressed the emergency button. He was hunting his prey, but I wasn’t going down without a fight.

The doors slid open and he moved toward me, holding a gun at eye level.

My body trickled with ice cold fear as my breath stilled. I didn’t dare move a muscle. I stood rigid staring back into the vacant, bleakness of a killer’s eyes. Ever so slowly, I raised my hands above my head as my arms shook. “Don’t shoot. W-want money? What do you want?” My voice wavered with intense layers of panic. I was seconds away from being shot. If I didn’t act quickly, I was about to join my brother in the afterlife. I didn’t have any confidence that the plastic divider would save me from a bullet.

A muffled sneer passed across his lips.

All I could see was a pumped up mouth with teeth bared and the gun holding steady. I wanted to take a sip of water so my throat could work but there was no way in hell I was going to move.

His arm was firm. No shakiness. This maniac had done this before. “Don’t play dumb. You know who this is,” more muffled admissions from the cloaked gunman.

Sweat rolled down to my eyebrows as thunder swept over the sky. “Rocky. Put the gun down. Put—it down!” It seemed hard to get my voice past the lump in my throat.

“You give me all the fucking money now. Here, use this bag. Make it quick or I’ll shoot you right in the middle of your forehead at close range. I know your dummy brother made a profit from our little deal and I wanna know where the money is.” Violence rang in his voice as he threw a canvas bag at me.

I opened the cash register, my fingers fueled with adrenaline. I could barely get the drawer to come out far enough. I dug out all the money and put it in the bag. I stared at him in horror as he glanced outside the window, bouncing around on his feet. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Rocky. I don’t know where any money is. My brother never told me any of that,” I shuddered as I spoke, willing the cops to come faster.

“Hurry up! Get it in the bag now! Quit stalling. Since you don’t wanna tell me, this is compensation. And as a little bonus I’m going to reunite you with your brother.” Rocky grunted. “I know you’re talking to fucking Angie Carmichael, and now I got the cops sniffing up my ass all the time. You think I’m going to let you get away with this?” He waved his gun around. “Do you, bitch?”

I yelped, as Rocky declared open war on me. But I listened for the cops. “Rocky, I had nothing to do with that.” This moment is what I feared. I told Angie that it would get worse and now it was the worst scenario I could have imagined.

Money dropped to the ground as Rocky’s wild eyes pierced mine.

“Can I get that?” I asked shakily.

“Hurry up! If you try anything while you’re down there I’ll shoot now instead of later. And you have plenty to do with it. You know the Rebel Saints. I’ve seen you.” Rocky was growing more agitated by the minute.

My head was spinning. I was seconds away from passing out. “It’s not like that. Please.” I repeated, hoping it would drum into his head.

He’s been watching me.

“Shut up!” Saliva flew from his lips as his red-rimmed eyes stabbed into mine. His evil darkness covered the whole gas station like a heavy weight.

I slipped down, picking up the money. I wanted to keep him talking so there was enough time for the cops to arrive. More now than ever, I wished for customers to come in droves but there were none. How could this be? I chalked it up to the torrential downpour. How fitting that Rocky was a part of that. I rose up and handed over the canvas bag to Rocky. “Here you g-g-g-o.”

Rocky snatched the bag so fast from my fingers that the velocity of the yank dragged me forward. “Bitch!” He sprinted past the counter.

Then I heard the sirens from the cops. The pounding sound of my heart filled my ears almost like a whooshing sound from the ocean.

The sirens stopped as the tires screeched and water flew up from underneath their wheels. One of the cops ran in through the doors as the emergency alarm from the back door exit erupted.

“He went through the back!” I yelled as one of the officers jogged in with his hand on his gun and another trailed behind him to the back door.

I didn’t hear a bike at all. I heard nothing. The pounding in my heart was thundering so loud that I dropped to my knees to slow down my breathing. I could hear the cops talking and strategizing out the back of the door.

“Where is he? Did he go left? You saw the back of him?” one of them addressed me directly.

“Yep, I saw him. He went left, right over that fence.” Tears started to flood as a feeling of powerlessness washed over me. Rocky was coming for me no matter what and when the article comes out, I would be screwed. He had his mind set on killing me and that was that.

Time to leave Holbeck. To me it was the only way out, even though I didn’t want to go. Footsteps from the cops running to the back sounded off in the distance.

One of them stayed out front. “Ma’am. Ma’am, are you okay? Do you need some water? Can you tell us about what happened here? Start from the top, and don’t leave anything out. I’m Officer Martin Close, my partner is working the perimeter right now. Tell me what happened…”

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