Chapter 27
Two things happened at once. The church bells began to ring and Forrest let out a door-breaking, or in this case, a bone-breaking kick to eyepatch’s knee.
The sword dropped as eyepatch went down.
Forrest lashed out with another kick, this time straight into the eyepatch, even as he moved to grab Jordana.
Forrest should have known Jordana wouldn’t just stand there.
Jordana was lashing out with kicks of her own, much higher up than his, to keep the men away from her the best she could.
Forrest eyed the dropped sword, but he took a punch to the jaw when he took his eyes off the men closing in on them.
He saw the flash of a sword and ducked, right in time for it to slice through the air where his head had just been.
From the corner of his eye, he saw Jordana as she scooped up the sword and sliced the hand of one of the men trying to grab her.
“Get to the church!” Forrest yelled as he was shoved against the window of Bless Your Scarf.
He didn’t see the door to the boutique open, but he heard the bells ring.
Suddenly, the owner, Brittany, with her blonde hair pulled back with a big pink satin ribbon, conked the man attacking Forrest on the head with the bronze statue of a pirate, dropping the man to the ground.
“Thanks! Get Jordana to the church.”
“Let’s go!” Brittany yelled, grabbing Jordana’s hand as she whipped a designer belt as if it were a bullwhip. “It’s good to see you again. Looks like our lessons are going to come in handy.”
“Forrest!” Jordana turned and tossed the sword to Forrest.
Forrest nabbed it mid-air as men descended on him.
Steel on steel seemed to echo all around him.
He didn’t have sword training. Forrest was going solely on adrenaline and the need to do whatever it took to protect Jordana.
However, what he did have was a youth spent roughhousing with five older brothers.
Forrest got low and plowed into one of the attackers, shoving him into another.
He was down to two opponents for at least a minute or two before the other two untangled themselves.
Jordana ran with the woman from the boutique.
Women from every direction were running for the church.
However, Jordana didn’t make it to the church.
Her arm was grabbed and she was spun away from the church.
Jordana lost her balance. She stumbled and smashed onto the ground.
She felt the asphalt tearing skin from her knees before her shoulder slammed to the ground.
Screw this. She was a fighter. She wasn’t going to run.
All the training her father insisted she have roared to the surface.
She acted on instinct as she pivoted around on her palm and one knee, even as the asphalt tore away her skin, kicking her leg out and sweeping the man’s legs out from under him.
She sent the man tumbling as three other men moved to grab her.
“I don’t think so, assholes,” a soft southern voice snapped a second before a knife was lodged in the chest of the man reaching for her. A hand appeared and connected to it was a beautiful Southern Belle. “Hi, I’m Savannah. That’s Tinsley. And here’s a sword. Do you know how to use it?”
“I do, thanks.” Jordana stood up and saw Tinsley in a battle with one of her attackers. “Forrest!” Forrest was fighting for his life, but he was only one man and had multiple attackers.
Jordana wanted to race to him, but she still had one man preventing her.
“Argh!” Danilo taunted as if he were truly the pirate he was dressed as.
“Are you delulu?” Jordana turned to see a very judgmental Lacy standing there with a large sword in her hand and at the ready.
“That’s so cringe,” Leah added, her lip curled in pure tween scorn.
Danilo seemed to be dumbfounded by the teen and tween before him armed with bigger blades than he had.
Jordana didn’t waste the opportunity. She attacked, letting all her martial arts training surge forward.
She shouldn’t have killed him, but she couldn’t risk him hurting the young girls.
She attacked with her sword, but he blocked her.
However, that wasn’t her true attack. Jordana kicked out and took him down by breaking his leg.
Danilo howled in pain as he fell to his rear.
As soon as he was on the ground, Jordana got him in a chokehold and that was the end of that.
“You’re so sigma. That was lit,” Leah told her, even as Jordana was quickly getting up to race to help Forrest.
“Um, thanks?”
“Here,” she turned to find Reverend Winston holding out the sword she’d dropped, but it wasn’t needed.
Forrest stood breathing hard with blood on his body, but he was standing and no one else was.
She didn’t know if Forrest had killed them all or if it was the group of women armed to the teeth who had done it.
Either way, he was safe. Besides a cut to his arm, he appeared not to be seriously injured.
“Why aren’t you in school?” Jordana asked the girls as Forrest and the large group of women began walking toward her.
“The church bells rang,” Lacy said as if that explained everything. “It means the town is under attack and all the women are trained to race to the church to arm themselves. Half my school is here.”
It was then that Jordana realized the men would have never gotten away, even if they’d tried to run.
Teenage girls stood back to back, forming two lines blocking anyone from joining the fight and anyone from leaving the fight.
The girls were all armed with knives, staffs, boarding pikes, and a couple of the older girls had axes. “Well, that hits different.”
Lacy and Leah smiled at her appropriate use of Gen Alpha slang. It was one of the few terms she knew.
Forrest had almost been taken down. He hadn’t known how he was going to defend himself against four other men, but then suddenly he wasn’t alone.
Tamika, the waitress from The Pink Pig had attacked from one side while Mary Jane from the diner had attacked on the other side.
Moments later a flood of townswomen had ensured not a single attacker was left standing.
Forrest thanked them all, but he was desperate to get to Jordana. He crossed the street and wrapped her in a tight hug and kissed her. “Are you hurt?” Forrest asked as he ran his hands down her body checking for injuries.
“No, I’m good. How are you?” Jordana held on to his arm to get a look at the cut.
“Just a scratch.”
“Forrest, there’s an army of teen girls here. They’re all armed to the teeth,” Jordana whispered. Forrest looked around and saw them blocking the road. “It’s the most empowering and terrifying thing I’ve ever seen.”
“Oh, honey,” a woman in her fifties said, dressed in jeans and a sheriff’s department polo and flanked by Granger and the other deputies.
“They’re nothing. It’s the middle-aged women in menopause who will give you nightmares.
We’re looking for any reason to stab someone, especially during a hot flash. ”
“Cut! I said Cut!” the director yelled as he stormed toward them. Well, up until the teenagers prevented him from going any farther. “That was not in the script! Did we get it on film? We need to do a second take. Why are you in jeans? You should be in period dress. Wardrobe!”
Mary politely asked a teen with acne, braces, and a spiked flail in her hand, to allow her through. She rushed up and threw her arms around Jordana. “Oh my god! Are you okay? What happened? Are these men dead?”
Forrest looked over at the men. They were, in fact, dead.
“I’m okay. These are the men who kidnapped me and chased Forrest and me through the jungle. And, yes, it appears they’re all dead.”
“I’ll get Bubba and Mean Abe. They like bad guy snacks,” Gator called out as the teachers began to call the teens back to school.
Mary looked ready to freak out until she looked off where no one was standing and began to nod. “Anne said you kicked booty.”
Gator took his South Carolina COCKS hat off and ran a hand over his hair. “I just ain’t gonna get used to those words comin’ out of a pretty woman’s mouth. You and Skeeter sure do make a good pair.”
Mary blushed and then Skeeter was there, running toward her with worry clear in his face. “Mary! Are you hurt? I’m so sorry I wasn’t here to protect you.”
They both stopped and looked off in the distance and then laughed. Yeah, Forrest didn’t know if he’d get used to that either.
“I can’t wait to tell my dad about the ghost-speaking couple,” Jordana whispered to Forrest. Then she gasped, “My dad!” Jordana reached out and grabbed Forrest’s uninjured arm. “We have to get to my dad.”
“We’ll come with you,” Reverend Winston said, motioning for some of the women to join him. “In case there are more armed men.”
The bread could wait. Jordana was right. These men were looking for her father. They knew he wasn’t in New York. It wouldn’t take long for them to figure out where he was. And that put everyone in even more danger.