Chapter 29
CHAPTER
TWENTY-NINE
Haz
“Two-hundred and fifty dollars!” I exclaimed.
They had to be kidding.
But judging from the bored look on the police officer’s face as he stood behind the glass divider and the smug look on Kieran’s, I would guess this was not a joke. Part of me thought Kieran was just making stuff up, you know, so I wouldn’t want to come and get my car.
Maybe I could appeal to his sense of justice. He was a police officer after all. Leaning in, I said, “I didn’t ask you to tow my car. Or put it here. Why should I pay for something I didn’t even ask for?”
“You want your car or not?” the officer answered.
Great. He had a personality like Kieran’s.
“Forget it,” I said, turning to go.
Kieran slapped a stack of cash on the counter, and I gaped as he slid it through the tiny window.
“You probably need that bulletproof glass because of the prices you make people pay to get back their own property,” I snarked.
It wasn’t very nice. But charging two hundred and fifty dollars wasn’t nice either.
Kieran snorted.
The cop glared at me. “Is that a threat?”
Kieran pushed me behind him. “Just give us the keys.”
A terse silence followed, and then, “Sign here.”
Kieran leaned forward. I tried to peek around, but he pushed me back. Moments later, I had my keys in hand and we were heading out into the impound lot toward row G.
“Thank you,” I said as we passed row E.
Kieran glanced at me from the corner of his eye.
“That was a lot of money that I didn’t have. I’ll pay you back when I can.” Which would be in like ten years.
“I don’t want your money.”
“You must be really rich then.”
“Mmm,” he hummed.
“Are you a millionaire?”
“Yes.”
My feet scuffed the loose gravel on the pavement.
Kieran stopped walking and looked at me. “And now you are too.”
I recoiled. “I don’t want your money.”
Kieran made a sound and started walking. Frustrated, I grabbed his hand and pulled him around. “I don’t.”
“I know that, baby doll,” he replied, eyes moving everywhere but on me.
“Then w-why won’t you look at me?” I asked, my chest tight.
His blue eyes snapped to mine immediately before moving away. “Because we’re out in the open and I need to watch our surroundings.”
“Oh.”
He sure liked to remind me people wanted me dead. The same people who killed my mafia boss father that I didn’t know anything about until like an hour ago.
He gripped my hand tighter and tugged me into his side as we started walking again. We turned down row H, and I spotted my ancient Toyota halfway down the row, squeezed between a rusty old white van that looked like something kidnappers drove and a fancy black BMW.
“There it is,” I exclaimed, rushing down the row toward the four-door sedan.
Being that it was over twenty years old, the color was debatable.
I think at one time it was considered brown, but it was so faded now it was like an off shade of dull silver that looked dirty even if it was freshly washed, which frankly wasn’t often.
Only the front two tires had hubcaps. The back two were just plain wheels with the centers beginning to rust. I thought it matched okay, though, because rust was brown just like the car.
The Toyota was backed into the parking spot, and my heart sank as I stepped in front of the hood to get an eyeful of the damage. “I was really hoping I’d exaggerated the wreck in my mind because of the rain and head injury.” I mourned, seeing the shattered headlight and collapsed bumper.
Sighing, I walked to the driver’s side. Down another hubcap. The driver’s window was shattered. Only a few jagged pieces of glass remained in the frame.
Bracing my hands on the door, I leaned in and groaned. “The interior is soaked! I thought cops were supposed to protect and serve! They could have at least put some plastic over the broken window. It’s going to take forever to dry this out and clean it up.”
One of my hoodies was in the back seat, and I unlocked the doors so I could grab it. There was also a beanie and one of my Neon Reef shirts. “These are wet too,” I announced and wrinkled my nose. “Smelly. Do shirts grow mold?” I wondered.
No one answered, and I realized Kieran hadn’t said a word. Drawing back from the back seat, I looked around, seeing him standing off to the side at the back of the car, glowering.
“This is your car?” he asked. His voice was weird.
“It looks worse than it is,” I said, adding a silent, I hope. “Once I get it dried out, the window replaced, and…” I looked toward the front end, which was looking less fixable by the second. I gulped. “Do some other minor repairs—”
“Are you out of your mind?” Kieran burst out, his voice strangled. The coloring of his cheeks was a bit mottled too, and his eyes… they sort of looked like a chihuahuas. You know, a little bulged. “This thing isn’t even worth the two fifty I paid to get it out of here.”
“Hey! That’s my car.”
He snorted and jabbed a finger at it. “That is not a car. It’s an excuse for a tetanus shot!”
“It’s a little rusty,” I defended.
“A little rusty?” He scoffed. “You could sand it down and sell it as paprika,” he deadpanned.
My mouth dropped open.
“And the tires are so bald they need AARP!”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “It’s not that old.”
“A shopping cart would be more reliable,” he mocked. Then, “Does it even have seatbelts?”
I threw my arms up. “Of course it does.” But only two of them work.
“There are weeds growing out of the trunk.”
“There are not,” I argued, storming around to the back end.
My face fell. There were weeds sticking out from beneath the trunk.
Confused, I grabbed the keys to open it up and see how that was even possible.
They clinked together as I raised them, and it took me three tries to get the lock to work.
When it finally popped open, I pushed the trunk up, the hinges making a loud squealing sound.
“It’s a fucking deathtrap,” he muttered behind me.
“How is that even possible?” I pointed at the weed definitely growing out of the back. Leaning in, I noted it was coming from beneath the loose carpet liner along the side.
Kieran’s arm wound around my waist and pulled me back. “Get out of there before you get some incurable disease.”
I started to tell him what I thought about his opinions of my car, but before I could, something else caught my eye. “What the hell is that?” I burst out, yanking away from Kieran and stumbling forward.
I dropped on my uninjured knee to look closer at the large dent in the back fender. There was a crack running through the center. I ran my hand over it, my fingers following the concave shape.
“Just how many wrecks have you been in?” Kieran wanted to know.
“None!” I defended myself. Then, “Well, one. The one from the other night in the rain. This wasn’t there.”
I gasped. Hazy memories of the storm, the loud bang, and the way my car fishtailed off the road replayed like an old movie in the back of my mind.
“Holy shit!” I exclaimed, bursting up, my sore body protesting in some places while the stitches in my knee tugged. “Someone ran me off the road!”
“What?” Kieran’s voice was like a whip cutting through the memories. His hands grasped my shoulders, giving my body a shake. “What do you mean?”
I wet my lips and shook my head. “I thought I’d hydroplaned because of the storm. I’d been driving cautiously and trying to stay alert, but then, all of a sudden, there was a bang and a jolt. My car was spinning out of control and slamming into the guardrail.”
“What are you saying, Hazard?” Kieran pressed.
I met his eyes. “Someone hit me. They ran me off the road.”
He cursed.
“I was confused because I hit my head. I thought the loud sound I heard was me hitting the rail, but that sound came before I hit anything. Something hit the back of my car.” I pointed at the dent in my fender as proof. “And that’s what made me lose control and hit the guardrail!”
“Grimaldi,” Kieran spat. “That motherfucker—”
A loud crack, followed by shattering glass, splintered the air.
A rough shove slammed between my shoulder blades, and I pitched forward onto the unforgiving pavement.
A heavy, immovable weight dropped over me like an anvil, completely blanketing my frame.
I tried to lift my head, but Kieran made a sound.
“Stay down. Don’t move.”
Another shot rang out, this one slamming into metal and another exploding the pavement just feet away.
Kieran’s body was so tense I could have sworn I was buried under stone. The only proof he was flesh and blood was the hammering of his heart against my back and the graceful way I felt him pull out a gun.
“Lay your keys on the ground,” he instructed, low.
I let them drop from my hand.
“When I say, dive into the car. Get on the floorboards and stay down. Don’t get up.
“But wha—”
His voice was harsh, devoid of emotion. “Do it.”
I nodded.
Silence blanketed the lot, but it lasted for only one breath.
“Go!” Kieran growled and burst up, firing off rounds as I flung myself into the back seat. I was barely in when the door slammed behind me, and Kieran was in the driver’s seat, keys in the ignition.
Gunfire rang out, bullets slamming into my car.
Kieran turned the ignition, and the car made a whirring sound and then choked.
The back window exploded, and glass rained down into the interior of the car. I covered my head and face, keeping myself down just like he said.
More glass shattered, and Kieran tried the engine again. “Let’s go, you son of a bitch,” he snarled. The engine fired up, and he tore out of the spot as another bullet slammed into the side.
The sound of the horn made my heart hammer.
“Move!” Kieran roared, and then the car crashed through something, probably the gate at the lot entrance, and the back fishtailed as he sped forward.
Police sirens filled the air, and Kieran took a turn that put the Toyota on two wheels. The car slammed back onto the road, and my teeth cut into my tongue. I cried out as the car accelerated.