Chapter 5 Rob #2
Heart hammering, I slowly looked over the outdoor seating area of the restaurant and the shade that was still pulled that broke my fall. If not for that shade, I would be a pancake on the ground instead of only slightly injured.
Thank God for restaurants on the first floor of the hotel.
I took off down the street, ducking into an alley for a quick breather. It was only as I leaned against the wall that I realized I’d lost my phone yet again.
Checking into a motel on the other side of town, I immediately grabbed the phone from the cradle and dialed Cap’s number. Thankfully, I had it memorized; otherwise, I’d be fucked.
The phone rang and rang, probably because he didn’t recognize the number. I hung up and called back, cursing when he let it ring again. The third time, he finally answered.
“Who the fuck is this?”
“Your favorite IT person.”
“Becky, your voice has gotten awfully low.”
Chuckling, I ran my hand over the back of my neck. “That’s sweet, Cap.”
“Where the hell are you?”
“California for that trial.”
It was silent for a second. “I know that, dumbass. Where are you? I can’t track you.”
That was odd at best. We all had trackers. Tugging on my shirt, I looked in the mirror at my shoulder blade, and that’s when I saw it. The small incision.
“It’s gone.”
“Well, no shit, Sherlock. If it was there, I wouldn’t be telling you I couldn’t track you!”
“Would you stop fucking yelling at me? I’ve got a massive headache, people are trying to kill me, and I’ve lost my fucking phone. Again!”
“When was the last time you checked in with Cash?”
“I haven’t. I don’t remember being in contact with him.”
“At all?”
I glanced around the drab motel room, wondering what the hell I was missing. “Look, you said something about a job I interfered with. Did he happen to give you any details?”
“Yes, he called me and very calmly explained that one of my operatives joined him on a job. Then he asked if we could get together for tea and discuss possible outcomes.”
That didn’t sound at all like Cash. “Really?”
“No, not fucking really!”
Sighing, I pinched the bridge of my nose, trying to make sense of what was happening. “Cap, my head is pounding. It would really fucking help if you could give answers without yelling at me.”
“I’m so glad that would help you. In the meantime, I’ve had to reroute a team out to your location because you can’t remember your shoe tie from a job.”
That was slightly harsh, but based on my current predicament, I couldn’t blame him for the sarcasm.
“What’s the address?”
I didn’t have that for him, but there was a very dirty brochure on the table that looked like it had been there since the eighties. “Starlight Motel. I’m outside of LA.”
“Sit tight, and do not move.”
That was easy enough. I was tired as hell and in desperate need of a nap.
And food.
Fuck, I was starving. If he was just sending the team this way, I had time to run out for something to eat. Walking over to the window, I peeked out from behind the mauve curtains, coughing when dust puffed in my face.
Scanning the streets, it was all clear. Not a soul in sight.
There was, however, a diner across the street. A single bulb flashed repeatedly from the Mickey’s Diner sign, while the rest lit up the parking lot with a dim yellow color.
It wasn’t the most appealing restaurant, but I was low on choices, and my stomach was aching with hunger. Decision made, I hit the lights and locked the door behind me, checking one last time around the motel. It was quiet.
Too quiet.
Pulling my gun, I checked the magazine. A single bullet. That’s all I had to defend myself against whoever was after me. Hopefully, I had lost them, or maybe they wouldn’t come after me again until I had a team.
As I crossed the street, I chastised myself for getting into trouble like this. I rarely went out on jobs, and when I did, the guys always ragged on me for the hell of it, laughing about how I was more of a desk jockey than a field operative.
And I’d just proven their point.
I strode up the steps of the old diner car, cursing when I nearly fell through the rusted metal steps. The door gave an odd jangle as I tugged it open. Glancing up at the bell, I grimaced at the grease coating the inside. When was the last time anyone had cleaned this place?
Cracked leather booths and rickety aluminum tables filled one side along the windows. The cook rested his elbows on the counter while reading a magazine. The toothpick he was chomping on was whittled down to nothing more than a nub.
“Take any seat,” he called out, not bothering to look up.
I took the seat closest to the exit, keeping my back to the wall. Resting my elbows on the table, I grimaced as a sticky substance coated my skin. My stomach rumbled despite the lingering smell of days-old grease in the air.
An older woman chomping on gum strode over, sloshing a glass of water on the table. “What can I get you?”
“A clean menu?” I muttered under my breath.
Smiling widely, clearly she’d heard me. Grabbing a rag that was bunched up on the counter, she smeared it over the menu, leaving more behind than she took off.
“Better?”
“Coffee,” I said, not sure I should grab anything other than that, no matter how hungry I was.
“Sure.”
She blew a bubble, popping it before she turned and headed over to the counter. When she picked up the brown slush in the pot, I almost told her to forget it, but I was distracted by heavy boots entering just behind me.
A tall man in a trench coat walked past me, sitting two booths down, facing me. His eyes immediately locked on mine, and there was nothing kind about anything in those eyes.
Fuck.
I glanced in my periphery, noting the second man lingering in the doorway.
The second hand on the clock ticked, counting down the seconds until one of us attacked. And all I had was a measly single bullet. I’d been in worse situations before, but I usually had a getaway or backup. I had neither right now.
“I wouldn’t touch the menus. They’re a little sticky.”
His lips curled up in a smirk. “Noted.”
I slid my hand under the table, touching the screws that were precariously holding the tabletop to the pole in the center. I’d felt the wobble when I sat down. It had annoyed me then. Now, it just might save my life.
The waitress ambled over, sloshing my coffee on the table, just as she had with the water. “Anything else, sweet cheeks?”
Leaning forward, I smiled at her. “Any chance I could get you to leave?”
“Sure, right after my shift is over.” Rolling her eyes, she walked away, busying herself behind the counter by filing her nails.
Well, it had been worth a shot.
Very carefully, I undid the screw closest to me, glancing over my shoulder at the man leaning against the doorway, probably getting hepatitis from the simple act.
“So, any reason in particular you’re looking for me?” I asked the man licking his lips in a creepy way at me.
“You know why.”
“If that were true, I wouldn’t be asking.”
The screw dropped into my palm, and I moved on to the second one.
“Playing stupid will get you nowhere.”
“Oh, if only I was playing stupid,” I sighed, rubbing my hand across my eyes.
Fuck, this headache just wouldn’t go away. “What I wouldn’t give for just a single night that involved eight hours of uninterrupted sleep. You know what I mean?”
He shrugged with a grin. “I can give you an eternity of uninterrupted sleep.”
Chuckling, I snatched the last screw while balancing the tabletop with my hand. “Well, that sounds like a fantastic offer.”
I moved fast, sliding out of the booth and whipping the screws at the man in the door while dragging the table top up, protecting myself as the man a few booths down pulled his weapon and shot at me.
All the bullets pierced the aluminum tabletop, one missing me by just a scant inch. I was too fucking tired for this shit. Charging forward, I rammed the table into the man, knocking him to the ground, but the aisle was too narrow for me to smash him into the floor with the table.
Spinning it vertically, I rammed the edge of the table into his stomach first, catching his hand in the process and breaking it. He screamed as bones shattered, and I lifted the table for another devastating blow.
But before I could bring the table down on his face, I was attacked from behind.
Rope pulled against my neck and I was yanked back, flush against the second man.
Choking, I had no choice but to release the table and dig my fingers under the rope burning against my skin as it moved and scraped my flesh.
“Where is she?” he hissed in my ear.
I gasped, struggling for air as this fucker cut off my oxygen.
Ramming my elbow back, I landed a solid blow, but it wasn’t enough to get him to back off.
Bracing my foot against the booth, I shoved backward, knocking him against the wall of the diner car.
He jolted just enough that I wiggled my fingers under the rope and tore it forward.
I rammed my elbow into his stomach hard, this time gaining the upper hand and spinning to land a solid fist to his face before I was attacked for a second time from behind.
A hit to my kidneys had me dropping to my knees. Rolling my eyes, I ducked just as I felt a whoosh of air by my head. I spotted a fork on the ground under the counter and snatched it, then turned and rammed it upward, right into the fucker’s eye.
Screaming, he backed away, yanking the fork out of his face. His eyeball came out, along with the muscles still attached. Tripping over the tabletop on the ground, he fell to his back, the fork stabbing his eyeball back in place for the second time.
I jumped to my feet and grabbed the glass on the counter, smashing it against the second attacker’s face, but it didn’t break. “Fucking plastic!”
I smashed it over his head again and again until he fell to the ground. Breathing hard, I leaned against the stool by the counter, wincing at the roughness in my throat.
“Fucking prick,” I muttered.
The man rolled over, pulling an oval object from his pocket.
“Really?” I shouted, turning and jumping over the booth, throwing myself as far from the man as possible. I dove under the table just as I heard the rattle of the grenade bouncing around the diner, and the subsequent explosion that sent shocks through my body and clanked around my head a few times.
Coughing at the dust lingering in the air, I climbed out from under the now mangled table, waving away the debris.
No one moved, not even the woman who was once behind the counter, but now laid slumped over the top with a bubble of gum popped over her face as blood dripped down her wide eyes that stared sightlessly in the distance.
I stumbled over the debris, climbing over body parts as I fought my way to the door. I could have just walked out the gigantic hole in the side, but somehow, taking the door seemed like the gentlemanly thing to do.
Once out in the cool air, I glanced back at the diner as a single bulb buzzed on the busted sign. It swung precariously in the air before crashing to the ground just in front of the diner.
Turning with a sigh, I hobbled away from the diner, back across the street to my motel. Staying there tonight was out of the question.
And deep down, I was grateful for that.
There were bound to be bedbugs in that mattress.