Chapter 41
The click was unsatisfying. The snarl on Tony’s face twisted into a smirk and she realized he set her up. Yet without wavering, Natalie continued to hold the gun against Tony’s chest and pulled the trigger again and again. With no surprise, each time, the hammer fell on hollow chambers. Frustration settled on her like a chainmail cloak. The terror wasn’t yet ended.
“Trick or treat, bitch. You got tricked, now I get the treat.”
She watched as he reached into the left pocket of his jacket and produced a single bullet. He held it in front of him in the palm of his hand. “Knew you might try to cheat me. I took out some insurance. You’re going to have to work harder to make this kill.”
Natalie saw his right hand come up slow. She knew he was reaching for the barrel of the Colt. She jerked the pistol away and swung for his head. He twisted, raised his arm, and blocked the blow. The weight of the gun ripped it from her hand and, for a moment, it seemed suspended in midair but then, it slammed into the dirt floor and slid to a stop near Rudy’s feet.
Rudy stretched his leg and tried to kick it toward Natalie, but his leg wasn’t long enough. The revolver lay inches away. Tony dove fast and stretched his hand out for it. Rudy swung his foot up and hooked Tony’s arm. The kick spun Tony around. He fell hard on his side and landed on top of the gun.
With the silver barreled menace back under Tony’s control, she kicked him in the low back with the toe of her boot. He rolled with the bullet still clutched in his left hand and grabbed for her leg with his right. She pulled it away just in time and his hand flailed past her calf. With his chest exposed, she drove a spiked heel into his abdomen and felt gratified when a little-girl shriek escaped his lips.
She ran toward the back of the corral, as far as possible, and then turned to gauge what he’d do next.
*
Tony sat up and picked up the Colt. Standing, he turned toward Rudy and with a swift kick, planted the heel of his shoe in Rudy’s face.
“Don’t fuck with me. Your life is hanging by a frayed thread already.”
He loaded the single slug into the chamber, slammed the cylinders closed, and lifted his eyes. Across the corral, Natalie stood like a trapped cat trying to judge which direction to run, he chided, “Here pussy, pussy, time for my treat.”
*
As Tony started to walk toward her, Natalie took a step back and assessed escape routes. The corral stood in the corner of the barn, so behind her and to the right, the walls offered no way out. If she continued backward, she’d further box herself in. Tony, on the other side of the small fire, blocked any opening in the corral’s fence. This left one path. She had to go over the top rail. She bolted to the left and, after the first step, her foot hit something in the darkness. It slammed into her boot-covered shin.
Natalie stopped. She looked up as Tony shifted on an interception path. The pistol hung from his right hand like a useless appendage.
She reached to free her foot from whatever had entrapped it and recognized the head of a handle-less steel dirt-rake like her dad used on the farm. She wrapped the fingers of her left hand around it. Prepared to run, she bent her knees and swayed side to side as if Tony was the pitcher and she was about to steal second base. Tony continued to approach. She waited until he was five feet away and then faked a run to the right.
Tony matched her move to his left and drew a step closer.
Natalie brought the rake up with a jerk and swung it at him. He twisted away to this left. Even without much force, the head of the rake made contact with Tony’s right arm. He lurched backward, stumbled over his feet, and fell into the fire. Coals and flaming shards scattered.
Natalie turned back toward the fence. In two steps she reached it. As she grabbed the top-rail, a shriek pulled her attention from escape to the boy she tied to the post just a few feet away.
“Natalie, Tony untie me,” Rudy screamed.
Natalie stood aghast with her fingers clutched around the plank and stared toward Rudy. Some of the embers had landed in the hay where he sat.
“Burn in Hell,” Tony said as he got back to his feet. He tucked the gun into his belt.
Natalie stepped on the first plank with her left foot. Years of neglect had weakened the support and it cracked under her weight. She thrust her right foot to the next slat before it gave way and swung her left leg over the top in one fluid movement. The action shifted her right foot. It slipped off the board and brought her down on the top rail hard. The pain shot through her crotch and a vivid memory of the pistol whip Tony had given her on her pubic bone in the warehouse replayed. She didn’t have time to cower or flinch, though. She employed the ache to stoke her mental strength. Pain meant she was alive and could still fight back. Tony had said, “You going to have to work harder to make this kill,” and she meant to do just that.
*
Rudy heard a pop as the scattered coals burst into flame and they gorged themselves on the fresh fuel by his legs. His eyes darted back and forth as this new terror threatened. He twisted to get out of their path and pulled his knees toward his chest. The rope tight around his neck choked, yet the fire continued toward him on a careless path without reprieve.
“Help me,” he shouted but no one responded.
He scraped his feet on the ground and tried to push the hay away from him. It had the opposite effect and stoked the blaze with new fuel. A few feet away he saw the pile of hay by the wall burning. Hasty billows of smoke streamed toward the roof.
“We’re gonna die in here. We need to get out.”
*
Tony ignored him and turned his attention to the more desirable subject as she leaped over the fence of the corral. He headed through the gateless gap toward her, unaware the bottom edge of his jacket had ignited in the back.
“Trick or treat pussy.”
*
Natalie disregarded him and ran toward the center of the barn with the rake head clutched in her left hand. As she reached the open area, she realized it had a rope tied to it. She grabbed the line about three feet from the rake and began to swing it over her head. As it circled, she let the rope slip out from her hands until it extended to a ten-foot radius from her body. She stood in the vortex and turned the rope above her head like a lasso in faster and faster circles. The rake flew around her chest high.
Tony came toward her out of the corral past Rudy. The flames at the back of his jacket lapped up its full length. They flickered above his shoulders. Natalie realized he was oblivious to the heat as his concentration fixated on the obstacle she hurtled between them.
Above her, she heard the distinct vibration from the blades of a helicopter. She tore her eyes away from Tony and lifted them toward the roof. The sound continued to build until it seemed to hesitate just above her. A flash of hope ignited as Natalie continued to swing the rake around her. Had a spark from the fire, a wisp of smoke or a glow from inside the barn escaped the hole-ridden roof and alerted the pilot? Her heart sank quickly when the roar crept away into the distance. Hope careened even deeper into the abyss.
She turned her eyes back to Tony.
*
Tony’s eyes, too, followed the cloud of smoke toward the rafters. He knew they had been spotted. Time was short but it no longer mattered. Survival gave way to redemption for Ma’s pathetic life and the crown of righteousness could only be earned by a willing sacrifice.
He tore his eyes away from the smoke and looked toward the glaring eyes of the innocent girl in front of him. From behind the tongues of orange flame reflected in them, he saw no fear, only confident rage. He began to walk again as if the flying object was his destiny. When at last he stood at the edge of the orbit the rake navigated, he paused and listened to the air as it twisted its way through the molded steel.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.
“Leave her alone,” Rudy shouted and kicked at the flames around him.
“I told you once, asshole, to shut the hell up or I’d do it for you,” Tony yelled with his eyes glued to the projectile Natalie had thrown between them. She had proven to be a creditable adversary. He’d take pleasure in her final test.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.
The whirling weapon flew by him several more times and Tony stood like a school girl waiting to step into the arc of a jump rope.
*
With Tony’s face in the shadows and the flames lapping up his coat, it looked to Natalie like Satan had walked straight out of the fires of Hell. Suddenly, Tony’s expression changed from victor to panic. She took three quick steps forward.
*
The blaze on his back began to singe Tony’s ponytail. The smell of his burning hair made him realize he was on fire and then he felt the heat. It drew his concentration from the orbit of the rake. He grabbed the lapel of this jacket and started to tear it off. At the same moment, the heavy rope collided with his right arm and began to wrap around his body. His arms, already pinned inside his blazing jacket, were entrapped.
The steel object, on a direct course for him, he threw himself to the ground, hoping to change the trajectory. The action only proved to be more catastrophic as the altered elevation brought the rake on a curve aimed at his head. It hit him in the face. The tines tore several fresh gashes into his flesh. Stunned, he collapsed to the dirt floor.
“Damn you, Whore. Bring it on.”
*
The ring of her phone aroused Angela Hawk from the comatose sleep she had fallen into as soon as her eyes had closed. She jerked her head up from the headrest.
“Agent Hawk,” she said as the sleep fog slowly released her mind.
“Agent Hawk, this is Patrolman Seth Parker, I may have found something.”
“What do you have?” she asked and, as her startled heart pumped life back into her veins, she sat up straight and looked out the window. One emergency vehicle remained on the scene. A tow truck had just finished hooking up the burgundy pickup.
“I’ve been flying south of the scene of the murder,” Seth reported to the agent, “and I just passed over what appears to be a deserted barn. There’s smoke coming through the roof.”