Page 119 of Intent to Kill
Wiping her eyes with her sleeve, she replayed the day in her head: The cheap motel. Dorian’s men surrounding it. A stolen red convertible, and another chase to the death.
“Baby, they’re still right on our fucking tail,” Adam had said.
“I know,” she had replied calmly.
At the edge of the train yard, she was certain they could still make it. She had wanted to fight it, to keep going. All they had to do was fight one last time, and then they could make their way to save their friends.
But Adam wouldn’t listen.
He’d kissed her, told her he loved her, and then pushed her off the edge onto a passing train below. And that’s where she’d been laying for the past twenty minutes.
Why did he do it? Why did he try to save her? She didn’t want to be saved, especially if it meant being without him.
Sitting up with her legs crossed underneath her, she surveyed her surroundings. The train she’d landed on was a red and rusting freight train. It bellowed across brown grassy fields with little in sight beyond them. Unlikely to stop for a while.
She lifted her knees to hold her head in her hands. Loud, heaving, sobs was all she could manage as she thought back over how horribly they’d failed. This family that had meant so much to her, wiped out so quickly by one man.
Was she going to be the only one to come out of this alive? Of the five of them, she couldn’t live with herself if it was just her left. No, she had to fight. Adam had given up. Paul, Carlos, Dan—they’d all given up. They’d let Dorian Blake take them down and kill their spirits. They’d all been beaten down because they refused to fight.
That wasn’t going to happen to her. She still had a whole lot of fight left in her.
The force of her motivation was so tangible that it pushed her to her feet. Even with the speed that the train barreled through the barren wasteland, it was nothing against the strength that was feeding her.
In the distance she saw the street through the trees. It was faint and far off, but it was there. The outskirts of the city.
Pushing against the forward momentum, she walked on top of the train to the very last car. There, she jumped down from the roof to a rusting platform at the back of the train.
Now all there was to do was jump.
She landed rough on the ground, tucking her head in and wincing, rolling for what seemed like forever before she eventually slowed. Her arms cut from the gravel. Her back jarred from hitting the ground. Her body was bruised and bloodied. Her spirit wasn’t.
She forced herself up. Her clothes were covered in white dust, tiny pebbles falling from her as she stood.
She limped through the overgrown grass, cleared the trees, and stood up straighter as she finally crossed the road to find a payphone. Her hand was as steady and as hard as her heart as she put in a coin and dialed the number.
“Tia,” she said.
“Mercedes? What the fuck! Are you okay? What the hell is going on?”
“Ssh, you don’t want to know.” Mercedes looked around nervously. “Look—what’s going down at the club? Is Blake there?”
“No—he’s...well, he was here ten minutes ago, but he got called away.”
“He’s not there now?”
“No.”
“Then he’s at the mansion,” Mercedes said.
“Mercedes, what’s going on? I haven’t seen you in weeks and now you–”
“I know, I’m sorry. I have to go.”
She didn’t give Tia the chance to speak again before she hung up and began stalking the streets toward a nearby parking lot. As she walked, she loaded her gun.
Blake had a pattern, a particular way he liked to handle things. First, it was torture. Always either at the Neptune Club, or his mansion. Then, for the killing blow, he’d go to his warehouse at the docks. So, if he wasn’t torturing Adam at the Neptune Club, then she knew where he’d be.
Checking her surroundings, she approached a gray sedan. She smashed the window with little effort, and was inside hotwiring the car in a matter of seconds.
