Master of None (13 page)

With excruciating slowness, she faced forward again. She said nothing.

The hum of tires on pavement filled the silence. Jazz’s lack of reaction concerned me more than if she’d screamed or cried or threatened to kill someone. Trevor. Possibly me.
A sick certainty twisted my stomach. If I were her, I’d blame me. I was the reason Trevor had targeted her in the first place.

“Jazz?” I croaked. “Are you . . .” I checked the rearview.

The muzzle of her Browning greeted me. “Turn around and go back. Right fucking now.”

She’d shoot me. I knew she would. But I still had to try to talk her out of it. “We can’t. They might be hanging around waiting for us to show up.”

“If they are, they’re dead. Turn the hell around.”

I sent Ian a do-something look. He didn’t. Teeth clenched, I swerved right and made a sloppy three-point. “We’re going to regret this,” I muttered.

“You would’ve regretted it more if you’d kept going.” Jazz checked the seatbelt she’d fastened around a still-napping Cyrus. She moved up to the seat behind us and thrust the Browning at Ian, handle first. “Can you give this thing some more kick?”

“Perhaps.” Ian accepted the weapon. He passed a hand over it, and his eyes closed briefly. The gun’s grip and body thickened. The barrel lengthened. His finished product didn’t resemble any gun brand I’d ever seen, but it looked as if it could punch a hole through steel at a hundred yards. He handed it back to her. “Will this do?”

“Oh, hell yes. Thank you.”

My hands tightened on the wheel. Wasn’t that impossible bastard supposed to be helping me? I failed to see how arming Jazz, who’d shifted from protective mother to vengeful hellion, would be useful to anyone. He should’ve done his dog trick and put her back to sleep.

Smoke came into view first, followed too fast by the pile
of blackened debris. Jazz made a small, helpless sound. But she didn’t scream.

She also didn’t change her mind about searching the devastation for her sister.

“Pull over.” She crouched, hand on the door, ready to fly. “Donatti, I need you to stay with Cy. Keep him safe.”

“No.”

She glared at me. “He’s your son—”

“I know. Christ, just listen to me a sec.” I edged off the road, threw the van into park, and took a hard breath. “If you want him safe, Ian should stay. He can protect him better than me. I’m going with you.”

“I don’t need your help. Cy’s more important.”

“Damn it, Jazz,
you’re
important. To me. Cyrus, too. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to sit here and watch you walk into a trap. He’s staying. I’m going. If you want to stop me, you’ll have to shoot me.”

Her brow lifted. “You finished?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. Let’s go.” She jerked the door open and stepped out.

I groaned. “Women. Do any of yours make sense?”

“No more than yours, I suspect.” Ian smirked and glanced back at the sleeping boy. “You should go. I will protect him.”

“Thank you.” I jumped out and hustled after Jazz, hoping there wouldn’t be anything to protect him from.

T
HE
ROOF HAD COLLAPSED AND BURIED EVERYTHING UNDER
chunks of charred rafters and melted insulation. Parts of the flooring poked through here and there like jagged wooden teeth. Small reminders that life had been here lay scattered
among the broken structure—the corner of a mattress, a snarl of wire hangers, the bare springs of a recliner with shreds of burnt material still clinging to them.

Jazz picked her way through the wreckage with dogged determination. I wanted to grab her and drag her away before she found what I knew had to be there—her sister’s body, probably in a condition Jazz should never have to see. She might thank me later, but right now, all I’d get for my trouble would be a swift kick to my manhood. Maybe a busted jaw, too.

I’d take a pass on that experience. Already had my balls bashed enough for this lifetime.

I followed her, close as I dared. Piles of blackened debris, weak and unstable, made moving a dangerous balancing act. And the smell didn’t help. Sharp traces of whatever accelerant the thugs had used to start the blaze—probably kerosene—edged the heavy black stench of burnt everything. Each breath felt like sucking in a mouthful of tar. Heat rose in visible air shimmers from some of the deeper mounds of rubble, but overall the temperature was bearable.

They must have hit the place the minute Jazz left Trevor’s. Maybe even before.

Jazz stopped moving, as if she’d just realized the same thing. But she remained frozen in place for so long that I knew she hadn’t paused to consider the asshole-ness of Trevor. I made my way closer, dreading her discovery, knowing without having to see what had riveted her gaze and sketched rigid shock into every line of her body.

When I found it, I wanted to unsee it for her. Just take the image and absorb it from her memory, so she wouldn’t have to spend the rest of her life with the vision of a bare brown leg and a naked foot jutting at an impossible angle from a snarl of
broken things. The idea that the rest of Molly lay mangled beneath made this almost perfect, visible portion somehow more gruesome. More final. Deader than death.

“That’s not her,” Jazz whispered. “It’s not. Not. M-molly.”

Her denial kicked me in the gut. I tried to put myself between her and the body, to spare what I could of her witness. “It is her,” I said, as gently as I could manage. “Jazz, you’ve got to accept it. You’ll only feel worse if you don’t.”

“It’s not.” She almost screamed but seemed to rein herself in with formidable effort. Closing her eyes, she shuddered and swallowed back dry heaves. “She has tattoos. Circlets. Both ankles. That’s not her.”

I looked again and saw what Jazz couldn’t—or wouldn’t. The heat of the blaze had melted her skin. Rough, uneven texture and discoloration bore evidence that she’d been exposed to air long enough to cool. If I squinted and stared hard enough, I could make out faint traces of ink streaking the ridged shin.

“Jazz . . .” I turned back to her.

Devastation stamped her features. She’d noticed.

“Excuse me.” She made a vague gesture, telling me to get out of her way.

Though instinct told me to force her away from this horror show before things got worse, I stepped aside. She wobbled across rubble to the forlorn leg, stopped. Knelt, bowed her head.

“Molly. I’m so sorry . . .”

She didn’t blame me. She blamed herself.

Feeling like an unwanted extra, I gave her some distance and scanned the wreckage and the property beyond. A brightly colored child’s swing set, smudged with soot and leaning forward as if the front legs had weakened in the heat, served as a
sharp reminder that Cyrus had spent a lot of time here. A large shed sat untouched several yards back, and a good half-acre of trimmed lawn expanded behind the house to dense woods. The shed worried me. Someone could be hiding in there, waiting to see who showed up to investigate. With no neighbors for miles, it might be hours before any cops arrived. Maybe never. No doubt Trevor had influence on the cops around here, too.

Something unnatural in the distance caught my eye. A flash in the treeline beyond the cleared property. Sunlight on glass.

They were waiting for us.

Jazz.” I started for her, but my foot sank through charred debris. I cleared falling on my face by a few frantic arm flaps. “They’re out there. Come on, we’ve gotta get back to the van.”

She looked at me and then at the yard. “Where? I don’t see—”

The distant, unmistakable sound of an engine starting stemmed her words. She stood—and headed the wrong way. Toward the thugs.

“What are you doing?” I yanked my leg free and clunked after her, but she scrambled lightly over the jumbled wreckage as if she was crossing a parking lot and pulled ahead of me. “The van’s
that
way.” I pointed back.

She failed to notice my helpful directions.

“Murdering bastards.” She whipped out the Ian-modified gun, sailed over the last of the rubble onto clear ground, and took aim at a black Jeep trundling over grass toward us.

I didn’t waste my breath telling her to stop. I ran, intending to knock her down and drag her back if I had to. Somehow, my usual elephantlike grace failed to slow me this time.

She still fired before I cleared the house.

“Are you nuts? You can’t hit—”

Another blast cut me off. The Jeep lurched, swerved, and almost tipped over before rolling to a stop sidelong in the grass.

I gave a low whistle. “Nice shot.”

Jazz didn’t move. I made my way to her, hesitated, and put an arm around her shoulders. Her body vibrated like a power line.

“Come on,” I said. “We’d better get out of here.”

“Look,” she whispered.

The Jeep bounced and rocked. Stopped. The driver’s-side door opened, and a body tumbled out. An arm closed the door. The Jeep backed up, skirted the heap on the grass, and headed for us at a fast clip.

Behind the advancing vehicle, the body stirred and attempted to rise.

And Jazz leveled the gun again.

“No.” I grabbed her arm. “Van. Now. Don’t argue.”

“Don’t go caveman on me, Donatti. These bastards are meat.”

Tugging on her was like trying to pull a telephone pole out of the ground. I glared. “Don’t make me carry you back. Because I will.” She’d beat my ass into hamburger for it, too. But I wouldn’t let her get killed—or live to regret being a murderer.

She must have seen something in my face that convinced her I meant it. Or she’d decided to just plug me instead. Either way, she relented and ran with me. We skirted the wreckage and pounded over brittle brown grass. I couldn’t shake the image of the wounded thug shoved from the Jeep like so much litter. That meant the one Jazz hadn’t hit was a ruthless, coldblooded
bastard . . . or knew damned well that Trevor would kill him if he came back empty-handed. Probably both.

We hadn’t reached the former front of the house when the sharp stutter of an automatic sprayed the air.

“
Move!
” I practically threw her ahead of me. If only one of us survived, I’d rather it was her. I didn’t know how to change a diaper.

She sprinted and slammed into the van’s side door seconds before I skidded hip-first against the front panel. I raced around the hood, scrambled into the driver’s seat, and made a mental note to teach Ian the finer points of getaway driving. Provided we lived long enough.

With a quick glance to make sure we still numbered four, I wrenched the gearshift to drive and took off. Navigating the remains of the house must have slowed the remaining thug down, but the bastard still made pavement before we’d gotten out of sight.

“Everybody buckle in,” I said. “It’s gonna get rough.”

A four-way stop loomed ahead. I kissed the brake just enough to manage my own seatbelt with one hand and peeled right, deeper into unpopulated area. If I risked heading for straighter roads, he’d have a clear shot. Of course, this meant I’d have to speed through unfamiliar territory.

Maybe I should’ve let Jazz drive.

I stomped the accelerator, moving as fast as I dared on the narrow, curving road. Behind us, the Jeep made the turn and picked up speed.

Ian twisted to look out the back window, then faced forward again with a blank expression. “When I tell you, drive faster.”

“I’m already going—”

“Do it. You will only need to continue for a few seconds.”

“Right.” I’d already hit sixty and either felt or imagined the wheels lifting around the bends. Much faster, and we’d end up rolling the thing. “I hope you’re gonna tell me soon.”

“Be silent. Drive.”

I risked a mirror glance. The Jeep couldn’t quite match our speed, but at the rate it was falling behind, it’d take hours to lose him. For an instant, I wondered what in the hell Ian planned to do. Then I decided against asking. I didn’t want to know.

The answer came when we rounded another curve. A massive tree alongside the road just ahead of us started to lean, and Ian said, “Move.”

I floored the gas. The van responded with a smooth jump to seventy, then eighty. I tried not to envision the thick trunk landing square in the middle of the roof, crushing us into fugitive paste, or smacking the back bumper to send us flipping end-over-end through the air and eventually crashing down to grisly death.

We cleared the falling tree with a few feet to spare. I rounded on Ian. “You asshole. Warn me next time you’re going to drop half a ton of wood at me.” A thud shook the ground, punctuating my statement as though the tree agreed.

Ian smirked. “You are still alive. You can slow down now.”

I tapped the brakes. Behind us, screaming tires announced the Jeep’s attempt to avoid the impromptu roadblock, and the crunch of metal and glass proclaimed its failure.

Shaking, I slowed to a crawl and sought Jazz in the rearview mirror. She sat straight as a poker, slack-featured, her pallor practically green. “Nice driving, Donatti,” she whispered.

“Yeah. Just call me Jeff Gordon.” I swallowed hard. “Is Cyrus okay?”

“He’s fine.”

“Boom!”

The small voice piped up from beside Jazz and startled laughter from me. “I guess he is. Doesn’t anything faze that kid?”

“Not really.” Worry creased Jazz’s brow. “All right, we’re not being followed anymore. Now what?”

“Good question.” I glanced forward to make sure I’d stayed on the road and watched her again. She still hadn’t let it sink in, but she was getting there. I could practically see the adrenalin draining, the despondency taking its place. “I think we need to find a safe place, get a little rest. Any suggestions?”

Jazz blinked once and dug something from a pocket. Her cell phone. She must have set it on vibrate. After favoring the phone with a lackluster stare, she met my gaze in the mirror.

“It’s Trevor.”

I pulled off the road and crouched between the front seats. “Don’t tell him we know. Can you put it on speaker?”

Jazz stared at me. Didn’t move.

“Come on, Jazz. You’ve got to snap out of it, just for a minute. You can snow this bastard.” I didn’t dare touch her, not even for comfort. She might break. I knew shock when I saw it. “You fooled me. You can fool him.”