Part 9 (1/2)
And yeah, if she told herself that long enough, she just might stop worrying about what-ifs during this crazy week.
Finally she pushed through the back door and sucked in mind-clearing breaths that calmed her for a whole two seconds. She coughed on smoke wafting from behind the Dumpster.
Smoke with a distinctive scent rising above even the stench of rotting garbage.
Swatting at an irritating fly buzzing around her head, Shay followed the smell of weed right back to a quartet of Mercenaries toking up behind the Dumpster. She was too furious to be intimidated by the tattooed FEAR across their knuckles.
She kicked her way past a backpack. ”That alarm means there's a bomb threat, gentlemen. So move it, unless you want flames smoking out of your a.s.s instead of your doo bie.”
Her order stunned them silent. Their slow-to-track red eyes didn't comprehend the situation as a chorus of expletives went up from the unmoving crowd. Finally, a kid with swaths of acne got his b.u.t.t in gear, trudging past her with leaden footsteps. ”Whatcha gonna do? Send Jaworski back here? He's probably too busy playing with his rod.”
The others laughed at the reference to the cop's tendency to reach for his baton. She wasn't amused.
As the fourth teen-one with a familiar snake tattoo peeking out of his s.h.i.+rt collar-pa.s.sed, she s.n.a.t.c.hed the hand-rolled from between his pinched fingers.
”Not a chance, Brody.” She stared down the seventeen-year-old with professor-type gla.s.ses and a scraggly attempt at a goatee. She ground his joint under her heel. ”Now move it.”
She raced after them around to the front. Eli herded people from the parking area to a lot across the street, where Angeline kept watch over others under the umbrella of streetlights. A fire truck honked in the distance. Officer Jaworski lowered his megaphone as other police cars circled the building.
Shay jerked to halt beside him, panting. ”Officer Jaworski? I think I found everyone.”
His face pinched with disapproval. ”Miss Ba.s.sett, you shouldn't have stayed inside.”
Okay, whatever. Why argue when she'd already gotten her way? ”I grabbed a basic floor plan of the building.” She pulled out the flyer from a mini conference they'd held on parenting for teens, complete with a sketch of the building for attendees to use in finding different cla.s.srooms. ”It's not an exact blueprint, but it has the general layout.”
He took the flyer from her. ”Good thinking. Thanks. Our bomb squad can use this until we can lay hands on something more official.”
She glanced at her pink and yellow striped watch and found that no more than ten minutes had pa.s.sed since Angeline had made the announcement over the loudspeaker.
Jaworski dismissed her with a wave, crowding her farther away from the building, his hand reaching for his rod-uh, baton. She understood he had a job to do, but the way she saw it, the potential for an equally large explosion simmered around here with the two rival gang members all fired up and mingling. If Jaworski pushed too hard with his hammer approach, things could detonate.
She made a quick scan to count cop cars and found a half-dozen, decked to the nines with guns and more billy clubs. A dog barked from the back of one vehicle. For bomb sniffing or control through intimidation? Her stomach went tight.
Sounds a.s.saulted her already saturated senses: the sirens, the voices, the bustling bodies. All of it swelled with restlessness. She forced even breaths in and out, wis.h.i.+ng she could will peace through these kids and make them understand how lethal crowd control could turn. They needed to disband soon before-d.a.m.n it.
A fight broke out.
”f.u.c.k you,” Rickie shouted, shoving another teen in the chest, scorpion tattoo on his hand flas.h.i.+ng red. ”Did you really think you could get away with dissing our tag?”
Amber stepped between them, her baby bulge all too vulnerable. ”It wasn't him. Webber wouldn't do that.”
Caden stalked closer, crowding the pregnant girl. ”Do you know something, b.i.t.c.h? Was it you?” The resident suck-up showed his true colors, ones that had nothing to do with gang colors.
Webber chest b.u.t.ted him, a sword tattoo flexing on his bicep. ”You started the tag war. We retaliated. Now get the h.e.l.l away from her.”
”Who do you think you are, telling me what to do?”
The exchange and shoves went so fast, in her growing panic Shay lost track of all the kids piling on.
Officer Jaworski barked through a megaphone. ”Halt. Step back, or we will be forced to remove you.”
The cop's orders all but bounced off the heads of the half-dozen or so teens pus.h.i.+ng at each other while the rest of the crowd jeered. Shay could only think of pregnant Amber in the middle.
Elbows jabbed into her side as Shay pushed through, her gaze locked on the vulnerable girl. A heavy foot stomped hers. She bit back a curse.
Eli slid past. ”Take it down a notch, Rickie.”
Rickie hauled back a fist and let it fly toward Brody. Eli ducked, barely dodging the punch and hooking the kid around the waist. His flailing foot grazed Shay's stomach.
Ouch, s.h.i.+t, d.a.m.n it.
She knew better than to get in the middle, but seeing Amber cradle her belly . . . Shay shouldered ahead to grasp the girl's wrist and wrap her arms around Amber's huddled body. Thank G.o.d no weapons had been drawn yet. This was seconds away from tear gas and drawn guns.
There had to be a better way.
She ducked clear of Rickie and Brody taking on anyone in their path. An elbow nailed her on the cheekbone. Sparks fired behind her eyes, wiping out her sight for a second before she blinked it clear again. She hauled the pregnant girl closer and backed away.
The smell of sweaty bodies and rancid hatred clung to the air. The lot filled with the shouts of their gang mates urging them on, the battle cry of street violence whooping it up until all she could hear were obscenities and shrieks.
Strong hands gripped her waist and ushered her out of the way with Amber. Shay started to scream, then swallowed back the sound in shock.
She sagged with relief. She didn't even need to see his face to know. She recognized those intimidating shoulders in a biker rally T-s.h.i.+rt. The high-end motorcycle parked a few yards behind him only confirmed it.
Vince's face came into sharp focus, a black do-rag over his scalp. ”That way, Shay. Go. Now!”
Good G.o.d, was this man living in her pocket? How else could he always know when to show up?
He gave a careful but forceful nudge that sent her back and away, her fingers locked with Amber's. Finally, Shay stumbled free of the smothering press.
She clasped the pregnant teen close to her side, surrept.i.tiously checking the girl's pulse at the wrist. A steady throb pushed through the cherry blossoms inked along Amber's arm. ”Are you all right?”
The teen swept the back of her hand across mascara-stained cheeks. ”Fine, it's no big thing.”
Shay wasn't so sure the girl was as unaffected as she claimed, but her heart rate was only slightly elevated, not dangerously so. Shay gave Amber a gentle squeeze, her eyes zipping back to search the crowd to find Vince, her unlikely savior. He blocked a punch then secured his attacker in a headlock.
Now that she had a better vantage point, she could see the cops making headway. Vince's presence helped even the odds, shoving apart the rival gang members. The street began to open up like the Red Sea to divide the warring parties of onlookers. Cops filled in blank s.p.a.ces as they worked without weapons.
Amber twitched against Shay, the girl's feet inching closer to the brawl. ”He's going to get hurt.”
Which ”he” did Amber mean?
”You need to think about your baby. You're having a little girl, right?”
Tears welled in her eyes. ”Yeah, but what about him?”
Shay didn't even know how to answer that other than to tuck the girl closer to her side.
A handful of cops stayed on the fringes, eyes darting, monitoring, hands on their holstered service revolvers. If anyone started pulling guns . . . Part of her longed for her own weapon, and another part of her was grateful the 9 mm was tucked away safely in her backpack somewhere in her office.
Slowly, the tide turned. Eli and Vince restrained Rickie and Caden, while Officer Jaworski and two other police officers snapped cuffs on the other offenders.