“Doug . . . Doug, damn it, answer me. You better not be sleeping in there or I’ll kick your skinny ass.” He walked to the end of the porch and yelled. “Oscar . . . Oscar, God damn it man answer me, where are you?” A door slammed as the angry man stormed back inside the house. Seconds later dim light from a lantern glowed inside.
JR woke when she heard a truck engine race loudly in the quiet night. The sound roared and then faded as it drove away. She hurt all over when she moved. Someone ran down the creaking stairs and out the front door, then yelled names several times; it sounded like Riley. The door slammed as the man came back inside. A match flickered at a kerosene lantern before Riley Hooper lit it. He stopped in his tracks, then said, “Those sons of bitches.” After lighting a second lantern Riley stomped to the stairs with it in his hand.
She looked across to see Mona staring back at her. In the flickering light, she saw Mona’s black eye and bruised chin and knew that wasn’t the extent of Mona’s physical damage. Mona had resisted her tormentors aggressively too. JR imagined she looked the same from the soreness all over her body. JR’s features tightened as her eyes locked on a nearby item while a plan hastily formed.
Riley Hooper raced to the top of the stairs yelling. “Get up, God damn it, get up. Everyone up and get dressed. Doug and Oscar took a truck and left. Danny and Claude, take a truck and go after them. What the hell are they doing? They were on guard duty for Christ’s sake. Get a move on there’s work to be done.“
As soon as Riley was out of sight, JR kicked off the single blanket and stretched her leg to reach an empty beer bottle. Her foot gingerly rolled it toward her until she grasped it by the neck with her left hand. She drew back her arm and smashed the bottle against the thick eyebolt her rope was hooked to. Riley’s screaming tirade upstairs covered the sharp noise as the thin, brown bottle broke. She tossed the bottom piece of their weapons over to Mona, made a sawing motion with the bottle, then hid the neck piece under her cover. Then she set to work.
Minutes later everyone was downstairs finishing dressing and drinking lots of water to clear the yucky liquor taste from their mouths. They stood in a clump.
Riley gave orders. “You men get outside and keep watch but stay here; we need to talk about what to do next. I can’t believe those two assholes ran off and left us. Women! Make breakfast. We’re all hungry. And lots of coffee. Lots of it and strong as mud. God damn those two assholes.”
JR had scooted close to the wall on the bare floor with the blanket pulled up over her head. The slack in the line let her silently work the broken bottle fragment back and forth on the half inch thick rope. A few frayed threads were felt as she worked. She prayed Mona was following her lead. Something had happened with the guards posted outside. Maybe, just maybe. She prayed Sam played a prominent role in whatever was going on.
Sam thought about Brodie’s actions and appreciated the diversion he’d created by disposing of the two guards and then making it appear they had run away. Devious but effective. Finding dead bodies would have alerted Hopper that he had come for the women.
The first sunrays were striking the tops of trees on the western ridge across from Sam and Smokey. Visibility was steadily improving. He couldn’t decide if that was a positive or a negative.
Shortly after the pickup left, a man ran out onto the porch, yelled, and then ran back inside.
Next, dim light showed on the first floor, then on the second floor. Smokey heard noise behind them before Sam did. A minute passed as Smokey softly growled before Brodie raced up the hillside and flopped beside them. He wasn’t even breathing hard. Sam’s rifle pointed at the front porch and his crosshairs were positioned ten feet from the steps. Brodie grabbed his rifle and removed the plastic covering it, then put his eye to the scope. “Make sure all four men are outside before you fire.”
The front screen door flew open, and four men ambled out and down the steps. They stopped on the wet gravel amid puddles in a tight group and spoke in low tones.
Brodie mumbled, “Shit, Riley isn’t with them. There’s more than four of the bastards.”
The brunette Sam wounded hobbled out gingerly to stand at the top of the steps. She was barefoot and wore a man’s shirt with long tails. A white bandage showed high on her left thigh. She spoke and the men turned toward her.
“Be ready to take those four now when a grenade explodes; we’ll deal with the others later. Get the two on the left, I’ll go right, then to the woman. We’ll likely have to storm the place at night with handguns to clear them out.” Brodie pulled the pin on a grenade, then tossed it with a strong overhead lob. The wounded woman saw the grenade and followed it’s dropping arc. She yelled a questioning comment when it was head high and pointed. It landed five feet past the targets, hit, and bounced and rolled ten feet into a puddle where it exploded. Gravel, water and smoke were thrown in all directions along with
