“I’d bet my left nut that the only threat she poses is to herself. But it wouldn’t hurt to check.” P.J. told him.
“Well, like I said, I’ll make inquiries.” Jules replied. “At least knowing that she isn’t working with the feds will be a start.”
“Thanks, Jules.”
“You wanna thank me?” Jules inhaled deeply. “Do us all a solid and call your damn mother. She’s threatening Reno if she doesn’t hear from you soon, it’s gonna be road trip time. And we are all too busy for that kind of shit right now.”
“What’s going on?”
“Just fucking Colombians pulling their bullshit again. Nino is up to something; we just don’t have a handle on it yet. Same old, damn same old. By the way, I might send a couple of cases of weapons for you to hold on to.” Then Jules added with meaning. “I’m gonna let Claire know that you’ll be coming home soon.”
“Tell Jet I’ll make room in storage.” P.J. said. “And yeah, tell mom I’ll make the trip.”
“Okay, good. In the meantime, I’ll find out what I can about your woman.”
“She ain’t my woman.” P.J. said. But by that time, Jules had already hung up the phone.
“I can’t believe how quickly the weather has turned in just a couple of hours.” Layla exclaimed as she stood next to Juliet. They had come out of the movie theater to find that a threatening storm had begun to intensify. Now, as they looked out from the wall of windows just above the exit door, the two friends discussed their options.
“I wonder if we should just ditch the cars and call Reggie to come pick us up?” Layla frowned.
“I think we’ll be okay if we leave right now, don’t you?” Juliet peered out through the glass doors and into the stormy night. “It’s not like we’re hours away from home. And we’d just have to have Reggie drive us back here in the morning to come get our cars.”
“Yeah, that’s true. It’s a moot point anyway.” Layla said as she zipped up her jacket and put the hood up over her head. “I just remembered that Reggie dropped the minivan off to have the wheel bearings checked. He’s with the kids at his mom’s house. I’m supposed to pick them up from there.”
“We can do this.” Juliet told her, even as a loud clap of thunder shook the sky.
“You think so?” Layla peered out into the storm and sighed. “We’re gonna get wet as hell.”
“Not me, I ran track in high school. But you? I bet you run all gawky and slow...kind of like a pageant queen on crack.” Juliet teased her friend.
“You wouldn’t be challenging me to a race would you, Miss Jones?”
“A race yes, but a challenge? I don’t think so!”
“Well in that case, last one back to their car is a rotten egg!” Layla squealed with laughter as she darted first for the door.
“Cheater!” Juliet’s voice rang out merrily to Layla. But when the two friends got outside, they were hit with the force of the storm. The rain came down in freezing torrents and the gusts of wind made them catch their breath. They huddled together as they ran to their cars.
“Reggie’s mom’s house is only a couple of miles from here!” Layla shouted out over the gale force winds. “Follow me, we can all stay the night there!”
Juliet shook her head and pressed the button to unlock the car. She was standing in a puddle and her feet were already getting soaked through her canvas sneakers. Juliet just wanted to go home, dry off, and spend the night waiting out the storm with some beef stew, and the classic movie channel.
“I’ll be fine!” Juliet assured her friend, then hopped into her car.
It had only been a matter of a few minutes after Juliet hit the highway that she began to question the wisdom of trying to outrun the storm. The rain came down in long, torrential sweeps, while the howling and determined wind waged a war against Mother Nature. Branches bent and bowed dangerously close to power lines. The black night sky split with bolts of white lightening, while thunder shook the trees from their roots. Juliet leaned close into the steering wheel to get a better look at the road ahead.
Visibility was bad and getting worse. The white lines of the highway faded in and out beneath the waves of rain. When a heavy truck passed Juliet going at a speed that was nothing short of suicidal, her car got hit hard with the impact of a backsplash the size of a small tsunami. Juliet swerved hard and had barely gotten her vehicle under control when the dashboard lights began to turn on and off as if under a voodoo spell. Lightning and thunder erupted almost simultaneously as fat, full raindrops continued to bullet her car with machine gun like intensity. Juliet had bravely white knuckled it since she had left the movie theater, but when she lost the beam of a front head lamp, she had had enough. She could barely operate the vehicle with the strength of two headlights but driving with a single beam would be impossible. Juliet had just decided to pull over when she saw the entrance to the long, dirt country road that would lead her home. She sent up a silent prayer of thanks and sighed in great relief as she drove her car onto the exit.
But once she had left the lights of the highway behind, Juliet found herself surrounded by complete darkness, both on the road ahead and on the road behind her. The deep violence of the
