He glared at us as we approached the Cherokee. I nodded at him and tried to smile. Instead of returning the gesture, Whitey turned away.
My stomach was in knots and I didn’t know why. It was a terrible feeling. I looked to the sky. Darryl followed my gaze.
“Full moon,” he muttered. “Bound to be some crazy motherfuckers out tonight.”
“True that,” I said.
I pointed my keychain at the Jeep and pressed the button to unlock the doors. While Darryl hopped inside, I walked around the front, checking the hood and grille for damage. There was none. At that point, I really wasn’t expecting to find any, either. Whatever the hell Whitey and his guys were looking for, it wasn’t vandals. Not the way they were going about their search.
Darryl leaned over and opened my door. I raised my leg to step inside. Something grabbed my ankle. It startled me, but I didn’t scream. Not loud, anyway. Instead, I made a strangled little noise in the back of my throat. The Russians were too far away to notice.
I glanced down. A hand gripped my ankle. The fingers wrapped around me tightly. It was a pretty hand. Slender and fair-skinned. The fingernails were long and red. The hand was attached to an arm and presumably, the arm belonged to someone hiding on the ground beneath my ride.
I recognized the fingernails and the hand. Had studied them every night, along with the rest of their owner.
It was Sondra. I was sure of it. For some reason, Sondra Belov was hiding beneath my Cherokee. And suddenly, I was pretty sure I knew who the Russians were looking for. I just didn’t know why.
I took a breath and held it.
“The fuck you doing,” Darryl hollered. “We’re gonna be late for work.”
The bouncers glanced in our direction. The hand on my ankle squeezed harder.
“I stepped in some gum,” I said loud enough so that the others would hear me. “Hold on a second. I want to scrape it off first. Don’t want to get it on my upholstery.”
“Well, hurry up.”
I knelt on the pavement and peeked under the Jeep. My breath hitched in my chest. Sondra stared back at me. Her eyes were wide and frightened. Her face was covered with black smudges. After a second, I realized it was her mascara. She’d been crying. Her lip was swollen and bleeding. There was blood under her nose, as well. She started to speak, but I put a finger to my lips and shushed her. Then I stood back up again, and slowly opened the door. The sound of my knees popping made me jump.
“Darryl,” I whispered. “Be cool.”
“Be cool?” His voice was very loud. “The hell do I care, Larry? It’s your ride. If you don’t want gum in it, then it don’t matter to me.”
“Be fucking cool.” I stared at him as hard as I could, trying to convey the weight and gravity of the situation. He must have seen that something was wrong, because he nodded at me.
“Right. Cool. Like a cucumber.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the bouncers. They were all reconvening now, heading back to Whitey. They seemed to have given up their search. None of them were looking at us.
“Okay, Sondra,” I whispered. “Quick as you can, sneak up into the Jeep. Stay out of sight and keep your head and shoulders down. Crawl between the seats and into the back. Don’t let them see you. Understand?”
“Sondra?” Darryl mouthed the word silently.
I glared at him and gave a slight shake of my head.
Sondra slipped the top half of her body out from under the Cherokee and slid into the vehicle, wedging herself between the driver’s seat and the gas pedal. Then she crawled in the rest of the way. She was barely dressed— skimpy blue silk shorts and a matching silk robe, more like a pair of pajamas than clothing. It was very obvious she wasn’t wearing a bra or panties. On her feet was a pair of baby blue high heels. Darryl stared at her, bewildered. Sondra wriggled over his lap and he turned to me. I shrugged. Sondra slid between the seats, and then hid in the backseat, hunkered down on the floor, keeping her head low. My heart beat faster. I glanced around again. The Russians hadn’t seen her.
Darryl was flustered. “The fuck is going on, Larry?”
“Quiet,” I said. “Not now, man. Let’s just get the hell out of here.”
I slid into the driver’s seat and shut the door behind me. Then I put the key in the ignition and turned it. The engine thrummed to life. I dropped the Cherokee into reverse and slowly backed out of the parking space, trying to drive normally, trying not to attract attention. We headed for the exit. Sondra hyperventilated. I checked the rearview mirror, making sure she was okay. Her robe had come unfastened and her breasts were sticking out. I tried to ignore them. Even though I stared at them dozens of times on stage, it seemed wrong somehow to gape at them now. I stared straight ahead.
“Hey, you!”
“Oh shit.” Darryl looked back over his shoulder. “You done pissed off the Russians, Larry.”
I glanced in the rearview mirror again. Otar was running after us, waving his hands and shouting something. His face was red and flustered.
“What do we do?” I yelled.
“Get the fuck out of here!” Darryl slapped the dashboard with his palm.
In the backseat, Sondra whimpered.
Otar got closer. I heard part of what he was saying. It sounded like ‘lights’. I slammed on the brakes.
“Go, stupid!”
“Relax. He’s not after us, Darryl.”
“Then why the hell is he chasing us? What’s he shouting?”
“The headlights,” I said. “I forgot to turn them on.”
As I grasped for the knob, Otar reached the side of the Cherokee. He was puffing hard. I could see it from where I sat. His cheeks looked like a blowfish. Before I could pull away, he glanced into the back. His eyebrows narrowed. He shouted something in Russian and grabbed the door handle.
“Fuck!”
I stomped the accelerator and we shot forward. Otar held on to the door handle for a moment, and then tumbled face first to the pavement. As we raced into the street, I saw him jumping to his feet, pointing at us and screaming. The rest of the Russians were running towards him. There was a flash of light, followed a second later by a loud explosion.
“Motherfuckers are shooting at us,” Darryl screamed. “Drive, bitch, drive!”
Sondra spoke up for the first time. “They will kill you if they catch you. Kill us all. Please go. Fast. Now.”
“Listen to the lady,” Darryl urged. “Get us the hell out of here!”
I did. The Cherokee’s tires squealed and the vehicle shuddered, as if the engine was going to leap right out of it. The RPM and speedometer needles wobbled back and forth. We sped down the road and took the on ramp for Interstate 81. There wasn’t much traffic; just a lot of tractor trailers. I darted in and out of them, watching for signs of pursuit, but if Whitey’s men had followed us, we’d lost them.
“Why the fuck did you let that guy catch up to the car,” Darryl shouted. “Did you think he wouldn’t see the bloodied up bitch in the back seat?”
“I know, I know. I wasn’t thinking!”
“Damn straight, you weren’t. Jesus fucking Christ, Larry!”
Sondra sat up and I saw that she was crying again. I grabbed some tissues from the console and offered them to her.
“Here you go.”
“Thanks. You are nice to help.”
Darryl shook his head. “Son of a bitch…”
Sondra wiped her eyes and blew her nose. She looked around for some place to put the tissues.
“I can take them,” I said softly. “Hand them here.”
“Is…how you say? Snot…is snot in them.”
“That’s okay. Really, I don’t mind.”
She handed them back to me. I dropped them on the floor at my feet.
