Shattered (The Protectors 11)

The houses in the area sat on large lots, which meant there wasn’t a lot of traffic, either of the foot or car variety. Something that would work in my favor. What wouldn’t work in my favor was the long jacket I was wearing. It was unseasonably warm for late spring, so the jacket wasn’t necessary to protect against the weather.

But it was very necessary to hide the gun at my back.

As I rounded the corner of the street Caleb was on, I expected that I’d either have to knock on the door of the house he was at or find a spot and wait for him to come out, but that wasn’t the case.

At all.

No, in fact, Caleb was standing right out in the open, completely impossible to miss.

Because not only was he standing on the walkway leading up to the house, he had a gun in his hand that was pointed at a man standing less than a dozen feet from him.

What the hell?

“Please,” the man called faintly as he used the briefcase he was holding to shield his chest.

Caleb didn’t speak or move. He had the hood of his jacket up over his head, but I knew it was him. I quickened my step as I took in our surroundings. I saw a woman with a little dog rush around the opposite corner, her phone at her ear. She kept looking over her shoulder as she ran. I had no doubt who she was on the phone with.

Which meant I had a minute, two at the most, to diffuse the situation and get Caleb out of there before the cops arrived.

My adrenaline was firing through my blood as I neared Caleb, and it took everything in me not to call his name.

“Please!” the man whispered fiercely. When Caleb didn’t respond to him, just held the gun on him, the man shouted, “I can’t help you!”

I was close enough to see that Caleb’s arm was shaking. I couldn’t see his face, but I didn’t need to because everything I couldn’t see, I heard in his voice as he softly said, “You promised.”

He didn’t yell the words, didn’t cry as he said them. His tone had the same bleakness I’d heard the night before, and that scared me more than anything.

The man shook his head, then said, “I’m sorry, Caleb. I just… I can’t.”

He shook his head again, as if that was somehow answer enough. The fact that he knew Caleb just added another layer of this-is-fucked-up to the entire situation. But of course, things were only getting started because not three seconds later, the front door opened and a kid came running out. A boy, maybe twelve or thirteen years old.

“Dad!” he shouted.

“Ricky, get back inside!” the man yelled, but the kid ignored him and ran right up to him. He threw his arms around his father, who immediately tried to shield the boy from the gun being aimed at him.

“Go back inside!” the man ordered.

“No!” Ricky yelled. “Get away from us!” he cried, his terror-filled eyes on Caleb as he clung to his father. “Leave my dad alone!”

Caleb faltered at the sight of the kid and lowered his arm slightly. I was about to call out to him, when the sharp sound of squealing tires pierced the air. I was moving before the police car rounded the opposite corner, its lights flashing but its siren silent. I was just feet from Caleb when the car came to a screeching halt and a cop jumped from the passenger side.

“Drop it!” he yelled.

Several things happened in the space of the few seconds that followed.

Caleb didn’t drop the gun. In fact, he did the worst thing he could have and turned to look at the cop who was shouting at him. I pulled out my own gun at that exact moment because I knew what the cop would do when he saw Caleb’s gun swing his way.

Before the cop could send a barrage of bullets at Caleb, I aimed my own gun at the cop’s foot, which was visible beneath the door he was using to shield himself. I ignored the screams of the man and his kid, as well as the cops, and fired. The police officer cried out and fell to the ground. It took every ounce of skill I had to shoot the gun from his hand without hitting him again. In that same instant, I reached Caleb and yanked him behind me as I turned and shot at the second cop, who was using the hood of the vehicle for cover. I hit him in the fleshiest part of his upper arm. It was a wound I knew would cause him to lose the gun, but not potentially make him bleed out right there on the street. I took out the front tires of the car next, then I practically dragged Caleb behind me as we made our way back to my car.