Gilded Cage

bsp; “Brandon!” Lillian groped the side of the seat and released the seatbelt. She was trying to yank off his seatbelt when the sound of footsteps echoed against the hard asphalt, coming towards them. Oh no. Panic seized her in full grip. They had to leave now. They…

Three gunshots tore through the windshield and hit Brandon’s chest.

“No!” Lillian screamed. They’d killed him. They’d fucking killed him. She struggled to reach over his seat to shield Brandon, but a pair of strong hands yanked her through her broken window. Lillian flailed and cursed. She had to help Brandon before it was too late. She couldn’t let him die.

She thrashed and cursed as the unknown man dragged her out of the mangled vehicle. Lillian gnashed her teeth, trying to bite off his arm. A hand flew in her direction and pain exploded on her left cheek. Her breath was knocked out of her lungs. She couldn’t breathe for long seconds as the man kept dragging her farther from the wrecked car. When she collected her breath, the man threw her roughly into a car. She landed face down on the carpet, where a gleaming pair of shoes were just an inch away from her forehead. She looked up and felt numb.

Maxwell Stanford leered at her with a malicious glint in his eyes. “Welcome back, Lillian. My, my, my, pumpkin. You’ve been a bad girl, haven’t you?”

Brandon felt as if tons of boulders had slammed against his chest. Something deep in his mind screeched at him to wake up. His internal alarm. His combat instinct jolted him out of the cloud of haze. Maybe it was the pain that yanked him out of his dream. Brandon instinctively grabbed the source of that burning fire. Instead, sticky, viscous liquid smeared his hand. Blood. His blood.

It hit him. The bullets had torn through him and made him lose control of the car. He remembered the car had skidded and hit the guardrail.

Lillian!

His eyes flew open. The seat beside him was empty. God, no. Where did she go?

Brandon shook off the fog of confusion, trying to focus his mind. The pain was forgotten. He unholstered his Glock and cocked it ready. Men coming. Two of them. Their voices carried to where he was.

“Did you finish him?”

“Three in the chest. That should finish him.”

“Chest? What are you…an idiot? Head, man, head. We ought to be sure.”

Fuck. Brandon kicked the car door open and fired two shots to the source of the voices. One missed. Brandon fired another and made the man’s head explode before he could fire a retaliation shot. Men yelled. Bullets rained in his direction.

Brandon flattened his body on the ground, taking cover. He scanned his surroundings, analysing the situation. He saw two high mobility vehicles parked to block the road about a hundred yards from the car wreck, and about a half dozen suits, fully armed. Most of them were Japanese and a couple were his fellow bodyguards for Blackwell. Shit. Brandon bet they’d be really pissed that he’d snatched Lillian right in front of their noses. Talk about treachery.

Three heartbeats passed. Brandon snatched a Berretta from his ankle strap and jumped forward, propelling himself while opening fire. His Glock and Beretta vomited their rounds. Thin, whinnying sounds slashed the muggy air and human flesh. Men screamed. Wails split the air. Some of them returned fire. Brandon whirled and took cover behind the wreckage. A rattle of bullets chorused.

Brandon unclipped his Glock and loaded a fresh mag. He blindly blasted a few rounds above his head. More screams. Bullets thundered around him. He took a deep breath, gambler’s impulse, and slammed himself down onto the warm asphalt, firing the Glock and the Berretta at the remaining men with crystal clarity.

His bullets gutted them. One hit straight in the eye. The back of the man’s head sprayed like a garden hose. Brandon hit the other shooter by his neck, ripping his shoulder. The Yak flailed backward. Brandon vaulted up in a split-second, firing the third shooter before he’d the chance to pull his trigger. Half of his face ripped open, his hand jerked. The semi-automatic in his fingers dropped. The man’s body lolled on the ground.

Brandon loaded a fresh mag into his Glock and charged the hi-mob car. He jumped on the roof of the vehicle and searched for the last fucker. Or two. He saw one curled by the tire with blood covering his face, trying to load a fresh clip into his gun. He knew that man. John Ishac. A former marine also employed by Blackwell from when Lillian was still in diapers.

“Wait… “ John halted him as he was about pull the trigger. “You don’t want to do this, Shea.”

Brandon paused. “Oh? Why not?”

“We can talk. I’m just doing my job. You know that, Shea.”

Doing his job. Following orders. Brandon understood that very well. But one thing he didn’t understand was how Ishac could sit still watching the girl he was supposed to protect being abused by her father’s crony and doing nothing about it. Brandon had become disdained with his fellow bodyguards after he’d found out what was truly happening to Lillian, and how they had turned a blind eye watching the injustice happen right in front of them. The way money had bought their loyalties disgusted him.

“Drop your gun and put your hands behind your head.”

“Okay, okay…” John did as he was ordered.

Just as Brandon was about to jump from the roof, he saw John, quick as the wind, snatch his gun back to shoot him. Brandon’s finger pulled the trigger before John could. John’s head whipped backward. The asphalt behind him sprayed red.

Brandon went looking for the last man and he found him cowering in a passenger seat in one of the cars. “You call yourself a Yakuza?”

The man stammered and begged for mercy in Japanese. Brandon decided to clog his head and dumped his unconscious ass next to John Ishac’s body. Brandon slipped behind the wheel and turned the engine on.

Lillian. He must get to her before Stanford could lay a hand on her.

The hi-mob vehicle was equipped with a sophisticated GPS and an online motorcade system so the drivers would know where their fellow cars were at all times. On the small screen that streamed the map and location of the others vehicles, he saw a moving dot labelled “Tengu One” heading back to Tokyo. Tengu was Stanford’s codename among the security executives. And Brandon would bet he had Lillian with him.