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I know who the Jury’s enemies are, I know what they do, I know where their clubhouse is.
I’m headed there now.
I still haven’t decided whether I’ll kill the fucking VP or simply destroy his pretty face. The damage will depend on how close I can get to him and my cool-off period between now and finding him. Either way, he’s going to pay.
I don’t have a death wish, but at the same time, I’m not a passive woman who let’s others dictate how I live my life. I never have. Why would I start now?
People are predictable and I know I don’t have a lot of time. Dad will have called Trigger the minute I left the house, and Trigger will be coming for me. If I wait for him, he’ll try to stop me, and I can’t let that happen. I need the satisfaction of destroying the bastard who threatened me. Who blew up my fucking clinic with no thought to who might be inside.
Unlike the Jury’s, the Blackbeards’ clubhouse is in an industrial area of Reno. It’s a small, dilapidated warehouse, surrounded by similar buildings. Nothing’s fenced, so it’s easy to come and go.
And hide.
I take an indirect route, then pull up to a warehouse that’s slightly removed from the clubhouse. I can’t know if the pretty-boy’s inside, but I have to start somewhere. I’m not opposed to cleaning a Blackbeard’s teeth with a little buckshot to get the information I want on the VP.
Before I slide out of the car, I check the mirror. My face is covered in blood, a deep cut on my forehead is still oozing. Another jagged slash runs parallel to the line of my jawbone. If I don’t get them sutured soon, they’ll pucker as they heal. The rest of the cuts are of no account.
My hair is matted with blood, and I fluff it to give it some life. This sparks pain in the upper bone of my right arm, which makes me groan. My ankle and ribs hurt, but it’s nothing I can’t handle. I’ve spent my life in stilettos. Turned ankles have never slowed me down.
The pinkie on my left hand is broken, and I need to set it before I start shooting. I pull the key to my clinic off my key ring. I swallow convulsively. I won’t be needing it anytime soon. My blouse is beyond salvaging, so I tear off a strip of material from the hemline and use it to bind the key to my finger.
I grit my teeth at the agony, but it’s a welcome reminder of my mission. After I can breathe normally again, I wiggle the rest of my fingers. My manicure is ruined, but that’s fixable. I clench my hands a few times. They’re stiff, but I’ll easily be able to hold the shotgun and pull the trigger.
I dump the shotgun shells into the empty shoebox, then slide out of the car, placing it on the roof while I reach in to grab the gun. I heft it in my hands, curl my fingers around the stock, and test the trigger by gently pulling it.
When I bring it to my right shoulder, my humerus protests. I know it’s fractured, which means I can’t use the arm to shoot. The kick from the gun would render me senseless after one shot. The alternative is to steady the barrel with my right hand and prop it up on my left shoulder. I test this out, pulling the trigger, imagining the recoil.
The weight of the gun makes my arms shake too much for the sight to be useful. The solution is simple. I’ll shoot from the hip with my left hand. It’ll be less accurate and scatter the shot wider, but I can live with that. I don’t think I want to kill anyone, not intentionally anyway, but I wouldn’t mind adding a few extra holes in the Blackbeard bastards.
I practice a few times; pull the trigger, drag the forend back, then push it forward to reload. It hurts, both my broken pinkie and right arm, but it’ll work in the short term. Satisfied, I load the gun with four shells and stuff several others into the pockets of my skirt. Then I flick off the safety.
I’m ready to go.
I grit my teeth at the pain in my ankle as I stride towards the Blackbeards’ clubhouse. No limping for me. That’s not how I roll. There are a few bikes scattered in the yard, but no one outside. No one to raise the alarm.
The drone of motorcycles in the distance doesn’t deter me from my destination. I’ve got a mission to complete. These Blackbeard pricks destroyed my clinic. They tried to kill me. They shattered my dreams.
They’re going to fucking pay.
Fuelled by fury, I yank the clubhouse door open and step inside, the shotgun hanging loosely in my left hand.
I scan the room. Two men sit side by side at a bar, drinks in front of them. They’re playing cards, looks like blackjack. Another’s slouching in an armchair, his feet propped up on a footstool, eyes half-closed, a joint between his lips. The fourth is talking on the phone, sitting at a table.
And the fifth man. The fucking fifth man is sitting on a couch whispering in the ear of a barely-dressed woman who’s perched on his knee. He’s the sonofabitch who walked into my clinic and threatened me.
I slam the door behind me and take a single step forward. I don’t need to get closer. The room isn’t all that big. Heads jerk up, eyes widen and one of the men at the bar goes for his gun.
I swing my shotgun his way and pull the trigger. The recoil throws me backwards, but the door stops me from falling. Buckshot scatters and hits both men. The one with the gun shoots the ceiling as he collapses to the floor. The second slides off his stool, his eyes wide, his mouth gaping like a goldfish. Blood is spreading on their clothes, but they’re moaning. Not dead. At least not yet.
I grit my teeth at the pain in my right arm as I slide the forend back and forth, expelling the spent shell and reloading. Then I swing the gun back and forth between the other three men. They’re standing now, the fucking VP dumping the woman on her ass on the floor. Their hands are raised in the air.
I glance at her quickly. “Get out,” I say flatly.
She whimpers as she tries to stand, stumbles, then crawls towards a door behind her.
Shouts from a back room dimly reach my ears. Adrenaline is coursing through me making me reckless, stupid. I don’t care.
“Whoa, princess,” the VP says through his pretty lips. “You wanna be careful waving that thing around. You’re gonna hurt someone.”
