No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced in any format, by any means, electronic or otherwise, without prior consent from the copyright owner and publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places and events are the product of the author's imagination or used fictitiously.
____________________________________________
Catch Linc Freemore's next adventure: www.LincFreemore.com
When you join the mailing list you'll get pre-release access to the next book and introductory discount pricing.
As usual his morning commute took him past that simple wooden cross, planted above the pit with the charred sides. And as usual Linc's stomach turned at the thought of it happening to the next child. A white cross by the side of a highway is common enough tragedy. A busy day interrupted for a fleeting moment by the thought of somebody's loss. Maybe a mother, maybe a son. And then gone again, like fleeting thoughts do. Back to today's agenda, or brooding over some impossible task they set or the goal posts they keep moving.
But the photo of the little boy atop the cross, the ragged edges of the pavement, the chunks of concrete and rock that disrupted the otherwise symmetric crater. The daily reminder of scattered body parts, screaming children and parents standing, watching, not knowing which way to run.
Nobody had expected a mortar shell to land on a suburban school route. Not the first time, anyway.
A road crew had tried three times to repair the hole and each time parents had formed a circle around it until the crew gave up and left. Not yet ready to hide their wound.
The rains had formed a glassy pool at the center. The level surged and fell like a tide as the rain and sun fought to dominate. Today the level was high and reflected a rutted silhouette from the broken edge of the hole.
The pair of swans were still there. Still working twigs and grass and wind blown plastic and paper into the mound that was becoming their nest. Still hissing and flapping at people who dared walk too close. Linc's stomach settled a little each time he saw them, relieved that some unsupervised dog had not got them yet. Still perched down the side of the crater on their pile of debris, a pair of snowy necks looping out of the blackened pit. An unexpected comfort for many who needed it.
He always slowed to pass this memorial, not caring how many people behind him honked. How can a person rush past a thing like that and think nothing of it?
He turned right at the end of the street and approached the cemetery. Another police funeral. This time 4 boxes draped with stars and stripes. Rows of white gloves snapped in unison against rows of black peaked hats. A three volley salute shattered the thick morning air and was followed by cheers from across the street, "ONE!"
They leaned on their bikes and cheered again at the second volley, "TWO!"
They raised their beers and clanked them together with the third volley, "THREE!"
They started their motorcycles and at the fourth volley cheered "FOUR!"
What ever the pastor's words, nobody could hear them over the revving motors.
Next to the row of gleaming Harley Davidsons and backed in perpendicular to the curb was a red Smart Fortwo cabriolet. its snub nose and "CARA" license plate projected into the street no further than the motorcycles, as if ready to peel out with them, top down and wind blasting through hair.
Cara Simmons, Chief Financial Officer, sat in the front scowling at something below the dash. Her Smart Car looked as out of place beside the Harleys as it did beside the ranks of upper management BMW’s and Audi’s at the office. It had always seemed odd to Linc for a CFO with so much money to drive such a budget vehicle.
The bikers revved until they got bored and then pulled out behind Linc. He moved over and the cluster of bikes passed easily. Their black jackets and their blue bandannas. He wondered how they got away with this crap.
He pulled up at the lights and watched a school teacher to his left wrestling a chain of first graders. Six of them linked hand to hand to hand. A kaleidoscope of scarves, hats and jackets. Small faces percolating joy and mischief and nervous excitement as they gathered next to a gray roadside telecommunications cabinet, preparing to cross the road.
The group was much larger a couple of weeks ago. He figured these must be the poor kids. The ones whose parents could not afford to keep them home from school. Off the streets and out of harms way.
He waited for a pimped out pumpkin with oversized chrome rims meandering up the street to his right. It was two hundred feet away and if it ever reached the lights it would cross in front and block him all the way to the office. His light stayed red and the candy painted pumpkin crawled on, the driver barely visible with the seat tilted all the way back.
A teenager stepped out from a door way and pointed a black object at the car. A frenzied spray of machine gun fire erupted from the flaming barrel as he waved it back and forth at the pumpkin, a boxy Oldsmobile. Linc recognized the unmistakable hyperactive sound from TV shows. An Uzi.
The teacher grabbed her students and began to huddle them behind the gray cabinet as the crawling Oldsmobile left a trail of shattered glass. The cabinet did not look very bullet proof but was better than thin air.
The driver slumped below the shattered windshield and the car accelerated. It held its course and gathered speed. It was no escape course. It surged forward, out of control and toward the cabinet. One hundred feet to go now and building speed. The cabinet a gray skittle.
Linc jammed his foot on the gas. His old Ford lurched forward. He would be moving too slow to ram the Oldsmobile off its course. The best he could hope for was deflection.
The V8 pumpkin struck his right front wheel and a tangle of metal locked the two cars together and shunted him toward the huddle of children. Metal graunched. The V8 growled. Rubber squealed.
Linc kept his foot hard on the floor and the two cars jerked and heaved toward the curb. Linc's left fender smashed into a traffic light. The light pole whipped into the pavement and embedded into the surface. The Oldsmobile tore free of his fender and piled through the front wall of the Post Office. His rear passenger door hit the cabinet and bumped it off its footing as the car came to rest, almost parallel parked.
He shut off his engine and let the sound of six squealing, healthy children slow his thumping heart. His car was wrecked but they were fine.
He opened the door and put his feet on the ground, stood up. Wobbly but good enough.
The street was deserted, the shooters long gone.
He did not bother to check the Post Office for injured. It had closed a year ago. The service had been so bad that everybody drove to the next suburb.
The teacher was standing now, her face white, her mouth opening and closing, the words stuck somewhere below.
“You s-s-saved us!”
He planted his forearms on the roof of the car and took some weight from his knees. He filled his lungs with air and burnt rubber and slowed his pounding heart some more.
“Are you hurt?” asked Linc.
“N-no. I'm fine.”
“The kids?”
“They're okay too.”
“Breathe,” said Linc.
She did and some color came back to her face.
“You were amazing!” she blurted.
Linc looked at the front of his Ford. “I hope my wife feels that way too.”
The red Smart Car pulled up next to him, “Linc isn't it?”
“Yes.”
“I'm Cara.”
“I know.”
"That was something else. Is anyone hurt?”
He pointed to the smoking pumpkin, “That guy is not well.”
“Everyone else is fine,” he added.
Cara took in the scene for a moment.
“Do you need a ride to the office?"
"Thanks. I'm not really up for the walk right now."
"But I should probably wait for the police first. They'll want my details."
"You'd be lucky if they have time for the shooting," said Cara. "Never mind your car."
"I guess you're right. No point waiting around."
He handed his card to the teacher, "Would you mind giving them my details if they want to talk to me?"
"For you, anything."
Linc locked his car.
“Do they need anything?” he asked the teacher.
“Thanks, no. We'll wait for the police.”
He squeezed into Cara's passenger seat. Cara the Slasher. Her reputation was for forcing people to cut their budgets for any activity where profits did not make it into the top fifty percent. To her a car was a cost. Nothing more.
She drove the nine blocks with the top still down. Perhaps to disguise the rough and noisy ride. It was too noisy to talk and he wasn't sure what CFO's talk about anyway.
She took a left and nosed in to her usual park three spaces from the main door.
Linc had subscribed body and soul to the company's