Endings by Linda Richards (portable ebook reader .TXT) 📗

Still sticking to the shadows, I move towards the van. Moving as slowly as I am, it takes a while for me to cover ground. The base is big and the white van is not as close as I’d thought at first. Perspective is everything in life, that’s what I’ve learned.

Even while I move, I keep alert, listening for any motion or other sign of life. But there’s nothing. After a while, I feel myself begin to relax. The world is full of white vans. There seems only a very slim chance that this particular path will lead me to Atwater.

Just as I begin to breathe again, I hear a motor start. My heart starts up with it, accelerating so quickly, I fear it will flutter out of my chest. I’m still not certain it is Atwater, and now I might lose him before I find out. I crouch low while I pull the Bersa from my bag, attaching the suppressor in a single, practiced motion, and when the van moves in my direction, I don’t waste time or energy on identifying the driver. Instead, I take careful aim and, as the moving vehicle picks up speed, I am pleased with my accuracy as I shoot out the front tire on the driver’s side.

The van is moving fast enough that it jolts to one side as the shot hits home. The van stops and the driver emerges, scratching his head at the unexpected blowout. At the sight of him, I feel a disappointment so sharp it feels unrelated to me: it is not William Atwater. Worse: the van I’ve immobilized belongs to the U.S. military. There are logos on the side and the man scratching his head at having a mysterious blowout is in uniform, though not fully. The pants and shoes look Army issued, but he’s wearing a bright green T-shirt and I can’t be certain at this distance, but I think I see something that looks like “Gabba Gabba Hey” printed on the front of the shirt. It makes me think of the Ramones for a second. How they are everywhere. Forever.

The man from the van appears to be alone here, and I wonder if he is some sort of forgotten security detail, left alone to mind the store. And I have damaged his vehicle.

“Shit,” I mutter, pulling more deeply into the shadows.

Now he is done examining his tire and he’s looking around for the cause. Just my luck: a military man. He will certainly know the difference between a common blowout and the damage caused by a bullet. He’s shielding his eyes from the sun and peering in my direction and I realize I am in luck: I am backlit by the late-day sun and it is shining in his eyes. More luck: he appears to be unarmed.

I stuff the Bersa into my bag and scurry back towards the hole in the fence, feeling like a fox going to ground. Once I get in motion, I don’t look back. I don’t know if he’s following me and I don’t want to know; I just want to get back to the car, the dog, the hunt.

I can see the gap where I got in and feel the beginning of relief flood my body along with adrenalin moving me forward at speed. I am preparing to duck in the direction of my escape when I feel the hand on my shoulder. He has caught me. He recovered quickly and was faster than he looked.

I swing around and face him, and see he is astonished. He is surprised by what he sees. I am not surprised by his surprise. If someone sneaks into a military base and shoots out the tire on a van, she is not expected to look like me.

“What are you doing here?” he says. “Why did you attack me?”

“I didn’t,” I say, fumbling from the beginning. Wanting to explain and knowing there are no good words for this. “Maybe you had a blowout?”

He raises his eyebrows at this. We are no longer in shadows. We are standing right at the gap in the fence, and I realize I was moments from making good my getaway. He is much larger than I am. He would not have fit through the hole.

“You shot out my tire,” he says again, ignoring my denial. I may as well not have spoken at all. There is wonder in his voice, though and it is doubly clear that, whatever he was expecting, it wasn’t me.

I don’t say anything. For the moment, it seems the wisest course. After all, what can I say? He doesn’t wait for words, though, and he’s caught me unawares. I’m not quite sure why. There is him, this military man in his fatigues. And then there is me, clearly in the wrong. So, when he snakes out one meat-like fist and squeezes my left arm behind my back in a half nelson, I am unprepared, though I should not have been. Even as I think that, I realize the fruitlessness of the regret. He had the jump on me, plain and simple. I could have played it differently, but I’d probably still be right here.

“Your weapon, please,” he says politely. Calmly. He may look ineffective, but he is duty trained. I should not have expected less.

“I told you,” I say through my discomfort. “You had a blowout. I don’t have a weapon. The blowout had nothing to do with me.”

He puts some pressure on my arm, bending it upwards, beyond the place where it is meant to go.

“Please don’t make me break this,” he says. There is no malice in his voice, I note. But I can also tell he doesn’t believe in the coincidence of his blowout and my showing up.

I don’t respond, and he pushes a little further on the arm I’d already thought was close to breaking.

“Okay, okay,” I say, through my pain. “Uncle.” The