Gary.” I leaned over him, my tears falling on his bloodied shirt. “Can you hear me?”
Grandma Donovon sank to her knees on his other side. She slipped a hand beneath his head and cradled it. “Gary.” Even though she was crying too, her voice was amazingly calm. “You need to get up. We’ve got to get you out of here.”
Rage exploded within me. I wanted to run after Bart and tear his eyes out. “Shouldn’t we call the cops?” I demanded. Who cared about Bart’s threats? I’d have stepped in front of a train at that moment if it meant seeing Bart and his lowlife friends behind bars.
Grandma Donovon gave me a hard look. “You see my grandson? This is what happens when you stand up to these people.”
Gary groaned. “Rayne?” His eyes were still closed, his voice breathy.
My heart leapt. “I’m here.”
“Help me up.”
I threw a terrified look at Grandma Donovon. She couldn’t really mean he should move. What if he had broken bones? What if moving him injured him more?
She nodded. “It’s our only choice. Or they’ll kill him.”
That’s the first time in my life I remember sincerely praying for God’s help. I begged him to let the two of us get Gary out of there. Then slowly, carefully, we supported Gary as he sat up and struggled to his feet. He was badly bruised and sore, but nothing seemed broken. We got him in the passenger seat of the truck. I climbed into the driver’s seat and scooted to the middle. Grandma Donovon drove.
I gave her directions to my house.
When we pulled into the driveway my mom was still gone. She’d made plans to go out with friends that night. Grandma Donovon and I eased Gary out of the truck and up our front porch. I unlocked the door, and we walked him inside and to the couch.
“I need clean cloths and warm water.” Grandma Donovon rolled up the sleeves of her casual shirt.
When I brought the large pan of water and washcloths, she began cleaning off the blood. Then she probed his face, neck, ribs, and arms with efficient, gentle fingers. I gave her a questioning look.
“Used to be a nurse.” She sat back on her haunches, gazing at Gary with glistening eyes. “Before my heart condition made me have to quit.”
“I’m sorry.” Gary moved his head and winced. “Grandma, I don’t … I should have just done what they said.”
“And go to jail for their crimes?”
Gary’s eyes opened. He looked at her in dull surprise.
She snorted. “Don’t think I don’t know what you’ve been doing. Thinking you were protecting me. But it’s not going to happen again. No more.”
Gary’s eyes slipped shut. “We can’t go back home.”
The phone rang. I ignored it.
“That’s not your fault.” Grandma Donovon wiped her brow. The edges of her rolled-up sleeves were wet.
In the kitchen the phone kept ringing. I made a face at it. After six rings it cut off, sat silent a few seconds, then started ringing again.
“We’ll have to move.” Gary swallowed. “I have to get our stuff out of there somehow …”
Three rings.
A startling thought rattled through my brain.
Four.
Tingles started up my spine. In a half daze I walked to the kitchen’s door and stared at the phone, as if it would tell me who was calling. But somehow I knew.
My head whipped back toward Gary and his grandmother. She was leaning down close to him, talking.
Our answering machine kicked on. I listened to my mother’s voice invite the caller to leave a message. My body tensed.
“We let you leave, you know.” The hated voice came through the recorder. Low, menacing. Grandma Donovon cut off mid-sentence. Gary’s hand jerked.
“I got to go out tonight and take care of some business, Gary. Come see me tomorrow.”
Click. The answering machine fell silent.
Grandma Donovon, Gary, and I looked at each other.
My mind is vague about the rest of that evening. I felt too wrung out to listen with a clear head as Gary and his grandmother talked. What could they do? Going to the police—if they connected with one that wasn’t on the take with Bart—would mean waiting for weeks or even months to testify against Westrock. By that time they’d be dead. Going home meant putting themselves under Bart’s thumb again. It would only be a matter of time before Gary took the fall for one of their drug runs.
One unspoken answer hung in the air. The more they talked, the heavier it hovered over our heads and weighed our shoulders.
Around midnight Mom came home. We told her everything—we had no choice. Mom stared at Gary, appalled, then ran around fixing him food, doing anything she could to make him comfortable. But a moment came when she edged me aside and gave me a look that seared my heart. An accusing expression that said this has been going on with Gary for months, and you’ve said nothing? Don’t you see the danger you’ve put us in?
Gary, by now sitting up on the couch, saw the unspoken exchange. The horrible knowledge of what he must do flattened his face.
He couldn’t be with me anymore.
No. My stomach flipped over. There would be another way—The phone rang. It was Bart.
“Look forward to seeing you tomorrow, Gary.”
Click.
Mom’s eyes lasered mine. There wasn’t a single thing I could say in response.
We all needed sleep. Grandma Donovon was given our spare bedroom. Gary would stay on the couch. I drifted into my room, numb and sick to the core. Somehow I drifted off.
Until a pounding rattled my door at four o’clock in the morning.