Page 79 of Their Property
“Hey, what’s going on?”
I lifted my head and looked around, realizing the women of the service center were barricading windows and doors. Kitty, the one who stopped us at the door, was handing out rifles and boxes of ammo to the other employees.
“Nothin’ to worry about, boys,” she said in answer to T-Bone’s question. “Just our monthly visitors.”
He cocked his head, squinting as he stared at her. “Your monthly…what now?”
Rapid footsteps thundered down the stairs, Chris and Tiff appearing at the bottom moments later, each with armloads of guns.
“Kyrie, can you shoot?” Tiff approached her quickly, holding out the handle of a 9mm.
“Uh, no?” Kyrie stared wide-eyed at the weapon.
“Then you better hide, because there’s a horde of bikers coming in hot from the southeast. They don’t look friendly.” Tiff held the weapon out to me and I took it, tucking it into the waistband of my jeans before accepting another gun from her.
“Y’all helping?” Kitty didn’t seem displeased by the idea as she cocked her shotgun. “These pricks come once a month or so, trying to steal this place from us. It’s just routine pest control, but if you wanna join in, we don’t mind cleaning them up early.”
“Hell yeah, we’re in.” T-Bone accepted a pair of handguns from Chris, who shared a grin with him. “Been too long since we’ve been in a good ol’ gunfight, huh, VP?”
“You know it, Pres.” Chris sounded downright cheerful.
“Your girl should get behind the bar,” Kitty advised.
The young blonde who had served us food took Kyrie’s elbow and began to lead her away, but Kyrie resisted, her face torn. “Are you guys going to be okay?”
“Just fine, little lady. You get to where it’s safe.” T-Bone was almost jittery with excitement. The only thing he liked better than a good fuck was a good fight. “We’ll play when we’re done here,” he added, his voice husky.
Kyrie allowed the other girl to lead her away, and T-Bone bumped his shoulder into me. “Dyno’s gonna be sore when he finds out he missed this.”
I wasn’t sure if he was talking about the gunfight or messing around with Kyrie.
TWENTY-FOUR
KYRIE
My chest felt like it would explode from holding my breath as I huddled behind the bar with Gretchen, the kitchen server. When the first shot rang out, it didn’t make breathing any easier.
“Oh my God...” I slapped my hands over my ears at gunfire emanating from all around me. It felt like escaping Blakeworth again, everything from the fear gripping my chest in a tight squeeze to the shouting and smell of gunpowder in the air. I didn’t even realize I was trembling until Gretchen slid her arms around me.
“It’s pretty loud, but you get used to it,” she said, rubbing my back.
“This happens once a month?” I was cowering in her embrace while she radiated absolute calm. She looked about my age and was probably even younger. How could she be used to this?
“Roughly, yeah. Depends on how bad Kitty and the others fuck ‘em up. With your guys helping, hopefully they don’t come back for several months.”
A stray shot hit a stack of glasses just above us, and I screamed. Gretchen covered my head while the shards rained down on us.
Where the fuck is my valkyrie now?
“You girls alright?” someone yelled. My ears were ringing too hard to know, but it sounded like T-Bone.
“We’re good!” Gretchen answered, carefully brushing glass out of my hair. Then to me, “Here, I got an idea.” She started crawling away, and I almost cried out and held onto her so she wouldn’t leave me.
She only went a few feet away though, to poke through a set of drawers set in the bar. Gretchen snatched something just as a series of bullet holes dotted the wall above us. She spun around on her butt and held it up victoriously as she came back to me.
A…tablecloth?
“So you don’t get cut up by glass,” she explained, unfolding the cloth and carefully draping it over my head and shoulders.
