Chapter 4 - Cash in a Canvas Sack
Marin didn’t have a car. She had an ancient, rusted Honda motorcycle that belonged to her late father, parked under a rotting tarp behind the mechanic shop next door. The battery was weak, the tires were bald, but the engine kicked over on the third kick with a sputtering roar that sounded like an angry chainsaw.
Gabriel threw his leg over the pillion seat behind her, wrapping his good arm around her waist. His body heat was intense, radiating the fever burning inside him, but his grip was unyielding.
"Drive fast," he whispered in her ear over the rattle of the exhaust. "And don't stop for red lights."
They tore through the gray morning mist, water spraying off the pavement and soaking through their clothes. As they crossed the old lift bridge into the harbor district, Gabriel directed her down a narrow service lane behind an industrial laundry.
"Pull in here," he ordered.
"We don't have time for side trips!" Marin screamed over her shoulder. "My sister is alone!"
"We go there empty-handed, and we both die on the bakery floor," Gabriel snarled back. "Shut the engine off and watch the alley."
He rolled off the bike, moving with a predatory grace that defied his shredded shoulder. He approached a rusted electrical junction box set into the brick wall, pried the rusted panel open with his bare fingers, and pulled out a heavy canvas duffel bag wrapped in industrial plastic.
He unzipped it on the wet asphalt. Inside lay stacks of wrapped hundred-dollar bills, three spare magazines, and two black semi-automatic handguns wrapped in oilcloth.
Gabriel racked the slide of the first pistol with his right hand, checking the chamber in one fluid motion, then handed the second weapon to Marin, butt-first.
She stared at the cold steel, recoiling. "I don't use weapons. I save lives."
"Last night you pulled a man out of a grave with a box cutter and two flares," Gabriel said, his gray eyes locking onto hers with merciless intensity. "The people coming for your sister don't respect the Hippocratic Oath, Marin. They respect kinetic energy. Take the gun."
Her fingers closed around the checkered grip. It was heavier than she had imagined, cold and smelling of solvent.
"Safety is here," Gabriel said, pointing with a calloused thumb. "Point center mass. Squeeze, don't jerk. If you have to shoot, shoot until the slide locks back."
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He zipped the bag, throwing the strap across his chest, and climbed back onto the motorcycle. "Now go. Let's show Marcus what happens when he fails to finish a burial."
Marin kicked the bike into gear, the tires skidding across the wet cobblestones before catching traction. The wind whipped her face, carrying the distant smell of saltwater and rising dough. They were two blocks away from Water Street when the sound of shattering glass echoed through the morning quiet.
