Southern Fried Sushi, page 28
I closed my eyes and retraced my steps. Then hurried down a smaller side path, wrapped in forest, a few bends just out of sight. A giant oak. I recognized its spreading branches.
I pushed fallen green leaves aside, digging around the roots. And, to my relief, snatched up my precious VSDB keychain. Held it up in the fading light and jingled it just to hear the sound.
Winchester was cooler than Staunton, farther north, and a chilly snap descended as the sun lowered, turning the glen pale blue. I sat back on my heels to rest, wishing I’d brought a jacket.
Something flickered through the trees. A sound, a movement. A ripple of wind in the leaves. I stood, one arm against the oak.
Then again, a flash of lighter color. Sure enough, several figures lurked in the shadows near the empty food buildings, all closed and boarded up. Probably cleaning people or something.
I tied my shoe and started quickly back toward the main trail. And scuffed to a stop on the leaf-covered earth.
Two guys blocked the path, looking in my direction.
I backed up a few steps then headed around the food area the long way, into the woods, hoping to throw them off. But as soon as I ventured beyond the buildings I heard laughter, low voices, and footsteps. And a whistle. Calling something in low tones.
The sun slipped another notch, turning everything an eerie dusky color, just like a scary movie. Summer crickets began their night calls.
I walked faster, pushing overzealous branches and leaves out of my way. But when I came around the next bend, there stood the guys again, still blocking the path. Closer this time, so I could see the leering grin of the tall one, shining dimly in the dusky twilight.
And I was farther away from the parking lot than ever.
Someone bird-called through the trees, rustling branches, and I stepped back, swiveling my head at a twig snap in the other direction. Probably just some dumb Boy Scouts clowning around, Shiloh! Chill. I wiped sweaty fingers on my jeans and surveyed my options, determined to walk out calmly, head up.
But on the trail behind me emerged another silhouette, too big for a Boy Scout. Or a boy anything. Barring my access back to the main path. The two guys in front of me whispered and sidled closer.
Instinctively I shrank behind a clump of pines, ready to scream.
No! Don’t do it! You’ll give away your location, and besides, nobody up in the parking lot can hear you anyway.
My heart thudded, and I slipped through the pines and off the trail. Dark woods closed in around me, drowning the foliagein darkish blue-gray. The color of battle uniforms under smoke. The color of dread.
Angular shadows slithered closer. Footsteps crackling twigs, muted whispering. That silly bird call and the shiver of leaves as a tree branch wobbled.
I was hemmed in, just like the Confederates at the Battle of Opequon. And even more outnumbered.
Great. I pressed cold fingers to my cheeks, crouching under a leafy maple branch. Think, Shiloh! How on earth did you get yourself in this mess?
I ducked through a thick shrub and into shadows, breath coming fast. Sweaty hair sticking to my forehead. If I could just make it to the food buildings, their dusky outlines still visible through a gap in the trees, I could hide there—and slip up the trail when the guys left.
My footsteps vanished across a carpet of moss and fallen leaves, and I flitted between two buildings like a nervous butterfly. I crouched near a patch of overgrown weeds, breathless, and forced myself to ignore the cobwebs tickling my neck and bare arms.
I leaned my cheek against the cool wood, waiting for footsteps to fall on the soft trail with muffled crunches. Closer and closer. Low voices, a whisper.
Shuffling past me.
And growing fainter.
I let out a shuddering breath, hearing nothing but birds twittering. The low groan of a towering elm, swaying gently in the evening breeze. A single acorn that fell with a plunk on a shingled roof.
Legs shaking, I eased onto my toes and then stood up. Peered around the side of the building and into the murky dusk, breath going out of me in relief. You’re free and clear, Shiloh! Make a run for it!
The empty trail gleamed pale in the fading sun.
I maneuvered a tentative toe over the underbrush, and then an arm grabbed me roughly from behind. A hand clamped over my mouth, swallowing the scream that tried to escape.
Chapter 36
I tried frantically to pull away, but he held me like a vise. I kicked his shins and rammed my elbow in his stomach, drawing some curses, but even after my most solid kick he grabbed me in a sort of headlock. He shoved his hand over my mouth, and I bit his fingers hard, which made him yell in pain. I squeezed out a partial scream.
But he smacked me in the head, making my ear ring, and this time he covered my mouth with the crook of his beefy elbow.
I tried to slide to the ground and out of his grasp, pounding him with all my strength, but he twisted my arm behind me until I cried out.
Then he dragged me, still kicking his ankles and punching with my free arm, away from the buildings.
I swiped for his shoelaces, making him stumble, but he cursed, righted himself, and caught my punch just as the other three guys sprinted through the trees, out of breath.
“What a little fighter!” he laughed, passing my flailing arm to one of the guys while they dragged me into the woods.
I dug my nails into the new guy’s wrist, making him yelp, and then punched him in the jaw while he momentarily loosened his grasp. It didn’t hit him as hard as I would have liked sincehe stood at an angle, but he still rubbed his chin and swore. I squirmed away from the third guy and tried to twist free when he grabbed my tennis shoe. Tore it away and kicked him square in the chest.
God! God! Save me! I’d never been a praying woman, but after my prayer on the hill, now seemed like a pretty good time to start in earnest.
“Careful! Hold her!” One of the guys grabbed my arm as I ripped it free, uppercutting into somebody’s nose and nearly squirming loose. “She’s a slippery one!”
My heart hammered in my chest, pinpricked with adrenaline as they pulled me through the trees, farther and farther away from the food buildings and any place I’d ever seen. I’d been mugged three times in New York and had my purse and wallet snatched four times. Once Mom and I had been carjacked. But never had anything gone this far.
It’s a nightmare! I told myself as I twisted furiously, limbs hobbled. Just a nightmare! It can’t be real!
Any second now I’d wake up and find myself in Staunton and thank my lucky stars to be in one piece. Forget lucky stars. I’d even thank God.
One painful wrench of my arm when I sank my teeth into somebody’s bony wrist reminded me I was very much awake.
“C’mon! Hurry up!” one guy urged under his alcohol-laced breath, jerking my hands away as I grabbed at tree branches. “There’s the trail!”
This is bad, God! Oh … this is bad!
I didn’t recognize anything. Shoot, I couldn’t even recognize Winchester on a map. I screamed at myself for not letting Randy come with me.
The woods opened to a deepening blue path, dead-ending near a neatly gated and locked Dumpster. Wild, patchy shrubs fizzled into dark, scrubby forest on all sides beyond a thin fence.
I panicked when I saw we’d come to an end, rammingwhoever was behind me hard with my head and giving a jagged blow with my elbow.
The guys dumped me on the ground, knocking my breath out, and I managed one scream before somebody wrenched my head to the side and stuffed a bandana in my mouth. He sat on me when I scrambled partially to my knees and grabbed his musty-smelling shirt around his throat, twisting so hard it tore.
I groaned under his weight, barely able to gulp air. Then as he wrestled for my arms, I managed to yank fistfuls of his long, greasy hair. Hard enough to rip some out. He bellowed. Two other guys seized my wrists while he wrapped duct tape around them, once, twice. All the while fending off my kicks.
“Sheeewwweee!” crowed the oaf as he finally got off me, brushing himself off. Still laughing as I tugged at my wrists, rolling my head in the leaf-covered dirt and trying to spit out the bandana. Somebody pinned my shoulders to hold me still. “Never thought it’d take four a us to hold one gal. Reckon she’s one a them women wras’lers!”
The thought popped incredulously into my racing brain as I tried to memorize their shadowy features for police reports: Rednecks? I’ve been kidnapped by rednecks?!
Then again, there was duct tape. I’d seen a car bumper held on with it.
“Well, looky what we got here,” said one guy with a patchy beard and leering grin. “Looks like we caught us a perty little jackrabbit.”
They’d all moved a safe distance from my tennis shoes, but one of them got too close, and I kicked again, this time knocking off his baseball cap. Underneath it gleamed a completely bald head, covered with creepy tattoos—a swastika, a Rebel flag, and a snake.
I stiffened against the cold earth, muscles paralyzed.
Uh-oh. Big-time.
Somebody shined a flashlight in my face, blinding me, andthe angry scowl of the skinhead bulged inches from my nose. Breathing those noxious alcohol fumes. He whacked me in the face with the cap before plopping it back on his head.
“Look at them fine-lookin’ eyes,” said one of the dumber-sounding guys as their illuminated heads filled up the deep-blue sky overhead, harsh light making me blink back tears. “How many colors ya reckon she’s got there?”
Something made them jump, and they turned back to me nervously. “Hurry up, y’all!” They seemed amateur, clumsy, and even skittish. “See how much she’s got on ‘er! I bet she’s loaded!”
“Shoot, she ain’t got no purse,” muttered somebody in a plaid jacket, jerking my jeans pockets inside out. “And nothin’ in there, neither, but some keys. Ya got a car here?” His eyes lit up. “She’s gotta car!”
“What’s yer plate number?” one asked excitedly, whispering to split up and go find it.
Someone jerked the bandana out. “Gimme yer plate number!”
I screamed, tugging on my duct-taped wrists, and Patchy Redneck Beard clapped his hands over my mouth. Stuffed the bandana back, spilling cigarettes from his shirt pocket. “Doggone it, ya idjits! Fergit the keys! She ain’t got no car.” He threw my keychain on the ground and hunted for his cigarettes.
I reached over and defiantly shoved my keychain back in my pocket with my fingertips, wrists still stuck together.
“Shoot. No cell phone neither.” I had no more pockets. Then they pulled off my tennis shoes to check for money, as if I’d really be so afraid in Winchester, Virginia, that I’d hide rolls of bills in my shoes. Ridiculous! I guessed correctly—they were amateurs. Amateurs who’d watched too many cop movies.
Still, the one with the plaid jacket held my head down while he stripped off my watch—a green plastic one from Japan—and pulled out my earrings.
Morons! They cost $8.99 at JCPenney!
“Wait a minute. Whadda we have here?” demanded the skinhead, focusing the flashlight beam on my T-shirt. Ice-blue eyes crinkled into a scowl. “New York? A stinkin’ New York Yankee?”
In other circumstances his comment would be funny. No, Mets! Can’t you read?
But they outnumbered me, and besides, I couldn’t talk with the awful dusty bandana in my mouth, foul and sour. I tried to spit it out and had almost succeeded when I saw a glint of metal. I froze.
“That’s right, little Northern trash Yankee. If you wanna come invadin’ our land, you’d better be ready to take us on! The South will rise again, and we’ll wipe all you cheatin’, commie Yankees off the face a God’s earth—right down the toilet with Israel!”
I had no idea what he was ranting about, but he pressed something sharp to my throat. Amateur or not, he was dangerous. The others followed his lead, murmuring angrily about Yankee invaders and making racist cracks.
One of them missing a tooth gawked at me, looking like Flash turned evil. “New York?” he wheezed. “Lot a blacks up’n New York, ain’t there?”
My pulse pumped with anger even through my fear. What is it with these racist people? I wanted to knock another tooth right out of his jaw.
“Well, yer a perty little thang. Betcha had a black boyfriend up there, didn’tcha?” Missing Tooth winked at me, but his smile was ice cold.
“Answer!” shouted the skinhead, poking his blade painfully deeper into my neck.
Let’s see … one … two … no, two and a half because Ryan was mixed … Oh, and that guy with all the nationalities—didn’t he have a black … grandmother? Uncle? Brother-in-law …? I guess my total came to something like two and three-fourths. Wouldthese creeps even understand if I used fractions? Or should I just round to the nearest whole number?
“She didn’t say nothin’,” croaked Plaid Jacket. “Ya know she had a couple!”
“‘Course she didn’t say nothin’! She got yer bandaner in ‘er mouth!”
“Looks like she needs a lesson in hist’ry,” Missing Tooth said in a raspy voice. “‘Bout people who got strung up tryin’ to befriend Uncle Tom.”
The skinhead glowered then slowly removed his knife. Blinded me with his flashlight again. “It’s not the Civil War,” he growled, lowering his face so I could see his crazy, ice-blue eyes. They terrified me. “It’s the War of Northern Aggression!” He tapped out each staccato word. “Did you know that? Did you?”
He put his boot on my chin, and I nodded yes.
“And the world won’t miss one less Yankee, will they?”
“Should we get her ta call her folks?” the other guys were whispering, already forgetting about the “his’try lesson” and going straight to money. “See how much rich Yankee money they’ll send?”
Good luck with that, buddy! And then my pulse chilled at his words: “We can take her out ta yer place, Jimmy! Ain’t nobody gonna find ‘er there. But how’re we gonna get her back to the car without—”
“Shut up, man!” Plaid Jacket hissed and smacked him. “Don’t say my name!”
“I wasn’t sayin’ nothin’! I jest—”
“Shh! I heard somethin’!”
The skinhead ignored them. He cursed me some more then yanked the bandana out of my mouth so abruptly I didn’t even have time to think. “Where’re you from?”
I started to tremble, from fear and from cold. If those clowns put me in a car, I might as well write my own obituary.
“Virginia,” I blurted. “Staunton.”
“Liar!” he shouted, spitting at me and kicking me in the ribs. The blow glanced off, but it hurt. I rolled onto my side, groaning.
I was sorry I cried over Sheridan. Sorry I’d ever come to this Southern stink hole, and if I ever saw another gray uniform or stupid Southerner I’d …
The skinhead flicked open his shiny knife. “You ain’t got no accent from Staunton, you dirty Yankee liar! I’ll show you what we do to Yankee scum who defile our land!”
The next thing I knew, my ears roared with the crash of underbrush, a hundred voices shouting—and a Confederate soldier clocked the skinhead hard with the butt of a Civil War musket. The snake tattoos spun, and the musket cracked him again, opening up a gash on his forehead and putting him out cold.
I crawled partially out of the fray as arms swung overhead, people everywhere.
Missing Tooth and Plaid Jacket cried out and tried to flee over the fence, but two other gray-clad Confederates and someone who looked like Adam tackled the two of them to the ground. Another soldier in gray with yellow chevrons bolted over the fence and went in hasty pursuit after Patchy Beard.
Shouts roared, and someone dragged me away from the fighting. He pulled my wrists free and thrust me to a Confederate soldier who looked fifteen. I screamed, seeing another Confederate after all the “Yankee” abuse, and tried frantically to jerk free.
“Get her out of here!” Adam yelled, shoving us away. “Shiloh, go with him! Now!”
He punched the squirming guy he was holding in the face—once—twice—and then passed him to another soldier who whacked him with his musket until he fell, limp.
“Come on! Quick!” The kid wrapped an arm around me, and I stumbled over tree roots with him, still gawking over my shoulder.
Without a doubt, this constituted the most bizarre thing I’dever seen in my life: a pile of Confederate soldiers brawling with a couple of rednecks and a skinhead.
Nobody would believe me! Nobody! Where on earth was my cell phone camera when I needed it?
“You mangy coward dog!” yelled one of the soldiers, wrestling the remaining redneck into the dirt. “Beatin’ up on a girl! I don’t give a care whar she’s from!”
“Hey, you one a us, man!” Missing Tooth squealed in protest, punching wildly. “Ya s’posed to be fightin’ the Blues!”
And then a long, deep groan as the soldier punched him hard in the stomach. He wilted like a rotten magnolia. “I ain’t one a you, ya stupid bonehead! I fight coward idiots! Don’t matter what color they’re wearin’!”
Adam caught up as High School Confederate whisked me down the path and up out of the woods. My breath came in ragged gasps, and I groped for support.
“It’s all right now.” Adam put his arm around my shoulders and got the high schooler to support my other arm. Someone put my tennis shoes back on my feet. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”
My side throbbed, pain spreading across my abdomen. “What happened?” I bawled as shock turned to tears, arms and legs wobbling. “Who are all these soldiers?”
“We came after you.” Adam’s chest rose, out of breath. “It was taking too long, so Randy and I decided to separate and see if we could find you.”
“He’d just come down the hillside lookin’ for ya when we told him we’d seen somethin’ weird,” said the kid, identifying himself as Trevor. “Couple a guys lurkin’ around down here, up to no good, and we thought we heard a girl screamin’. So we came up kinda quiet-like to see what was goin’ on.” He shook his head. “Bunch a idiots! My dad’s done called the cops.”
