Chapter Twenty-Seven

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Chapter Twenty-Seven

 

Monday

Lake City, LA

 

Brandon stood in his bedroom, cordless phone in hand. Karen lay in his bed, sleeping peacefully. He wanted to call the police but Shorty’s words gave him pause. What if Shorty was telling the truth and he’d really been the one who rescued Karen? Though they had different ambitions in life, Brandon had a soft spot for Shorty. After all, they’d both lost brothers in the Simmons Park Massacre. Brandon owed it to his troubled friend to try and confirm his story.

Leaving Karen to rest, he headed over to Simmons Park. The park, surrounded by a rusted chain-link fence, had been officially condemned after the killings took place, but everyone in the hood still used it to play ball, smoke out, and drink. But not Brandon. He hadn’t set foot on this cursed ground since that day.

Everything looked just as he remembered, although weathered and worn from years of neglect. The faded, rainbow-colored jungle gym still stood beside the abandoned gymnasium—once a place of summer pool parties and community activities, now a hulking, beige husk with busted windows and cracked peeling walls.

If a building could catch leprosy, this was it.

Brandon hopped the fence and saw a burgundy Oldsmobile Eighty-Eight turning the corner. He instinctively ducked, knowing that any neighbor would have more than a few choice words to say to Moses if they saw Brandon going into Simmons Park.

Brandon pushed through the first pair of doors of the run-down gym and was immediately assaulted by stale air and the stench of rot. He headed up the stairs where Shorty had supposedly heard Karen’s cries. Soon Brandon stood in front of the only closed door in the corridor. He pushed it open and entered the tiny room.

There was a mini refrigerator nailed to the floor, a toilet with no seat, and a giant Jamaican flag covering the entry. Brandon noticed a camcorder sitting atop a tripod in the far left corner. There was a crashing sound from below.

Someone had thrown open the doors downstairs. They sounded like a herd of elephants as they approached the stairwell. Panicked, Brandon only had one thought—these must be the real kidnappers!

They were now on the landing and rapidly approaching the guest room from hell. Brandon flattened himself against the wall next to the door opening, trying to calm his breathing and heart-rate with little success. In his head, he sounded like a broken vacuum cleaner each time he inhaled.

Then Brandon remembered Shorty’s gun.

The door blew open. An obese, dark-skinned man barged in, a sweaty black blob with gigantic bulging eyes. His huge eyes nearly tripled in size after Brandon hit him in his baby-making factory with the butt of the gun.

All the intruder could say was a very surprised, “Ooof!”

Brandon got tangled up in the Jamaican flag as he tried to flee the room. A large hand clamped on his ankle and he fell to the floor, halfway between salvation and imprisonment.

Brandon squirmed and tried to get out of the man’s reach. After bashing the man over the head with the butt of the gun, Brandon jumped up and ran toward the stairs. Unfortunately, he was so focused on what was behind him that he missed the first step. Badly. Brandon flew down the stairs headfirst.

As his forehead came into contact with concrete, he heard gunshots.

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