One Blood

Chapter Sixty-Five

Chapter Sixty-Five

 

I-10 W

 

Tap.

Tap-tap.

Lincoln opened his eyes.

Someone was tapping on the windshield. Lincoln rolled his sore neck and stared into the eyes of a dead man. Kris grinned down at him like a lunatic.

 Kris had a billy club in his hand and started hammering against the windshield.

Lincoln flinched and closed his eyes. When he opened them again, Kris was gone. Something was still tapping on the windshield, however. There were also loud metallic plongs. The Jeep vibrated as large chunks of ice battered the car from all directions. The rational part of him wondered how in the hell it could be hailing in Louisiana.

Lincoln sat up in the seat, groaning from the effort. His butt was asleep and he was sore in muscles he never even knew he had.

Plong-plong!

Ice bashed the Jeep. Then, crack! A spiderweb formed in the upper right-hand corner of the windshield after a baseball-sized chunk of ice exploded there. It sounded like a firing squad was shooting at the car.

Outside, people ran for cover.

Lincoln expected the hail to slack off, but after another few minutes, it grew in intensity. His instinct was to dive into the backseat and ride it out, but as his body awakened, so did his bladder. If he didn’t make a move soon, he would urinate on himself.

Finally, the storm calmed down a bit. Lincoln tucked Jhonnette’s gun into the waistband of his hospital pants, grabbed the car keys, and opened the door. He limped from the Jeep to the Quick Stop rest area in bare feet. His bladder kept him from returning to the vehicle.

At least it wasn’t as packed now as when he’d first parked. Highway traffic was moving quite nicely.

How long was I out?

He entered the convenience store and swiped three boxes of Band-Aids, aspirin, and a bottle of peroxide from the shelves. Slipping into the restroom, he relieved his bladder’s burden, and then focused on his wounds.

The hospital had done a nice job dressing him, but there was some leakage from the bandages on his shoulder, right bicep, and left thigh. He poured the peroxide on his wounds and placed fresh Band-Aids over the bullet holes. Then, he re-dressed them with the hospital bandages. Lincoln swallowed a handful of aspirin. The ribs on his left side were still tender from his fall off the ferry that morning.