Page 9 of Potent Desire 5

5

Maddox

It’s odd, and almost addictive, leading a fleet of 25 cars, carrying hundreds of soldiers into battle.

As soon as the three families had converged, geared for war, I got in my car. Beside me sat Quincy Harrison. Behind him, Larry Slater. He looked almost demeaned, being made to sit in the backseat. More so, because there wasn’t a door for him to enter through. He had to shuffle in awkwardly, wrinkling parts of his fancy suit.

Quincy has it right. When you get older, get fat. That way, anyone smaller than you, has to do the hard work.

“So, what’s the plan here, Mister Braddock?” Quincy turns to me. His face is scrunched up in confusion, his eyes squinty.

“Plan? Haven’t really thought about that,” I reply. I threw reason and the rule book out the window a few miles back. Saving Isabella is the priority, I don’t care how many people fall in the process. I didn’t tell either Larry or Quincy that. They may be part of the fallen in the end.

“You’ve gotta be shitting me,” Larry says, adjusting himself, hands on the backrest of the front seats. Where he’s sitting, his head’s directly blocking the rearview mirror. I let him have it though because both of them are probably terrified now. “I’m all for following at The King, but there has to be a plan. Oswald’s probably got one.”

“Oswald Braddock is a fool. The only plan he’s ever come up with is using Maddox… I mean Mister Braddock here, to get a job done for him,” Quincy says. “He’d no doubt shoot himself in the foot trying to threaten us, before actually hitting a target.”

Is this what it’s like to be on top? A bunch of stuffy old men, gossiping about one another? Do they even realize we’re storming into a war zone? Something tells me not. Larry and Quincy, like Father, have become soft in their later years. The groundwork and hard labor are long behind them. Now, they sit up high in ivory towers, dictating and calling shots for those whose lives mean nothing.

To think, not all that long ago, I was one of them. Cannon fodder.

“Plan’s simple.” I cut off whoever wants to speak next. “We’re going to pick up our guns. We’re going to point at anything that moves. We’re going to shoot the shit out of them. Then we’re going to get Isabella Romani out. Alive. Or there will be consequences. What more do we need?”

“We’re doing what?” Quincy turns to me, mouth agape.

“We’re going into the thick of it. If you can’t stand with your men, you can’t stand to lead them,” I add. “Today we earn our bread in blood.”

“And this is all for Bruno’s daughter? You’re going to get us all killed for a dead man’s daughter?” Larry says.

“Hold your tongue, before you lose it,” I spit, my narrow eyes glaring at him through the rearview mirror.

Neither of them speaks again. Too afraid, I suppose. Fighting a mental battle, before the physical. I already know, Quincy and Larry won’t stay and fight. They’ll be there, but more than likely they’ll be hiding, tuck-tailed in the back. Maybe squeezing the trigger of a gun once or twice to feel the rush.

They’re old, so I shouldn’t blame them for their cowardice. I shouldn’t have brought them at all, I suppose. But I need all hands on deck. If I’m going to lead this band of misfits, I’ll need to know I can trust them. What better way than putting them in an uncomfortable position?

Soon enough, we arrive at a point just beyond Father’s estate. I deliberately park a short distance out, two football fields or so. I expect the rest of the cars to do the same, but a fleet of 25 is hard to coordinate. A few vehicles rush by without warning, never pausing until they’re right outside Father’s gate.

One van doesn’t stop at all. It uses its blistering speed to smash right through the wrought iron gate. The rest of the vehicles drive by us too, while the first gunshots erupt. I watch for a while. Quincy and Larry do too.

“The war is on.” I start my engine again.

“The war is what?”

“He said on, Quincy. The war is…” Larry gets cut off, flying back in his seat, while I speed towards my troops.

I pull up behind a long row of cars. The three families set up a blockade, using a long row of stationary vehicles as a shield wall, for cover in this battle against the Braddocks. All hell’s broken loose by the time I’m out, and ducking behind the wheel arch of a Cadillac. Quincy gets out, huffing and puffing, red-faced. Larry slithers awkwardly from the backseat, keeping his body low, and creasing his fancy suit further.

Today we fight or today we die. There’s no stopping our final stand for glory.

I’m coming, Isabella. No matter what it takes, I’m coming, my love.

* * *

My childhood home. A once cherished place, where I used these yards to play my imaginary games. The outside is simple, with long stretches of perfectly manicured lawn, flower beds, and few trees scattered here and there. Perfect for seeing oncoming threats, but there’s a fatal flaw in Father’s design of the property.

Apart from a Buick, a Mazda, the water feature, and a single oak tree, there’s little to no cover from my incoming attack. Knowing this property so well, all its nooks and crannies, puts my father at a disadvantage – one he couldn’t have foreseen. I can’t complain. An easy win is always good for morale.

But my heart isn’t in the fight. Not like the rest of the men standing ready. All I can do is think about Isabella, and what horrors she might already have endured inside that house. The mental and physical torture of cruel men. And where my plan of storming the gates felt so fool-proof in the car, what does it hold for Isabella now?