Shadow Of The Past Trilogy ∞ THE DISPLACED

68 ∞ take off

Day Sixteen ∞ Saturday afternoon

JAGG HALTED HIS BIKE in front of the crew, looking from one to the other. "What'ya still doing here?" He turned off the engine.

"Well, you certainly took your own sweet time," Toni said from the front seat of the van. "You know how long we've been waiting? You forget we've got plans?"

"Y'all should've been on your way already. They weren't finished with me yet... and then they just let me go. I don't know what happened."

"Well... we know," Sleek said, grinning. "My crazy sisters—that's what."

"Lora insisted," TJ said, shaking his head.

Jagg's brow rose, and he looked into the back of the van. "Where is she?"

"She soon come. She needed to freshen up," Toni said.

"She's coming," Ramiro said, nodding toward the intersection.

They saw Lora at the service station across the street, closing the door to the public restroom.

"Y'all should've seen her," Toni said. "If I didn't know, I would've sworn she'd just got mugged."

Jagg face darkened. "Mugged? Who—"

"Yeah, like, reeeally mugged," Pace said, poking at Jagg's momentary confusion. "Torn clothes, roll-in-the-dirt kind of mugged."

There were chuckles all around as Jagg's eyes widened in understanding. 

"You mean, the two of you were at the station?" Jagg turned to watch Lora as she crossed the street. She smiled when she saw him, but said nothing.

"Yup." Toni jumped out of the van to take Lora's arm. "You should've seen her act."

Lora glanced at her. "You are a good teacher."

Jagg sighed, shaking his head. "I can't be angry with you two. The fucking Feds would've kept me for hours trying to make me slip up... So you went to the station to report a mugging."

"And nobody recognized us. She took care of that. And those Feds too." Toni grinned with a smug look on her face. "And... if your Patty got anything down, that ass Trey might just have an unexpected visitor dragging him to the station for questioning. Serves him right, that S-O-B."

∞

It rained. It was little more than a drizzle, not enough to dampen the spirits of the crowd they'd left behind. Danny stared at the drops barely blurring the passing view, wondering vaguely why they were heading for the longer route via Tuskegee instead of taking it straight west from town. Then he realized where they were going.

The airfield.

Danny's stomach did a flip. He'd never flown before. He wasn't even sure how he felt about it.

I guess I'll find out.

Atlas drove past the entrance to the small terminal building to park near the larger buildings and got out without a word. Danny met Mickmi's gaze and pulled out his spare windbreaker.

"Here," he said, placing it over her shoulders. "I don't want you getting wet."

Mickmi gave him a brief smile. They got out as Atlas hoisted his seabag onto his shoulder and started walking with long strides between the buildings. They had to hurry to keep up with him while the rain diminished to an occasional splash in the face.