Time was a tickin. Between throwing the sign in the air and doing the splits like a goddamn madman, I kept radioing to Dale and Jim. “Do you see anything?” I asked them.

“That’s a negative good buddy,” Dale responded. I could see him munching on pistachios in an air conditioned Porsche.

Jim didn’t understand what was going on. “Who is this?” he would say.

I was growing desperate so I squinted my eyes and scanned my surroundings. There was a yellowish car sitting curiously across the street and I thought I recognized it. I radio to Dale. “Do you see that shitty yellow Pontiac Aztec?” I asked.

“What the fuck are you talking about?” he radioed back.

“For fuck sake Dale! It’s right next to you!”

From the corner of my eye, I could see him turn his head left. “Oh yeah, that thing,” he said. “It’s been sitting there for awhile.”

“Then why didn’t you say anything?!”

“It didn’t look suspicious to me,” he shrugged.

I put down the sign and leave my post in front of the mattress store. I sneak up on the Aztec and noticed a woman sitting in the driver’s seat with sunglasses and reading a newspaper. “Susan fuckin Brucetti!” I uttered.

I pulled out the Colt Python from inside my track pants and climbed into the passenger’s seat. This sudden movement startled her and she jumped and dropped the newspaper.

“JAMES!” she exclaimed.

“Busted!” I said.

“What are you doing here?!”

“I should ask you the same question!”

With the engine running, she shifted the car into drive and slammed on the gas. I flew back in my seat and dropped the Python onto the floorboard. When I tried to reach for it she swerved the vehicle and tossed me to and fro. “You can’t have my organs!” I shouted to her as I attempted to wrestle the steering wheel from her hands. But she grabbed the back of my head and slammed it against the dashboard which caused my fake dreads to fall off. While in a daze, I turned around to see Dale in a hot pursuit.

“You can’t outrun us,” I said to her half concussed.

She weaved in and out of traffic causing other motorists to brake or crash into one another. I fought through my impending CTE and grabbed the wheel but she karate chopped my throat and I feared she broke my larynx. Dale was still in pursuit.

“James, can you hear me?!” he radioed through.

Blood spewed from my mouth as I tried to respond. “I’m being abducted!” I gurgled.

Susan grabbed the walkie talkie from my hands and threw it out the window and then she swerved onto the interstate on-ramp. Dale was on her tail and attempted a t-bone. This worked and the Aztec spun wildly out of control and out of the way of Dale’s Porsche. But Dale, now moving at a tremendous speed, hit a guardrail and launched his car several feet in the air before landing upside down in the middle of the interstate. Susan regained control of the vehicle was headed 90 miles per hour eastbound outside of Reno.

“You killed Dale!” I shouted while holding my neck.

“Where have you been for months?! And why are you now in Reno?!”

“I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you!” I said and I reached for her neck. But she did another jujitsu move and knocked me out cold.

When I awoke, I was tied to a bed with my arms and legs splayed out. I was inside yet another motel in the middle of the desert and my head hurt and could feel my brain bleeding on the inside. I tried lifting my head and shouted for Susan. “If you’re gonna kill me then let’s get this over with!” I said.

I could hear her fumbling inside the bathroom and I presumed that she was preparing the bathtub to harvest my organs. It was agony to lay there while I awaited my death. But moments later, she opened the door and gave me a long hard look. “What were you doing outside of that UPS store?” she asked me.

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” I said.

“Were you following me?”

“Following you? Hell! I forgot you existed!”

“Were you going after Madam Joelle?”

I paused. “What’s it to you?” I ask.

“Why won’t you tell me?”

“I’m a dead man regardless. I saw you stalking me in Los Angeles. There’s only one reason why someone would stalk me: they want my organs.”

She was genuinely perplexed. “What are you talking about?”

“Why do you think I disappeared for so long eh? I knew you were onto me!”

Susan chuckled and rubbed her forehead. “No. No, James, I was following you because you were connected to Randy.”

TO BE CONTINUED…