Dark Star: Confessions of a Rock Idol (46 page)

I just wanted to get out…
find Karen.

Smiles and laughter and yells of congratulations surrounded us.

We were on our way, pressing forward, moving the scores of people along with us.

A hand tapped hard at my shoulder. I didn’t look back, but then the hand grabbed my shoulder, trying to pull me back.

I turned.

The jury foreperson was on his toes, four feet away, stretching his arm out to me, the silver cross ring near my face.

He said something to me, maybe five words, but the noise drowned him out.

Again he spoke, mouthing the words in hopes I could read his lips. But still I didn’t understand.

I turned back toward the door and pressed forward.

Have to get out.

But the hand pulled my shoulder once more. And the jury foreperson muscled his way up against me.

I squinted at him, not knowing what he wanted, not really caring.

Then he hoisted himself up to my ear. “I saw Christ in you.”

I pulled back and stared at him ever so briefly.

Then I bent down to his ear. “Thank you.”

“Go find Karen.
Godspeed!”

I squeezed his outstretched hand, and he fell away from the pack.

A few feet farther and, finally, a burst of cool air, as we hit the exit and hurried down its white stone steps.

I kept hearing the question, “Everett, how do you feel?” I tried to concentrate on forging ahead. “I just thank God.” I looked at the ground, trying to keep my feet moving toward the car. “Now, we’re going to find Karen and finish the rest of this story.”

More questions pelted me from every direction.

“That’s all.” I kept a hand on Mary and Sarah as we reached the white SUV.

The sound of the crowd outside was muffled as we shut the doors. Everyone held on to whoever ended up next to them, and most of us had tears on our faces. We smiled and sniffled, but no one said much of anything.

Cameras flashed like crazy outside, and the SUV rocked slightly to the sway of the mob. Then Gray eased away from the Miami-Dade Justice and Administration building. As we were able to accelerate more, it felt freeing to leave courtroom B-3 farther and farther behind.

Gray glanced back at us. “I thought we’d go back to the house and plan our strategy from there.

“Sounds good.” I nodded. “Thanks for the car, Gray.”

Mary sat next to me in the middle seat, her arm locked in mine. She tried to say something, but instead, could only manage a smile, a shake of her head, and more tears.

From the backseat, Sarah and Jacob reached forward, each with a hand on my shoulders.

It was quiet for a long stretch. The streetlights zoomed past. The trial was behind us. Miles behind us now.

I reached to the front seat and gently rested my hand on Boone’s shoulder. He looked back at all of us, with a big grin. “The prayer worked…apparently.”

The glass exploded just to the right of my temple.

Screams and cool air filled the car.

In slow motion, I noticed the splintered window next to my head.

“Get down!”
Boone yelled.

We all collapsed to the floor while Gray crouched at the wheel, raising a bent right arm to protect his head.

“It’s a green pickup—a camper!” Boone shouted from low in the front.

I lifted my head just enough to look in the lane to my right.

Crack, crack, cr…cr…crack.

Splinters of glass pelted us, as more of the windows on the right side of the SUV exploded and crumbled in our laps.

“It’s him, Gray!” I ducked down again. “It’s Zaney.”

Everyone was silent as the car rolled on. The girls weren’t screaming anymore.

We wanted this monster.

“Is Karen with him?” Gray crouched so low he was barely able to see over the dash.

“She’s not in front,” I shouted.

“Is anyone shot?” Jacob called out.

A brief silence. We checked each other. “No,” I said. “No one’s hit. Just cuts from the glass.”

“He’s dropped back,” Gray warned.

“Someone call 911!” Sarah yelled.

“I am.” Boone covered his free ear and pressed the cell phone to his head.

“Here he comes again,” Gray said as the dark camper picked up speed on the right.

I crouched low, hearing it coming, then peeked… His windows were down. A gun was in his right hand, at the top of the steering wheel.

“Next time he shoots, jam on the brakes and get behind him!” I yelled over the wind.

“I’ll try,” Gray mumbled, getting down low again.

Now Zaney drove right alongside us. I stuck my hand up in the air to draw fire.

The second Zaney peeled a shot, I slammed into the seat in front of me as Gray nailed the brakes, swerving right. Sarah squealed from the back as the SUV fought to stay on all fours.

“We’re behind him.” Gray slapped the steering wheel.

“Good! Follow close,” Jacob said. “Don’t let him get behind us. We’ll follow him as long as we have to.”

“Did you get the cops, Brian?” I asked.

“Got ’em. They’re coming.”

“I’m calling Chambers.” I pulled my phone from my rear pocket. “Where are we?”

“We got turned around leaving the courthouse,” Gray yelled.

“We’re now southbound on Route 1,” Boone announced.

As I spoke frantically to Chambers, I felt our car slowing, slowing.

“He’s up to something,” Gray said, as I looked up to see Zaney’s brake lights.

Gradually, the camper came to a dead stop, just off the side of the road.

Gray cautiously pulled over to the berm but stayed some fifty feet back.

“He’s getting out!” Sarah screamed. “Where are the police?”

No one said anything as Zaney rocked out of the driver’s seat, squinted back at us, slammed his door, and sauntered our way. His long arms hung low at his sides. The gun seemed small in his large right hand.

“Is she in back?” Jacob asked angrily.

“What do we do?” Mary asked.

The silence assured us there was no clear answer.

“If he starts firing, I’m going to mow him down.” Gray stared straight ahead.

“We need him alive,” I said.

Zaney stopped just past the taillights of the camper. As if he were about to take target practice, he casually spread his legs at shoulder’s width, raised his arms in the air, then lowered and locked them out in front of him with the gun at eye level—pointed directly at us.

“Everybody down!” I commanded.

“What do you want me to do?” Gray peeked his head up. “Get out of here?”

I don’t know. I don’t know. We’re so close…

Boom!

The passenger side windshield blew out.

“Ahh!” Boone covered his head as shards of glass rained down on his crumpled body.

“I’m takin’ him out!” Gray sent the SUV in motion, its engine roaring to life.

Zaney remained in firing position as we picked up speed, but who…

“Stop!”
Jacob yelled.

There’s someone else…

“It’s Chambers!
Stop!”
My body bashed into the seat in front of me again as our brakes locked up and the tires screeched, sending the SUV skidding to a halt.

Ripping open the door handle, I rolled out of the car into the cinders and sprinted toward Zaney and Chambers. Jacob was running, too, and Jerry. Gray stayed back with the girls.

There were sirens now…and blue lights in the sky.

Chambers had Zaney in a headlock from behind, but Zaney lifted him off the ground, whipping him around like a mannequin.

The gun was no longer in Zaney’s hand.

Jacob had the door of the camper open and darted inside.

I followed.

“You ain’t gonna find nothin’,” Zaney moaned as Jacob and I scanned the filthy confine.

I ripped out of the empty camper in time to see Zaney rear backward and plow Chambers into the back wall of the camper, dropping him to the asphalt.

Screams arose from the SUV.

Jerry lunged for the monster next, but Zaney bashed Jerry’s face onto his knee, causing him to crumble to the ground.

Pain knifed through my knuckles and up my wrist as I jacked Zaney in the face, then in the stomach with my other fist. But it barely fazed the goon. He grabbed my arm and twisted it like a twig up behind my back and yanked my hair with his other hand.

Boom, boom, boom.

Jerry fired three shots into the air with Zaney’s gun, but it still didn’t deter him. Instead, he locked his free arm around my neck, practically lifting me off the ground with the arm that was behind me.

Jerry froze with the weapon still drawn on Zaney.

Jacob was limp on the ground, and Chambers lay behind us.

While choking my neck in the crease of his massive right arm, Zaney positioned me fully between him and the gun Jerry now held.

I could hear the frantic squeals of Mary and Sarah nearby.

“You Boy Scouts didn’t think I was gonna let your pretty live, now did ya?” Zaney dragged me back several steps. “She was way too dangerous. Had to be snuffed.”

“Just tell us where she is, and we’ll be on our way,” a desperate Jacob gasped from his knees.

“Daddy, that little thing is long gone by now,” he cackled. “And you people are next…you and your
crusade for Jesus.”

Zaney’s evil laughter boomed into the night as he ratcheted his grip on my neck and yanked my arm higher behind me. I gasped.

“You were right, rock star,” he seethed, strangling me. “Endora was sent to stop you, to
ruin you!
And I’m gonna—”

Bang!

An explosion, a flash, and the smell of gunpowder filled the night.

The monster’s arms went limp around me. “Ah!” He dropped to the ground.
“Ahhh!”

I turned to see Donald Chambers, lying by the camper, gun riveted to his hands, arms braced in front of him, still pointing at Zaney.

Writhing, Zaney cradled his fat, bloody calf in both arms. Cops swarmed in from all directions, weapons drawn within two feet of his face.

“Don’t shoot!” I yelled.
“Don’t shoot.
He’s the only one who knows where Karen is.”

Media mayhem.

Helicopters hovered with spotlights, and national TV crews, newspaper and magazine reporters, and photographers by the dozen descended like a cloud of locusts on Jackson Memorial Hospital. They converged to find out what could possibly be happening for an encore in the aftermath of my dramatic acquittal in the murder case of Endora Crystal.

Inside a small, stifling-hot hospital waiting room, I’d been pacing, praying, and watching TV reports for the past two hours with Jacob and Sarah, Mary and Jerry, Gray, and Donald.

Meanwhile, seven police investigators, who’d been working diligently on Karen’s kidnapping since it happened, were interrogating the wounded but stable Zane Bender at his bedside in a private room just down the hall.

All we knew was that Karen was still missing and Zaney had repeated to detectives that she was dead; he wouldn’t say where.

Although I’d pleaded to speak with Zaney, the lead detective in the case—a short, stocky guy named Hardy—refused my request.

Anger tightened my jaw muscles and warmed my cheeks.

Why?

Karen was so good, so pure and innocent. She didn’t deserve to die…alone somewhere.

My whole body was tense, shivering…pacing.

Jacob slipped his big arm around my shoulder. “It’s going to be okay, you know.” He tilted his head to look at me through bloodshot eyes. “Whatever happens, Karen is going to be all right.”

I dropped my head, and the emotion from the past week raced to my eyes and nose and mouth. The others gathered close, settling in around me.

Jerry began to pray once more.

Peace descended again.

Okay. You’re here. You’re here…

Three knocks sounded at the door.

“Mr. Lester,” the all-business lead detective interrupted. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to break anything up…”

I walked over to him.

“We’ve decided to give you ten minutes with this creep.” His eyes fixed on mine. “I’m gonna warn you, though, he may say some things about Karen…ugly things. You must keep your cool. The whole goal is to get a location from him.”

“Thank you,” I managed, shaking his hand, looking back at the others. “You guys…pray.”

Zaney’s injured tree trunk leg was in traction, wrapped thick in white tape and gauze. The fluorescent lights from above reflected off the sweat at the base of his fat neck.

“Ha, ha! This is what I’ve been waitin’ for—the headliner!” he said from his hospital bed, which I could barely see beneath his massive body. “I’ve been holdin’ out for you, rock star!”