“You might wanna stay out of this, Phillips, unless you’d like to eat that camera of yours. I don’t know why this little shit tripped me . . .”
One of the other men clears his throat. “Watch the language, Willis.”
I expect this Willis guy to let go of Grant and turn on the other guy, but he just twists Grant’s collar a little harder. I don’t think Grant is actually choking, but his face begins to go from pale to pink, and he claws at Willis’s hand.
“Mr. Willis,” Delia says, “he didn’t mean any harm. We’re just passing through and heard the president might stop here. If you’ll just let him go, I’m certain he’d be happy to apologize to your daughter and these other ladies.”
Grant is trying to nod, but Willis’s hammy fist is in the way, so the best he can manage is to bump his chin against it a couple of times.
Willis looks over at Delia, and a slow smile spreads over his face, as though he’s noticing her for the first time. His eyes travel from head to toe, lingering at strategic points along the way. Delia blushes, and I can see her jaw twitch slightly before she pastes on a nervous smile and steps forward.
She stops in midstride as Willis’s smile disappears and he grabs the front of Grant’s shirt with his other hand. “I don’t know who you people think you are, but—”
Camera Guy—Phillips, I guess—grabs Willis’s right arm, the one twisting Grant’s collar, and at about the same time, Grant pulls his foot back and kicks Willis in the knee. Willis drops Grant and pulls back his left arm, probably intending to punch Phillips and then finish dealing with Grant.
I don’t think Willis intended for his elbow to connect with Delia’s nose. I’m not sure he cared one way or the other that it did, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t planned. Willis even looks a little surprised at the crunch when his elbow hits her face, slowing down his punch long enough for Phillips to duck out of the way.
Delia’s hands fly to her face. I think she would have dropped to the ground, but Abel is behind her. He grabs her under the elbows and steadies her, and then he takes a step toward Willis. I didn’t see Abel approaching, but the look on his face is pretty much the polar opposite of the downcast eyes and shy demeanor he wore in Athens.
Abel’s jaw is clenched, his body a tightly wrapped coil, but his voice is polite, almost deferential. “I think you owe Miss Delia an apology, sir.”
Willis stares at him and then spits on the ground about an inch from Abel’s foot. “And I don’t give a damn what you think, nigger.”
Panic flashes into Delia’s eyes, and she pulls her hands away from her nose so that she can grab Abel’s arm. Unfortunately, there’s blood on her hands, and I don’t know if it’s the offensive word that makes him take that first menacing step toward Willis or the sight of his wife’s face, the lower half covered in blood, her nose smashed and bent to the side at an odd angle.
Abel doesn’t throw the first punch, but he definitely throws the second one. And I think he may have thrown the third one, too.
∞19∞
Willis is down, and for a moment, I think he’s out. Then he stumbles to his feet, just as a second guy jumps in to take a swing at Abel. I start to run forward, but Kiernan grabs my arm, pulling me back.
“Kate, no. You really think we can take all of them?”
“No, but I don’t think all of them are going to join in. They were laughing at that Willis guy—”
“Until Abel punched back, yeah.”
I scan the crowd and see that he’s right. Their expressions have changed. No one is laughing anymore. They look angry, for the most part. I’d like to believe they’re all angry at Willis for smashing Delia’s nose, and some of them may be. I think Phillips, the guy with the camera, and a few of the other men fall into that group, and maybe half of the women.
But most of the women aren’t staying. The mother with the fussy toddler grabs two of the older kids by the fence. She hands the little one to the oldest and says, “Y’all take Timmy and get in the car. I’ll be there in a minute.” The girl nods. The boy looks like he wants to argue, but he snaps his mouth shut when he catches his mom’s expression.
The other side of the street is now empty, with the exception of the sole woman in the group and the man who took the cigarette from Abel. They’re still watching, but they’re standing inside the doors of their car, ready to make a quick departure if necessary.
Two guys grab Abel’s arms. They’re having a tough time holding him, until a third guy grabs his shirt collar and yanks it backward. Delia and Grant try to pull them off Abel.
“Get your hands off of him!” Delia shrieks. “Abel!”
Then Grant takes a punch to the chest, stumbling backward.
Kiernan curses softly, shaking his head like he knows he’s going to regret his next move. “Get Delia to the car. I’m going to see if I can help Abel.”
I take off, running around the edge of the spectators, and grab Grant’s arm.
“I’m with CHRONOS. Let’s get Delia to the car.”
He just stares at me for a second, his jaw hanging.
“Now!” I say, holding up the medallion and tugging the leather cover down a fraction of an inch so that he can see the glow.
That snaps him into action. Grant turns out to be quite impressive when he has direct orders to follow. He runs forward and spins Delia around, then bends down so that his head is almost level with her waist, flinging her over his shoulder in one swift motion. Delia doesn’t go peacefully, but he has a solid grip on her legs.
I run alongside, glancing back over my shoulder at the crowd once we reach the road. Things don’t look like they’re settling down. If anything, they’re getting worse.
“Can you get Delia to the car and keep her there?”
“Yeah,” Grant says, although he looks a little doubtful.
“Okay. I’ll be back.”
Delia claws at me and misses as I run past. She’s still screaming for them to let Abel go, her screams interspersed with a rather impressive string of profanity aimed at Grant and me for pulling her away.
I catch a brief glimpse of Kiernan at the far side of the crowd as I get closer. From the way his head whips backward, I think he’s just taken a punch.
I can’t see Abel, so I push between two broad-shouldered guys to get in closer. That’s when Willis, who has apparently realized he can’t beat Abel in a fair fight, pulls a knife.
There’s a collective whoosh of breath from the crowd, and most of them take a step back. Willis charges at Abel, knife raised. Abel dodges to the left, then swipes his right leg outward, causing Willis to stumble. Before Willis can regain his balance, Abel crashes into him. They both land on the ground, wrestling for the knife. Abel finally latches onto Willis’s forearm, pushing the hand holding the knife out to one side.
Willis’s hand is mere inches from my foot, so I stomp his fingers as hard as I can. He lets out a roar, but before I can see whether he dropped the knife, there’s a chuckle from one of the men behind me and someone yanks me backward, out of the circle.
I hear the dull thud of fists pounding and then the sharp crack of a gunshot.
“All right, that’s it. It’s over.” The voice comes from the other side of the circle, near the back.
Someone else on that side says, “Mitchell, you ain’t wearin’ no uniform, and this ain’t no traffic offense, so why don’t you go on home?”
A few people laugh, and then there’s another shot, and one of the men who was next to Phillips earlier pushes forward. His face is thin, with deep-set eyes that scan the crowd. “Don’t nobody in the middle move. The rest of you, get on back.”
A few of the men trade glances, like they’re debating whether to obey. Finally, one guy steps back, and the rest of them follow, several of them grumbling as they go.