A Map of Days (Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children #4) - Ransom Riggs Page 0,80
car running?”
“Good as new,” he said.
“Jolly. Keep it idling for us.” She turned to me. “Back in two shakes.” She turned to Bronwyn. “Coming?”
Bronwyn rolled her shoulders and shook her arms, limbering up, then nodded.
I secretly loved it when Emma got like this—so pissed off that she grew oddly calm, her anger a focused tool she could wield to great and destructive effect. She and Bronwyn started walking toward the motel. The rest of us weren’t going to stay behind, of course, but since Emma and Bronwyn were the ones among us most capable of wreaking havoc, we kept a few paces behind them.
In the forecourt, one of the highwaymen had Miss Billie by the wrists and was shouting questions at her while the other one rampaged from bungalow to bungalow. “They was here, I know it!” he shouted, and burst out of Adelaide’s place. “Every one of you who’s lyin’ is gonna wish to hell they hadn’t! You know the punishment for disobeyin’ orders!”
They didn’t look much like cops, on closer inspection. They were wearing green fatigue pants and army boots, and they had the buzz-cut hair and dumb, overconfident swagger I’d come to know well growing up in Florida. The shorter of the two wore a gun holstered on his hip.
“Disobeyin’ orders is even worse than not payin’ your protection fees!” the taller one shouted. “Next time your clock needs windin’, maybe old Rex don’t turn up.”
“You leave him alone!” cried Miss Billie.
He drew back his arm to slap her but stopped short when the smaller one said, “There they is, Darryl!” His mouth formed an O as he pointed to us.
“Well, well, well,” said Darryl.
He let Miss Billie go. She scurried off behind the POOL RULES sign. We came into the forecourt and stopped where it met the pool. There were about twenty feet separating us. Emma and Bronwyn stood at the front of our little group, Enoch and I at the back. Millard was silent and, I hoped, sneaking around to flank the highwaymen. I kept Paul behind me.
“Y’all must be new in town,” said Darryl. He cleared his throat loudly. “The road you was on is a toll road. What’s the toll today, Jackson?”
“Gets a sight higher if you try an’ skip out on it.” Jackson joined the other highwayman at their squad car, leaned against the door, and hooked his thumbs into his holster belt. He’d been looking us up and down, and he didn’t seem worried about what he saw. His lips broadened into a greasy smile. “How ’bout their cash and their wheels.” He nodded toward the garage. “Why, I think I seen one of those babies in a magazine.”
I could see the residents of Flamingo Manor peeking out through their blinds, like a scene in an old Western movie.
“You can go to hell,” Emma said.
Now Darryl was smiling, too. “Bless her heart, ain’t she got a mouth.”
“I don’t allow anybody to disrespect me,” said Jackson. “Least of all a woman.”
“Least of all,” Darryl agreed. He snorted again, then took a handkerchief from his pocket and rubbed his nose with it. “’Scuse me.” He turned slightly, pressed a finger to one nostril, and with a sharp exhalation fired a little black snot rocket onto the ground, where it proceeded to steam, eating a small hole in the pavement.
I heard Emma gag.
“Wow,” Enoch whispered beside me. He sounded jealous.
“That’s one nasty habit, Darryl,” Jackson said.
“It ain’t a habit. It’s an affliction.”
Emma took a step toward the men. Bronwyn followed her lead.
“So he’s got nuclear phlegm,” said Emma to the short one. “What’s your peculiarity—being the planet’s biggest asshole?”
Darryl burst out laughing. Jackson’s smile vanished. He unleaned himself from the patrol car and unbuttoned his holster.
Emma and Bronwyn took another step toward them.
“I think they wanna dance,” said Darryl. “Which one you want?”
“The littler one,” he said, staring at Emma. “I like her mouth.”
The girls broke into a run toward the two men. Jackson went for his gun, and Emma, who had kept her hot, glowing hands hidden behind her back, whipped them around to her front and grabbed the man’s gun as he raised it.
The gun instantly melted. As did Jackson’s right hand. He fell to the ground, writhing and howling.
Darryl dove behind the squad car. Before he could begin firing, Bronwyn rammed the driver’s-side door with her shoulder. The car skidded sideways, tires squealing, then tipped onto its side and fell over on its roof, pinning the man beneath it.