“What?” one of them hollered back, no doubt unsure what I was pulling.
“We got a major leak,” I said, poorly disguising my voice. “People in there need to get out till we get it repaired.”
I tugged on Junior to follow me to the front of the house before something went wrong. I kept my head low, fearful of Tony walking outside and recognizing me. My brother quickly communicated to Sihad and the rest with eye signals not to do anything yet. After delivering the message to the man who answered the door that it wasn’t safe for them to remain inside the home, we retreated to the van with the fake National Grid magnetic signs on the exterior. One of our group remained on the side of the house, pretending to call in an emergency repair order.
“What the fuck is going on? We got them to open the door,” Sihad said, out of breath and obviously nervous over the sudden change in plans as we regrouped following the retreat.
“My daughter. If she’s in the basement and someone’s down there with her—”
“Shit! We coulda had her!” he yelled, cutting me off. “Our chances don’t get any better than that.”
“Watch your tone, bro. I ain’t gettin’ my niece killed. We wait,” Junior urged Sihad as he motioned toward the home.
As we went about acting like a normal work crew gathered around the van, a flurry of activity erupted from inside. Two men exited first onto the porch, checking outside for any signs of trouble. Like rats creeping out of their rat holes at dusk.
“See, they’re relocatin’. Afraid o’ gettin’ blown the fuck up. Now they comin’ outside to us,” my brother said, glad I was right with my gamble.
“This is it,” I said, reaching into my tool bag for the SIG Sauer pistol. “Silencers, since we’re outside.”
“Damn. You is used to gettin’ wet,” Sihad joked with a smile. “Let’s do this.”
Keeping my hard hat low over my face, I saw him. Tony. He came out of the house and beat a path straight to his Cadillac. He was by himself. If we were wrong about Mariah being here, we’d need him to help us find her. We couldn’t let him drive off.
“Your call, sis,” Junior said, his hand resting inside his tool bag as he prepared to set up road cones around the van in the continuance of our ruse.
“Green light,” I said just as three more men exited the home and walked across the lawn to the van. Still no sign of Mariah. Once Tony was clear, they’d be free to drive away too.
Tony pulled away from the front of the house and drove straight toward us. When we were just about to unload on his car, he slowed anyway.
“Hey, man. How long is this gonna take?” Tony chirped in our direction out his lowered passenger-side window. Despite the disguise I wore, I almost couldn’t bear to look in his direction. I felt my hand trembling as I placed my finger on the trigger. Eventually, Junior took it upon himself to respond.
“Waitin’ for the big boss to send another inspector,” my brother replied, trying to keep a sufficient distance so as not to be recognized, but still close enough to shoot.
I couldn’t take it any longer. I slowly turned to steal a glance at the man who’d snatched my child from my arms. In that instant, his eyes locked on me and our path was set. No cheap disguise could obscure the eyes of someone from their former lover. A second later and he’d taken an accounting of the other gas company workers.
“Shit,” Tony muttered as he turned toward the road, preparing to gun the car.
“Junior!” I yelled.