The Biker In The Neon Diner And The Turquoise Stone Betrayal
CHAPTER 2: THE SHATTERED GLASS
The air inside the Starlight Diner went colder than the desert rain. Walter Thorne did not flinch, but a twitch developed in his left eyelid, betraying the crack in his aristocratic armor. His hand inside his brown woolen jacket shifted slightly, his fingers pressing a concealed radio transmitter wired directly to the county patrol repeater.
“You’re a delusional felon, Silas,” Walter said, his voice dropping into that smooth, condescending tone that had sent three dozen men to the state penitentiary in Florence. “Jesse Kelly was a drunken prospector who couldn’t handle his liquor on the mountain grade. The county coroner ruled it accidental death by blunt force trauma. I took this girl into my custody as legal guardian out of Christian charity because her mother had already died of consumption.”
“Christian charity?” Nora screamed, stepping back from the counter, her eyes blazing with sudden, furious comprehension. “You kept me locked in this miserable trailer court! You told me my father died a bankrupt drunk and left me with ninety thousand dollars of mining debt that I had to pay off working double shifts in this diner! Every dollar I earned went straight to your estate management office!”
“You were paying for your room and board, girl,” Walter said coldly, not even looking at her, keeping his gaze glued to Silas. “And you should have been grateful I didn’t let the state foster system take you to Phoenix.”
Outside the rain-lashed window, the harsh sweep of high-intensity halogen spotlights suddenly illuminated the flooded parking lot. A white-and-green Mohave County Sheriff cruiser slid to a halt across the gravel, mud splashing ten feet into the air.
The diner’s glass door flew open with a violent bang, admitting a blast of wet desert wind and Deputy Clint Vance. Vance was Walter’s nephew, thirty-eight years old, thick-necked and brutal, with his hand already resting on the wooden grip of his service revolver.
“Uncle Walter!” Vance barked, shaking rain from his wide-brimmed Stetson. “Dispatch received the alarm signal. What’s the problem here?”
“The problem is an escaped federal parolee,” Walter said, pointing his cane toward Silas. “Silas Morgan has returned to the county in violation of his probation and is actively threatening civilians. Disarm him, Clint. If he resists, shoot him where he sits.”
Deputy Vance unsnapped his leather holster with a practiced click. “Hands on the counter, old man! Do it now!”
Silas didn’t reach for the counter. With the blinding speed of a man who had fought through prison yards and back-alley ambushes, Silas seized the heavy ceramic coffee mug and hurled it with pinpoint accuracy. The steaming mug struck Deputy Vance squarely between the eyes, shattering into ceramic shards and blinding the deputy with scalding black coffee.
Vance screamed in agony, his revolver firing wildly into the ceiling tiles as he stumbled backward. The gunshot sounded like a cannon inside the small diner, blowing plaster dust and electrical insulation down over the counter.
Silas vaulted over the counter, his heavy boots clearing the stainless-steel bread warmer in a single leap. He grabbed Nora by the waist, sweeping her behind the industrial ice machine as Walter drew a small, nickel-plated .25 automatic from his coat pocket and fired three rapid pops into the wall where Nora had been standing.
“Go! Out the kitchen service door!” Silas bellowed.
“My purse! My father’s picture!” Nora cried, trying to turn back.
Silas scooped the scalloped photograph from the counter with one hand, tucking it inside his leather jacket, while using his other hand to grab the heavy iron meat cleaver from the magnetic strip on the prep table. He hurled the cleaver across the room, embedding it four inches deep into the wooden cash register right beside Walter’s head. The old man recoiled with a gasp of pure terror, tumbling backward over a vinyl barstool.
Silas kicked open the aluminum kitchen exit door. The storm hit them with the physical force of a tidal wave. Cold, driving sheets of rain plastered Nora’s hair to her face as they stumbled across the flooded mud of the rear alleyway.
Silas shoved Nora onto the leather pillion seat of his vintage 1982 Yamaha XT500 thumper, a rugged dual-sport desert machine built for canyon trails rather than highway comfort. He kicked the starter lever down with savage force. The single-cylinder engine fired on the first compression stroke, roaring with a deep, unmuffled thud that echoed off the metal siding of the surrounding storage sheds.
“Hold on to my belt with both hands!” Silas shouted through the gale, his boots bracing against the mud as the rear tire spun furiously. “Keep your head down against my spine! Don’t let go no matter how hard this machine bucks across the wash!”
As Nora wrapped her trembling arms around his soaked leather jacket, her fingers brushed against the frayed neckline collar of her pale blue polyester waitress uniform. Underneath the synthetic seam, her fingertips detected something rigid, circular, and metallic stitched securely inside the hem—a tiny, waterproof plastic beacon disc no larger than a nickel, pulsing with a faint, rhythmic red LED light through the weave.
“Silas!” Nora shrieked into his ear over the deafening exhaust noise. “There’s something stitched inside my collar! Walter put an electronic bug in my uniform! He’s been listening to everything!”
Silas glanced back over his shoulder, his eyes catching the unmistakable scarlet blinker of a military-grade satellite telemetry beacon. Without hesitating a second, he reached up with his scarred left hand, clamped his teeth into the collar fabric, and ripped the seam wide open with a violent tear. He spat the plastic tracking transmitter into the churning muddy puddle beneath the tire and stomped it six inches deep into the gravel with his heavy steel boot heel before dumping the clutch, launching them into the pitch-black desert night like an artillery shell.
