Tiny announcement before this chapter gets started: I made an oversight during chapter five and somewhere along the way, I lost the dog. (Woops—sorry, pooch!) Thanks to GrayWolf84 for bringing it to my attention! Originally the boys were going to take him home earlier in the day, but I realized that the later chapters will work better if the dog is in the car…so I tweaked chapter five a little (yet again) and the situation has been fixed.
I also forgot to say thanks to KatieMalfoy19, whose comments on chapter four got me thinking and eventually brought about Boss' second picture of the General. But everything is where it should be now, and it should be smooth sailing from here. (Well, for me, anyway…Bo and Luke might disagree.) ;) Carry on!
- Flynne :)
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– Chapter Six –
"Found and Lost"
"Luke!" The panicked shout tore out of Bo's chest as his cousin fell. He instinctively slammed on the brakes, but the car behind him kept going. It smashed into the General with jarring force. Bo growled determinedly and held on. He took a sharp breath and floored it, speeding ahead even though it was tearing him up inside to leave Luke behind.
The wild chase had lasted through most of the wooded section of road, and the instant the General burst out of the narrow lane, he wrenched the wheel around. The air filled with the harsh smell of burning rubber as he forced the car into a 180 and tore past the pursuing car. He heard branches snapping as the car's back end swiveled through the underbrush, but all he could think about was going back the way he had come and finding his cousin.
Bo ain't the only one scared for Luke—I am too. Every time those boys go hangin' out of them windows like that, I get nervous that somethin' like that might happen…but I never expected that it actually would.
The rear window shattered in a spray of glass as the men in the car behind started shooting again. Bo felt the cold shards hit the back of his neck, but he just ducked lower in the seat and kept going, frantic blue eyes scanning the dirt track for any sign of his best friend. His brain was screaming at him to go, go, go! as the pursuing car loomed closer, but he didn't dare go full speed in case Luke was lying in the road.
His heart plummeted to his feet as the General's headlights suddenly illuminated the shape of another car up ahead, parked across the road and completely blocking the narrow lane.
"Not again!" Bo burst out. He stomped on the brake and spun the wheel to keep from ramming into the other car, holding his breath as the General spun and skidded sideways. He lurched to a halt bare inches from the other car and there was a squeal of tires and a cloud of dust as the car behind him hemmed him in.
Bo barely had time to pry his death-grip off the wheel before two burly men from the second car reached through the window and grabbed him, dragging him out of the General's narrow window with painful roughness. He winced as they slammed his back up against the car and pinned him there.
The man on his left caught sight of the knife fastened to Bo's belt. He pulled it out and flipped it open, examining the blade with casual interest in the yellow glow from the headlights. "You sure ain't too bright, friend," he drawled. "I think you would've gotten away if you hadn't come back. You're a real softie to come back for your buddy, but I'm willing to bet he bought it."
Bo fumed at the mean grin on the man's face, but he felt a tiny spark of hope. The man didn't know what had happened to Luke…which meant that they hadn't found him. He had been terrified that his cousin would be caught and killed by whoever was behind him. He knew there was a horribly real possibility that Luke had been killed in the fall anyway, but the faint hope that he had survived and escaped gave him courage and he stared back defiantly into the other man's eyes.
"Yeah? Well, seems to me you ain't so smart neither!" he retorted. "Folks 'round here don't take too kindly to thugs gangin' up on their friends." He felt a chill run through him when the other man looked at him through narrowed eyes and leaned into him, pressing the knife against his side. He could feel the razor-sharp edge through the thin fabric of his shirt, an unwelcome reminder that he had sharpened the blade just the week before.
"You got a mouth on you, kid, and I ain't sure I like it," the big man said menacingly.
"Max, get out of his face." A tall, dark-haired man, obviously the leader, strode forward and fixed Bo with a heated glare. "All right, Duke, talk!" he growled, grabbing his prisoner by the collar. "Where's the money?"
Bo's heart was racing and he was nearly sick with worry over Luke, but he was good and mad and he wasn't about to be pushed around. "I don't know what you're talkin' about!" he protested angrily.
The other man smiled savagely. "I've only heard that excuse about four thousand times." His grip tightened. "Now, where's the money?"
"I got three bucks in my wallet," Bo shot back. "You want it? You're welcome to it."
The man lashed out and backhanded him across the face. "You want us to refresh your memory? You were supposed to make a delivery last night but you never showed up. Somewhere along the way, you took that money and hid it: fifty thousand dollars. I've killed men for less, plowboy."
"You're crazy!" Bo snapped. "The only thing we hauled last night was a load of whiskey, and we didn't even make it 'cause we were—" The words jammed in his throat as sudden realization made his nerves thrum like electrical wire. Holy smoke! Boss Hogg! He was lyin' to us the whole time!
"You were what? Don't bother lying to me. I already heard the whole thing from J.D. Hogg. You'll save yourself a lot of grief if you just hand it over."
"Listen, I swear it's the truth!" Bo insisted. His breaths grew shallow as he fully began to realize the danger he was in. His eyes swept the darkness behind the cluster of men, looking for any sign of Luke. He saw nothing. "Boss Hogg told me and my cousin we were deliverin' a load of shine for him. Some guys run us off the road and took the crates before we got where we were goin'. I don't know no more'n that!"
The man's eyes narrowed into cold slits. "You're gonna wish you'd told me what you did with that money, boy," he said ominously. He made a brief gesture and the two men holding Bo tried to force him to the ground. Bo fought back, but his struggles came to a sudden halt as he felt a burning-cold stitch of pain in his side. He gasped sharply, realizing with a surge of alarm that his anger had caused him to forget about the knife.
His surprise gave his captors the advantage and before he could resist, the man called Max had hooked his foot behind his leg and knocked him down. The others gathered round to hold him down while the leader knelt over him and pressed a thick, wet cloth hard against his face, covering his mouth and nose.
Bo instinctively recoiled and clamped his mouth shut as he tasted the mildly sweet liquid on his tongue. He held his breath and fought hard to break free, but he was helpless flat on his back. His lungs were burning with the effort of holding his breath but he didn't dare let himself breathe—he didn't know what the man was holding over his face but he knew he shouldn't inhale it.
The man holding the rag grew impatient and drew back his fist to hit Bo hard in the stomach. The air burst out of Bo's chest in a rush and he gasped, panting heavily as his aching lungs cried out for air. He could feel the edges of his mind start to grow fuzzy and he tried not to breathe again, but the man above him kept hitting him, forcing him to inhale the sweet-smelling vapors.
Bo felt his body going numb and he grew lax against the ground. The stinging pain in his side dwindled to nearly nothing. The man stopped hitting him, but he hardly noticed it. His attempts to hold his breath were becoming shorter and shorter, and he found that he was fighting to keep his eyes open. A few moments more, and Bo knew he was slipping away. The glare from the headlights merged and spun around him, pulling him down into a black vortex.
xxxxx
Brock sat back on his heels and watched his victim panting as he fought for air. The young man gave a last gasping sigh before his eyes closed and he went limp against the ground. Brock immediately pulled the chloroform-soaked cloth away from Bo's face, gazing critically down at his prisoner.
"He still alive, Snyder?" he asked.
One of the men pinning Bo's shoulders to the ground put his fingers against his throat. "Yeah, he's alive. Is that what you wanted?"
"For now." Brock draped the rag over Bo's mouth and nose again and rose to his feet. He looked distastefully at the blood slowly soaking through Bo's shirt onto the ground. "That was stupid, Max," he said angrily. "We can't kill him yet. If his cousin is dead, this one needs to stay alive to tell me where the money is."
Max prodded the prone body with his foot. "I didn't mean to cut him. You saw him fighting back. Anyway, it was just a pocketknife. It can't be that bad."
"You better hope not," Brock replied warningly. A sudden high-pitched whine caught his attention and for the first time he noticed that the Duke's dog had climbed out of the car. The dog had been watching the strange goings-on from the back seat with mild confusion, but once he realized that the kind young man he liked was in trouble, he had started to get agitated. He was pacing anxiously around the group of men, waiting for his chance to push through and get to Bo.
Brock nudged him away with his foot, but when the dog insisted on moving closer he kicked him sharply in the ribs with his heavy boot. The dog gave a surprised yelp and ducked underneath the General.
Now, that's just low, ain't it? You gotta be some kind of scum to beat a man down like he just done to Bo, but to turn right around an' start kickin' his dog, well…that's crookeder than the devil's hind toe.
Satisfied that the pest had been effectively discouraged, Brock looked away and started scanning the trees at the edge of the road. "The second man fell out of the car somewhere along here," he said. "If the fall killed him, we can let this one live. If he got away, we'll finish this guy off. Snyder, you stay with him—keep that rag over his face, but make sure he keeps breathing. We need him alive for now but we can't have him waking up too soon. The rest of you, start looking."
Brock's thugs began to spread out to search the underbrush but the sudden sound of a car engine and the glow of headlights down the road brought them up short.
"Change in plans, boys!" Brock called. "We can't get caught out here…Head for the cars."
"What about him?" Rod asked, jerking his thumb toward the still form on the ground.
"We're taking him with us. Snyder, you and Max get him in his car and follow us. Rod will drive your car."
The two big men bent down and lifted Bo's body from the ground. They dumped him in the back seat of the General through the window openings before tugging at the door handles. The doors stuck fast. Fumbling inside to find the locks didn't do any good.
"Brock, we can't get the doors open!" Snyder called back.
Brock frowned as the sound of the car drew closer. "Never mind, then. We've got to get out of here. I don't think it's going to be a problem, though…He won't be hard to find, and I'll finish the job later myself." He gave one last contemptuous glance at the General Lee before he hurried to his car and sped off into the night.
As soon as Brock's men moved away from the General, the dog jumped back inside. He slithered into the back seat, nosing concernedly at Bo's body. His nostrils flared as he smelled blood mingled with the strange, tingling smell of chloroform. Max and Snyder had left Bo's face covered, and the mild scent was strong to the dog's sensitive nose. He whined uneasily and gave a disgusted snort, recoiling from the unsettling odor. He climbed back into the front of the car and sat as far from the smell as he could get without losing sight of Bo.
The next moment, the approaching car hove into view around a bend in the road: a huge white Cadillac. Boss Hogg saw the General sitting in the middle of the road with a mixture of anxiety and relief. He slammed on the brakes and climbed out of his car in haste.
He lumbered up to the General, panting heavily as he all but collapsed against the hood. "Oh, thank goodness I found it! I plumb run my legs off!" He sucked down another deep breath before he moved around the side to peer in the window. "Luke? Bo? You boys in there? I've been lookin' all over the place for—" The words died on his lips and he felt a chill of horror as he looked inside. Bo was curled up on the back seat, unmoving. His face was pale and still, and a dark red stain was slowly spreading across his pale yellow work shirt.
"Oh, Lordy! I done it for sure this time," Boss moaned. He looked around for Luke, but the only living thing he saw was the shaggy yellow dog on the front seat, giving him a friendly but hesitant stare. He put a chubby hand through the back window and nervously tapped his fingertips against Bo's hair. "Oh, Bo? Bo? Time to wake up!" There was no response. He leaned in a little farther, pausing to toss away the damp rag that obscured much of Bo's features, and lightly slapped his cheek. "Come on, you ornery lawbreaker! Wake up!"
No response.
Boss bit his lip, stamping his feet in agitation. "Oh, I gotta get him outta there!" He tried to lean in through the window, but got stuck halfway through. "Dah! Confound it all! Why can't you Dukes have cars that work like normal people? Stupid ding dang doors stuck tighter than molasses in winter!" he scolded. He planted his feet against the ground and leaned back, popping out like a cork from a bottle. "Dangit, you got yourself in there...there's gotta be a way to get you out!"
He leaned in again, flailing his arms around until he managed to grab onto Bo's shirt. He braced himself and leaned back. Bo slid a little ways across the seat, but Boss couldn't move him much. "Jiminy crickets! You ain't much bigger around than a telephone pole; how comes you're so heavy?"
Boss backed away, looking anxiously around for any sign of help. "I just gotta get you back to town! I can't stand the sight of you but I never ever wanted to hurt nobody..." He trailed off, running out of breath. "Jefferson Hogg, you got yourself in a bind this time," he muttered.
Then his beady brown eyes lit up. "I can't move Bo...but maybe I can move that stupid orange bus he drives!" He scuttled back to his car and hastily hooked his towing chain between the General and his own car. "It's gonna play havoc with my gas mileage...but I'll just send the bill to the Dukes!" He chuckled at his own resourcefulness as he started towing the car back the way he had come.
By the time ol' Boss stopped at the Boar's Nest, he weren't laughin' no more. He was gettin' so worried that he felt he couldn't even choke down one pickled pig's foot. He kept lookin' back at the General the whole way, waitin' for Bo to sit up and start yellin' at him, but he ain't heard nothin'. Right now he's startin' to think Bo might never move again—and there ain't nobody gets re-elected with somethin' like that hangin' over their head.
Boss rolled out of his car and bolted into the Boar's Nest as fast as his short little legs could carry him. "Hey! Hey, stop everything!" He bellowed. The music and laughter continued unabated. The only person to notice him at all was Rosco.
"There you are, Little Fat Buddy!" the sheriff said excitedly. "You know, I've been wonderin' where you got to! We couldn't find you here or at your office, and Lulu said she hadn't seen you. Flash was worried, too, and she—"
"Oh, never mind that flea magnet!" Boss said crossly, waving his hands frantically in the air. "We got trouble!"
"What kinda trouble?"
"Duke trouble, that's what kind! You numbskull, do we ever have anything else?"
Daisy heard her last name from where she was standing over by the bar. She slammed down her tray and marched over, planting her hands on her hips. "Boss, you quit ridin' on my cousins! They ain't done nothin' wrong, but you won't let up on 'em! I know all about what you made them do last night, and I think it was a real low-down thing to do, so if I were you, I'd—"
"Oh, quit crowdin' me!" Boss cut her off, pointing a chubby finger toward the parking lot. "If y'all would quit yappin' like a bunch of hens, you'd have let me tell you that Bo Duke might be dyin' in that car out there!"
All conversation in the lively bar stopped instantly, and every eye fixed on Boss Hogg. Daisy went white. She pushed the stammering Rosco out of the way and bolted outside. Cooter jumped up and darted after her, leaving the sound of breaking glass behind him in the silent room as his beer mug shattered on the floor. Unable to face the incredulous—and accusing—stares inside, Boss turned around and chased after them.
Daisy skidded to a halt next to the General and slipped inside without a moment's pause. She climbed into the back of the car and knelt on the floor, bending anxiously over her cousin. "Bo, honey, can you hear me?" She gently cupped his face in her hands, brushing the hair off his forehead. His skin felt warm. She pressed her fingers against his neck, feeling for a pulse. A slow, gentle pressure rebounded against her fingers. In the dim light, she could just barely see his chest rise and fall.
"Thank God! He's alive," she said in relief. She quickly looked him over and her heart gave a lurch as she noticed his bloody shirt. There was a tear in the fabric a few inches above his waist on his left side, and much of the material on that half of the shirt was soaked through. "Cooter, he's bleeding! We gotta get him to the hospital."
"Easier done than said!" Cooter nudged the dog out of the driver's seat and hastily slid in through the window. He pawed around the wheel and was relieved to find the key still in the ignition. He gave a quick twist and the engine roared to life. The dog immediately slid to the floor on the passenger side and braced himself in the corner. He could sense that Cooter was every bit as anxious as Bo and Luke had been earlier, and he had no desire to be tossed about again.
"Get goin', Cooter! Please hurry!"
"We're gone, sweetheart!" Cooter gunned the engine and flew out of the Boar's Nest parking lot faster than if he'd had a truckload of revenuers on his tail, leaving a small crowd of observers staring after them.
Daisy climbed onto the back seat and squeezed into the corner, pillowing Bo's head and shoulders on her lap. It was tight back there—Bo was a tall man, and having his frame sprawled out on the seat made for an awkward fit. She was a little cramped, but that was the least of her worries.
"Oh, honey…how did this happen?" Was it really only half an hour ago that he had bid her a cheerful goodnight? "Stay out of trouble on the way home!" Her playful parting words echoed in her head and she blinked hard, fighting back tears as she brushed her cousin's blond hair off his forehead. She gave a little gasp as Bo suddenly took a sharp, deep breath and shifted against the seat.
"Bo! Can you hear me?"
"Is he comin' around?" Cooter asked, slewing the General around a curve in the road.
"I think so." Daisy put her hand on Bo's cheek, holding his head steady, watching with growing hope as his shallow breaths grew longer and deeper. "Bo? Wake up, sugar."
"Mmmph…D-Daisy?" Bo's blue eyes fluttered open, their clear depths unnaturally clouded with pain and confusion.
"Yeah, it's me, I'm here."
"Where—" Bo tried to sit up but fell back against her at once, wincing as he reached for his head.
Daisy put her hands on his shoulders, holding him down. "Take it easy, Bo! You're hurt! Just lie still. Cooter's drivin' us to the hospital."
His hand strayed to the throbbing pain in his side and he flinched as his fingers came away wet. Daisy caught hold of his wrist and moved his hand away. "I'm bleeding," he said muzzily, almost to himself. He looked up apprehensively at his cousin. "Is it bad?"
Daisy gently pulled his shirt free of his waistband, a chill running through her as she touched the wet fabric. She peeled back his shirt and cringed inwardly when she saw the wound, but the knot in her chest loosened a little as she realized it wasn't as bad as it could have been.
"No," she replied. "It doesn't look too deep. I can't see it too good in this light, but it looks like the bleeding is slowing down."
"Man, I'm glad to hear it." Bo gave his head a little shake and blinked a few times, trying to clear the foggy feeling from his brain. "When that guy took my knife I thought he was gonna try and slice me up with it."
Daisy shook her head in confusion. "What guy? Who?"
"I—I don't know."
"Where's Luke?"
Bo abruptly stiffened as Daisy's question brought the full memory of the night's events back in a rush. "Luke!" he gasped. His eyes grew wide as he looked up into his cousin's face. "Daisy, we gotta find him! He could be really hurt!"
"Honey, what happened? Where is he?"
"These two guys were chasin' us…They tried to run us off the road and they started shooting at us. Luke tried to shoot their tires with the bow and arrow but we were on that narrow part of Jessup Road—they rammed us and I couldn't hold the General to the center. Luke got knocked out of the car."
Daisy stifled a gasp of dismay. She was afraid for Luke but it wouldn't do to let Bo see how scared she really was, particularly because she could tell he wasn't completely all right himself. He was speaking slowly and tiredly and he still had an unfocused look in his eyes. So she took a deep breath and threaded her fingers through his hair again, trailing her fingers across his temple in an attempt to calm him.
"Don't you worry, Bo. Just as soon as we get you to the hospital we'll get someone out there to look for Luke. Don't worry…We'll find him, I promise."
Boy, I sure do hope she's right. Daisy ain't never broke a promise before. They say there's a first time for everything, but I hope this ain't it.