The Last Best Lie

by Kennedy Quinn

  “What did Jake do?”

  “What do you think? He went to Chris’s place and read him the riot act, practically standing on the kid’s toes all the while. He got the boy to admit to screwing the crook, even got him to admit he’d been shacking up with someone before Adalida got to town.”

  “And then?”

  “And then Jake did what any good father would do.” He spread his hands out before him. “He told his daughter the truth.”

  “To break them up?” I said angrily.

  “Hey. It’s not like Jake had to lie. The little shit had his johnson out every time the wind blew. What happened to him was his own fault.”

  “My God, you are so judgmental!”

  “I have morals.”

  “So do I!”

  He pointed at me. “No, you’ve got this naive, romantic concept that there is no right or wrong. Typical bleeding-heart, liberal crap. But, hey, if no one’s right and no one’s wrong, and there is no God, then you can do whatever the hell you want, can’t you?”

  I reared back. “How did God get into this?”

  “Exactly!” He was breathing hard, staring at me.

  Putting my hands out in front of me, exasperation overwhelming me, I said, “You make me crazy! I don’t understand what you’re saying half the time. And the rest of the time when I’m talking to you, it’s like you’re hearing someone else. Listen, I don’t know who you’re confusing me with—maybe this Sara person. But I’m not her. I’m not your enemy! And while you are, without a doubt, an absolute ass, I think you’re not mine, either. So, will you please,”—I put my hands together as if in prayer—“will you please just stay in the moment and talk to me?”

  He looked me up and down. “What are you getting so emotional about?”

  I groaned. “You are such a man.”

  “Thank you,” he said, as if surprised at my admission.

  “That was not a compliment. Let’s just stay focused, okay? I need to understand what happened. Adalida and Chris fought, but clearly they made up. Is that right?”

  “Yeah, I don’t know how. Jake couldn’t believe it.”

  “So he forbade her to be with him, and she killed herself?”

  “Christ, I don’t know,” he said, seemingly exasperated. “Jake sure as hell didn’t think so. But we never found evidence of foul play. And we looked. God, we looked.”

  “What about the poison they took?”

  “Methanol in their iced tea. Chris didn’t take as much, and it left him brain-damaged. Nobody thought he’d live, but Jake wouldn’t give up on him.” Hunter shook his head, frustration creasing his rugged features. “He quit the force. I did what I could. I helped get the kid into a good hospice in Chicago. Jake couldn’t stay in New Orleans. He didn’t want pity, and he couldn’t take the memories.”

  “He moved north, with no income, but he still intended to care for Chris?”

  “I’d have given him half my business for as often as he saved my ass.”

  I moved a step closer, sensing Hunter letting his guard down as he talked about his friend. “And yet he started up his own business in competition with yours.”

  Hunter snorted. “He was no competition. He was his own man. It cost him a lot to let me help him as much as I did. I’m not saying it was a bad idea to keep an eye on Chris. Who knows, maybe the kid would have come out of it, and Jake could have gotten the truth.”

  “You don’t honestly think Jake only wanted to keep Chris alive in hopes that he might one day reveal what really happened?”

  “It would have been the smart thing to do.”

  “Maybe it would be the thing you would do, but Jake wouldn’t have used him like that. He did it for the same reason he took care of George: because of what they meant to Adalida.”

  “You’re such a female.”

  “Thank you,” I said, with deliberate sarcasm.

  A smile played briefly at the corner of his mouth. “That wasn’t a compliment. So, are we done? I gave you your story. That’s all there is to it.”

  “But where does that put us, Hunter?”

  “It puts us back on a plane to Chicago. You’ve had your run, Angel. I’ve got serious work to do now. We’re out of here.” He walked over to the bedroom door and rapped on it, motioning Tina out when she opened it.

  I watched them go and then ran down the stairs after them. At the bottom, I grabbed Hunter by the back of his coat. “Hold on.”

  Hunter had Tina by the arm. “What now?”

  “You went way over the line back there. You ever do it again and I’ll—”

  He let go of Tina and put his hands on his hips, towering over me. “You’ll what?”

  Body on a mission, I grabbed his lapels and pushed him against the wall. I kissed him, slow then deeper, entangling my fingers in his hair. He flinched at first, gripped my arms as if to push me away, then he moved them around my back, pulling me into him. Leaning down, he bent me backward with the force of his kiss. Just when I felt his body give in to the passion, I pushed him away. Holding him at arm’s length, both of us breathing hard, I stared him in the eyes. “You remember this, mister. You ever try another idiotic stunt like you did back there, and you’ll never taste me again. Understood?”

  He nodded mutely, his shell shock gloriously obvious.

  Grinning triumphantly, I took Tina by the arm and marched her away, not looking back.

  Her eyes wide, even a bit horrified, she said, “What was that all about?”

  “I’m not sure, but it was very empowering. And don’t you ever tell my mother!”

  She flashed a bemused smile and looked over her shoulder as we reached the open door.

  “Is he coming?” I said.

  “Well, he’s following us, if that’s what you’re asking,” she said, chuckling.

  I grinned. “Yes, that’s what I—”

  The shot rang out, and something wet splattered my face. Tina sank to her knees, smearing blood against the white door as she fell against it.

  Hands grabbed me from behind and thrust me into the cover of the wall behind the door. Hunter shielded me with his body, his gun drawn. Eyes narrow and focused, he pushed me back farther, scanning the horizon from our safe place. “Get down!” he whispered harshly.

  As we knelt, I reached for Tina, her body caught half in and half out of the doorway. Hunter pushed my hand back and shook his head. That’s when I noticed the top of her head was blown open and fragments of bone and gray matter were splayed in a cone behind the body.

  I fell onto my hands and knees and held my stomach in, trying desperately to keep from vomiting. Hunter’s hands were soft on my shoulder. “Keep it together,” he said quietly. “We’re exposed here, too many windows, too many doors. We have to get upstairs. Can you manage it?”

  I nodded.

  “That’s my girl.” He grabbed my hand. “Let’s go.”

  Crouched low, we ran up to Tina’s bedroom. Hunter went to the window and frowned.

  I sank to a seat on the floor in the corner. “What is it?”

  He shook his head. “I’m not sure. I thought I saw—never mind.”

  My nausea returned. All the blood rushed out of my head, and my body shook. I put my head between my legs, praying to God I could just calm down. I heard Hunter sit down beside me. He put one arm around me, his other hand holding the gun and pointed at the door. He pulled me closer. “It’s going to be okay,” he said into my hair. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

  I nodded as tears stung my eyes. “And who’s going to protect you?”

  He scanned the room, visually securing all entrances. “I guess you’ll have to.”

  “Deal,” I said.

  “That’s my girl,” he said again.

  We sat still. I struggled to stay calm, but he was a rock. His eyes never left the door, his focus as sharp as a surgeon’s scalpel. After another few minutes, when it became clear no further danger would manifest, he pulled out his phone, gun still hel
d high, and dialed 911. Then he called Voltaire, who said he’d smooth things out with the locals—cop to cop—and get the next flight out. He’d be with us in a few hours. Hunter didn’t let loose of me until we heard sirens.

  A contingency of Sûreté du Québec police officers took us to safety, surrounding us on our way to their cars. We passed the limo, and I spotted a blanket-covered body slumped in the front seat, an emerald green cap flipped upside down near the wheel. Hunter pulled me closer, trying to spare me the sight. But I’d had enough—enough fear, enough anger, enough bodies. I felt dullness, an emotional emptiness sweep through me. Why was this happening? Revenge? It couldn’t be just that; this wasn’t a single act of vengeance but a blood-thirsty spree. Nestor had as much as said it: No innocent person brings on this much hatred. What had Jake done that could cause all this? “Nestor was right,” I murmured as the patrol car pulled away.

  Hunter leaned closer, pulling me up against him. “What did you say?”

  My jaws ached with exhaustion. “I was remembering something Nestor said.”

  “You saw him too?”

  I looked up at him. “Saw who?”

  “Nestor. I thought I saw him out the window back there. He was in the distance, but—”

  A scream of fury erupted out of me. I kicked the back of the front seat. “That son of a bitch! She warned me! I was so fucking stupid!”

  The two policemen in the front whirled around, the one in the passenger seat drawing his gun. “What the hell—” he said.

  Hunter pulled me back, pinning my arms to my sides. “She’s all right. I’ve got her. Madison, calm down. Come on, Angel.” He turned me into his body, freeing one hand to caress my hair, rocking me and making “shhh” sounds.

  I struggled against him as my mind shrieked in rage. “They didn’t have to die! Don’t you see?” Then the fight drained out of me as suddenly as it had erupted. Tears came, and I groaned, burying my face in his chest.

  Hunter cupped my chin. “Madison, look at me. You have to get control. You’re supposed to be protecting me, remember?”

  “I could have stopped this. Lilly warned me he was dangerous. I didn’t want to listen.”

  Locking eyes with me, Hunter scrubbed away my tears with his thumbs. “Lilly knew that Nestor tried to kill Jake?”

  “No.” My head pounded and my throat, raw with emotion, burned. “But she warned me that he had a grudge against Jake. And that I didn’t really know him. Why didn’t I listen?”

  Hunter looked off into the distance. “We’ll sort through this. We’ll get him.” He looked down at me. “And I won’t let him hurt you.”

  “It doesn’t matter about me! Don’t you get it? If I’d gone with you from the beginning, no one else would’ve died.” I could barely speak now for the pain. I just wanted to crawl away, to hide. “But I had to be so fucking smart. It’s my fault.”

  “Stop it!” he barked. “It’s not your fault. You didn’t pull any triggers, you didn’t plant any bombs. Nestor did. It’s his fault. And we’re going to stop him. Do you hear me?”

  I fell into his arms. “I don’t care anymore! I want to go home. You were right. I can’t do this. I can’t! Please, I want to go home!”

  He sighed and held me tight. “It’ll be okay. It’ll be okay.”

  I lay curled up on my side on a cot in the back room of the local police station. For the last two hours, I’d been a zombie. Emotionally and physically exhausted, I’d tried to answer questions, the police bearing down hard, pushing for clarity that I just couldn’t muster. Hunter put an end to it, surging forward like a lion, his baleful glares and tensed muscles getting me the time-out I needed. Thus, I’d been allowed a half-hour rest, while in the rooms outside Hunter liaised between Voltaire on the phone and the local police in person.

  As I lay there, Jake’s earlier warning echoed in my ear, “The best, the most dangerous lie is that last one, the one that lets them pull the trigger, the one that says ‘he deserves it.’ Delusional fuckers like that, they’ll do anything. And you’ve got to know them when you see them. Or I promise you, girl, you’ll be dead.” That last phrase resonated in my mind: you’ll be dead. But it wasn’t me who’d ended up dead. Others had. So many people had died in the last two days, all because I didn’t know a delusional liar when I saw him.

  I curled up tighter. There was now a full-out hunt on for Nestor. Voltaire had confirmed that no one could find him in Chicago. He seemed to have disappeared into the air.

  But he hadn’t. The man I’d once trusted lurked somewhere nearby. He’d tried to kill Jake and had killed Mr. Keeper and the chauffeur. He’d killed Lathos and Tina, and, all the while, he’d been trying to kill me.

  That bone-deep despondence, born of the sure knowledge of betrayal and of the anger and shame it evoked, shook me to the core. And what if I’d gone with him at the canal? I closed my eyes. I’d be dead. But Tina would be alive. And the chauffer, I didn’t even know his name. Did he have a family? Kids? Grandkids? Who else would Nestor kill to get to me?

  I closed my eyes. Despair sapped my will and my strength, leaving my limbs too heavy to move and my mind trapped in a loop of guilt and anguish.

  A thought crept its way through the blackness: If I let him kill me, would he stop? Is that so unreasonable a thing for the universe to ask of me? Oh, make it stop. Please, make it stop.

  The door creaked open. I lifted my head.

  “Lilly,” I said hoarsely. “Has Voltaire arrived, then?”

  Despite civilian clothes—jeans and a red plaid shirt over a gray t-shirt—she looked stiff and authoritative, from her polished boots to the small bun knotted at the nape of her neck. Her somber expression said everything. There seemed no fight left in her either, no fire. She was just as exhausted as I was, and I could tell that she, too, wanted it all to be over.

  Lilly closed the door quietly behind her, as if any loud noise would make me crumble into pieces. I couldn’t blame her; my eyes felt swollen to golf-ball size, and I could barely talk for the pain in my throat. One of the police had given me a white cotton uniform shirt, but I still felt cold. I sat up and rubbed my arms.

  I said, “Are you here to help them find Nestor? Or try to talk him in?”

  She shook her head, her face etched with disappointment. “It’s beyond repair now. We just have to do what we have to do.” She stared at me for a moment and then rubbed her hands together briskly. “You need to come with me. I’m supposed to get you safely to the airport.”

  “Aren’t I special?” I said apathetically. “This is my fault, you know? I led him up here.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I have Nestor’s phone. It has a GPS locator service. That’s how he found me.”

  She shrugged. “Any cop can find a way to do that. Don’t feel bad about it.”

  “But I led him to Tina.” I struggled against the overwhelming weight of my guilt.

  Lily crossed the room and knelt at my feet, resting her hand on my own. She sighed, as if she couldn’t figure out what to say to comfort me. “We have to go. He’s still out there.”

  My head shot up. “They found him?”

  “I meant he’s probably close. He’s followed you this far and won’t stop until it’s over.”

  I hugged myself, shivering. “He’s not going to stop until either he’s dead or I am, is he?”

  She stared at me, lips pursed. “We’re taking multiple cars. Voltaire’s already at the airport, and there are Canadian cops waiting in ambush in case Nestor follows us. There will be cars around us at a distance. Hunter’s already started out. We have to go.”

  I shook my head. Behind these four walls was safety. “I’m not leaving.”

  She took me by the elbow. “You have to.”

  I shook her off. “No!”

  Anger flared in her eyes. She turned away, and when she turned back her expression seemed set with resolve. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to be the one to tell you. You’ve been through enough
. But I have to make you understand that no one’s safe until he’s caught. He’ll get to anyone to get to you. He already has.”

  Like a lit match, the urge to fight flared in me. But I spit on it. Enough! Damn it, Madison, don’t lie to yourself anymore. You’re a spoiled, elitist child, just like Hunter says. How many people have died because of you? Will you lead Nestor to more? “I won’t go.”

  She stared into my eyes, her mouth set in grim determination. “Jake’s dead.”

  My ears roared. My knees buckled. I sat down hard on the concrete. My mouth moved but nothing came out. No! I felt my chest constrict and my mouth went dry. I groaned and pulled my knees up to my chest, rocking myself, my eyes shut tight. Please, God. No. Please, please!

  Lilly strode over and hauled me into a sitting position. “Nestor told the guy guarding Jake that he was there to relieve him. It looks like he smothered Jake as soon as the guard left. You need to realize that nothing is going to stop Nestor. Our best chance is to get you out of this country and into a place where we have control! We have to go now!”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know what to do! If I leave, everyone with me will be in danger. Mr. Keeper, Tina, the chauffeur—they were killed because they were near me.”

  “So, you’re just going sit here and let him go after your friends to flush you out? Who do you think he’ll go after next? Hunter? Zach? Your mother?”

  I stared at her, incredulous, terrified. She’s right. Until Nestor’s caught, everyone around me is in danger. And yet, the sickening truth was that as much as I feared for the people I loved, I was even more terrified to expose myself. I closed my eyes, trying to think of a way out. But I knew I had no choice. I swallowed hard, scrubbing away the tears. “All right. I’ll go.”

  Lilly helped me stand, then led me to the door. Rather than turning toward the front of the station, we turned left. “This way, out to the parking lot in the back,” she said.

  When we got to the rear door, she motioned me back, peering out ahead of us. “Keep your head down and follow close. Got it?”

  “Yes.” That sickening sensation of mortal fear tumbled in my stomach again.