West of Sin

by Wesley Lewis

  Advance Praise for West of Sin

  “West of Sin blazes with page-turning tension, wit, exceptional dialogue, and affable characters.” — Foreword Reviews

  “Fans of zippy, high-tension thrillers with romantic and humorous elements will be enthralled by this fresh and original novel.” — BookLife Reviews (editor’s pick)

  “An explosive adventure that pays off repeatedly with nail-biting scenes that often manage to surprise.” — BestThrillers.com

  “A very impressive first novel . . . Lewis knows how to deliver plot twists, things most astute readers will not see coming . . . A rousing, well-researched thriller.” — Kirkus Reviews

  West of sin

  A Thriller

  Wesley S. Lewis

  Copyright © 2020 by Wesley S. Lewis

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without prior written permission.

  Red Granite Press llc

  4301 W. William Cannon Dr.

  Ste. B-150-222

  Austin, TX 78749-1487

  www.redgranitepress.com

  Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental unless otherwise stated in the Author’s Note & Acknowledgments.

  Jacket design/photographs © 2020 by Red Granite Press llc

  WEST OF SIN / Wesley S. Lewis — 1st ed.

  Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Lewis, Wesley Scott, 1980- author.

  Title: West of sin: a thriller / Wesley S. Lewis.

  Description: Austin, TX : Red Granite Press, 2020.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2019950130 | ISBN 978-1-7340157-0-6 (hardcover)

  | ISBN 978-1-7340157-1-3 (paperback) | ISBN 978-1-7340157-2-0 (ebook) | ISBN 978-1-7340157-3-7 (audiobook)

  Subjects: LCSH: Robbery--Fiction. | Kidnapping--Fiction. | Human

  trafficking--Fiction. | Organized crime--Russia (Federation)--Fiction. | Skydiving--Fiction. | Suspense fiction. | BISAC: FICTION / Thrillers / Suspense. | FICTION / Thrillers / Crime. | FICTION / Romance / Suspense. | FICTION / Women. | GSAFD: Suspense fiction.

  Classification: LCCPS3612.E9879 W47 2020 (print) | LCCPS3612.E9879

  (ebook) | DDC 813/.6--dc23.

  For Anna, Terry, and Gale, my biggest fans.

  “[Las Vegas] may not be the end of the world per se, but you can certainly see it from there.”

  ―Robin Williams

  West of Sin

  CHAPTER ONE

  Jennifer Williams’s tears had turned to anger about twenty miles back. She had no plan and no destination, just a basic need to keep putting miles between herself and that hotel room thick with the stench of sweat and betrayal.

  The past hour was a blur. She vaguely recalled running for the elevator and stumbling through the lobby. Her wits had returned to find her speeding through the Nevada desert in a stolen Chevy Traverse.

  Jennifer had forgotten to give Bryan the valet ticket after using his rental car to pick up the extra marketing flyers he’d insisted on ordering, but she’d remembered it when making her escape. For the first thirty miles or so, she simply drove, not considering where she was going, just trying her best to keep the shimmering lights of the Las Vegas Strip in her rearview mirror. When the city disappeared behind a mountain, she dried her eyes and started seeing red.

  One year had passed since their conversation in the lounge atop the Stratosphere Tower, one year since he’d confided in her that he thought his marriage was ending, twelve long months since she’d privately decided to wait for him.

  Jennifer wasn’t so naïve as to think Bryan had left his wife for her, but she had presumed his marriage was the only thing keeping them apart. In the four months since his separation, they had walked a fine line between friendship and something more, enjoying the occasional movie or dinner together but keeping things platonic so as to avert office gossip and avoid complicating his already sticky divorce.

  Now that the divorce was final, Jennifer had expected this trip to end—or preferably begin—with something a bit more intimate than the prolonged embraces they sometimes shared after a night out. What she’d gotten instead was the crushing realization that her hopes for the coming months—being in a real relationship by fall, introducing him to her family over the holidays, going someplace tropical for her fortieth birthday—were never going to come true.

  From some dark corner of her mind came the terrible thought that maybe he’d never wanted more, that he’d used her as an emotional placeholder.

  She pushed the thought away. This was not the time to question things she knew—or, at the very least, things she’d known an hour ago—to be true. She was buzzed from four rounds of drinks and punchy from ten hours spent pitching retail properties to bored tenant reps who cared more about the real estate beneath her skirt than about anything in New Wave’s portfolio. She was tired, she was lost, and to top it all off, the lace pattern on her expensive French panties—the kind made to be seen, not worn—had imprinted itself painfully on her backside. Comfort had not been her top priority when selecting her attire for the evening, and nothing she’d chosen was well suited to a long drive.

  For the first time since leaving the hotel, she took note of her surroundings, looking for any clue as to where she might be.

  Her rearview mirror reflected nothing but a black sea of desert. To the left and right, she saw more of the same. A couple of miles ahead, a single cluster of lights beckoned from the left side of the road.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  The conspicuous click-clack of her high heels on the tile floor made Jennifer wish she’d left the overpriced stilettos in the car and walked barefoot. Wearing a slinky black dress into a remote truck stop was uncomfortable enough without her shoes announcing her entrance.

  A quick glance at her surroundings eased her mind. The truck stop had only one customer, and he seemed oblivious to anything beyond the contents of the beverage case. She approached the front counter.

  The leather-skinned woman behind the register gave an uneasy smile, revealing two missing front teeth.

  Jennifer forced a smile of her own. “Excuse me, I seem to be a bit lost. Where are we in relation to Las Vegas?”

  The clerk sighed and, in a voice that suggested a pack-a-day habit, said, “You’re about an hour west of Vegas. Head east on 160 till you hit the interstate.” When Jennifer didn’t immediately respond, the woman added, “Just turn right out of the parking lot.”

  “Thanks.” Jennifer glanced around the store. “Where is your restroom?”

  “Restroom’s for customers only.”

  Jennifer took a deep breath and forced another smile. “I’m going to buy a cup of coffee.”

  “We’re out of coffee.”

  “Okay, I’ll buy something else.”

  “It’s out of order.”

  “What?”

  “We only got the one restroom,” said the clerk, “and it’s all plugged up.”

  Jennifer exhaled slowly. “Is there another gas station around here somewhere?”

  “Lots of ’em up the road in Pahrump.”

  “How far is that?”

  “About ten miles west. Just turn—”

  “Left out of the parking lot, I got it.” She turned away
from the cashier. “Thanks.”

  Jennifer didn’t need to pee so badly as to drive another ten miles in the wrong direction, but there was no way she could make it back to Las Vegas without caffeine. She worked her way to the back of the store, where the lone customer—a well-built man in a pair of khaki shorts and a blue polo shirt—was still studying the beverage case.

  She spotted a row of iced coffees and reached for the cooler door.

  The man in the blue shirt pivoted toward her. “Can I help you?”

  She hesitated. “Uh, no. Just getting a drink.”

  “What do you want?” He opened the case. “I’ll grab it for you.”

  Jennifer was tiring of these socially awkward desert dwellers. “Thanks,” she said, reaching into the case, “but I can manage.”

  As her hand came to rest on the glass bottle, she froze. Either the day’s stress was getting to her or something on the other side of the case had just moved. She peered between the shelves, trying to see into the unlit stockroom.

  Behind the row of beverages, a pair of eyes stared out of the darkness. She released the bottle and took a quick step back.

  She struggled to make sense of the eyes, which seemed to float in the darkness. Then she saw the gun barrel wedged between two rows of sodas, and the missing piece fell into place.

  In the dark stockroom behind the drinks, someone in a black ski mask was pointing a shotgun at her.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Jennifer screamed and stumbled backward, trying to put as much distance as possible between herself and the gunman inside the cooler.

  Twenty feet to her right, a door swung open, and another man in a ski mask stepped out of a small restroom, carrying a chrome-plated pistol.

  Still reeling, Jennifer tried to turn toward the front of the store. Her high heels skidded on the tile floor. She lost her footing and fell hard.

  Ignoring the pain in her tailbone, she used her hands and feet to scoot backward across the tile, not thinking about anything but escape. She kept kicking and pushing for a couple of seconds before realizing she’d backed into a row of shelves.

  The masked man from the restroom stopped at her feet and raised his pistol. Jennifer closed her eyes and waited for the bullet that would end it all.

  When the bullet didn’t come, she looked up at the man and waited for him to say something. He just stared at her. She followed his gaze down to her lap and saw that her dress had ridden up to her waist.

  Her expensive French underwear was meant to be seen, but not by him. She grabbed the hem of her dress and slid it down over her hips. With her modesty restored, she crossed her ankles and placed her hands in her lap. The man in the mask looked on without a word.

  From somewhere near the front of the store, a male voice bellowed, “Well, that worked for shit.”

  Jennifer looked in that direction, saw a masked man pointing a pistol at the back of the clerk’s head, and shuddered at the realization that he must have been hiding behind the counter the whole time.

  Somewhere on the other side of the shelves, a heavy door opened with a thud. A moment later, the man in the blue shirt rounded the end of the aisle with his hands raised, followed closely by the barrel of a shotgun—the one Jennifer had seen inside the beverage case—and the masked man who’d almost scared her to death.

  Without taking his eyes off Jennifer, the man holding her at gunpoint said, “I told you we should have grabbed her when she walked in.”

  “Fuck you, Al,” responded the man with the shotgun. “How was I supposed to know she’d look in the cooler?”

  The man guarding Jennifer turned and pointed his chrome pistol at the man with the shotgun. “Do I have to shoot you in the face? Is that what it’s going to take to get you to stop saying my name?”

  The man in the blue shirt took a slow step to the side, out of the potential line of fire.

  “Let it go,” called the man guarding the cashier. “I’m pretty sure everyone knows your name by now.”

  “I’m sorry,” said the man with the shotgun. “It just slipped out.”

  “Well, it’s been slipping out too goddamn much,” replied Al, turning his unsettling gaze back toward Jennifer. “And this is taking too goddamn long, and we’ve got too many goddamn witnesses.”

  “Maybe we ought to just bail,” said the man with the shotgun.

  “Maybe you shouldn’t have told us you know how to break into an ATM when you clearly don’t,” said Al.

  “All I said was that I’d broken into slot machines. Then you guys said that slot machines don’t hold enough cash. Then I said, ‘What about an ATM machine?’ and you guys got all excited. But this thing ain’t like no slot machine. It’s like a fucking safe.”

  “We don’t have time for your excuses. Just figure out a way to get the money out of the machine.”

  “Al’s right,” said the man behind the counter. “We need to get that money and get the hell out of here before anyone else shows up.”

  “Can I make a suggestion?” asked the man in the blue shirt.

  Al turned and pointed his gun at the man’s forehead. “If you’re going to suggest that we shouldn’t leave any witnesses, I’m starting to agree with you.”

  Jennifer was beginning to dislike the man in the blue shirt.

  “No,” said the man, unfazed, “I was going to suggest that, rather than focusing on getting the money out of the machine, you should focus on getting the machine out of the store.”

  “It’s bolted to the floor,” responded the man with the shotgun.

  “No it’s not,” said a raspy voice.

  All eyes turned toward the clerk.

  “I know,” she continued, “because they’ve moved it twice since I’ve been here.”

  Al glared at the man with the shotgun. “You didn’t even check to see if it was secured?”

  “What’s it matter? It ain’t gonna fit in the car.”

  “He’s right,” said the man guarding the cashier. “We can’t exactly strap it to the hood.”

  “Take my truck,” said the man in the blue shirt.

  Al’s eyes narrowed. “Truck?”

  “The white half-ton Ford parked out at the pump. It could carry at least six of those machines.”

  If this were a real estate transaction, thought Jennifer, these robbers would owe him a facilitator’s fee.

  “Where are the keys?” asked Al.

  The man glanced down at his khaki shorts. “Front right pocket.”

  Al stepped forward and, without breaking eye contact with the man, reached slowly into the pocket and pulled out a set of keys.

  He took a step back and glanced at his partner holding the shotgun. “Watch these two, and don’t do anything stupid.”

  Without waiting for a reply, he turned and ran to the front of the store. He paused at the door just long enough to scan the parking lot and tuck the chrome pistol into his waistband before sprinting outside.

  The man with the shotgun looked down at Jennifer, then back up at the man in the blue shirt, then down at Jennifer again.

  “Okay,” he said, “you two move up to the front of the store. And don’t try anything funny.”

  Jennifer wondered if he actually thought they might try something funny or if he’d said that because it felt like something a masked robber should say in such a situation. She had no intention of trying anything funny, and the man in the blue shirt clearly intended to cooperate.

  She pulled her feet under her, wincing at the pain in her bruised tailbone.

  The man in the blue shirt offered his hand. “Let me help you.”

  She accepted and the man hoisted her to her feet.

  His mouth formed a faint smile. “I bet now you wish you’d let me grab that dr
ink for you, huh?”

  “Now I wish I’d driven on to the next gas station,” she replied, not seeing any humor in it.

  The man with the shotgun motioned them forward with the barrel of the gun. “Get moving.”

  “Watch where you’re pointing that thing,” said the man in the blue shirt.

  “Just move.”

  The three of them walked to the front counter.

  “Okay,” said the man with the shotgun, “both of you get back there with—”

  Jennifer was pretty sure he was about to say the name of the man guarding the clerk, but he was interrupted by the tail end of a white pickup crashing through the glass doors at the front of the store.

  The tires squealed as the truck skidded across the tile floor. Jennifer turned away from the careening vehicle and closed her eyes, certain she was about to be crushed against the row of celebrity gossip magazines lining the front counter.

  As she braced for the truck’s fatal impact, she instead felt a pair of hands grab her by the waist and hoist her into the air. Suddenly she was hurtling headlong across the counter. She opened her eyes just in time to see the clerk and the other masked man jump back as she landed at their feet.

  She sat up and realized that the commotion had stopped. Peeking over the counter, she saw that the truck’s rear bumper had stopped less than a foot from the man in the blue shirt and the man with the shotgun. Al forced open the driver-side door and hopped out.

  “Are you fucking nuts?” screamed the man with the shotgun.

  “Shut up and go get the ATM,” said Al. “Both of you go. I’ll watch them.”