by Roxie Rivera
“Too late for that,” Marley said as she turned into the Target shopping center. “Her husband put her and the baby at risk the second he started his illegal bullshit. Honestly, I’m surprised they haven’t been hurt yet. He’s obviously having some sort of money issues. That probably means he owes his Chinese counterparts. I don’t know a lot about them, but I would imagine they wouldn’t blink at offing a woman and her kid to send a message.”
“I hope you’re wrong.”
“I hope she was taken by the FBI yesterday. That’s the best thing that could happen to her and the baby.” Marley maneuvered through the packed parking lot and eventually found an empty space along the side of the store. She put her Prius in park and sat behind the wheel as if thinking. Finally, she said, “Get the phone out of my glove box.”
I did as she asked and handed it over. “What are you doing?”
“The right thing,” she said, her voice full of reluctance. “We’ll never be able to live with ourselves if something happens to her or the baby.”
Even though I could have stopped her, I sat silently as she powered up the cheap burner and dialed 9-1-1. My stomach was in knots as she waited for the dispatcher to answer. Would Ben find out? Would he be furious? Would he get in trouble? How bad would his punishment be? I thought of the stories I had read of chopped off fingers and grimaced. I’m sorry, Ben.
“Hi, um, I have a tip about a woman and her baby who are in serious danger. Her name is Margie Metcalfe. She has a young baby. Her husband is Gary Metcalfe. He’s involved in some shady money shit. The FBI raided their house yesterday morning. Her husband’s enemies are planning to kidnap her and the baby. Please protect them.”
Before the dispatcher could ask any questions, Marley ended the call and powered down the phone. She removed the battery and SIM card. Handing me the SIM card, she said, “When we get inside, go to the bathroom, wrap this in toilet paper and flush it. I’m going to dump these in the recycling bins up front.”
“Okay.”
“Do you keep burners?”
I shook my head. “Should I?”
“Yes.”
“Then I guess we should put that on our shopping list,” I remarked dryly.
“Not here,” she disagreed. “They would be easy to trace back to you. We’ll get some cash and go to a couple of different gas stations. You should keep a mix of different brands and carriers. Never pay with your card. Always cash. Don’t buy more than one at a time.”
“Right,” I said, committing her lesson to memory.
Marley touched my hand and held my gaze. “If anyone finds out about the 9-1-1 call, you tell them it was me. I’m not afraid to go toe to toe with any of them. Spider will never let anyone hurt me.”
“Jesus, Marley.” I closed my eyes and wondered what the hell my life had become. “Am I doing the right thing?”
She shrugged. “It’s not my business to tell you how to live your life. You can’t help who you love. In the end, you have to decide what you can accept and what you can’t.”
Neither of us mentioned the possible baby complication. If I was pregnant, if I had a baby with Ben, even if I someday decided I couldn’t take the crime family connection, I would never be able to break free. He would always be in our child’s life—and so would his illicit activities.
Marley squeezed my hand. “We’ll figure it out, Aston. We always do. You’re not alone, okay? No matter what happens. We’ll always have each other.”
Feeling emotional, I hugged her tight. “You’re the best bitch ever.”
She laughed and hugged me back. “You’re the best sister from another mister.”
After we hugged it out, we got out of the car and headed into the store. Instead of sidestepping the empty carts left on the sidewalk by inconsiderate shoppers, we grabbed two of them and pushed them inside. I did as Marley had instructed, seguing into the bathroom to dispose of the SIM card before rejoining her at the Dollar Spot.
Our longstanding Sunday Target date wasn’t as fun as usual. We were more subdued as we pushed our carts through the Dollar Spot and then through the clothing and beauty aisles. We spent almost ten minutes trying to figure out which pregnancy test was the best and finally decided to get one of each—a digital and one with two pink lines—and a bottle of prenatal gummy vitamins.
Eventually, we wandered into the home goods sections and hunted the end caps for bargains and clearance. My gaze wandered away from the soft throw blankets on clearance to the baby section. Seeing the baby gear made my heart do a weird little flip. I had always wanted to be a mom someday. It had always seemed like something I would do after I turned thirty, but now, here I was, twenty-four and facing the very real likelihood that my plans had drastically changed.
Unable to help myself, I pushed my cart toward the baby aisles. My hand glided over the smooth gray rail of a crib before testing the firmness of a crib mattress next to it. I stared at all of the different pieces of gear on display. Bouncers, swings, high chairs, exersaucers, walkers, strollers… My head was spinning by the time I reached the end of the aisle. Who knew babies needed so many things?
When I turned down the car seat aisle, I gawked at all of the straps and latches. They looked like the sort of thing an astronaut would ride in on a trip to Mars, not a seat for a baby. Some of them were part of travel systems—whatever the hell that was—and others seemed to be made for bigger kids. How long did a kid have to sit in one of those things?
The next aisle wasn’t any more reassuring. There were shelves of formula from at least seven different brands, each one offering multiple options. Milk based. Soy based. Powder. Premade. Organic. Non-GMO. Sensitive. Professional. Advanced. For gassiness. For spit-up. For neuro support. For colic. Hypoallergenic.
Across the aisle, there were breast pumps and breastfeeding gear. I looked at one of the pumps on display and cringed. It looked like a torture device. It took me back to a dairy field trip I had taken as a kid. I remembered watching the farmer hook those huge silver milking tubes onto the cow’s teats. Holding the human version made my stomach roll. How bad was that going to hurt?
That thought spurred worries of childbirth. I couldn’t even imagine what kind of hell that was. I would definitely be one of the moms who got pain relief the second I stepped into the hospital. I didn’t want to feel anything. I wanted to be blissfully unaware of my body being stretched to the breaking point.
As I left the formula aisle, I ended up in the section lined with layettes. I had bought baby clothes for friends or coworkers a few times. I had always just grabbed something ridiculously cute and called it a day. Standing here now, surrounded by pinks, blues, pale greens and sunny yellows, I felt an overwhelming urge to touch the soft fabrics. The newborn outfits were impossibly small. The socks were adorable, and the shoes were the sweetest little things I had ever seen.
“You okay?” Marley asked gently. She had obviously seen me going into the baby section, but she hadn’t followed at first. She must have known I needed some space.
“Yeah,” I said, voice thick with emotion. My eyes started to prickle with heat, and I blinked back tears I wasn’t ready to shed. Inhaling a deep, steadying breath, I said, “I think I’m ready to go.”
“Okay. Sure.”
Grateful for Marley’s friendship, I followed her to the front of the store and picked a short line. She moved through the checkout line next to mine and finished a few minutes before me. When we met up again, we piled our bags into my cart and gave hers to an employee straightening them out by the entrance.
“You’re going to be a great mom,” Marley said as we neared her car. “Whether that’s sometime later this year or in a decade,” she clarified. “You will be an amazing mother.”
“How can you know that?” I asked, fearful that I would end up just like my mother.
“Because you’re an amazing friend,” she answered as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “You’re selfless, caring and kind. You’re generous. Yo
u love with your whole heart. You do the right thing even when it sucks.” She unlocked the trunk so we could load our bags. “Deep down inside, you know that you told me about Margie and her baby because you were worried about them. You knew I wouldn’t be able to let it go. You couldn’t make the call yourself because you were conflicted about betraying Ben, but you made sure I would. You did the right thing, even if it was hard.”
She was right, of course. She was always right. She could see through me and read me better than anyone, maybe even better than Ben.
Not sure what to say and deciding I didn’t need to say anything because she had already said it best, I took hold of the cart. “I’ll take this back.”
“Sure.”
As she closed the trunk, I turned around with the cart and pushed it across the parking lot to the closest cart corral. On my walk back to her car, I paused to let an SUV pass. I hadn’t noticed the minivan next to us before, but I could see there was someone sitting in the middle row. The van was really close to the passenger door, and I hoped I wouldn’t bump it when I tried to get into my seat.
Before I had even touched the handle of my door, the sliding door of the idling minivan opened quickly behind me. Startled, I turned to see who it was, but I wasn’t fast enough. A heartbeat later, a man had his arm across the front of my throat. He pressed his face to my ear and hissed, “You scream. I’ll kill you.”
Certain he was going to kill me anyway, I fucking screamed. I screamed like a virgin in a horror film running from a machete wielding psycho at a summer camp.
He swore angrily and jammed something hard under my shirt and into the sensitive skin of my underarm. A second later, a painful shock stole my breath. I gasped and jerked as the electricity rocketed through my body. Gripped with intense pain, I sagged in his arms as my vision tunneled to black.
Marley screamed, and her voice faded into nothing along with my consciousness.
Chapter Thirteen
With nothing helpful to report, Ben strode into the club, careful to avoid the power cords and construction equipment in his path. The boss’s newest acquisition had been undergoing renovations for almost a month, including the parking lot. What had been an ugly eyesore on the corner of a busy street was now hidden behind tall evergreens that would shield the patrons from prying eyes and appease the neighboring business owners who weren’t thrilled to have a topless joint right across the street or next door.
He crossed the floor, edging along the newly revamped main stage and then following the line of the bar top to the door that led to the back of house. There were a few familiar faces in the hallway, and he nodded at them before stopping outside Besian’s office. He rapped his knuckles against the door and waited.
“Come in.”
He stepped inside the office and shut the door behind him. Besian removed his reading glasses, setting them aside and out of the way as if embarrassed that he needed them. He closed the folder in front of him and leaned back in his chair. “Well?”
“Nothing.” Ben dropped into the chair across from the boss. “Not even the Russians have been able to find them.”
Besian swore in Albanian before he rubbed his face and sighed. “I’m waiting for Kostya. He was checking in with one of his little spiders. He thinks the FBI probably picked up the wife and baby.”
Trying to set him at ease, Ben said, “Is it really that bad for us? We’re not involved in whatever the hell Gary, Paul and Calvin were doing. We were victims in their crimes.”
“That won’t stop the police from dragging us all in and sweating us,” Besian replied. His hand moved to his chest, touching the spot where he had been shot. Was he in pain? Had it become a nervous tic to touch it? To remind himself he was alive?
“No, it won’t,” Ben agreed.
The door opened suddenly, and Ben jumped to his feet, instinctively moving in front of Besian. It was only Kostya, but Ben didn’t relax. It was impossible to feel at ease around the infamous Russian cleaner. Ben had witnessed Kostya working on a guy once, and the experience had left him violently shaking and sick. Just the smell of leather or the sound of metal clanging against metal would take him right back to that night in a soundproofed storage building. Until then, he had never realized how much a man could bleed without dying.
Slamming the door behind him, Kostya stormed across the room. “You have a fucking problem.”
“Tell me something I don’t know,” Besian replied dryly.
“This.” Kostya held up his phone and tapped the screen.
“Hi, um, I have a tip about a woman and her baby who are in serious danger. Her name is Margie Metcalfe. She has a young baby. Her husband is Gary Metcalfe. He’s involved in some shady money shit. The FBI raided their house yesterday morning. Her husband’s enemies are planning to kidnap her and the baby. Please protect them.”
Ben slanted a stealthy glance toward Besian who had clearly recognized the voice just as he had. Marley. He bit back the growl of frustration that threatened to erupt. She could have only gotten that information from Aston. She betrayed us.
He couldn’t blame her for trying to help her coworker. She had known Margie much longer than she had known him, after all. The woman had a baby and was innocent in all the shit her husband done. Aston had a soft heart and telling Marley was something he should have anticipated. He hadn’t thought it needed to be said. He had been certain she understood that was a secret she needed to keep.
“Why is your girlfriend calling 9-1-1, Ben?” Kostya pinned him with a furious glare.
“It’s not Aston,” Besian corrected roughly. He sat forward in his chair. “It’s Marley.”
“Oh, that’s fucking great,” Kostya snarled. “Now, we have two of them running their mouths?”
“Easy,” Ben warned, not in the mood to hear the cleaner going after Aston or Marley.
“Easy? What the hell were you thinking telling your girlfriend about our plan?”
“He didn’t,” Besian interjected. “I told her.”
“Have you lost your fucking mind?” Kostya reacted with shock and anger.
“No, but you have if you think you can come into my office and talk to me like that,” Besian snarled, his usually contained temper flaring dangerously.
Kostya clenched his jaw and turned his attention to Ben. “You need to get your girl under control—or else.”
Ben bristled. “Are you threatening her?”
“If it means she’ll get in line and do what she’s told? Fucking yes.”
“Hey, hey, hey,” Besian said, jumping up from his chair and rushing to step between them. “Cut it out. Both of you. We are not going to brawl in my office.”
Before Ben could protest, a scuffle in the hallway gained his attention. Besian and Kostya heard it, too. Shoulder to shoulder, they turned toward the door and the raised voices of the guards. They were trying to prevent someone from coming into the office, but another voice shouted, “Houston PD, open up!”
Kostya let loose a streak of Russian, each phrase nastier than the last. Wordlessly, Besian strode to the door and yanked it open. Not even bothering to fake politeness, he asked, “Santos, what the fuck do you want?”
“Him.” Eric pointed at Ben.
“Me?”
“Why?” Besian demanded.
“Have you heard from Aston in the last couple of hours?” Eric asked, ignoring Besian’s query.
“No.” He reached for his back pocket and retrieved his phone. There weren’t any messages from her. “She and Marley were headed out to Target. They go every Sunday. It’s their thing.”
Eric’s usual hardass expression softened. “I’m sorry, Ben, but I have to show you something that’s going to upset you.”
Fear gripped his heart. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Besian and Kostya exchange concerned glances. Like him, they knew that Eric wouldn’t apologize or try to be nice unless he had earth shattering news to share.
Eric turned his phone toward Ben. “We had a bu
nch of 9-1-1 calls coming from a Target parking lot. This is what we found on the security feeds.”
Ben’s heart raced, and he swallowed anxiously as Eric tapped the play triangle on his phone screen. At first, Ben didn’t notice anything unusual. It was almost a minute before Marley and Aston came into view with their Target cart. They seemed to be talking about something serious, maybe that phone call Marley had made earlier. They placed their bags in the trunk, and Aston pushed the cart to the corral while Marley got behind the wheel and started her car.
On her way back to the car, Aston seemed to turn her attention to the minivan idling in the space next to theirs. He couldn’t tell from the camera’s angle, but he thought there was someone in the middle row of seats. Just as that thought registered, the passenger door suddenly slid open and a man leapt out and grabbed Aston. She struggled and screamed.
Her attacker had something in his right hand. A gun? Aston screamed again and jerked wildly, as if being electrocuted. A stun gun? A Taser? She dropped like a sack of rocks, and her assailant threw her into the van, shoving her legs out of the way so he could close the door.
Like a wild hellion, Marley launched herself over the hood of her car and started wailing on the man who had hurt Aston. Kicking and scratching and slapping, she beat the hell out of him. The man reared back with his fist and slammed it right into her face. Ben winced as Marley flew back into the car, her face instantly bloodied. It was a horrific hit. She was a small woman, and the attacker was his size, strong enough to break her jaw if he had tapped her in just the right place.
The attacker snatched Marley up and jammed the device he held into her neck. She didn’t have much of a fight left in her, and she went down quickly. Blood poured from her face as the man picked her up and threw her into the van on top of Aston. He glanced around the parking lot and seemed to notice the small crowd watching and yelling. From the back of his pants, he pulled a gun and fired it into the air, dispersing the crowd. He got behind the wheel and raced out of the parking lot, disappearing from the camera’s view.