Ford Security

by Clara Kendrick

  “You boys got names?” she questions with a seductive bite into her lower lip. “I mean, of course you do…”

  “No talking,” the second man says—the one who’s bulkier and with longer hair, with eyelids that cover half of his blue eyes.

  “What about you?” She nods at the first man—I’ll refer to him as Hazel and the other as Blue. “Do you have a name?”

  Hazel cocks his head towards Blue, like he’s seeking permission to speak. “You’re not supposed to be talking.” He wets his lips and averts his attention so that he’s staring blankly ahead.

  “Tell me your name and I’ll shut up,” she continues to press on, clearly stepping over her boundaries and I almost want to cup my hand over her mouth before she can get herself into trouble, but she’s a big girl and I reckon that I know what she’s trying to do. “It’s just a name.”

  “It’s Matthew,” he says flatly, catches a quick glance of her, and then pretends otherwise. “Are we done talking now?”

  “You know, Matthew?” She takes a careful step forward, putting Blue on high alert. He twists on his feet and steadies one finger on the trigger of his gun. “I’m a very rich woman and I can pay you twice what you’re being paid.”

  “This isn’t about the money,” Blue grunts out but it’s clear that he’s lying. I know the type of man he is. He has allegiance to nobody. He’s simply a hired man. “Stop talking.”

  If I know Lola at all—which I think I have a pretty good grasp on who she is by now—then I know that she’s not going to stop anything just because a man with a gun tells her to stop. She likes to pretend she’s not strong and brave, but she’s the strongest woman I’ve ever known.

  “I’m not talking to you,” she says flatly and makes sure her gaze is affixed squarely on Matthew. “I’m talking to him and I think I have something I can sell you.”

  “What’s that?” Matthew cocks his head to her, curiosity glistening in his eyes.

  “A little bit of money.” She shrugs. “It’s in my car and I can take you there to get it.”

  “Nobody is leaving this room,” he responds and swallows a gulp in his throat. He passes a quick look to the man standing beside him and then shifts his attention back to Lola. “But my curiosity has been piqued. How much money?”

  Blue narrows his eyes at Matthew. “What the hell are you doing, Matt?”

  “I’m making a deal.”

  “Absolutely not,” Blue stammers and twists on his feet to scold the taller man. “You and I have been in this together from the very beginning. You’re my brother and I’m not going to let you do something stupid—”

  “You’re right, you’re my brother,” he responds quietly, almost like he’s trying to whisper, but I can clearly hear every word they’re saying to each other. “And you’re not going to do anything stupid to stop me.”

  Blue rolls his eyes and then raises the gun to aim squarely at Lola’s head. He takes a careful step forward all the while making sure to keep enough safe distance away from us.

  My blood begins to boil and if he even thinks about pulling that trigger, I need to be ready to act. He laps his tongue over his bottom lip and then takes another step.

  “I don’t happen to agree with my brother, but I’m not going to say no to a little bit of extra cash.” He cocks the gun. “So tell me how much you’re offering.”

  “I’ve got a few million in my car,” she lies straight through her teeth, but if she’s good at anything, it’s lies and manipulation. I found that out firsthand all those months ago, but even if I believe she’s being honest with me now, I know she’s not being honest with these men. “Like I said, I’ll take you to the car.”

  “No.” He throws one hand outwards. “Give me your keys and I’ll go get it myself.”

  “That’s not going to happen.” She shakes her head incredulously. “Not only would that be foolish of me to do, I’d lose all my leverage and you could run off with my money after killing me, but the simple truth of the matter is that I had one of those nifty little fingerprint scanners implemented on my car and the way to unlock it is by me using my finger.”

  He grits his teeth and tenses his throat. “And why should I believe you have this money?”

  “Because…” She swallows. “I’m Lola Grimm. Seth Grimm’s daughter.”

  “Bullshit,” he mutters and rushes forward to press the barrel of the gun against her head, digging into her flesh.

  My body shifts before my mind even has time to process what’s happening, but I come to a dead stop when I feel the cold barrel of a gun pressed against my own head. I shift my head away slightly so that I can angle my eyes on Lola.

  “Why do you think Richard is holding us here?” She swats Blue’s hand away like a true badass, although that probably wasn’t the best course of action in the moment. He seems to admire her bravery, though, as he takes a few measured steps back and drags one finger along the lining of his lips.

  He cocks a wild grin and nods. “Take my brother to your car.” He steps out of the way to allow Lola to rush past him and to join Matthew at his side. But just before they manage to slip out the front door, he continues, “But if you’re not back in three minutes, your boy toy here is going to be dead.”

  Lola passes me a quick solemn glance before nodding and then slipping through the open door. Matthew lowers his gun to his side as he follows her out of the room and closes the door behind him.

  Blue drops down into a wooden chair, straddling it backwards as he wags his gun at me. “That’s quite the girl you’ve got on your hands.”

  “You’re not telling me anything I don’t know.” I take a moment to laugh at this short moment where we can relate to each other. “How do you know Richard?” I question, changing the course of the conversation.

  “I honestly just met him today.” He drops the gun to dangle over the back of the chair, letting down his guard. “Said he needed security for a high-risk event. Said he was expecting two people to show up and ruin the party and I’m guessing those two people are you.”

  I raise my hands into the air as to let him know that I’m not a threat, which is obviously a lie, but I’m trying to connect to him so I can get him to let his guard down even more. That way, if Lola’s not back in the specified time frame, I won’t have to worry about him sending a bullet through my pretty brain.

  “I’m going to level with you,” I say, the back of my throat dry like I’ve swallowed gravel or something. “When my girl comes back into this room with that wad of cash, you need to get as far away from this building as possible.”

  “Interesting,” he muses out loud and leans slightly forward, eager to hear more. “What are you planning to do?”

  “Trust me when I say you don’t want to be around when everything goes down.”

  “You’ve got my attention.” He pushes himself backwards off the chair and climbs to his feet. He wags his finger at me and shakes his head. “You’re a dangerous man, aren’t you?”

  “Not as dangerous as the people on that rooftop.”

  “Those people?” He points to the ceiling and chuckles. “They’re harmless rich bastards. I’m not afraid of any of them.”

  “You should be.”

  He begins to step towards me with a deliberate pace. “I’m not.”

  The office door is thrown open, taking the both of us by surprise but by the time either one of us knows what’s going on, Lola has Matthew’s gun aimed squarely at the back of Blue’s head.

  I couldn’t be more proud of my girl than I am right now in the moment.

  “Drop the gun,” she demands, cocking the gun against the back of his head.

  His eyes rise to meet mine and there’s a pained, severe expression painted across his face. “Where the hell is my brother?” he questions as Lola grabs his hands and bounds them behind his back. “I swear to God if you—”

  “Relax,” she chides him before ripping him backwards and then turning him on his feet so he can walk out
of the room. “Your brother is just fine and you’re going to be just fine.”

  I smile for another moment or so before breaking away from the spot I’ve been standing in and following the two of them out the door. Lola looks both ways before pushing him towards the back door and then through it.

  We step out into the night air, our feet padding along the asphalt. I’d move to assist her, but she’s got things handled and I’m not going to lie: It’s very much a turn-on to see the way she’s managed to take control of the situation. She lets him walk on his own accord all the while making sure he knows she’s got the gun aimed at his back should he try something stupid.

  “Are you taking me somewhere to kill me?”

  “I told you to relax,” she scowls, and I can’t help but to chuckle under my breath. Remember what I said about levity? Yeah, that shit’s important in a time like this. I need a little bit of laughter right now because I honestly don’t see how we’re going to execute this plan anymore, knowing that the bombs have been deactivated on the rooftop.

  We come to the corner of the building and that’s when I decide it’s time to assist. I rush forward and throw Blue against the hard exterior as he attempts to walk out into the parking lot without checking to make sure the coast is clear. I’m sure he’d love for us to get caught walking him at gunpoint, but that’s not going to happen.

  Lola peeks around the corner and waits for two men in business suits to enter into the building before gesturing to me that the coast is clear.

  “Make your way to the white cargo van as fast as you can,” I whisper in his ear and though my voice is low, it’s clearly wrapped in the subtext of a threat.

  He groans before pushing away from the wall and stepping out into the parking lot. I’m on high alert, my eyes shifting at the scenery all around us as I make sure the coast is clear and that nobody can see us.

  I think back to our time on the rooftop and remind myself that there is no clear view of the parking lot since the view is hidden by the air conditioning units and back-up generators.

  We finally make our way to the van and Blue rushes to get a good look inside through the windshield. He gets a glimpse of his brother passed the hell out in the passenger seat. And just as he’s about to knock on the window, Lola cuts in front of me and cracks him in the skull.

  He goes down for the count almost immediately—he’s nowhere near as hard as he thinks he is. He’ll be out for a good hour or so and that should be plenty of time. I drop down onto the ground to drag his body along the hard ground while Lola opens the back doors for me.

  I push his limp body inside before tying his hands behind his back using rope and then close the door and turn to Lola with an exasperated breath.

  She glances down at her watch and sighs, wipes the sweat from her brow. “The party’s about to start and we already took the entire explosives supply from the factory—”

  “And we don’t have time to find more.” I drag my open palms over my face, grit my teeth and pound my fist against the van, eliciting a painful crack from my knuckles.

  Her eyes drop to the ground, searching for something as she tries to think. And then she looks up to me with a flat expression. “We don’t need explosives to take these men down.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  She nods her head and slowly but surely, a smile passes over her lips. She’s definitely up to something and I’m dying to know what.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  LOLA

  As soon as the elevator doors rip open, I race out and down the hallway as fast as I can. And though there's no air conditioning in the entire building right now, it's like I can feel a gentle breeze wrapping around my body, but maybe that’s because I'm running so fast. I'm sweating and my chest is heaving, but I'm also running out of time and I know that I can't stop for anything.

  My heart beats against my chest and then threatens to beat right out of it. It's beating so fast that I'm almost terrified I could have a heart attack at any given moment.

  But I keep going. Keep racing towards the inevitable.

  I don't know why I didn't think about it before but there's another option to take all of these men down. Perhaps the reason why it never crossed my mind was because I was too filled with bloodlust. I was too busy focusing on not only destroying their lives but ending them. As retribution, perhaps, for all of their sins.

  And the total sins of all of the men standing on the rooftop right now as Richard takes the stage is probably too high to count. It's an astronomical number. Up there are some of the worst men in the world, and the worst of all the men I’ve ever known. Some of them are even worse than my father.

  And that's saying something because my father was a terrible man. Not once did he ever care about who he had to step on or who he had to destroy, nor did he ever think twice about ending someone's life if it suited his purpose. If something got him farther ahead in life, he had no problem doing whatever the hell he had to do to make sure he got what he wanted.

  And he always got what he wanted until the moment someone put a bullet into his head, finally ending his life. And someday I'll figure out who that person was and I'll seek out vengeance upon them. It wasn't their place to take away my right to kill my own father. I know how terrible that sounds and I don’t care.

  At the very end of the hall of the seventh floor there is an office that used to belong to my father, though it’s probably long abandoned like most of the rooms in the building. And they’ll stay abandoned against Richard’s wishes.

  Inside that office are secrets capable of bringing down everyone my father ever associated himself with. There are two glass doors with my father's name printed on the glass. I reach for the door and try to pull it open but it's locked. That's not going to stop me though. Nothing is going to stop me right now.

  I spin on my feet and look at my surroundings. And out of the corner of my eye, I notice Zach looking at me with confusion written all over his face. I can read him now, almost like an open book.

  I don't pay him much attention though. Not right now because there are more important things to deal with. I locate a fire extinguisher hidden behind a pane of glass and rush to it. Using my elbow and nothing more, I shatter the glass and grab the extinguisher before rushing back to my father’s office and launching the heavy object through the glass door.

  Before the glass can even shatter to the ground, I'm climbing through the opening I've made with the fire extinguisher. And behind me, I hear Zach’s feet crunching against the broken glass.

  I take a quick glance around the room and though it looks mostly the same as it always had before, it's been cleaned out. It's a sterile environment with nothing more than a desk and cabinets remaining, with the only evidence my father ever owned the place being the words written on the broken glass door.

  Gone are the pictures of my father, my mother, and myself. There were never any pictures in his office of my sister because for all intents and purpose, she didn’t exist. She hid her life in the darkness once we reached a certain age. I used to believe it was because she wanted nothing to do with this life, but as it turns out, she was simply waiting for her chance to strike.

  It’s beyond fitting that in the wake of my father's death—his fake death, anyways—that he was basically erased from this own life. And in the intervening months since he first died—again I'm talking about his fake death—there has been a power struggle to try and claim what was rightfully his.

  The only legacy he really left behind is the infighting of his people as they try to claim his money and his power. And that's why they're all here today. That's why Richard is here, to assemble all of the associates into one room so he can rule with an iron fist. And in the twisted delusions of his own mind, after the night is over, he will no doubt be the new man in charge.

  Not if I have anything to say about it.

  “Are you going to tell me what we're doing here?" Zach questions from behind me, still clearly confused.
It's not like I blame him for being confused because I haven't even come close to telling him why we’re here. The only clue he has is that I said that there's another way to take these people down. Other than that, he's running on nothing. "Lola!"

  I crane my head over my shoulder to look at him, glare right at him, but I don't answer his question before turning back around and standing behind my father's desk. I reach underneath the desk and find what I'm looking for. There's a small, tiny trigger in the corner crevice.

  I click it.

  And then, I race back around the desk and pass Zach.

  “What the hell are you looking for?" he questions me with a growing sense of agitation in his voice.

  Still though, I don't answer his question, not because I don't want to but because my mind is focused elsewhere. There's another switch in this room and I'm trying to remember where it is. I stop in place and spin around in slow circles as memories begin to flood my imagination.

  I've spent so much of my life in this office building and in this very room. I should know it like the back of my hand but with all of my father's possessions gone, it's like I'm looking at a blank slate. I've hit a roadblock and I can't find what I'm looking for and the longer it takes, the more frustrated I get. I drag one hand through my hair, calming my slick locks as I try to think harder.

  And that's when it all clicks into place. I race to the large windows that hang just behind the desk. And I drop down to my knees and pop the plates off the silver electrical outlet. From behind me, I can see and feel Zach's shadow hovering over me before he, too, drops to his knees and looks straight ahead at the open electrical circuit. And I can hear him gasp just slightly when I go to reach my finger inside.

  And there is the switch.

  I click that one too.

  From behind me, I can hear moving parts from within the walls. I rush to the far right wall of the office and caress the wall with my hand until a partition slides out of the way.

  And I pray under my breath that whoever cleaned out this office didn't find this particular partition. My father was a paranoid man, not that I blame him, but it was because of his paranoia that he often hid away secrets on all the people he associated with.