by JA Huss
When I look back at Ford his expression says it all. That look says he’s scared. That look says this shit is not pretend.
Ford’s got it all right now. A wife he loves and who loves him back. A beautiful baby to take care of. A big house in a quiet neighborhood filled with designer shit. A job working with all his favorite people. And if there’s one lesson the three of us have learned, the more you have, the more you have to lose.
It’s scary as fuck. And isn’t it better to have nothing? Isn’t it better to have nothing to lose than to have everything, and know it’s all gonna disappear?
I think it is.
“Rook’s testimony,” Ronin reminds us. “What’s she supposed to say when this guy says she chose to stay with Jon?”
Silence. What can she say?
“We’re so fucked,” I say. “She’s never gonna convince anyone of anything. Do you remember how many times we had to have her go over the details when we pinned all this shit on Abelli in the first place, Ford? And there was no one to cross-examine her.” I look over at Ronin and he’s pale. The truth of what we’re into is finally sinking in. For all of us. “Last fall, Ronin? That was just a statement. It was pre-school shit compared to what they’re gonna do to her next week when she takes the stand.”
“We only have one option,” Ford says. “She needs to tell the truth. Whatever the truth is about why she stayed, Ronin, that’s what she needs to say. That’s the only thing she’s got left. We need that jury to buy her story about Abelli and Jon one hundred fucking percent, otherwise we’re all going down. Otherwise all that shit she said about what happened in Boulder is back on the table. And if the jury decides we’re lying about what happened in Boulder, not only might this asshole walk, but the Feds might think we’re the ones behind all this shit. Not Jon. Not Abelli. Not that fuckup in Boulder. Us. And how fucking ironic would it be for us to get pinned with their dirty shit?”
We’re silent again. “What’s the truth, Ronin? Did she say why she stayed?” I hate to ask it—I mean, I’m on Rook’s side—but you know, when someone comes and says they want to save you from an evil monster, most people get on board with that.
I look over at him when he doesn’t answer.
“We could say she was psychologically traumatized,” Ford offers.
“She probably was,” I agree. “But that doesn’t make her a reliable witness. We need that jury to buy into a lot of fucking lies. A lot of fucking lies. And her name is on that property, Ronin. She was half owner of the property where those girls were being sold. And then this witness comes in and says he tried to help her get away and she said no?”
I’m quiet to see if Ford will fill in the blanks for me, but he doesn’t. “Ronin.” I wait until he looks up at me. And God, it breaks my heart to see him so defeated, but he needs to hear the truth. “She’s going to jail if that guy testifies.” I look over at Ford and he’s got his hand over his mouth as he listens. “She’s going to jail for a long fucking time. We need a goddamned miracle at this point.”
Ronin pulls his phone out and texts someone. He waits for a reply and then sits back on the couch. A few seconds later there’s a knock on the door.
“Come in,” Ronin calls.
Rook peeks her head in, then swallows hard like she knows what’s coming. She slips in and closes the door behind her. Ronin stays silent and even I’m beginning to squirm.
“Should I sit?” Rook asks.
Ronin looks up at me. “We can’t just sit back and take it, Spencer. We gotta try, at least. So she’s gonna talk and you’re gonna find the holes. Got it?”
I nod.
Ronin turns back to Rook. “I want all of it this time, Rook. Not the bits and pieces you’ve told us so far. OK?”
She looks terrified, but Ronin grabs her hand and pulls her onto his lap. “Gidget, we’re on your side. OK? We’re not gonna judge you. But we need you to be honest with us, because if we don’t get this perfect, we might all go to jail.”
He stresses all and when I look over at Ford I can tell he’s picturing what might happen to Ash and Kate if he goes away to prison. At least I’ve kept Ronnie out of this. If I go away, yeah, she’ll be upset. But she’s independent. She’s a fighter. A survivor. Ronnie will be sad, but she’ll be able to move on. She won’t fall into a depression and be left with only her criminal family to rely on. And Rook in prison? God, she’ll never make it.
“Understand?” Ronin asks Rook.
She buries her face in his neck and nods.
“Now,” Ronin says as he lifts her off his lap and sets her down on the couch next to him. “Tell us why you stayed when that guy said he’d help you. Were you pregnant?”
“No,” she says in her small, scared voice. “It was after I lost the baby.”
“Were you scared?”
She shakes her head again. “I was scared,” she says, contradicting her body language.
That’s not gonna fly at all. The jury will pick up on things like that. The defense will jump on that shit so fast. And it’s intuitive. Whether people know it or not, they pick up on the lies with these small cues.
“I was scared,” she continues, “that Jon would find me if I left. Come take me back and be even more violent. But the truth is—” She looks over at Ford, then me. “I was embarrassed that I was in this situation to begin with. I was embarrassed that I let him turn me into that person I was back then. I was ashamed that I was part of this sleazy underground world of sex slaves. Even if those girls were there willingly in the beginning and I was duped into believing they were all there because they liked that stuff, I was ashamed to be part of it.”
Ronin looks over at me.
I just shake my head no. Not good enough. “I get it, Ronin. It makes sense. And they can call in experts to testify that Rook’s reaction was normal, because it is. After years of abuse like that, her mind was not right. But we don’t want experts convincing the jury she’s OK. We need Rook convincing the jury she’s OK. We need them to trust her. And this explanation makes her look weak and stupid.”
We sit in silence. Each of us thinking about her mistakes. About all our mistakes.
“I thought he’d do the same things to me,” Rook admits a few seconds later. “I thought that guy was lying and he was gonna take me somewhere far away and sell me. Or rape me. And yeah, Jon was a monster. But he was the monster I knew. He made me have sex with him and he beat the shit out of me, but he never let anyone else abuse me. So I thought this cop friend was just another one of Jon’s business associates. I mean, probably deep down I knew he wasn’t. But the paranoia took over and once that idea got in my head, I couldn’t get it out.” She looks over at me. “I swear to God, Spencer, I know it’s sick, but I just figured I was better off understanding my place in Jon’s world than taking a chance on this stranger. I didn’t want to go through that again. I didn’t want to have to accept that my life was changing and it was only getting worse. I could deal with the fact that one man raped and beat me, but anyone else doing it but Jon would break me completely. I just couldn’t take the chance that he’d be nice.”
Ronin pulls her close and wraps a protective hand around her head. Then he looks up at me with questions in his eyes.
“Better. That’s better. Much better than the first one. It’s still a pretty bad answer, but it makes her look sympathetic instead of weak.”
“Pam.” All our heads collectively turn to Ford as he talks into his phone. “Find me the best witness prep specialist you can. I need them delivered to Fort Collins by Friday.” He stops to listen. “It doesn’t matter. We’ll cover all costs.” He presses end on the phone and then lets out a deep breath.
“I don’t want to cheat,” Rook says. “I don’t want to have to lie to win anymore.”
I agree. And I think Ford and Ronin feel the same way. We can’t go on living like this. We can’t. This shit needs to be settled.
“It’s not cheating,” Ford says calmly. “The defense is using the
same tactics. And I’m sure the Feds will have you talk to witness prep anyway. We’re just gonna get our own. To protect our interests only and fuck the rest of them. OK?” He looks over at me, then Ronin. “Because those guys in that courtroom do not give two shits about Rook and how this will affect her. They want to win. And if they have to make her look like an evil slave seller and put her behind bars in the process, they will.”
No one says anything after that, just a few awkward moments of silence.
“OK, on to new business,” Ford says. “Enough of this ‘we’re out’ crap. We’ve got a new job going down tomorrow, Spencer, come up with a plan.”
It’s absurd. It’s just totally absurd to talk about honesty and truth in one breath and then plot out how we’re gonna slip a spy cam out of my competitor’s garage in the next.
But fuck it. We’re in. We’re in deep. And we’ve only got two choices… sink or swim.
Rook looks at Ronin. Ronin looks at me. I look at Ford.
We start swimming.
Chapter Twenty
SPENCER
Once everyone gets back to work I call Carson.
“My man,” he says over a cacophony of girly voices. I’ve known this guy like one week and he’s changed so much I barely recognize him. “What’s up?”
“What’s up with you?” I ask back. “How’s things going over there?”
“We’re so busy,” he says in a whisper. “She’s got so many customers, she barely has room to breathe, let alone think.”
“Is she pissed off at being so busy?”
“Nah, she’s enjoying herself. I can hear her laughing back there right now. And she’s not using the plastic. Too distracted.”
Now this is the best news all fucking day. I get that dealing with the blood is a serious thing. I understand that she’s at risk of getting a disease if she’s not careful. I want her to be safe. I want her to continue to provide exceptional care to her clients. But she’s overdone it. That plastic shit needs to be over. She needs to stop being paranoid and just enjoy herself. If she wants to quit inking people up, that’s fine. But she should not make that decision based on an irrational fear.
“So she’s happy?” God, I just want her to be happy.
“Hold on.”
There’s some background noise and then I hear Veronica’s voice. She’s joking with her customer.
“Can I help you, Carson?” she asks in her sweet voice.
“Just wanted to let you know your next regular is here. That’s all.”
“Oh, good. Tell him I’ll just be a minute.”
“Will do, boss.” A few seconds later he comes back on the phone. “See? She’s having a good day, Spencer. This was a great idea. It’s been nothing but butterflies and flowers. Except for that horror show who showed up earlier. But it’s fine. This next guy probably wants something demonic too, but after him there’s two more butterflies waiting.”
“Perfect, man. I owe you some chrome on that bike.”
“And my own custom logo. And a t-shirt with my logo.”
“You’re pushing it now.”
“Nah,” he says back. “You love her. And I just told you she’s happy, so you love me now too.”
“Well, keep the bromance on the lowdown, eh? Later.”
I end the call before he can reply and lean back in my luxury chair, my hands behind my head. I sigh. He’s right. I love her and I love everything that makes her happy. I hope that when all this shit finally settles she realizes that I’ve always had her in mind. I hope she knows that I only pushed her away to protect her.
I only have to look at Ford. He’s starting to realize how vulnerable Ash and Kate are, and this confirms that I did the right thing keeping Ronnie away from my fucked-up life. I only have to look at the fear in Rook’s eyes today. She knows she’s going to be ripped apart again next week. She knows that all her mistakes will be out in the open. And she knows that some of the things they’re saying about her are one hundred percent true and it could land her in prison.
And she probably knows that there’s a part of her that deserves to be punished for standing by and letting women be sold on her property. Just like I know there’s a part of me that deserves to be sent to prison for murder. And that’s not even counting all the fucking money we stole.
But Ronnie is clean. Ronnie is perfect. And that’s almost funny considering that most of the people in this town think she’s some feral girl from a trashy family. But she’s never been arrested. She’s never been in trouble. She’s never had to lie her way out of a tight spot. She doesn’t get drunk and dance on tables at the Sundance. She doesn’t cheat people. She might be loud, and devious, and she might plot to piss me off every chance she gets. But she’s never hurt anyone.
And that’s sorta cute. Out of all of us, Veronica Vaughn—tattoo artist, deadly shot with a .45 at forty yards, and loud-mouth e-cig smoker with big hair and bigger tits—is the only one of us who’s squeaky clean.
If I get arrested next week because Rook can’t handle the stress of testifying, I’ll ask Carson to take care of Bombshell for real. He’s gone above and beyond for me in the Bomb department. And she’s got her family. Her brother Vic will make sure she’s OK.
I go back out to the garage and start getting my shit together for the bike we’re delivering to the first big client in two weeks.
We might not make it that long.
This dream of mine might be over before it even starts.
Chapter Twenty-One
VERONICA
When I’m finished with the last girl for the night, I walk her up front and plop down on the couch while Carson rings her up. Most of her housemates have left, but the ones who were tattooed today wait for her outside in front of the shop. One blonde girl notices her paying and then the group of them swarms inside, chattering away like girls do, lifting up the back of her shirt to see the bandage. One girl carefully pulls on the tape so they can check it out, and then they ooh and ahh at it.
Yes. I feel quite pleased with myself. Today was fun. I did my three regular guys. That back piece on Chuck from Kansas, the final art for a chest piece on Stew—that one took a while because I had to take all sorts of pictures to put in my portfolio—and then my last regular was Dave from town.
Dave’s been coming to me since before I actually worked here. When I look at him I see the last four years of my life inked up on his body. Most of my regulars have a theme—like Spencer’s blackbirds or Chuck’s horror movies. Stew has naked girls. He’s got naked strippers, naked acrobats, naked clowns, naked Playboy bunnies, and his chest piece is actually a stage full of saloon girls. There’s just tits everywhere on that guy.
But Dave is different. Dave’s theme is all war scenes. Today was just some shading and fill-in stuff. He’s still got a few months before his work is done.
Since most of my clients are men I don’t get a lot of butterflies and flowers. Each of these girls today wanted something a little different even though they all said butterfly with flowers. One wanted a bitchin’ death’s-head moth instead of a butterfly. I do those a lot, that’s a very popular tattoo. One girl wanted a fantasy butterfly. One wanted a regular butterfly but caught in a Venus fly-trap.
And now that it’s eight forty-five, I’m dead-ass tired but one hundred percent content.
But it’s got more to do with Carson calling me Bombshell than the ink I did today.
“Well,” he says as all the girls pile through the door and the place becomes silent, “you pulled in almost four thousand dollars today so far. That’s a decent take, right?”
“So far?”
“Yeah, you’re open until eleven, aren’t you?”
“Oh, yeah. Well, four thousand dollars is a decent take. My dad takes half, so two grand for me. That’s incredible.” And it is. It’s weird too—a few weeks ago I was stressing about coming up with a down payment on my crappy apartment. And now it seems like money is just dropping out of the sky for me. “Well, I’m
beat and my date’s gonna be here any minute to follow me home, so—”
“Date? What date? You’re open until eleven.”
“Yeah, usually. But my new landlord asked me to have dinner with him tonight and I said I’d close early. So…” I walk back to the break room and Carson follows. I wiggle out of my scrubs and Carson almost has a panic attack until he realizes I’m fully clothed underneath. I stuff my scrubs in the washer and pull out some clean clothes I left here a while back from my locker. They’re just old jeans and a sweater, but it’s better than the clothes I’ve been wearing for two days. When I look back at Carson he’s got his chin in his hand, like he’s thinking very hard about what to do next.
I leave him standing there and go into the bathroom to change. When I come back out, still pulling on my boots, he’s still standing in the same position. “Something wrong, Carson?”
“No,” he says too quickly. “Nothing. It’s just… how well do you know this landlord? You’ve never mentioned him before.”
“Oh, I just met him yesterday.”
“Oh, the apartment thing, right.”
I smile at him. “Yeah, how’d you know about my apartment?”
“Uh…”
I was gonna let him run back to Spencer, but he’s screwed up twice now, and that’s just sloppy. “Spencer knows him. Bobby Mansi? So when you go report back tonight or tomorrow or whenever it is that you check in with the bossman, you tell him that’s who I’m having dinner with.”
Carson laughs. “I don’t know what you’re talking—”
“Carson? Just for future reference, only Spencer calls me Bombshell. So you know what? If you’re suddenly on the Team, along with Ashleigh and Rook, then you better get your shit straight. Because if he gets hurt because you fuck up in front of the wrong person, I’ll make you pay.”
“Veronica, please. I have—”
“Don’t act like I’m stupid, OK? I know he sent you here. I might not know the details, but one of those girls talked about a hundred-dollar limit and mentioned that someone was paying for their art. So save it. That was obviously Spencer.”