by Carmen Faye
“I’m not from in there,” he said, gesturing toward the casino. I pretended to be confused.
“What are you here for then?”
He shrugged, and I wasn’t going to find anything out if I kept walking that road.
“You know, Jerrill isn’t the best kind of person to be dealing with,” I said. His guard went up. He took a step away slightly.
“What do you know? Were you following me?”
“Relax,” I said. “I’m on your side.”
His shoulders were still tight, and his eyes flitted around as if he was looking for a way out.
“Who are you?” he asked.
“Let’s just say I think we can help each other out. What did you just sell Jerrill?”
He shook his head. “It’s just art, man. He was interested in a new piece that came in—”
“Art in a back alley?” I asked, cutting him off.
He nodded. I shook my head.
“I’m interested in what you gave him. That’s all. Maybe I can get some of my own.”
“You deal?” he asked. I shrugged. Dealing… we were getting closer. I thought of all that money that Jerrill handed over. I wanted that. It was on my mind the way a woman was and I wasn’t going to let go of it.
“I think you and I could make some serious cash,” I said. “You’re dealing drugs, yes?”
He hesitated as if he wasn’t sure if he should answer me. But honestly, how many things could anyone be dealing?
Finally, he nodded. I nodded too.
“Right. Well, this is what I’m thinking. He’s buying a big stash from you, judging by all that cash. And you’re making a quick buck selling to someone who’s responsible for the eventual misfortune of many. So how about we make sure that we double what we’re getting out of this?”
“We?” he asked.
I nodded and took a step toward him. He didn’t back up. Progress.
“You tell me where that stash is. I’ll follow his henchman from the pickup, and we steal it back. You resell that shit to someone else, or even right back to him, that’s just straight profit.”
He narrowed his eyes at me.
“You’re going to steal the drugs I just sold to Jerrill back from him?” he asked.
“You catch on quick,” I said and took a deep breath to force the sarcasm back out of my voice.
“What makes you think you can take on someone like Jerrill and his security system?”
I shrugged. This was right up my alley. This was what I was good at. Gambling had been a way to make up the cash I owed the club, and now to pay back Alex. But stealing shit was what I was made for.
“I’m one of the best in the business,” I said.
He took time to think about it, finishing his cigarette and lighting up another one in a promising cancer chain. He took so long I wanted to ask him straight up what he thought when he finally nodded.
“Yeah, okay,” he said. “What do I do if Jerrill comes to ask me where his stuff is?”
“I’m not going to steal it before he gets to it. You tell him the truth—you don’t know what happens with the drugs after a delivery, you can’t guarantee the security of the people who buy it.”
He was starting to see the light. He nodded. “And once you have it?”
“Then we do a bit more business, make sure that it comes right back on the streets again, and we split the cash seventy-thirty.”
He frowned. “Seventy-thirty?”
I nodded. “Seventy for me because I’m doing all the damn work. You’re getting thirty because you already got all the money from the first sale, and you’re just going to resell.”
He didn’t seem to like my division, but he must have seen a whole lot of non-negotiable on my face because he nodded and held out his hand.
I took it.
“Nice to do business with you,” he said. “I’m Henry. My friends call me Rat.”
Rat. Well that was accurate.
“Ben,” I said. “Ben Reeker.”
Might as well keep up the alias while I was at it. I wasn’t going to give him my real name.
“So, you want to give me a heads-up on where this stash is before it’s gone?” I asked. He took out a scrap of paper and found a pen, and wrote down the number of a safety deposit box.
“Where is this?” I asked.
“Train station. It’s a system that works. You’re following them from there?”
I nodded.
“Well, you better go now.” He lifted his arm and looked at the face of a golden watch that made my fingers itch. I wanted that shit on my own skin. “He’s probably doing the pick-up in about half an hour. He doesn’t like to wait.”
Which was fine by me. I hated the waiting game, too.
I turned to leave when Rat grabbed my sleeve. I looked at him with my best don’t-touch-me look. He shoved a business card into my hand. At least, the piece of paper was business card size, but it was a blank with only a number written in pen.
“In case you need to get a hold of me.”
I nodded.
I went back into the casino through the fire escape and made my way through the group of people inside. They were high on the possibility of winning, and it fused with alcohol and smoke to make a combination that would never replicate real life. It was addictive in its own way—winning aside.
I hailed a cab outside and got the car to drop me off in front of the train station. I pulled out my phone to check the time. A message from Alex sat front and center, but I closed it without replying. Later. If this worked, I was going to be able to surprise her with a lot more than my quick learning skills.
I found the row of lockup boxes that stretched across the far wall and flipped up my collar. It wasn’t going to hide my face very well, but the wind that cut through the tunnels was cold. I leaned against a wall, hidden mostly in a shadow and kept an eye on those boxes.
And hoped I wasn’t too late.
I waited for forty minutes. I was just about to leave, thinking that I’d missed them after all, when Jerrill’s muscle arrived. The man looked a little lost without his boss to hold his leash, and he glanced around him to make sure there were no prying eyes. He didn’t see me.
I was dying for a smoke, but lighting up now would give me away, so I clamped down on my craving, forcing my body to wait it out.
The box opened, and the henchman retrieved a square brown box that looked like it was the exact size of the lockup. He put it in a black duffel bag and closed the little door again, locking it and dropping the key in his pocket.
When he turned to leave, I waited a couple of seconds to give him a good, unsuspicious head start, and then I followed.
I followed him through the train station. He must have parked all the way on the other side. He looked a lot like the few people that traveled at this time of night, walking around with a single bag. He looked over his shoulder once or twice and I had to jump or turn or hide to make sure he didn’t see me.
Finally, he reached the parking lot on the far side and got into a black Bentley that didn’t suit him at all. I was willing to bet the car belonged to Jerrill. I knew Jerrill wouldn’t be in the car. Mr. Muscle would have been forced to come get the precious cargo alone.
When he got in the car and started driving away, I made sure to get myself a cab again and asked the driver to follow the Bentley the way they did in all those movies. The guy even complied, and I felt like I was a part of an action flick.
We twisted in and out of residential areas, taking a lot of dingy backroads that didn’t go anywhere special and finally stopped in front of an old warehouse that looked two steps away from having a condemned sign slapped onto it.
I got out of the cab and ran around the side to follow the Bentley that had driven around the back.
I got to a chain link fence and found a rusted hole that might have been cut by some trespassing teenager years ago.
Jerrill stepped out of the open warehouse door. He wore the same salmon s
uit that he’d worn at the club, but he wore a long duster-type coat over it, and he looked like some kind of drug lord. Which fit the whole scenario really well. Mr. Muscle took out the brown box and opened it. Jerrill studied the contents and then nodded. His henchman walked past him into the warehouse.
I was dying to follow him inside and see exactly where he was stashing the shit, but that was like committing suicide, walking into Jerrill’s turf like that. So I hung low and waited until they were all done and ready to leave before I even started thinking about going in there.
The doors were closed and locked with a padlock and chain as thick as my arm. Then Mr. Muscle got back behind the Bentley’s wheel and Jerrill got in the back, ready to be chauffeured to who-cared.
I waited ten minutes. The place was dark, no lights, and if I didn’t know better, I would have thought no one had been at that abandoned warehouse for years. It sure didn’t look like the kind of place that would have a stash of drugs in it. I crept around the side of the building looking for a way in.
There were small doors along the side, like staff entrances. I tried one door, but it was locked. When I moved down, trying them all, I ended up with a whole lot of nothing.
I stepped back and glanced up against the high brick wall that reached almost four stories up in height. There were windows everywhere, and the second one up had no glass in it anymore. I didn’t want to change anything and make it clear someone had been here. I wanted to leave as little trace as possible.
I walked to the corner of the building. The mortar between the bricks had started to crumbled away, leaving enough space for me to grip with my fingers. It was just the tips, but it was better than nothing.
I started climbing. It hurt my fingers like a bitch. I used to do this with gloves on, and my muscles were screaming at me for the torture I put them through as well. I hadn’t done something like this since Emmett.
I made it to second story height without slipping and stopped myself from looking down. Best way to get yourself distracted and then tumbling in a nasty fall. I reached over with one hand, moving slowly so I didn’t lose my grip with my other hand and my toes. I reached the ledge and then the lip of the metal that used to hold the glass.
A car drove by on the road a couple of feet away from the building and I closed my eyes, praying that whoever was driving didn’t bother looking up. Or worse yet, come into the yard. A few seconds and there was no sound—except my panting. Thank God.
I stretched out my leg and looked for footing. I found a space and hooked the toe of my shoe. I was just about to reposition my other hand and foot when my toe slipped. The momentum yanked my body down, and I lost my grip with my other hand and foot completely.
I gripped the one hand that still had a lip to hold onto as tight as I could. My body scraped against the bricks, as I swung against the rough wall. My chin burned where there would no doubt be a graze. The raw metal lip dug into my skin with bits and pieces of broken glass still at the edges. I dangled like an idiot from the building by an arm, but it was enough to save myself.
Swinging my other hand up, I grabbed onto the lip and then pulled myself up. It hurt like a bitch, biting into my skin, but there was no turning back now. I hooked my leg over the windowsill and pulled myself into the building, collapsing on the floor beneath the window on the other side.
I was in a room that must have been an office at some point. There were marks on the wall where a desk must have bitten into it and scuff marks on the floor. The door was open and leading to the rest of the dark warehouse.
I had no idea where to start looking, so I started at the bottom and worked my way up. It took me a good two hours to work through all the offices and other rooms and I ended up with nothing. Dammit.
I walked back down to the stretch of floor that made up the bulk of the warehouse and stood in the middle, rubbing my hands over my face. It was heading on towards dawn, and I had to get out of here before the sun came up or I’d risk someone seeing me leave the place.
I spotted another broken window, one that was much lower, and walked toward it. Getting out was going to be easier than getting in, thankfully. I’d almost reached the window when the sound of my footfall changed from the empty steps on concrete to a hollow clanking on metal. I looked down and noticed I was on a kind of trap door. In the darkness I hadn’t been able to see it.
I felt around in the dim lighting and found a small ring. When I pulled on it the trap door lifted. Stairs led down into a pit of darkness, and I followed it because this was the last place I could look before admitting defeat. When I reached the bottom, a thin chain hit my face and I grabbed it and pulled. A light clicked on, washing through the underground storage facility.
Shelf after shelf lit up. I’d expected to find the brown box and make off with it. I hadn’t expected so any of them. And other kinds of containers as well, bags, plastic ice cream tubs, black bags, you name it.
They were all stacked on the shelves.
I was in some sort of drug highway.
The air smelled musty from being enclosed for so long. But this was exactly what I’d been looking for.
I took one wooden box off the shelf and shifted everything so that it didn’t look like one was missing. I clicked off the light and went back up the steps and closed the trap door behind me. It took me all of a minute to get out of the building, around the exterior, and into the street. I couldn’t stay there long now, but I would be back.
Holy shit, if I could play this with Rat over and over again, I would definitely be back.
And rich.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
I checked my phone for the twentieth time and swore under my breath. I hadn’t heard from Rip since he’d left on Sunday. It was already Thursday morning, and he wasn’t responding to my texts or answering his phone.
I refused to feel sad about that. We weren’t dating, for God’s sake. I didn’t give a shit about him. But I did have an issue with the fact that he never left the money behind as I’d thought he would. I’d been stupid and I hadn’t demanded my share. And he’d left with it.
Wasn’t that just perfect?
I called his cell again. It was off this time, shooting straight to voicemail. Dammit. It was a lot of money, and I wanted it. It was my half of our winnings. After we’d had to pay so much to the Crucifix Six, there was still something left. And now he wouldn’t give it to me.
What if something had happened to him? I’d spent the last couple of days being irritated with him that he hadn’t bothered to give me my money, or show up to talk to me about it. But what if they’d done something to him?
I shook my head. I wasn’t going to make excuses for him. If he really was as on top of his game as he liked to tell me he was, he was still alive and kicking and he had my damn money.
If I didn’t hear from him by nightfall, I was going out to find him. This was getting ridiculous, and I hated that he made me look like a needy woman because he wouldn’t contact me. But what was mine was mine, and in this case, I wasn’t talking about a lover but cash.
I spent most of the day cleaning. Again. My house was spotless now. It was something I tended to do when I was frustrated or angry—and the last couple of days I’d been both.
I checked my phone again after I finished. It was after lunch and still nothing.
By the time the sun started setting behind the horizon, I shrugged into my coat and put on boots before I got in my car and drove to the other side of town. It felt good to be driving. When I was out gambling, I took a cab so I didn’t get charged with a DUI, but it was nice being in control of something.
I drove to the motel where he’d mentioned he stayed. The parking lot was strewn with a lot of potholes, and I parked in a bay that was barely demarcated with white paint…most of it was faded.
I got out and pulled my coat tighter around myself, feeling like I was in danger of getting contaminated by something. How could he stand staying here?
When I walked into r
eception, it was a little better. The place was rundown and worn but not neglected, and it was clean. An old lady stood behind the counter, her hair looking like she went once a week that get it colored for gray regrowth and permed. She had lips that were too red and blush on her cheeks that suggested she couldn’t see well enough to balance out her makeup in the mirror anymore.
“I’m looking for Rip…” I stopped myself and tried again. He had a different name he used, I remembered. “I’m looking for a guest called Ben Reeker.”
The old lady leaned forward, as if she couldn’t hear me too well. When she got the name right she looked in her books, her finger slowly sliding down over the names. She frowned.