“I recall, Pumpkin.” I look at my watch. “You’re up very late, or maybe you’re just up really early. Either way, it must be important for you call me in the wee hours.”
“I’m always up this early. Got to get my run in before practice,” he replies. I forgot he’s a rugby player. “You need to get that sexy ass on the next flight home, Honey Bunny.”
I lean my head against the cold window. “I can’t,” I reply. “I’m dealing with a crisis that needs my immediate attention. Plus, I’m not sure I have a reason to go back to London.”
“A reason? I’ll give you a reason. Your boyfriend that adores you. You are the best damn thing that has ever happened to him, and I won’t stand by and let you throw it all away over some stupid kerfuffle.”
“Do you know the story?” I ask. “I can’t get a damn word out of him. I have no clue what’s going on!”
“I don’t know all the details, HB. I don’t need to. You two need to sort this out. I repeat: Get your ass on a plane.”
“Liam, this is really a conversation I should be having with him. Everything Gavin’s done from the second we stepped into that club has been shady. He’s got a lot to account for, but he’s not talking,” I shout, waving my hands wildly.
Big Al looks over his shoulder. “Everything okay back there? You’re getting pretty animated.”
“Keep your eyes on the road,” I snap. “And turn the heat down, I’m melting back here.”
Al hums the Wicked Witch of the West theme song. What an asshat! After digging around in my purse, I find a pack of gum and throw it at the back of his head.
Liam clears his throat. “You still with me HB?”
“Yes, I’m still here,” I reply. “Like I said, I’m in the middle of something.”
“I know Gavin’s acting like a wanker. These moody streaks are his one major flaw. They come out of nowhere, but leave just as fast. You, however, packed up and flew across an ocean. Abandonment loses to moody every time. He was gutted when I talked to him earlier, he’s sure you’re gone for good. Pretty reasonable assumption, if you ask me. He and James had a row; Gavin tried to kill him. In all the years we’ve known each other, none of us has raised a fist in anger. Something’s rotten in the state of Denmark. You need to come home and sort this shit out before I lose both of my best mates.”
I smirk. “Shakespeare? I never know what’s going to come out of your mouth.”
“I was a theater major, my dear. And it isn’t about what comes out of my mouth, but what I can do with it. Care to find out?”
“Let me get this straight. You call me to come back to London for your best friend and then offer me oral sex?”
“The way I see it, if Gavin and James kill each other over whatever is going on, I want first dibs. Just making my case now.”
“If I stay away from London, you boys will go back to the way you were. It’s better I’m gone.”
He gasps. “You need to come back to London because it’s where you belong and you bloody well know it,” he says.
“I’m not sure I do know that. He said he couldn’t do this anymore. I’m not sure anything is waiting for me in London but heartache.” I pull my cross back and forth along my necklace while I debate if I really want to ask the questions that are burning my brain. Am I ready for the answers? “Do you think he slept with her?”
“Ha! He’d be more likely to ask for a blow job from a viper. Well, now that I think about it, getting one from O would be getting a blow job from a viper. Scratch that. My point is, Gavin would never cheat on you, and he would never sleep with O. Get that out of your head right now. You need to come home, before this gets more out of control than it already is.”
I want to tell him that the reason I left has nothing to do with Gavin or what happened that night, but there’s no way for me to do that without him asking questions I can’t answer. “Like I said, Liam, I can’t come back right now. And, unless he can carry on an actual conversation with me, he can piss off.”
“He fucked up, but you left the country without even saying a word. That’s cold, my dear. Get home,” he says before hanging up.
I’m not sure what to make of that conversation. Gavin’s talked to Liam about it, but won’t talk to me? Liam claims Gavin’s panicked I’m gone, but he’s the one who walked out. Al’s phone rings, and I’m reminded that my relationship drama has to take the backseat to the matter at hand. I have to push Gavin out of my mind.
Trying to clear my mind, I lean back and close my eyes. Sleep takes me quickly.
Al slams on the brakes, jarring me awake. “Rise and shine. You have a date to keep.”
Chapter Fifteen
Groggy from my nap and emotional roller coaster, I drag myself out of the car. The ice cold air stings my exposed skin while I button my coat, and wrap my scarf around my neck tightly. We’re parked in a grassy field in the middle of nowhere. There’s no moon tonight and the sky is filled with clouds, so without the light from the car, I wouldn’t be able to see a thing. I wonder if there’s a gangster’s guide to clandestine meeting locations. How the hell do they find these places?
Al hands me a flashlight. “Go down that path a ways. You’ll see him.”
As retribution for the witch reference earlier, I flash the light in his eyes. “How far is ‘a ways’?” I really don’t want to be wandering all night.
He knocks the light away. “Walk down the path. If you ain’t seen him yet, you ain’t gone far enough. Got it?”
“Al, you missed your calling as a tour guide,” I say, rolling my eyes. It’s now or never, so I head down the path.
The path leads me down a hill to a lake, and I make out Carlos sitting on a bench on the dock.
After rolling my neck and shaking the tension out of my shoulders, I take a deep breath and walk to the bench. “What is it with you and lakes in the middle of the night?”
“Look around. Do you see anyone?” he asks with a smile.
The metal bench is freezing. Even with my knee length, down filled jacket I can still feel the icy metal on the backs of my thighs. My whole body shivers, but I try my best to hide it. “No, because no sane person comes out here at this time of night. This place is like a scene out of a bad horror movie.”
“If you’re afraid of the boogey man, Lily, you shouldn’t request a sit down with him,” he says with a laugh.
“Touché.” I smirk. A drug dealer with a sense of humor. At least he keeps it interesting. “On that note,” I continue, “let’s get down to business before something climbs out of that lake and tries to eat us. I had nothing to do with Max pursuing a case against your organization. I hear through the coconut telegraph not everyone sees it that way and my life and his may be in danger because of this misconception. I would like to rectify that and go back to me putting all this crap behind me.”
“Just how to do you think you can do that? I suspect you’ve made efforts that have failed, or we wouldn’t be sitting here.”
I can hear the doubt in his voice. I need to ease his discomfort, but it’s hard to sound convincing when my teeth are chattering.
“You’re going to tell me where he is, and I’m going to get him and bring him home.”
The words aren’t out of my mouth before he laughs. “Do you have a death wish?”
“I already have a bounty on my head; why not pull out all the stops? If they kill me, I want to go out on my terms. Sitting around waiting for the next Charlie is not a choice. I’d rather walk into the lion’s den than be stalked prey.”
He stops laughing, but he still has a smile. “You could teach some of my guys a thing or two, you know.”
“I’ll set up a weekend retreat after all this gets cleared up. Give them all some tips on how to be awesome. In order to do that, I need to get off the damn chopping block. Tell me where he is. I’ll put on a disguise, casually run into him somewhere, and get him out. I guarantee you we’ll be in a different time zone before anyone notices he’s missing.”
“If you get caught, you’ll both be dead and no one will ever find your body. That’s not a guess; that’s a certainty. I can’t protect you there,” he warns.
I rub my gloved hands over my arms, trying to keep the blood flowing. “Yeah, I’ve heard your children are fighting amongst themselves.”
He shrugs. “Power struggles are a part of life,” Carlos responds.
“I went to an elite boarding school, and I was in a sorority. There was always a mean girl in control and twenty girls dying to take her place as queen bee. They may not have had guns, but they may have been crueler than all your men put together. I understand power struggles.”
He laughs and shakes his head. “If things were different, I would introduce you to my daughter. You and she would get along well.”
“Sounds like you have your hands full,” I reply. “Look, Carlos, I know I can do this. Just tell me where he is. I’ll get him out. I’ll have to tell him some things, but not enough to betray you. I made a promise of confidentiality to you. No one at the FBI knows a thing about you or our relationship. I have and will continue to keep that promise. But, keeping Max there is dangerous for everyone involved, so to keep all our asses out of the fire, I might have to spill the beans.”
Carlos won’t look at me. He walks to the shore of the lake. He tries to skip a stone, but there’s a layer of ice forming on the surface of the lake. It’s too dark to see, but I hear it scrape the ice as it slides along the surface. Still not understanding why this decision creates so much conflict for him, I decide to do what I do best: push. I walk over and throw rocks too.
“You’re good at that,” he says.
“I grew up in a small town, across the street from a lake. Fishing, skipping stones, I can do it all. Although, ice stone skipping is a first for me” I get a small smile from him. “Tell me why this is such a hard decision. I know you don’t owe me an explanation, but maybe if we talk it out…”
“We have a code of silence. I’ve brought you in too much already, and my judgment has been called into question. You should have been eliminated. That’s… standard operating procedure. But I knew you wanted nothing more than to run as far away from us as you could, and I didn’t expect you to resurface as a problem.”
“If you had eliminated me, I promise Max going under cover would be the least of your organization’s concerns. Between Max, Greene, and Sully, the FBI would have been out for blood. I can’t even imagine what Gavin would have done.” I try to maintain my cool. It isn’t every day you’re reminded how expendable you are. “You made the choice with the least risk. Anyone who can’t see that is an idiot. What am I saying? They gave Ash five million dollars. We aren’t talking about the sharpest knives in the drawer.”
“Most people asking favors don’t throw insults around. Especially to me,” he spits at me.
Dropping the stone in my hand, I put my hands on my hips and look him square in the eyes. “Am I wrong?”
We stare at each other for a few moments.
He breaks our stare and shakes his head.
He mutters, “The balls on this girl. What’s your plan? Let’s start there.”
“You need to tell me where he is before I can create a plan to get him out.”
He takes a deep breath. “He’s in Tucson.”
“What?” How the hell does this come back to Tucson? “Where in Tucson?”
He picks up a rock and flings it. “They operate out of a club called Seven Spades.”
Cock-sucker-mother-fucker. It always has to come back to Ash, doesn’t it?
Anger boils within me, but I can’t lose my temper. I turn and walk down the shore, throwing a few more stones. Carlos is kind enough to give me space to pull myself together, but I know he won’t be patient for long.
“You understand that Max would have found them at Seven Spades regardless of my involvement. It would have been all over Ash’s file. He was digging for a connection, and that’s an easy one to make,” I say through gritted teeth.
“Yes, I understand that. There are others who aren’t sophisticated enough to make that connection.”
I shake my head in disgust. “So it started back then? While we were in school?”
“Yes.”
Ash was always into something, but I never dreamt it went back that far.
“We lived at that damn bar. I always assumed it was because his fraternity brother managed it. That, and their bathroom was always clean and they had a velvet couch that was the best place to lie down after too many shots.”
Ash’s problems didn’t start in DC; they started right under my nose in college. When I could have gotten out. How the hell was I so damn blind? When we were in DC and I saw the changes in him, I turned a blind eye to them. He wasn’t hiding from me, I was choosing to ignore it. I felt superior because I thought it was on my terms, not his. When we were in school, I thought he was harmless. Flashy, arrogant, and always looking for excitement, but benign. How did I miss how deep the trouble he was in was, even then? I thought I was smarter than that, but instead I’m a freaking cliché.
No time for a pity party. “If he’s at Seven Spades, I know just how to get him out. I need a bit of time for planning, but I know how to do it. Good-bye, Carlos.” I walk back toward the path
“Don’t you think we should discuss your plan?” he shouts.
I turn around to face him. “Does it matter? If I fail, I’m dead. You wouldn’t have told me where he is if you didn’t think I could do it.”
I hear him laugh as I trek back up to the car.
“Come on, Al,” I say. “I’ve got a plane to catch.”
Chapter Sixteen
I’ve seen enough spy movies to know that when dealing with bad guys, it’s always better to be inconspicuous. Flying into Tucson may raise red flags, so I fly to Vegas. Not only would no one expect that, but I need help from an old friend.
During the long drive to the airport, I’m fixated on the clock. It’s morning in London, and I wonder what Gavin is doing. He hasn’t called. Calling him would either ease my pain or break my heart, and I can’t take that risk. I need a clear head for what I’m about to do.
When we arrive at the Buffalo airport, I’m floored. I knew we drove a ways, but I didn’t realize how far. I catch a seven a.m. non-stop to McCarren. Before we take off, I text a friend I haven’t spoken to in years, hoping she can help me out. Isn’t that what sorority sisters are for?
Sleep takes over as soon as the plane takes off. It may be the last sleep I get for a few days, so I treasure every minute of it.
Stepping off the plane, I’m reminded of what a zoo Vegas is. Before I even get off the jetway, I hear the annoying ping of slot machines. People getting off their planes are full of excitement and hope. People boarding planes look as if they’ve been rode hard and put away wet. Such is Vegas.
I text my sorority sister and ask her to meet me at departures. That’s an old airport trick I learned from Ash. I spot a shiny red Mercedes convertible, and I know I’ve found my ride.
A stunning redhead jumps out of the car. Her hair wasn’t always red, but I’d know her anywhere.
She runs to me with open arms as soon as we make eye contact. When she reaches me, she hugs me so tight, I can barely breathe. “Hey, Britt. Thanks for coming to get me.”
“Anything for you, doll. You tell me you need help only I can provide, I’m there for you.” She releases me and nods in the direction of her car. “Now get in and tell me what the hell is going on.”
Brittany was in my pledge class. We weren’t really into the whole sorority thing but were doing it anyway. Britt because her parents made her, and me because I thought it was a wise move. She was a ballet major from a strong Southern family that expected her to carry on the family name with pride. To say they were shaken up when she dropped out of school, eloped to Vegas, and became a showgirl is an understatement. Britt was disowned but never looked back. She’s now making a killing starring in a show on the strip
, Scandalous. Her last show I saw was jaw-droppingly sexy.
“I have to go back to Tucson, and I need to be incognito. Can you use your showgirl magic to make me over? I need to be there by ten, so we have about six hours.”
She throws the car in gear and pulls away from the curb. “Suga, that’s more than enough time.”
“One more thing. Can I borrow your car?”
She laughs and rolls her eyes. “Anything else?”
I shrug. “Just the makeover and slut-wear.”
“You’ve come to the right place,” she says with a smile. She pats my legs. I can’t help but notice the ice that adorns each of her fingers. She looks like she robbed a jewelry store.
I assumed we would go to her house, but she takes me to the hotel she works at instead. As we walk through the casino, I flash back to hazy memories of gambling, dancing till dawn, and out of control parties. They were good times, what college was supposed to be about. But as I sort through the haze and remember the drama that comes with inebriated teenagers with money to burn and no appreciation for the consequences of their actions, I get a sour taste in my mouth. Living in the fast lane isn’t necessarily a good time. It’s just fast.
Britt takes me through the dressing room to her office. The sign on the door says “Executive Producer.”
“Wow, Britt, you’ve certainly worked your way up in the world.”
“Come on, now. You know I’m more than just tits and ass,” she says with a wink. “Now, before I get started, do you trust me?”
“Why do you think I’m here? I trust you with my life.” If she only knew how true that statement is.
“Okay, let’s get started.”
Three hours later, I’m made up and ready to go. If only Tucson were down the street. “Britt, I’ve got a six-hour drive. I’ll have sweated off all this makeup by then. No one can know I’m there. I can’t use my credit cards or stop by someone’s house. What should I do?”
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