by Amity Cross
“Heather, take a break!” Monroe called out.
The waitress scowled and dumped the mop, letting it clatter to the floor. She muttered something foul under her breath and stormed out of the diner. A second later, the bell rang furiously, then the door slammed.
“Raging bitch, that one,” Monroe drawled. “You want a drink?”
I nodded, and he turned to take out a bottle of soda from the refrigerator. Opening the lid, he placed the Coke in front of me. A little vanilla for my tastes, but it was cold.
“So what is it this time?” he asked, settling on the chair opposite. “I’m getting too old for this shit.”
“You’re barely fifty,” I replied, curling my hand around the cool glass.
“You know me, Gunnar. Without this pile-of-shit diner, I’d be out on the street begging for pennies.”
“So, nothing’s changed?”
He inclined his head. “Once you’re in, you never leave.”
I snorted and took a sip of the soda. Bubbles ran down my throat, doing nothing to quench my thirst.
“Why are you here?” Monroe asked. “I know your kind. You never stop by for a friendly chat.”
He was right. Things never got personal between us, though when I was still undercover, I did my best to keep the heat off the guy. Back then, Monroe’s diner had been a hotbed of underworld information gathering. The best way to describe it was the crossroads of the dregs of society. A trading post of sorts. It wasn’t spoken aloud, but Monroe had always been under the Hollow Men’s thumb. In our world, information was more valuable than the shady goods we peddled.
“They tried to hurt someone close to me,” I said. There was no use hiding my reasons. They weren’t unique in the slightest. Revenge was a mill that kept on grinding around here.
Monroe raised his eyebrows and blew through his teeth. “Again? Once wasn’t enough for you, Gunnar?”
“Believe me, it’s a situation I’d rather not be in.”
“So… I assume you want to go back in?”
“Like you said, I never stop by for a friendly chat.”
“Who’s buying?”
“I pay in blood. You know that.”
“Only because you don’t have King’s money anymore.”
“What good is money when your enemies are still breathing?”
“No cash, no deal.” Monroe stood and pointed toward the door. “You know how things work around here. Get your sorry ass out of my diner, or I’ll have to let them know you were here.”
I smiled up at him, realizing he was old. Not in the age sense, fifty wasn’t ancient, but living his life on the edge of the law had worn him down. His skin was sallow, his eyes watery, and there were lines around his brow and mouth usually reserved for old men. The poor guy had a few liver spots forming, too.
“How long have you had this place?” I asked, staring up at him. “Twenty, thirty years?”
“Gunnar, I’m warning you.”
“I noticed a distinct lack of customers on the way in. The economic downturn doesn’t cater for bacon, eggs, and refillable coffee, does it?”
“What are you getting at, boy?”
“It’s a metaphor, Monroe,” I drawled, smiling at the fact he’d called me boy. “You’re becoming obsolete. Instead of rolling in dirty money, you’re barely keeping the doors open. No one comes north of the Strip.”
“Are you threatening me?”
“Depends on how you look at it. I like to view it as an offer.”
His eyes narrowed. “Which is?”
“You get me a way into the Hollow Men’s operation, I’ll get you out of Las Vegas and set you up. I know a crew who’d appreciate bacon and eggs.”
Monroe snorted and sat back down. I had him.
“What kind of crew.”
“Fortitude MC.”
“No way in hell.” He waved me off. “You want to put me under the thumb of another madman?”
I grinned, thinking about Sloane. “It’s under new management.”
“Marini…”
“Is dead.”
He scratched his head and frowned, the cogs in his mind working overtime.
“Changes things, right?” I raised my eyebrows, waiting for his answer.
As I saw it, he didn’t have much choice. Even in Fortitude’s current state of turmoil, it was a far sight better than waiting for the diner to go completely under. That was if the Hollow Men didn’t decide putting a bullet in his head was better for everyone. With the MC, Monroe had a chance at a better life. One that could be a family. Bikers were like that, despite the criminal undertones.
“I know you, Monroe,” I continued. “You’re not a bad guy. You’re just a victim of circumstance, profiting the only way you know how. When I knew you before, you wanted to get out. You wanted out so bad, you were willing to sell out King himself. Well, here’s your last chance.”
“How do I know you won’t cross me again?”
“You don’t.”
I stared at him as he stewed over my proposition. Asking a man like Monroe to have faith was like asking for the impossible, but put him between a rock and a hard place…
“I can tell you what I know, but it isn’t much,” he warned. “Like you said, times have changed.”
I downed the last of my Coke and slammed the glass bottle on the table.
“I’ll take whatever I can get.”
Chapter 6
Sloane
Chaser had been gone a long time.
I leaned back in the green and white plastic lawn chair, watching as the last of the sun lowered past the horizon. Only a thin sliver of burning orange lingered, and the longer I stared at it, the more its image burned into my retinas. I closed my eyes and chased the afterimage around the insides of my lids before opening them again.
Sighing, I counted the brightest stars in the sky. One, two, three, four… I wished I had a book. Or that there was something decent on TV or that the TV actually worked and wasn’t all static and noise. I didn’t know anything about setting up a reconnaissance mission, so I couldn’t even help Chaser plan any of that. There’d been no more word from Gasket, either.
A few hours ago, I’d even thought about masturbating to pass the time, but I couldn’t get slick. Ten minutes of rubbing my clit later, I gave up, unsatisfied and angry. Then after an afternoon on the roof, I was so bored I’d thought about hurling myself off the edge I.
There wasn’t much in the way of life out here. After spending the last week watching the comings and goings of the motel, I’d figured out it was more of a rest stop catering to truckers and wayward souls than anything else. A few hundred yards down the sand-blown road was a twenty-four-hour convenience store named Cactus Joe’s Convenience Stop.
Chaser had become a regular customer, but I’d never been down there to peruse the gossip magazines. I hadn’t left the motel grounds since we’d arrived. It wasn’t because I didn’t want to—I’d established my impatience factor over and over—it was because Chaser didn’t trust that everything and everyone in the outside world wasn’t in league with the Hollow Men.
Like a guy named Cactus Joe was working for The Man. Pfft.
My stomach growled, and I looked up at the sky. The stars were well and truly out even though the thin strip of sunlight still lingered on the horizon. Chaser was taking his sweet time.
I peeled my ass cheeks off the lawn chair and made my way downstairs. Noting the car wasn’t out in the lot, I scowled and went inside our room. We had to have some food kicking around.
I opened the moldy refrigerator and squinted at the lone can of beer. Liquid dinner? I made a face and closed the door. If my choices were beer or beer, I’d choose nothing at all. Ironically, those were the only options in the whole stinking place.
Glancing around the room, I thought about going to Cactus Joe’s. I wasn’t a prisoner here, and the likelihood of someone recognizing me at an out-of-the-way store on the ass cheek of Las Vegas was slim to none. I knew Chaser
would get a tickle up his asshole about me wandering the desert on my own, but as my stomach squelched and popped, I figured he could go screw himself.
I snatched up my little coin purse and counted out the money Chaser had left me. Fifty dollars. That ought to get me a mountain of snacks to fatten myself up with. Hesitating, I wondered if I should leave a note. If he came back, and I wasn’t here… Well, things would get bad.
I took out the pen from the bedside table and tore a corner off an old newspaper. Over the black and white inked advertisement for Las Vegas Wet ‘n’ Wild theme park, I scrawled a ‘be right back’ message and left it on the table.
Outside, the motel grounds were deader than a doornail. Curling my hands into the sleeves of my cardigan, I darted across the two-lane highway and began walking toward the convenience store. Nights got cold out here, which never quite made sense to me. A car zoomed past, blowing my hair away from my face, and I glanced over my shoulder at the receding tail lights.
It kind of felt daring, being out here. Remembering how it was out on the road with Chaser the first time, I shivered. That was a different story to the one we were in now, but I still erred on the side of caution.
Outside Cactus Joe’s were a set of iron horse sculptures that had rusted to a lovely shade of coppery brown. I gave them a cursory glance as I passed, my boots scuffing the scrappy little tufts of grass that were trying to grow in the arid soil. Maybe when this was all over, I’d learn to ride a horse, but not here. Someplace cooler where people owned coats. Montana. There were horses in Montana, and it was far away from here.
I crossed the tiny parking lot that was devoid of cars and approached the automatic doors. They swished open, and a blast of cool air hit my face. I stepped into the artificial lights and grabbed a red basket. The shop assistant glanced at me in the convex mirror, then went back to the magazine he was reading.
Shuffling down the aisles, I began piling in bags of potato chips, chocolate bars, instant noodles, a packet of cookies, and a gossip magazine. I checked over my shoulder so many times, I was sure the guy at the front had pegged me for a shoplifter, but when I dumped my haul on the counter, he sighed and rang everything up. Then he shoved it all into a single plastic bag, crushing half the chips.
When I finally made my way back to the motel, I groaned when I saw Chaser’s car in the space outside our room. Typical.
The door opened, and Chaser stormed out of the room, shoving a gun down the back of his jeans. When he saw me standing in the middle of the lot, the plastic bag hanging limply from my fingers, he scowled.
“Where have you been?”
“I left a note,” I replied. “Get over it.”
“Sloane—”
“You don’t get to turn into a controlling boyfriend,” I exclaimed.
“We’re not playing a game,” he fired back.
“I know what’s at stake! We’ve been talking about it for months!”
“Then what aren’t you understanding?”
“I was hungry, Chaser. I didn’t know when you were coming back, so I went to get something to eat. Deal with it.” Turning, I strode into our room and swung the door with all the strength I could muster, but he caught it with his hand and pushed inside.
“I had to work a deal,” he said, closing the door. “That’s why it took me so long.”
“What deal?”
“Fortitude has a new live-in cook.” He sighed and sat at the table.
I rolled my eyes and put down the plastic bag of snacks. “I could do with one of those right about now.”
“The guy… The informant was almost no good. His importance to the Hollow Men was almost over, but he was able to give me a few leads to follow.”
“So in exchange for getting him out of Las Vegas and setting him up with a cushy job with burly bodyguards, you got us a couple of maybes?” I curled my lip and opened a bag of potato chips. “Seems like a bad deal to me.”
“It’s better than nothing.”
“We’ll see about that,” I muttered. Licking the salt off my fingers, I looked at Chaser.
“What?”
“I was careful, you know. You have to stop getting so worked up about my whereabouts. I just went across the street.”
“It’s not about that,” he replied, taking the bag of chips out of my hand.
“There’s that cotton wool again.” I snatched the packet back. “I may not be as smart or as trained or as bulletproof as you, but I’m your equal in this, Chaser. Don’t forget that.” I shoved a chip into my mouth and crunched. “Oh, and that goes for life, sex, and everything in between.”
Chaser grunted and began picking through my haul. “Instant noodles?”
“And chocolate.”
He took out the gossip magazine and raised an eyebrow. “I see Jennifer Aniston is still keeping busy.”
I made a face. “There are so many things wrong with those words coming out of your mouth I don’t even know where to start.”
I watched as he flipped through the magazine before tossing it aside and taking out the instant noodles and setting them on the table.
“So, what now?” I asked. “What are we going to do with your maybe leads?”
“Tomorrow,” Chaser said, filling the electric kettle with water. “We leave and see if my informant is full of shit or not.”
“Leave?”
“It’s time to head to Las Vegas.”
“For real?” My stomach churned in a different kind of way.
“For real.”
Chapter 7
Chaser
That night, I did an inventory of all our belongings.
We had two guns—the revolver and my 10mm pistol—and a couple of boxes of ammunition. I always carried cash, so that wasn’t a problem. There was one cell phone between us and both our bags of clothing, which I’d recovered from the cabin before we’d left the night of the attack. So, not much.
Traveling light was good, but we’d need more supplies before this was over. Sloane would need her own burner phone in case we were separated…or she wanted to go to the store.
The next morning, we checked out of the motel and loaded our meager belongings into the car. I watched her as she lifted her bag into the trunk, trying my best not to think about her ass. It looked great in those jean shorts she was wearing.
The real long game was about to begin, yet she seemed too excited for my liking. There was a line between gray and complete darkness, a border I’d become familiar with, and I was starting to worry she was about to cross the point of no return.
Would she face her father’s death, or would she revel in it?
I used to see her indifference as a sign of strength, but now I wasn’t so sure. We were about to head into enemy territory, and if she came apart at the wrong moment, it could mean her life.
“Sloane?”
She looked up, her eyes sparkling. Her sunglasses were on her head, pushing away long, messy tresses of hair from her face.
“What now?” she asked, slamming the trunk closed. “We’ve talked about everything already.”
“I’m not convinced.”
“Are we still on this killing my father business?”
“It’s not a joke.”
“No, it’s not. I told you how I felt about it.”
“Indifferent?”
She rolled her eyes. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”
I didn’t know, either.
“If you want, I’ll let you do the honors,” she added. “That is what it’s about, right? You think I’m going to lose my soul, or some shit, by taking out the guy who my piece of shit father was going to sell me to. Am I right?”
I raised my eyebrows.
“What?” She screwed up her nose. “As long as he’s dead, then whatever. You pull the trigger, or I pull the trigger.” She shrugged. “The result is the same.”
“I don’t…”
“This is our forever we’re talking about,” she said. “So get in t
he car already.”
I wrenched open the driver’s side door and slid into the car, wondering when I’d become such a weakling. Oh yeah, it was when I finally found something worth living for.
Killing King might send her right over the edge, but maybe that wasn’t what I was so worried about. Maybe it was something else.
Something more sinister.
Chapter 8
Sloane
As we drove, the desert gradually gave way to the city.
Buildings began to rise up out of the sand and grit, and the road gained a border of tall palm trees. A fast-food restaurant sailed by, then a motel, and finally, the Mandalay Bay hotel and casino towered on our left. It was our first glimpse of the Strip.
I hadn’t been to Las Vegas before, but it was one of those places people thought they knew all about because of what they saw in the movies. Elvis impersonators marrying drunks in gaudy wedding chapels, seedy strip clubs, glitzy casinos with rows upon rows of roulette tables, and all the concert residencies put on by fading pop stars. Nostalgia and regret was the scent I was picking up as we approached ground zero.
Chaser stopped at a traffic light, and ahead, I could see a billboard—that looked like it was twenty stories high—flashing advertisements outside of the MGM Grand.
“Your mouth is hanging open,” Chaser said, looking at me out the corner of his eye.
“I’ve never been to Vegas before,” I replied. “It’s not what I expected.”
“It has a way of surprising people.”
The lights changed, and we moved off, coasting through the heart of the city.
My nose was practically fused to the window, my eyes flicking back and forth, taking everything in. The throngs of people walking up and down the sidewalks were unbelievable. Neon lights flashed brightly even though it was daytime, and the casinos were an overwhelming mass of extravagance. One minute we’d passed a pyramid, then a New York cityscape, and then we coasted past the Eiffel Tower.
“It’s so…” I couldn’t think of a good word to describe it.