“Where’d she get this?” Emmelia asked.
“Bought it off a guy. Said his name’s Larry Johnson.”
Emmelia didn’t know a Larry Johnson. She would soon, though.
XII.
Day Eleven, Sunday
Two Dead
Jacob hadn’t left the hotel room in a couple of days. Missy was bringing him a steady diet of Burger King and Subway. She kept trying to get him to eat more of those nasty Impossible Burgers, but he wasn’t having it. He wasn’t actually eating much of anything, though. He didn’t have an appetite. The cartel, the adoption agency, his book—everything made him sick. Sick and nervous. His luck couldn’t last forever. It was already a small miracle he’d survived what he had. How much longer could the streak continue?
He was on the phone talking to Tina about this, but she wasn’t in the mood to listen to him whine. “The writing still coming along?” she asked.
“Not really. I can’t focus.”
“You just have to buckle down. One hundred ten percent. Don’t give up,” Tina chirped.
“I’m not giving up. I’ll get the book done. I just can’t focus right now. I might need some more time.”
“Ah, no. That’s not an option. We’ve got a tight schedule for a reason. No one’s going to buy a stale story.”
“It’s not stale if I keep getting attacked. I can add the new stuff.”
“Your page count is set. No more.”
“It can’t be adjusted?”
Tina wasn’t listening. “You take any photos?”
“Of what?”
“Of what happened.”
“No.”
“Not one?”
“No.”
“Jacob, you need to get a better sense for what makes for a good photo op. Your followers would’ve eaten that up. Instagram—oh, my God—would’ve loved it. Nothing gratuitous, of course. The nasty bits would be blurred, but we could’ve gotten a couple hundred preorders out of something like that. You really got nothing?”
“I wasn’t taking pictures. I was trying to stay alive.”
“Don’t be so dramatic. I’m talking about after the fact.”
“People love drama.” Jacob sighed, then added, “No, I didn’t take any pictures.”
“Could you go back? Remember how much engagement we got on the posts of the apartment fire?”
“I don’t think there’s anything to see. The hotel cleaned the room.”
“Hmm. You could try to blacklight it.”
“They replaced the carpet.” He had no idea. He wasn’t going back there.
“Too bad. Just take some next time, okay?”
“Next time?”
“Well, yeah. Pretty pathetic if they don’t try again, don’t you think?”
“Jesus, Tina.”
“Oh, relax. I’m joking.”
“Not funny.”
“I actually got you some private security. Twenty-four seven. He’s outside the hotel right now. This guy’s credentials are impressive. His website has a whole list of all the training he’s been through. East Himalayan Krav Maga, whatever that is. Anyway, you’re welcome.”
Jacob sat on the edge of the bed, staring at a watercolor of Lake Superior. “Maybe we should put all this social media stuff on hold. Publish the book, but—”
“Never,” Tina blurted. “You don’t post, momentum dies. It’s influencer suicide.”
“Influencer? What happens when an influencer dies?”
“Come on. Don’t be like that. You’re not going to die. My tea leaves were in a very positive position this morning.”
“Oh, that’s reassuring.”
“Yes, I was pretty pleased to see that,” Tina said. “We shouldn’t worry. Full speed ahead.”
Jacob rolled his eyes. Tina was relentless. The thought that she’d staged the attack for publicity hadn’t escaped him. She could’ve hired actors or something. One of them had obviously gotten more than he’d bargained for, though.
“Here’s an idea,” Tina offered. “Go sight-see. Take a bunch of photos of the big D.”
“The big what?”
“The big D. Duluth. You want fewer posts of the cartel? Then fine, get something else to post about. Alexis can send you a bunch of social media friendly spots up there.”
“I’m not really keen on going out right now.” Jacob grabbed the pepper spray from his leather bag and inspected the label. The expiration date said it was good for a year. Plenty of time to get through the training class for a conceal-and-carry permit. No, not a conceal-and-carry permit, just a carry permit, he reminded himself. Breeland had told him there was no “conceal” to Minnesota’s permits. The state didn’t make a distinction between open and conceal.
“You’ve got security now. You’ll be fine. And it’ll be good for you,” Tina pressed. “Stretch your legs. I’ll tell Alexis to find places outside the city. It’ll be quiet and peaceful.”
“Or secluded and deadly.”
Tina clucked her tongue. “So dramatic.”
“Wanna trade places with me?”
“I would, actually. You’re going places. I’m jealous. I just hope you don’t drop me in a year when you’re rich and famous.”
“Rich and famous,” he parroted. “If I’m still breathing in a year, I’ll be happy.” It was just a matter of time before that sicario returned to finish the job. A cloying energy, wound up tightly, thumped in his chest. The sicario is coming. The sicario is coming.
Timing her entrance perfectly, Missy opened the door and sent Jacob jumping to his feet. Cocking her head, she let Quincy’s leash slip from her hand, and asked, “What’re you doing?”
Jacob sat with a sigh, and the pug hopped up on the bed, resting beside him. Jacob said, “Talking to Tina.” He wiggled the phone. “She’s freaking me out.”
“Oh, come on,” Tina huffed. “You want to change topics? How about this? I’ve got a campaign drawn up for when you get your little girl. Want to discuss that?”
Jacob rubbed his eyes, thinking again about whether he was even fit to adopt.
“Fingers crossed,” Tina said.
“Yep. Fingers crossed. Listen, I gotta go,” he said.
“Take a look at Alexis’s list when she sends it. And say hi to Missy for me.”
“Sure thing.” He flipped the phone over his shoulder. “She’s trying to get me killed.”
Missy took off her shoes and sat near the head of the bed.
Jacob rubbed his eyes again, then ruffled his hair. “I never should’ve answered Simon’s email. I didn’t even care about publishing a book at that point. I was over it.”
“Oh, no, you weren’t. You’ve wanted this since forever,” Missy reminded him. “Maybe you would’ve dropped it for a bit, ridden the high of what’d happened, but it would’ve come back, and when it did, you would’ve kicked yourself for not taking the chance.” She bent a knee and shifted her foot under her butt. “And whether or not you answered Simon’s email, do you really think nothing would’ve happened?”
“Maybe? I don’t know.”
“Don’t kid yourself. The cartel?”
Jacob’s face flushed. “You tell me what I should do. If none of this surprises you, what should I do?”
“Exactly what we’re doing,” she snapped. “Just don’t get so freaked out over it.”
“Oh, you’re right. The cartel coming after me is no big deal.”
Quincy moved to the empty side of the bed.
“I didn’t say that.” Missy reached over and pulled the dog against her hip. He grumbled but didn’t squirm away.
“The police still haven’t caught the other guy. I should just be fine with that?”
“I’m not telling you how you should feel. You’re just stressing me out.”
“Sorry I’m stressing you out. The cartel’s just stressing me out.”
Missy looked up at the ceiling and took a breath. “This isn’t working.”
“What’s not working?” Ja
cob’s voice cracked—something it always did whenever what was just said resembled the start of a break-up scene.
“You just sitting in here like a trapped rat.”
“Oh.” Jacob sighed. “Yeah. It sucks.”
“How about we get out? Drive up the shore or something?” She squeezed Quincy by the rolls of his back. “Want to go on a day trip, Quincy?” The dog’s pig tail wiggled.
Jacob got up and walked to the window. The room looked out on the highway and a shopping center across the way.
“No one will see you,” Missy promised.
“Tina said she got us some private security.”
“Perfect.”
“And she wanted me to go sight-seeing. Pictures for Instagram.”
“There you go. Let me send a few emails so work won’t bother me the rest of the day.”
“I guess we could try it. But if I’m going out, you know what I could really go for?” Jacob said, fiddling with the pepper spray at his side. “A cappuccino.”
~
Emmelia had nothing against either of them. Absolutely nothing. Jacob and Missy were simply a means to an end. It’d been between her and Bump. She’d become obsessed with getting her pound of flesh from the man who’d flipped her life upside down.
She’d been trying for a good year to do so, but nothing had ever stuck. Rumors, insinuations, blackmail—none of it had stuck. It was only after Barry had been bragging about how he’d managed to get himself a box of Black Talons—“the original G slug”—that things had come together.
She confiscated half of Barry’s box and went looking for the right target.
And along came Jacob White.
After a couple days of stake outs, she’d decided to shoot at him during one of his morning walks with Quincy. It’d be simple and obvious—the park across from his apartment was filled with millennials and empty nesters who’d panic and cause a fuss.
The day before, though, they’d all gone to the state fair. The Great Minnesota Get-Together. People had been everywhere, and the news would be all over it. Bump would look like a total fool.
The cookies had been a particularly nice touch, leaving Jacob’s face splattered like the side of a gas station toilet.
She’d spotted the off-duty cop down the street well before pulling the trigger—he had that confident, observant demeanor all cops had—so she’d fired once, then ducked away, passed through several backyards, and got in her car. Off she went, leaving Jacob White, the Minnesota boy who’d hurt the cartel, befuddled and alive.
In a way, she’d probably saved his life. There had been, and still was, a half-million-dollar bounty on his head. That kind of money attracted plenty of suitors. And until she’d made him shit his pants with the near miss, he’d been oblivious to the danger.
Afterwards, she’d assumed he’d abscond to some remote lake house. He’d hide out for a couple months, then reappear to give her another opportunity to mark up Bump’s reputation. Rinse and repeat. But instead of the lake house, he’d walked into her coffee shop, just stepped right up to the counter. Holy hell.
And oh-so-not good. She couldn’t have him in her city.
So she’d tried to get him to go back to Minneapolis by setting fire to his apartment, but what a disaster that’d been. Missy and Quincy had just showed up in Duluth instead. The whole Jacob White ensemble together again.
The convoluted episode at the inn had made sense in her head, and maybe it would’ve worked nine times out of ten, but luck clearly favored Jacob more than her.
And what an absolute lunatic he’d turned out to be. Plain and simple, he was a monster with insatiable bloodlust. Bits of Bump’s face, both bone and blood, had splashed everywhere, landing on bathroom tiles and in carpeted corners. Jacob was a freak, and if he hadn’t left the city (she still didn’t know what had happened to him), he surely was on the prowl, looking for her. At least she’d covered herself up, but she still feared he knew. Somehow he knew.
She was pouring a customer’s latte, hoping Jacob had left town (even though Avispón wouldn’t be too happy about that), when the door opened. She glanced over, a smile on her face, then nearly dropped the milk pitcher, the latte art squiggling into a blob.
Jacob smiled as he approached the counter.
She slopped the drink together, set it on the counter with a call to her regular, and turned to Jacob.
“Good morning,” he said. He sounded like Hannibal Lecter. His eyes were dead, vacant.
She couldn’t read him. “‘Morning. How’s it going?”
He gave a small laugh and sighed.
Creepy.
“You wouldn’t believe it if I told you,” he said.
“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?” She glanced at the door, wishing someone else would come in and cut the conversation short, but it remained closed.
“Both, I guess. You see the paper yesterday?” He pointed at the newspaper rack by the window.
Emmelia shook her head.
“I got attacked again.”
Emmelia widened her eyes. “In Duluth?”
Jacob nodded. “At the hotel.”
“Holy shit.”
“I’m okay, obviously.” He raised his arms, showing no wounds other than a couple of nicks from the shattered glass door. He also inadvertently showed her that he didn’t have the telltale lump of a concealed weapon. But that didn’t mean she was safe. There were plenty of soda bottles next to the pastry case.
Jacob grinned, resting his hands on the counter. “I thought this city wasn’t dangerous. What kind of place you got here?”
Emmelia shrugged. “Ha-ha. Don’t know.”
“Anyway,” he went on, “can I get a capp? Heading up the shore for the day. Checking out nature. Trying to take my mind off everything.”
Bullshit. He was toying with her. But she played along. “Going to see Split Rock?” she asked as she got to work on his cappuccino.
“No, not that far north.”
She saw the lie in his eyes. She knew he knew who she was, and there’d be no drive up the shore. He was trying to get her to relax. He’d come back when her guard was down, thinking he was off hiking.
She tamped the coffee into the portafilter, locked it into the machine, then snapped the brew paddle to the left before steaming the milk. Jacob watched her movements like a rabid dog, dull eyed yet full of loathing.
If she’d had those altered opioids from her office, she could’ve dropped a few into his drink. Simple. But with her luck (and his), it wouldn’t kill him. He’d slurp the capp down, survive another attempt on his life, and come at her amped up on painkillers.
She finished the drink and pushed it across the counter as he held out his credit card. It took her a moment to realize she hadn’t charged him. “It’s fine. On the house.” She wanted him gone.
“Cool. Thanks.” He took the cappuccino, giving it a taste as he walked out. “See you later.”
Once the door closed, Emmelia rushed around the counter to the front window and watched Jacob cross the street to a red hatchback. Missy sat waiting in the passenger seat.
And behind them was a Nissan Altima with a man inside whom she recognized: Larry Johnson. Or more precisely, Gregory Larry Johnson. (He’d used his middle name when dealing with Amy the other day.) Emmelia still wasn’t sure if he was the one actually lacing her opioid pills, but seeing him sitting behind Jacob now raised her suspicions to a whole new level. Is he in on this?
Gregory shoved some food into his mouth, stuffing his cheeks like a chipmunk, then tossed the container aside, chewing, chewing, chewing as he followed Jacob’s movements.
Emmelia pushed from the window and hurried through the café into the back. “Barry,” she shouted. “Take over for me.”
The bearded man gestured at the roaster. “I’m in the middle of a batch.”
“Kill it.”
“What’s going on?”
She yelled, “Jacob White was here,” and rushed out to the alley
where her Honda was parked. The CR-V wasn’t much of a speedster, but she got down to the stop sign around the block in time to see Jacob pass, then Gregory. She idled there for a few seconds before pulling out after them.
It soon became clear Jacob had lied to her, but not quite as she had expected. He did in fact head up the shore. He just went farther than he’d said he would, reaching Split Rock a touch before noon. Then he, Missy, and Quincy got out, stretched their legs, and headed for the lighthouse perched atop the lakeside cliff. Gregory trailed behind like some bored chaperone.
Emmelia stayed where she was. She had a clear sightline to the red Honda and Gregory’s Nissan parked next to it. They weren’t going anywhere.
She’d spent most of the drive considering three things: how she could get the drop on Jacob, whether she could actually kill him, and what Gregory was doing in all this. Concerning Gregory, her initial thought was he was having a go at the half-million-dollar bounty, but when Jacob made a pit stop in the unincorporated community of Castle Danger, Gregory took the other side of the pump, and the two filled up like travel buddies roaming the shore.
So maybe Gregory was a fanboy. Or maybe he really was a buddy. It’s a small world, she thought.
No matter what his connection, though, Gregory clearly wasn’t trying to kill Jacob. He was just getting in her way. Which brought her to another one of her concerns: getting the drop on Jacob.
There was a handgun under the seat; she could fill Jacob with an entire clip as he strolled back from the lighthouse—just cut him down before he unlocked the car door—but the parking lot was full of people. There were even a couple of school buses—“Northern Lights Church” printed on their sides—at the back end of the lot with the drivers perched behind the wheels looking out over the cars. Someone would see her crossing the lot, and most certainly someone (most everyone) would see her after she’d drawn their attention with the gunshots.
This wasn’t the place to try anything, so she waited in her SUV.
Conveniently, it wasn’t more than twenty minutes before Jacob and Missy returned, Gregory still trailing behind. They all got back in their cars and headed south, so Emmelia too headed south, and followed them to their next stop: Gooseberry Falls State Park.
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