by Dale Mayer
She stood up and tugged a loose sweater on over her shoulders, wincing as she forced her shoulder to cooperate.
Grabbing up her bag, she quickly packed up her clothes. She didn’t want to be here any longer. To know that Billy had come and gone so freely in her own personal space was hard. Invasive on top of so many other invasions. A horrible feeling all around.
When her bag was full, she closed it up and turned to see what she’d left behind. There was still so damn much. Too much to take all at once. She’d have to do a serious clean out. And that thought made her sick to her stomach. Had Billy rifled through her closet, her underwear? God, he’d been sick.
Had he napped in her bed, mocking her silently? Playing with her life as if he was a kingpin that no one knew about?
And Roxy, had he done the same to her?
Had he stowed money in her closet, too? Roxy was a packrat, the complete opposite of Jazz. Just like her artwork, she was a minimalist in life. She had just the barest furniture required and even fewer dishes. But when it came to her clothes, some of her own rules had been broken. There was too much in here.
Realizing there could be more money, she was determined to sort now and know for sure.
Instantly, she hopped to her feet and started tossing things into three piles. One for charity, one to move to Morgan’s place, and another to pack away for later use.
The thought of Billy having pawed through her things, her life…yeah, maybe selling was the only way she could get rid of the icky feeling. The real estate market was up so she’d definitely get her money back. But it was a big chunk of her life to walk away from. Except…it was no longer the safe place she’d carved out for herself.
But then what? Move in permanently with Morgan? Was she ready for that? Was he?
It really didn’t matter. She’d find a solution. If nothing else, she could rent until she figured out her next move. She stood up and lugged her packed bag to the doorway, then went back and tossed stuff she was keeping onto the bed. She’d continue to set up a security system here as she wouldn’t want anyone else to experience the horrible last week she’d had, either. What if the guy came back looking for his money and there were renters here?
She didn’t want to be responsible for anyone else getting hurt.
“Jazz?”
She turned to face Morgan, hearing the concern in his voice. “I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not.” Several strides and he was at her side. A gentle finger stroked across her cheeks. Lifting it, he showed her the glistening drop on his fingers.
“What’s the matter?” He gathered her into a close embrace.
She snuggled in closer to his warmth. His strength. “What’s right? I don’t know that I can live here knowing your brother has been in and out whenever he wanted. He could have been here when I was home. Laughing at how stalkerish he was being.” She shuddered.
“I’m so sorry for Billy’s behavior.”
“No,” she cried. “I’m not blaming you. He’s hurt you too.”
“And we can’t keep letting him hurt us. He’s dead. He’s gone.” He grasped her shoulders lightly. “We have to move forward.”
She nodded dumbly. “A little hard when I find out he’s been in my closet. My bedroom. My house.”
“I know that,” he said in a low voice. “Let’s grab your stuff. We’ll come back on another day and deal with the rest of this. Don’t make any decisions right now.”
She nodded and watched as he grabbed her bag and money-stuffed boots, then motioned for her to step in front of him.
“Morgan, someone is here for you.”
Dean’s voice filtered through the house. Jazz frowned. “There shouldn’t be anyone here.”
Morgan glanced at her. “It could just be the neighbor.”
She nodded but dragged her feet outside. There was no one there. “Dean? Where is he?”
Silence.
She turned back to see Dean standing beside Morgan, a gun to his head. She froze. “Dean, what are you doing?”
“Collecting my money,” he said grimly. “The money that bastard brother of Morgan’s stole from me.”
Jazz raised stricken eyes to Morgan’s hard, angry ones. “Then why the gun?” she said bitterly. “Did you ever plan to do the security system or just to set it up to be a Peeping Tom system, Billy-style?”
“I’m nothing like his fuck-up of a brother,” Dean glared at her.
“Holding a gun to his head makes you exactly that,” she snapped at him, hating to see yet another betrayal in Morgan’s eyes.
“Give me the money.”
Refusing to give in to the fear, she walked over and grabbed the boots. She peered into the first one then made it appear as if it were empty. She peered into the second one and pulled out the roll with the smaller bills.
“How do I know that this money was yours?”
“Doesn’t matter if it is or not. Billy stole a ton of shit from me.”
“You could have just asked,” Morgan said quietly. “Or do you plan to kill us, too?”
Indecision crossed his face. He snatched the money out of Jazz’s outstretched hand. “I figured you wouldn’t give it to me.”
She shrugged. “We,” she paused for emphasis, “aren’t Billy.”
He groaned. “Really? You’d have given it back to me if I’d asked?”
“Yes. And you’re not the only one who Billy stole from. We were accosted last night in my store by an intruder who was after money that Billy stole from him.”
“Borg?” Dean’s face paled. “Oh Shit. He’s a bad ass. Keeps his fingers in all the pots, the dirtier the better. And he let you live?”
“He’s hoping we’re going to find his money. But I’ve given it to you, so now you can give it to him.” Jazz gave him a fat smile. “Of course, you might have been in cahoots with Billy and he just forgot to share the spoils with you.”
Dean lowered the gun. “Fuck. He stole a bunch of shit from my house, made it look like a bloody break-in. I’m in security for Christ’s sake. I had videotape of what he’d done. I called him out on it and threatened to go to the police. To this day, I don’t know why I didn’t. I should have. It would have solved all my problems. Instead, he talked me out of it.”
The look on his face was so lost, so bewildered…she could understand.
“Billy was very…persuasive,” Morgan said quietly. “He could make the most implausible thing plausible.”
“Yeah, that he could.” Dean stared down at the money in his hand. “He made me somehow believe that there was a bigger chunk of money coming my way if I didn’t turn him in and somehow…somehow I believed him.”
He shook his head. “That’s not me. But after my wife left me, I was in a spot,” he shrugged. “And obviously not in my right mind, or so I’d like to think. He’d never have talked me into this nightmare otherwise.”
“And the big money pot was stealing from Borg?” she asked incredulously. “That man is going to kill you if he finds out.”
“He won’t find out.” Dean glanced over at the two of them. “Unless you guys tell him.”
Jazz immediately shook her head. “I won’t tell him.”
She waited half a beat then said, “Do you know how much money was stolen?”
“Over twenty thousand. I was supposed to get half.” He looked wistful for moment before his face hardened. “Now if Borg finds out, I’m dead.”
“Do you know how to get a hold of him?” Morgan asked. “Because if you want out of this hole, giving it back is the way to go.”
Dean’s face lit up with hope. “There was a place…a tattoo parlor in town that Billy used as a message place.” He frowned at Jazz. “I figured it was your shop.”
*
Morgan stared over at Jazz. Her skin had gone sheer white, her eyes huge orbs of fear.
“What kind of messaging system did he have?”
“No idea. For all I know, he left messages in the window or some such thi
ng,” he said. “Billy was into spy bullshit like that.”
Morgan nodded. He reached out and tucked Jazz closer against him. He’d been keeping a close eye on the gun in Dean’s hand. This play could go bad so many ways.
Not to mention they were out in the open and anyone could see them. Waving a gun around was likely to get the cops called on them. He couldn’t decide if that was a good thing or not.
Dean had been a victim as much as anyone here. But when life had given him an opportunity to make the right choice, he’d allowed greed and Billy to help him make a wrong turn.
He understood. He’d allowed Billy to help him make a few wrong choices as well.
And like Dean, he could only blame himself. Morgan had made his way back to the right side of his poor decision. Was it possible to help Dean to get back on track from his? If he’d been actively involved in a robbery, that was a whole different story.
He’d have sworn that Dean wouldn’t be mixed up on this. But neither could he forget that his good friend had a gun in his hand.
Yet at the same time, he hadn’t hurt them. Even now, Dean looked undecided. He was staring at the roll of money in his hand. Staring at it as if it were poison. Which it was.
“Dean?” He waited until the man lifted his gaze to stare at him.
“What?” But Dean’s gaze was absentminded, as if he was lost in his thoughts.
“I have to ask, what are you planning to do?”
He felt Jazz’s startled movement, her awareness of the situation.
Dean waved the gun arm around then dropped it down as if in disgust.
“Jesus, what the hell am I doing?” He slumped to a sitting position on the front step and groaned.
“How about starting with putting the gun away before someone calls the police?” Morgan asked quietly.
“Ah hell.” He slipped it into his jacket pocket. Not quite far enough way to make Morgan happy, but way better than having it waved around Jazz’s head.
But a defeated Dean wasn’t nice either.
Jazz stepped back from Morgan, and his arms immediately felt empty.
“What do you want to do?” she asked.
Chapter 6
Jazz wanted to walk away from her house. From all the hellish moments she’d had here. But first she had to get out. Making a decision, and very tired of dealing with the bad hand other people dealt her, she grabbed the bags from Morgan’s grip and walked away.
She never said anything. She just tugged it free, walked to the truck, and tossed it over the back of the box. She walked back over and collected her boots. There was no way she was leaving the money in the other one. She had to have something to give Borg if he returned. And if he didn’t, then she’d have to decide if she was going to give it to the police or to a charity. Maybe she could do both. Give it to police and if no one claimed it, she could collect it after thirty days and give it to charity then.
She tossed the boots up in the front of the truck cab and hopped in. Like hell she was going back out. She wished she had the keys because that was a given that she’d be driving out of here right now. In fact, she was tempted to hit the horn anyway. Her own truck was parked on the side, her bike at the back. But she didn’t think she could escape in either without pissing Morgan off – and as for Dean’s reaction – she had no idea. She wasn’t going to take the chance. Especially if that left Morgan to deal with an angry Dean.
The two men talked together for a few moments, then Morgan walked toward her.
Quietly, he stepped into the truck and turned on the engine. Backing out of her driveway, he pulled the truck forward and down the block.
Jazz turned to look behind them. There was no sign of Dean.
“So,” she asked quietly. “He let us go, but is he likely to change his mind?”
“I don’t think so.” Morgan shoved his hand into his pocket and pulled out the roll of bills. “He gave this back.”
She made a startled exclamation and snatched it up. “Really? Why?”
“Because he’s trying to get out of a bad situation.”
“And giving back the money he was promised is going to do that? How does that make any sense?”
“He figures the money was part of the wrong turn in his life. As was Billy. With Billy now gone, he wanted nothing to do with the money. And he knows he’s in deep trouble if Borg ever finds out he had a hand in this.”
“And that part about Billy using a tattoo shop for communicating with his friends?”
There was a deep silence. Then he said admittedly in a deep voice, “He didn’t know the name of the shop but did say he thought it was on Carlson Street. And that it could be yours. It’s one of the reasons he suspected we might have the money.”
Her heart slammed against her ribs. She leaned back and closed her eyes.
“Christ. Does this mean that Billy was stealing for Borg? And didn’t hand it all over one time?”
“I’m afraid so. And someone – possibly from your store – was their go-between.”
“And the dragon tattoos?”
“I can’t say. But I’m wondering if they aren’t people who worked for Borg?”
She twisted. “Did you ask Dean if he had one?”
He took his eyes off the road and stared at her. “No, I didn’t.”
“You need to. There has to be a connection.”
“I doubt Borg would make his employees get a dragon tattoo in that location. Tattoos are common in gangs, but not like that.”
Jazz wondered if anything would make any sense. There were too many unknowns and too many loose threads. It was crazy. But the problem now was this large stash of cash. “What do we do with the money?”
“I was wondering…maybe we should be trying to contact Borg.”
“Not the police?” She studied his profile carefully. “I’d love to bring the police in on this.”
“I would like to. But keeping you alive is first and foremost. If Borg…who already has us on his radar…is using your shop as a go between, then he’s likely to already know something is up. He’ll be getting insider information somehow.”
“It’s not Roxy or Perl. Roxy has been my partner for almost ten years and Perl has worked there for over a year.”
“I’m not suggesting that they might be,” he said in a mild tone. “I was actually wondering about a camera or audio inside your shop instead.”
Shit. Her breath caught in her chest and stayed there. She closed her eyes as she struggled to release the panic inside. She’d worked so hard to make her business what it was today. To think of someone trying to screw with that was just too much.
“Breathe,” Morgan snapped, his voice harsh. He reached across and shook her. “Damn it, Jazz, breathe.”
Whoosh. The air flushed outward, and more cleansing air swept in. She took in several more breaths before she answered in a low voice, “I’m okay.”
“Are you sure?”
She nodded. “It was just the thought of my shop, my customers, everyone being on camera. Every word being listened to, monitored. It’s just too much.”
“Stay calm. We’ll get to the bottom of this.”
“Why did you leave? Damn it, if you hadn’t disappeared, then Billy wouldn’t have gone this far down the road,” she cried. Instantly she regretted the outburst. With a groan, she leaned her head back and said, “I’m sorry. That wasn’t fair.”
“Maybe not, but it is the truth. I wonder if he didn’t have this all planned in the first place. That getting rid of me was part of his methodology. Leaving not only you wide open, but the shop available to use as his playground.”
“God, what a horrible thought.” She couldn’t bear to think about it, but it had to be faced. “It also left my house easy to access as you weren’t there.”
“Well, your apartment. You didn’t own the house when I was there.”
“No, I bought it not long after. I’d been looking for a place that didn’t have memories. A new start – in so many w
ays.”
In the silence of the cab, she could hear his regret.
“So what do we do now?”
“I’m thinking that as the shop is almost closed for the day, we should grab a bite to eat and then go and see if we can find a system that might have been used. There has to be some way that he knows when someone wants him. Or has something for him.”
“Food would be good. I want to go to the store after everyone has left. Including Roxy. She’s been victimized enough.”
“Agreed.”
*
There was a Chinese food restaurant not too far away from the store. He pulled into the back parking lot and turned off the engine. She hopped out.
He waited for her to go ahead of him. The restaurant had just opened for the dinner crowd and was still empty.
Good. Then they wouldn’t be disturbed.
Jazz walked to the window and chose a table close by, seating herself so she could look outside and survey the restaurant. He knew she’d had several major shocks lately. She had to be wondering from what direction the next one was coming from. He sat down opposite her.
The waiter came over immediately and handed over menus.
“Jazz, do you know what you want?”
She shook her head. “No, just order something please.”
He frowned, glanced at the menu, then picked out the dishes he knew she loved and ordered. With any luck, the food wouldn’t take long to arrive. Her skin was pale and her eyes, well, they looked like they’d taken several blows.
“It’s going to be okay. We can fix this.”
“Really? If we give the money back to Borg, then we’re perpetrating the cycle. If we call in the cops, then we’re likely to be the ones in trouble and Borg gets away.”
“I don’t give a rat’s ass if Borg does get away as long as he stays a long ways away from you.”
“From us,” she snapped. “I don’t want to survive this to find you didn’t. No making stupid sacrifices that get you killed either.”
He grinned at the ire in her voice. “I won’t.”