Clay held up a finger. He went over to the dresser and picked up the phone.
“Hey, Jasmine,” he said. “How long has thirty-four been occupied?”
He listened for a second.
“And that’s one person. Huh. You ever seen anyone else here? OK. Thanks.”
He dropped the phone back in the cradle. “Buchanan booked the room, but it was a woman who stayed here. She came and went unpredictably, but she’s rented this room for a month,” he said. “Same amount of time that Hadley’s been in town. So she had the money, and the plan was for Buchanan to just swing through—first new stop on his usual route, so a planned disruption—grab her, and disappear. Well, that was his plan. Meanwhile, Elizabeth planned to kill him and then her and Hadley split the cash. Except now she’s in the hospital, and Hadley can’t get the money until Fisher’s men leave town. Makes sense.”
Grade shook his head. “No,” he said.
“Makes sense to me,” Clay said. “Maybe I’m just too dumb to keep up, City Boy.”
Grade winced. “Don’t,” he said.
“It was a joke. I’m a lot of things,” Clay said. “Insecure ain’t one of them.”
That was a lie. Grade had seen the tension on Clay when he’d flashed his scars and the way he’d relaxed when Grade hadn’t flinched. Some things didn’t need to be poked at, though. Not when you already had bad news to deliver.
“This was just the first place I could think of to look. Hadley doesn’tknowwhere the money is,” Grade said. “It’s my job to find it… before he starts cutting my sister’s fingers off.”
Grade’s voice cracked, and the taste of salt bloomed in the back of his throat again. He sniffed and pressed his thumb hard against his upper lip until it died away again. He didn’t know what was wrong with him. Anger was useful. Self-pity wasn’t.
“It’s OK,” Clay said. He put a hand on Grade’s shoulder and squeezed. “We don’t need to find the money.”
“Yeah,” Grade said. “If you’re going to suggest I tap my dad’s stash? Meth’s gotten cheaper since then, and he’s also dead, and I have no idea where they dumped his body. I already told Hadley that.”
Clay rubbed his thumb over the nape of Grade’s neck.
“We don’tneedthe money; all we need is Hadley tothinkwe’ve found it,” he said. “Do you trust me?”
“I… I met you yesterday.”
“Do you trust me?”
“You were standing over a corpse taking a piss.”
Clay grinned and pulled Grade’s head down until their foreheads touched. “And you trust me.”
This time it wasn’t a question. It didn’t need to be. Grade needed his head examined—because everything he’d just said was true—but he didn’t need that to be a question.
“I trust you,” Grade admitted.
“Text him back,” Clay said. “Tell him you have the money.”
Grade reached for his phone even as he shook his head. “What if he knows I’m lying?” he asked, his fingers clenched around the phone so tightly it felt like he had squeezed the sweat out of his palms. “He’s got my sister. She’ll already have pissed him off. You’ve met her. He could hurt her. I won’t… I’m the big brother. I might be a shit one, but it’s my job to protect her, to keep her safe.”
Clay cupped the side of Grade’s face in his hand. “Tell Hadley you’ve found the money, ask him where he wants to meet you, and then I’ll kill him for you. If he doesn’t know where the money is, no one will care if he’s dead.”
Chapter Fourteen
Nothing was everquitethat simple, of course.
Clay might not have a lot of respect for some of Hadley’s recent choices, but the man wasn’t stupid. He’d pulled the wool over all their eyes, one way or another, and made Clay look like a fucking amateur once already. He wasn’t going to get the chance to do it again.
“You got this?” he asked Grade as he held out the bait-bag. There was a couple of grand in cash on top, fresh out of the cash machine. It still had that new money smell of hot paper and fresh ink. “All I need you to do is keep his attention on you for as long as possible.”
Grade took the bag and hefted it reluctantly in his hands. The run-down motel room, a woman’s scant life hung up on unpadded hangers, felt like the wrong background for the scene.
