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The man raises both hands and steps at me, and right away, I snap my rifle into place, staring down the line of sight, glancing around to assess the situation.
We’re alone – one door, a possible entry point.
I turn, nodding at him, so he moves, and I’ve got my back against the wall.
“Do you think I’m going to walk down without a weapon?” I snap. “Cormac knows better than that.”
“Oh, dear Cormac,” The voice rises from the staircase, belonging to a man in a faded purple suit. He’s got long, slick black hair, covered in sweat or product, with shiny gold chains hanging around his neck, his shirt open halfway down his chest. “He was a lovely man.”
“Junior?” I say, studying Cormac’s son. He’s twenty-two and looks it as he gets closer, his face spotty and his cheeks pale.
I remember him when he was just a kid pestering his dad for cash.
“My name is Cormac,” he says. “I was never Junior.”
“Where’s your father?” I say, lowering my barrel halfway. “And where’s Kelly?”
“My dear father is down there.” Cormac points at the floor, leering at me, and then I get it. Hell. He’s dead. It’s as simple as that, sometimes, in this life. “And Kelly is down there.”
He points toward the staircase.
“You know,” Junior says, running a hand through his slick hair. “She really likes me. Fell head over heels. I thought, well… the only girl you’ve ever taken, this one. There must be some loyalty there. But she threw herself at me.”
“Presumably, you want my attention,” I say, my finger twitching for the trigger. But I maintain discipline. “You’ve got it. How much?”
“How much?”
“Or what do you want?” I snarl. “It’s always the same with you motherfuckers. Go on, tell me.”
“You ought to change your tone. Daddy’s the one who ordered the hit on Matt.”
I laugh darkly because otherwise, I’ll roar. I’ll leap at him and slam the butt of the rifle across his sneering face.
“Maybe that’s true. Or maybe you’re bullshitting me. It doesn’t matter. The life killed Matt, all of you. You’re all fucking dirt. Give me my….”
My woman’s sister.
“Kelly, or things are going to go very badly for you.”
He laughs in a way I don’t like at all, a way that makes me want to grab his shoulders and throw him against the wall, hard. Throw him so his bones creak in his body, and he doesn’t know what’s hit him.
“She isn’t here,” Junior says. “Do you think I’d be that stupid, Jamie? No, she’s somewhere safe, somewhere you won’t be able to get to her.”
Junior glances at the guard, then back at me, at my rifle. I’ve still got it half-raised, ready to snap it into place and pull the trigger.
“Could you lower that thing, Jamie? You’re sort of making me nervous.”
“Yeah, that’s sort of the point.”
He grins tightly. “Fair enough. But you’re forgetting. I’m the one with the leverage here. A snap of my fingers…,” he goes snap. “…and the only woman you’ve ever had a relationship with – as far as I or anybody else can tell – gets an unfortunate case of throat slitting.”
My instinct is to tell him the truth.
I may have had a relationship with Kelly, but I didn’t feel anything, nothing close to what I felt for Jennifer.
But I can’t forget the way Kelly pleaded with me, tears in her eyes, to keep the secret.
Please don’t tell her. Jennifer can‘t know.
Pushing away the past, I focus on the here, and the now. “How do I even know Kelly’s still alive?”
Junior spreads his hands. “Look around, Jamie. It’s just Lance and me here.”
The other man grunts.
“There’s nobody else. Just the two of us. Do you think I’d meet with you alone if I hadn’t already taken care of everything?”
“So, where is she?” I snap.
“Somewhere safe,” Junior says. “Someplace where you won’t find her, as I said. But I can show you.”
I tense up on the rifle when he reaches into his pocket.
He laughs gruffly as he takes out his phone.
“You’re paranoid.”
It’s the only way to stay alive in this life, but I won’t impart that lesson on this little bastard.
He shows me his phone screen.
There’s a camera at the top corner of a bedroom – a simple bed, a small desk, and a window looking out on what looks like woodland. Kelly paces up and down the small room, then stops and glares at the camera.
Her lips are moving, but I can’t make out the noise.
Importantly, she doesn’t seem hurt. But it’s not always easy to tell.
I have to keep reminding myself that, as far as Cormac Junior knows, Kelly means something to me…and not just because she’s my woman’s sister. As far as he knows – hell, as far as Jennifer knows – she’s the love of my life.
“I don’t want to hurt anybody,” he says. “I just want what’s rightfully mine.”
