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I kept my gun trained on Ghost as I dragged him from my truck. He pretended to fall to his knees to make himself appear weak and dazed. I yanked him back to his feet. He’d told me to be rough with him, but I hated knowing I was hurting his arm. I had to remind myself to keep any feelings of sympathy off my face as I frog-marched him toward Teddy and the two men who flanked him.
“So you really do have him?” Teddy asked.
“You doubted me?”
“You’re sneaky. I learned that a long time ago.”
“If I wasn’t, I never would have caught him. You know they say he can disappear into thin air.”
“He better not do that after you hand him over.”
“Once I hand him over, that’s a you problem not a me problem. If you can’t manage to keep him restrained, maybe you’re not fit for your new role.”
Teddy glared at me, his hand resting on his gun, and I felt Ghost tense.
I wanted to reassure him. Teddy enjoyed forcing me to do what I didn’t want to do. He enjoyed punishing me by dragging me deeper into the world I so desperately wanted to leave behind. Now that he thought he could do that again, he wasn’t going to shoot me. What would be the fun in that?
“You’re going to regret this,” Ghost slurred.
“Did you drug him? Is that how you managed this?”
I shrugged. “Maybe it is, but I’m not about to reveal my secrets. If you want me to work for you, then I do things my way. I made that clear long ago.”
Teddy scowled. “Hand him over.”
“You sure you’re ready for that?”
He glanced over his shoulder and motioned for the guards to move in closer just like I’d known he would. He was going to make sure his protection was in place before he handled a person like Ghost. I didn’t think Teddy would lay a hand on him. I didn’t think he’d dare, and if Ghost got away, Teddy could blame the guards. He always needed somebody to point the finger at.
Using a hand on his back, I shoved Ghost forward. He pretended to stumble, then, in a perfectly coordinated move, he slipped free of his bonds, grabbed his gun, and shot the man on Teddy’s left as I shot the man on his right.
We’d pulled it off exactly as planned.
Teddy’s eyes went wide, and he turned to run.
“Don’t,” I yelled. “I will shoot you in the back, but I’d rather have a conversation first.”
When Teddy turned around, I saw the sweat beaded on his forehead. He was scared, and I liked that.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Betraying you. You’ve done it to me often enough that I thought you’d recognize the move.”
“You’re working with him? You fucking snitch!”
“I am working with him,” I said looking at Ghost. “Because he’s my ticket to getting rid of you and severing my last tied to this goddamned organization.”
“They know who you are. They’re going to come after you.”
“Are you sure? As I see it, I’m getting rid of a problem for them. You really think they’re going to care that you’re gone?”
“What do you mean gone?”
“You honestly think I’m going to let you live? You think I’m going to let you run back to them and tell them when I did? They’re never going to know I was even here.”
Ghost watched me as I talked, and the admiration on his face did things to my body I didn’t have time for right then. Later, I would make plenty of time for them.
“We can do this easy, or we can do this hard,” I said. “Tell me who’s really behind this push into new territory. It’s not old man Russo, and Trey is… well, he’s gone.”
“You know where he is?”
“I know how dead he is.”
“You son of a bitch.”
“Does that mean you’re not going to tell me? Do you want to die the hard way?”
His eyes widened as I aimed my gun at his knee.
“No,” he screamed. “I… I’m sure we can work something out. I’ve got a lot of valuable information. If we work together, you might move up to be the person who’s really running this operation.”
Several years ago, an offer like that might have been attractive, but not now. “I don’t want any part of it. Talk, or I start shooting.”
“You didn’t used to be like this,” Teddy whined. “Remember what we had? We could have that again.”
Remembering being with him made me nauseous. I was nothing more than a pawn to him.
“You have until three. One.” When I readjusted my aim, words started spilling from him.
When we had the information we needed, I smiled at him one last time. “Thank you. That was helpful.”
I was raising my gun when Ghost took the shot instead. The bullet hit Teddy in the center of his chest. He clutched at the wound as he fell to his knees. A second later, he slumped to the ground. If he wasn’t already dead, he would be in a matter of seconds.
