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Before I can react, his words stop me cold.
“Hello, Stephanie. Your family misses you.”
7
Stas
“How the fuck?” I shake my head as I steer the car like a maniac, pushing the engine hard, doing 110 mph toward home. Nothing is working in my favor.
The fucking plane gauge that was a problem on the way down, went out again and we had to land, wait for a new one to be delivered and installed. Then tested. I about lost my damn mind.
Everything seemed fine at the house when I talked to Ginger and George when we were down for repairs, and honestly, Calfus knew my name but even with that there’s not much other information about me, even where I live that is easy to find.
Everything I own is in a trust or under other names that are not traceable back to me. Still, I’m on the phone with Malcolm now as I drive back from the airport to home, hoping to get more intel on Calfus and what actually went wrong that allowed him to know my fucking name.
“When I said it, I knew it was a mistake, but I didn’t think he caught it.” Malcolm Reynolds’ voice is stoic but after all these years I detect the twinge of panic.
Reynolds is my connection. He sends me the files and the jobs and I take it from there. He’s the one they contact. He’s a ghost for the most part, doing all his work via phone and electronic communication. I’ve only met him a couple times myself.
He’s no saint. That’s the business we’re in. Cleaning up for those that have the resources. I do the relocations, but he has others that handle the wet work and other things I don’t know about I’m sure.
George fits in somewhere in the clean-up department, so he’s no fucking saint either, but I trust him with my life. With her life, too. At least I did.
Cleaning up means taking crime scenes and polishing them like it never happened. Scrubbing out evidence.
Or, if that’s not possible, making it look like something it isn’t, so the authorities don’t have a trail to follow. That’s not my bag. My own training set me up for what I do, which is creating new lives and identities for the ones that can afford my services.
“It’s your fucking job to not make mistakes. He played you. He’s good, but for fuck sake you are supposed to be better.” Anger pounds in my temples but my focus needs to stay straight.
“How he figured out the rest, I’m not sure.” Reynolds answers with a hint of remorse but it’s not enough.
“You were the one that said he was a genius at playing people. It’s his life to pick up on anything and everything that could be a weakness. Now I’m the one with my ass hanging out in the wind. And I don’t fucking care about me, but her. God damn it.” Reynolds doesn’t usually share the details of what puts someone in my lap.
It’s not a good idea, for him, the client or me. He gives me enough to not place them in areas where they could be made, which is all I need to know, but not all the details. Never the details. Because that could sway my own judgment.
“You’re a ghost. He figured out your name, but nothing else in your world is tied to that identity, you said so yourself. But I’ll tell you everything I know about him…”
In this case, he had to spill.
Turns out, this fuck makes his living on the highest level of grifting. His main tag is taking women for large sums. This time, he tag teamed a mother and a daughter. Both fucking married to top level mob operators. And the daughter ended up pregnant. He pocketed about a million and a half before the mother and daughter figured it out.
Needless to say, these particular husbands have one way of dealing with something like this, and every direction he turns would have ended with his body parts in paper bags—starting with his fucking dick.
I grip the wheel until my fingernails dig into my palms as I race through traffic, punching the other phone with her number again and listening as it rings continuously with no answer. George isn’t answering either and the fist pounding in my gut takes a few more whacks until bile rises in the back of my throat.
“I told you.” Reynolds takes on a deeper tone. “The girl makes you vulnerable. It was a mistake. What we do—and having people you care about—just don’t go together. She’s your Achilles heel and you should have known better.”
“Fuck off.” I counter. “Don’t put this on me. You fucked it up. Dropping enough about me so a psycho can figure out who I am. Where I am. That’s on you.”
