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“What? No—Hi! Great to see you?—I get that reaction?” Nodding, I’m so done with this entire mission. “Fuck you and let me in.”
I can hear her scoff, but the gates buzz open for me. I drive through and park next to the service entrance. No one uses the front door unless it is for an event where an important person is expected. Fancy pearls and big old family names are what it means. I walk in the service door to the kitchen and I am faced by the monster herself. She slightly stumbles over her feet as she walks toward me.
“Everything went to the pisser since our last meeting. Reese, you said you could handle this situation! Jessica is dead and I am being accused of her murder!” She throws a bundle of flowers on the table along with her gardening gloves. “Mitchell is dead! The entire building is in shambles, the business is losing stock, and my ‘friends’ won’t talk to me.”
“They aren’t your friends. They used you—I like these roses. Did you grow them yourself?” I ask. Trying to divert that conversation. Picking up one rose, I accidentally poke my finger with one of the thorns. “Shit.”
Blood drips down my finger. I grin as I wipe my blood on the underside of the countertop, just in case. I shrug, holding my hand up in front of me. A new drop of blood falls down my finger. Allison sees this and quickly grabs a towel along with a small first aid kit from the cabinet. She places the stack in front of me.
“Don’t get blood on my stuff.” She turns and goes back to complaining. “You were to take Mitchell down and I was going to be the wife everyone sides with. Sympathy can open so many doors! No one was supposed to die! How do I get out of this mess? Leave the country?”
“Now there’s a thought!” I say out loud as I clean my tiny wound. I finish bandaging my finger and go to put my trash in the garbage when I knock her glass of red wine over on the floor. “Oh my god!”
“God, you are so clumsy!” She grabs another dishcloth and some cleaner. She is on her hands and knees cleaning my mess. I notice a couple of empty liquor bottles in the trash. The mostly empty wine bottle on the counter confirms she is a mess.
As she is on her hands and knees, I grab the first aid kit and shove it into my bag. Can never have too many first aid supplies, am I right?
“You need to figure this mess out so I can rebuild and rebrand my image.” She slurs some of her words and I know she is just at the beginning stages of being smashed. Just buzzed enough to piss off and manipulate.
I roll my eyes at her. Really can’t stand this woman. I look around the house and decide that this simply isn’t a good place to kill her. There’re cops outside, and the place is either bugged or has hidden cameras or both. I need to play this smart and get her out of the house. Maybe a small hike and she accidentally falls off a cliff? Hmm… that’s a thought.
I whisper and wave my hand around, insinuating we’re being recorded. “Let’s get out of here and get you some fresh air.”
She huffs so dramatically. “You promised me.”
“I promised you nothing,” I calmly state.
She pulls a gun from under the pile of flowers. She has it pointed directly at my head, surprising me with the steadiness she displays. This woman is aggravating me with her actions. She was the reckless one in her pursuit of power. With Mitchell out of the way, she would have been the sole owner and CEO of not only her own business but the ones Mitchell owned himself and the businesses that they created together.
Either this bitch doesn’t get the hint, or she simply doesn’t care. I hold my hand up and point between her and me. “Seriously? This is where we are at? Why the gun?”
“You were to be the one who took him down. We had a plan.” Tears prick at her eyes. “I can’t walk out of the house without someone whispering some god-awful thing about me and my family! You let that man ruin everything.”
“Don’t blame me for that. I can’t control what I didn’t know. Until you called me when the new patient consultation went down the toilet, I did not know there was anyone else after your husband. He made a lot of enemies on his own,” I say.
I can’t tell her the truth. She can’t be trusted in her current state of mind. If she only knew it was me that encouraged Adam to make that appointment. I had found that she wasn’t the victim she made herself out to be, instead; she was the orchestrator of a bigger plan.
She groans, remembering that god-awful day. “How do we fix this?”
“I told you, we need to get out of here and get a fresh perspective,” I say again.
Allison walks over to me, lowers her gun to the ground, and slaps me across the face… hard.
A small squeak escapes my mouth. My hand covers my stinging cheek. I take a deep breath before looking at her again.
“Do you think I am stupid?” She shakes her head. “I am being watched! I can’t drive anywhere without the dumb cops following me! It will cause even more suspicion on me!”
I take my keys out of my pocket and hold them out to her. “Okay, we can take my car. I will call my handler as soon as we are clear from this house. The car has dark tinted windows.”
She contemplates the offer and looks over my shoulder at the car parked outside. She grabs the keys from my hands and pushes the gun against my shoulder. “I will drive and you will call.”
I nod and walk out of the service entrance, with her following behind. She puts the gun in her purse and I am relieved that it is out of her immediate reach. I climb into the passenger seat while she sits in the driver’s seat, buckling up and starting the engine. She leaves the property, briefly stopping and looking down the street at the undercover police officers that are sitting and watching the house.
She takes off in the opposite direction. God, I had forgotten how horrible she was at driving. She is a master of kissing the opposite curb with the tires but not hitting anything or anyone.
“For God’s sake! How the hell did you not die when you crashed?” I gasp. “I swear you are a cat with nine lives.”
“I am an excellent driver!” she firmly states, gripping the wheel. “The mechanics and cops said my brake lines were cut! I swear it was Mitchell! That fat bastard would’ve done anything to get me out of his life. Divorce was never an option because we didn’t have a prenup. Love is a goddamn joke!”
