by Imani King
“We’ll have him alone out here. No one ever comes to this part of the park. Boss says the guy should go down easy. We get access to his accounts, his contacts... We’re set. Art says he’s got money in the hundreds of millions. His pops was tied to the mob in New York, and Red brought all that money with him when the old man was killed. Art knew the guy. Nasty, dirty old cop.” The man chuckled. “It’ll be a huge boost for Art. He’s got nothin,” Al whispered to the other man. My stomach dropped. Had he just said ‘Art?’” It couldn’t be. I knew my father was a complete dick, but I couldn’t believe he’d involve me in this. Nausea hit me and I stifled a groan, burying my face in the hot plastic seat.
“Fucking hell, man,” the short one said, “What if she’s awake?”
“She’s not,” said Al. “Plus she wouldn’t be able to hear us anyway. Art says if we off the tall guy, boss’ll get access to the guy’s offshore accounts. Says it’s millions, maybe hundreds of millions. Who the fuck knows?”
“Shit hasn’t gone down yet, and we ain’t gotten paid. But I think we’re good for it. Some kind of covered-up murder in New York. Boss says that Red guy knows about… you know…”
“About what?” Al asked. “About the… thing with his ex-wife?”
“Shut the hell up, Al. She’s gonna wake up. She ain’t need to know all this shit. Not if she’s the bait. Art’s ordered Red to take care of her, and he says Red will follow what he says to the ends of the earth.”
“Let’s hope he fucking does. Art’s broke. We’re broke. We better fucking hope Red comes and falls right into this shit.” The van drifted on and on, and I felt myself drifting further and further from civilization. And further and further away from the only people I had left in my life.
My father, using me as a pawn. Red, bound for danger. My mother, long gone—and perhaps at the hands of my father.
I lay there listening to the two men talk, the coil of fear winding tighter and tighter in my body. The scarf over my eyes smelled stale, like it had been sitting in a drawer for far too long. And like a good, smart girl, I kept quiet, my body humming with the knowledge I’d gained. They were thugs, and I knew they wouldn’t hesitate to hurt me, even if they had orders not to kill me… yet.
Would they kill me anyway? I turned the thought over in my mind, another sick feeling rising in my gut.
The heat was starting to get to me, the walls of the van seeming to close in, the zip tie eating into my wrists. The wound in my head throbbed. The men hadn’t tended to it, and they weren’t about to be generous with any pain relief. Still, I kept quiet as they drove on. They were too stupid to figure out that my father would probably be displeased with my state, even if he had told them that it was okay to rough me up. I imagined him saying it and turned the words over in my mind.
Rough her up a little. But don’t kill her. Not yet.
Hot bile rose in my throat. I hadn’t even known my father had an issue with money. Was he broke? Was that even within the realm of possibility? A memory hit me, all at once. My father had met with the lawyers all day a week after my mother’s death. He had left his office in a rage, storming past me. There was no trust fund, they’d said. Not a penny to her name. The Hollywood Rose was destitute, and she had no estate to leave to her daughter.
Bitch, fucking bitch, he’d said. If he had thought about it for one moment, he might have realized that his daughter could hear him. But as usual, he didn’t give one single shit. But it wasn’t me this time. It wasn’t my mother.
Red. Red was the target. Not me.
Red, his hands on my body. His eyes, sincere and searching. My pleasure, tumbling through me as surely as the sea hits shore.
Panic joined the nasty twisty feeling in my body. The men started talking again, apparently confident that I was deaf—or at least asleep.
“Yeah, this one is tricky. It’s Art paying us back what he owes and taking the rest for himself. He told the boss he was going to have us taken out, but he’d thought of a better solution. That Red asshole gave the boss an incredible beatdown back in the day, and apparently he’s become a thorn in Art’s side. Plus, he knows too damn much.”
“We’ll take care of that. He’s toast once he gets out to the desert.”
I moaned, trying to push the rag out of my mouth again. They kept using the same oily old rag over and over. I moaned again, trying to get their attention. I’d had enough of listening to them talk about a man I cared about, a man I wanted. The only person left in the world that I could maybe trust. Maybe if they took me to use the bathroom, I’d be able to kick one of them in the balls and disable him. Then I could make a run for it.
With a blindfold on, and a zip tie on my wrists. Yeah, right. None of that seemed right. I wouldn’t make it very far in whatever godforsaken inland hell we were in. The air was hot and dry, and the men had kept mentioning the desert. I imagined myself, fumbling around Joshua Tree or wherever the fuck we were going, trying to live off of my wits. Yeah, that probably wasn’t going to work. And then what about Red? What would I do? Try to find him and use rocks to kill the bad guys? I found myself wishing that I’d signed up for a survival course instead of pre-med classes. My Berkeley education and my Hollywood legacy didn’t make shit for difference out here. I’d die, even if I got away.
I thought of Red again ... his arms around me, his lips on mine. Even in the midst of this situation, he gave me a sense of calm. It was hard to explain why. He was a part of all this shit somehow, and it was because of his past that the men had taken me. That much was clear. There was some kind of exchange set up, and it all centered on Red and what he’d done or hadn’t done.
And my dad had set him up for it. It was a grotesque thought, but one that I had to face as a possibility. I heaved silently, pulling against the zip ties. If I vomited in this thing, it would all be over. The gag wouldn’t work out too well with any nausea. I’d just have to keep it pushed down and hidden away, like everything else in my life.
Red
“Fucking Joshua Tree National Park, in the middle of fucking nowhere.” I passed the welcome sign for the fucking desert-ass park, swerving the Aston into the parking lot where I was supposed to meet the fuckers who took Gabi. I thought of her, too perfect for me. Too perfect to know the truth about her asshole father, the man who’d probably sent her off to that producer and didn’t give a shit what happened to her. It wasn’t fair, this life. And it hadn’t been fair to Gabi. I drove the Aston to the east end of the lot, listening to its comforting, throaty rumble. The assholes weren’t even there yet, hadn’t even shown their faces. I waited, watching as the sun set over the desert. Pink, yellow, and orange, mixing all together over the city and its crowded counties.
I felt unsettled as I sat and watched the road. Gabi had been taken on her way to see me. I thought back to Art’s face as he told me to go get his daughter. There were no tears. There was no emotion. He’d pointed to the case of money, and he’d tried to get me out of there as soon as possible.
Art Sanchez. I’d known him for more than ten years, and I’d done his dirty work in all that time. He’d dragged me across the country after my crime, and I’d borne witness to his. I was a bad kid, son of a dirty cop, raised among the mafioso. My father was a nasty man, friends with Art from way back. They were cut from the same cloth, but Art hadn’t given me any choice when it came to following him across the country. He knew my secret, and I ended up knowing his. More than he wanted me to know, more than he ever bargained for. We were valuable to each other, and I’d gotten myself into this damn mess.
And Gabi, well, she’d messed everything up. I closed my eyes for a moment and thought of her. I’d do anything to protect her, anything to hold her in my arms again. I’d make sure she was safe, even if it did mean she found out about what I’d done. Even if she found out what her father had done.
Art’s using her… and if he’s using her… that means…
A van pulled up into the abandoned parking lot, rumbling over rocks
and kicking up dust. This was a part of the park no one came to, hadn’t been open to visitors in years due to rock slides and flash floods in the spring. It was fucking dangerous to be stuck here. Any piece of shit could find a place out here to stash a body. Slide it under a rock, dig a hole that would dry in a cemented paste before the rains of spring came.
The van squealed around and parked. Two men slid out—one tall and fat, the other short and scrawny but full of wiry muscles. I glanced over them before turning off the Aston and getting out of the car. I grabbed the case Art had given me and put it up on top of the car behind me. The men walked over, and I craned my neck, looking for Gabi’s dark waves in the back of the van. There was nothing, no one.
“She’s down in the back of the van. Let’s just say she ran into my gun a couple of times,” he said. “I know your boss wouldn’t like that, but she’s a feisty one. And real pretty too.” The man glanced back at the van, and the short man chuckled. I brought my hand to the gun at my hip, fury pumping through my body. The air seemed to still, my senses heightened, each movement slowing around me. This is what happened when my rage came to me. It was a tool, a tool that made me hard and cold.
Gabi, my beautiful Gabi. The girl was as pretty as an angel, and she wanted me worse than any woman I’d ever been with. I was used to the bored models and actresses of Los Angeles. But Gabi, Gabi was all curves, her young body seeking mine out, sighing and rocking against me at the slightest touch. Innocent, with the twist of a bad girl deep inside.
“If you hurt her, I swear to God I’ll kill you both.” I moved my hand over the butt of my gun and put my finger next to the trigger.
“Easy there, Red,” the wiry little man said. “Al’s just joking. She ain’t but so roughed up. And Al here didn’t even get to do what he wanted to her. And what the hell do you care about this girl anyway? Not like she’s your girlfriend. Just the boss’s daughter.” Al turned slowly and pulled a gun from the back of his jeans, aiming it right at the back of the van.
Compact semi-automatic. Goddammit.
“I ain’t joking. I’ll shoot her dead. Boss won’t care too much, long as we got what we came for.”
“Cut it out,” said the wiry man. Al turned back and stuffed the gun back in his jeans.
A stupid man. The wiry one has the brains, but he’s not as strong as the big one. The big one probably knows how to work a gun, but he’s not quick.
“I got what you came for,” I said. I nodded toward the suitcase on top of my car. “You want me to open it, show you the bills?”
“Yeah, sure,” said Al, grinning.
“That’s not necessary,” said the little man. He held out his hand and darted his eyes around nervously. I picked up the suitcase and stepped toward him, but just as I did, I saw the thick, dark curls of Gabi’s hair at the back window of the van. She shook her head slowly and pointed at the two men. The short man reached out his hand and grabbed the edge of the case.
“Come on now, man. Hand it over,” he said. Gabi’s mouth opened in a scream and she banged at the window. The air stilled again.
Something isn’t right. Even through the van’s dark windows, I could hear her cries, even through the makeshift gag over her mouth. I dropped the case, and it flew open. A spray of dollar bills poured out and caught the wind, flying into the desert. Beneath the bills were sheets of white copy paper.
Gabi’s muffled shouts reached my ears, but the other two men didn’t seem to comprehend. Al and the other man looked back toward the van. In that one moment, time slowed. I stepped forward and grabbed the gun from Al’s jeans, warm and sweaty from his skin. I smashed it against the back of the short man’s head, knocking him to the ground. His eyes rolled to the back of his head, and I hit him again before Al could turn around. Taking aim, I shot Al in the leg. He brought his hand to the wound, and blood pooled under his fingers. He fell to the ground, Gabi screaming in the background. I rushed to the van and swung the passenger door open, propelling myself into the driver’s seat just as I slammed the door behind me. I started the rusty old thing and drove up to the Aston.
“I’ll miss you baby, but I think someone will be looking for you.” I rolled the window down and leaned out of it. Taking a deep breath, I shot out the tires. “May the desert keep you well.” I sped off in the van. The two men lay on the ground, the short one passed out, and the taller one in agony. “I won’t kill you just yet. You’ll need to tell Art to come and get you…”
I sped off toward the east. Cell reception was dead in that section of the park. The two men would have to hobble their way to a gas station several miles up the road. And if they lived the night, they would.
If they didn’t, well, I’d go find Art myself.
But for now, we were as safe as we could be. Gabi groaned and rolled her eyes in the back seat.
“Sorry, baby. You look good all tied up. We’ll get you sorted at the next inconspicuous place.”
And maybe, for one night, we’d have a moment together before everything went to hell.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Gabriella
When Red pulled over to cut the zip ties on my wrists, he kissed me, deep and hard, pushing me against the van. The California wind whipped around us as night fell over the dead zone between Joshua Tree and Los Angeles. As soon as his lips parted from mine, hot tears came to my eyes.
“Red! It’s Dad. It’s Art. He’s using me… and you. He doesn’t give a shit about me, about either of us.” I leaned into Red’s shirt, my tears making streaks down the fine blue fabric. I melted into him and threw my arms around his back, sobbing. The heaviness of my life had fallen back on me, hard and horrible.
“It’s okay, Gabi. I’ll turn Art in for what he did—”
“You mean, hurting my mother? Killing her?” I looked up at him. His deep blue eyes settled on mine. He was silent for a moment. “Did he do it? You know something, don’t you? You always did!” I beat against his chest with one hand. The emotion was rising in me like a tide, as uncontrollable as the sea. It was all beginning to sink in.
“How in the hell did you know that? What did you find? How do you know?” He grabbed my arms and clutched hard, but his grip softened immediately.
“Did you have something to do with it? You were here. You were working for my father then!” I sobbed, and he pulled me into him.
“No, no, no. I didn’t. I was with him when… when he moved her. I’m the only witness.” He smoothed his hand over my hair. Red hugged me tight, encasing me in his arms with the strength and tenderness he possessed. I sighed but choked again, still racked with sobs. “You need time, Gabi. Time to understand this.”
“Oh God, oh God, oh God. Thinking of her like that… my father… I can’t…”
“Shh, Gabi. You sleep now. And soon, we’ll be home.”
I nodded, my face still pressed into my shirt. Gently, he guided me back to the passenger’s side of the car and helped me in. “You mean, your home?”
“I’m not taking you back to Art,” he said. He buckled himself in and started the van. It rumbled away, creaky and protesting, but bound for Los Angeles again. “Besides, it’ll take those goons a while to get back to Art. We’re okay for right now. Trust me.”
“I do,” I said, leaning my head against the seat. I grabbed one of the bottles of water the men had carried in the car and drank it down in its entirety before closing my eyes and drifting off as we crossed the desert.
Red
“You shouldn’t,” I said. But she was already asleep, her thick curls framing that beautiful face. Those deep brown eyes closed and dreaming, hopefully of better days.
I thought of Rose. Rosalind Dawson, the Hollywood Rose. She had been so beautiful, so like Gabi, but delicate in a way that Gabi wasn’t. Even as little as I knew Rose, I couldn’t imagine her beating at the car window and screaming through a gag. But God. That awful day. That day when Art had called me. The bastard’s voice was as even as ever.
Red, we’re moving a bo
dy tonight.
