by Beck Jones
And now this is where it had landed her. Yes, she was a different person than she was just a few months ago. And it was all Russ’ fault.
Still, she would not be brought down by all of this.
She bolted down the glass of wine and poured herself another glass of courage.
RUSS
He stared up at the sleek building, unable to enter it just yet. It wasn’t like an affair was some kind of scandal these days. Her husband was probably aware of it, and Martin Bayard no doubt had his own erotic life outside Amanda. They were obscenely rich, for God’s sake. They didn’t have to abide by the same rules as some bumpkin couple in suburbia worried about what their church friends thought.
Still, he dreaded asking her. He walked around Central Park for nearly an hour, and the sun had already set and the city was ablaze by the time he was gazing out Amanda’s window again.
She handed him his drink. Maybe after the awkwardness, it would be like always.
“We hadn’t arranged anything,” she said. “So I assume you’re here about your alibi.”
Because he didn’t know what to say to that, he decided to say nothing.
“Are you going to ask me?” Amanda said. Her tone had changed, and although he couldn’t have said exactly how it had changed, he knew it wasn’t good.
“No,” he replied. “I’m not going to ask you. I’ve told the police I was with Liz all night last night, and she’s told them the same thing.” To hell with the alibi. From what Flynn had told him, Amanda might decide to screw him over anyway.
Amanda set her drink on the coffee table and then began loosening Russ’ tie. Her fingers were dexterous but gentle. “Oh, Russ, you’re being silly and stubborn. You’re going to need friends in the coming days. Rich and powerful friends. And I am one of those friends. In fact, I would say I’m your best friend right now. So why don’t you make love to me like your life—your full and successful Manhattan life—depends on it. Because it does.”
She stretched up to press her lips against his, and he felt himself getting hard, not out of lust but out of anger. He controlled it, however, maneuvering her clothing to the floor, and laying her on the insanely pricey Persian rug. Tossing his own clothing aside. Yes, he needed her right now, but he wouldn’t bow to her. He was going to destroy her pussy.
And then she plucked his tie from the pile on the floor and changed the terms of their debate.
THE PRO
“Witness protection,” she said.
He couldn’t help himself. He did a double take.
“Watch the road,” she said.
He looked back at the highway. Bullshit.
“You know, it’s funny,” he said, “but you’d figure somebody in witness protection wouldn’t be keen to have her picture plastered all over the place—like on her best-selling books.”
“I’m not in the program anymore. But I was in it. My mother and I were in it. My father was a crime boss, I suppose you’d say. But it wasn’t the Mafia. Not the real Mafia anyway. The Dixie Mafia. I guess it was a lot like the other Mafia, only with redneck accents. He used to beat the shit out of my mother. Raped her. He had no fear of her. In fact, I don’t think she counted at all for him, which is why he didn’t try to keep any secrets from her. And then one day, an FBI agent comes calling, and she ends up testifying in a trial that put him in jail for life. And we were shipped off with new identities. They actually let you keep your first names, and even your initials, but my mother wanted to rechristen me in honor Scarlett O’Hara, even after her own redneck Rhett turned out to be a monster. Sharpe was my witness protection name, and even when I left the program, I kept it because it made me think of Becky Sharp. You know, the novel Vanity Fair.”
Of course, he didn’t know the novel. He wasn’t Mr. Fucking Ph.D. God, he was getting sick of her.
“And you’re not in in the program anymore?” He should at least be relieved at that. Assuming she was telling the truth. That could muddy the waters, to so speak, and make the feds bird dog somebody else.
Bird dog. Where the hell did he get that? She was the red neck, not him.
“I got tired of all the restraints,” she was saying. “By the time we were in the program, I guess I’d lived too much of my life figuring that some night or other my father was going to get a little too drunk and kill my mother and me. Living on the edge had become comfortable.” She shrugged. “Who knows why people do anything? Why did you get into your line of work?”
“I don’t want to get into my life story, thanks.”
“You’re still planning to kill me, aren’t you?”
“If you thought I was going to kill you, why didn’t you put something else in that flask?”
“I didn’t want to kill you. I told you. I wasn’t completely sure who you were. You gave a really convincing story.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“Besides, is it so hard to believe that I find you attractive? Even though you might be a killer? Is it hard to believe I might find you attractive because you are a killer? You really sell yourself short.”
“Please stop with the bullshit.”
“I’m not bullshitting you.”
“You’re just being the woman you think I want. I know. You told me you could do that.”
“How do you know I’m not being honest? It’s not like I have a lot more to lose here. Think about it. You can kill me anytime you want.”
“Why didn’t you do a runner when I left this morning?”
“Because I’m sure it’s not my father or one of his cronies who hired you. When I went to college, I thought I wanted to be some kind of crusading journalist, because of what had happened to my mother. And I guess I thought I might end up in my dad’s crosshairs. And just maybe that was part of the appeal of being a crusading journalist. I don’t know. But then I started writing novels, and I liked it and I got really successful fast. And ever since I hit the best-seller list, I’ve always expected a hired goon, no offense, to come knocking at the door—well, not knocking, but you get the idea, again, no offense. The thing is, before now they’re the only ones that I knew who hated me enough to kill me. So I’m curious, and without your help, I’ll never know.”
“You’re never going to know.”
“Aren’t you curious about who hired you? I mean, obviously this has something to do with the Take Stock show.”
“You don’t know shit.”
She snorted. “Spoken like a guy who also doesn’t know shit. You don’t know who killed Vanessa, do you? They didn’t clue you in to that. Don’t you wonder why not?”
Because he’d screwed the pooch, that’s why. And Selena went with somebody else. Fuck Selena. Fuck Scarlett Sharpe. Fuck Amy. He was sick of them all.
“This is all bullshit, you know. I’m not some kind of contract killer. This is just your writer’s imagination gone wild.”
“Why did you agree to come out here?”
Million dollar question. How the hell had she gotten the upper hand like this? Not much comfort that her old man was some kind of hayseed Soprano.
He turned off on the exit to the state park. “Call it my love for literature. You need me to help you with the chapter about Edward’s old man. What did you say his name was?”
“Josiah.”
“So I’m okay with helping you write Josiah.”
Shit. He could actually feel the cockweiler stirring.
“You have to think of him as an older, harder version of Edward. You don’t look like him, at least how I see him in my mind, but if you can feel like him, that will be enough.”
This time he pulled off the road before the park entrance and eased the car into a wooded area.
“You could puncture a tire that way,” Scarlett said.
“Let me worry about that.”
“I will. I expect you can change a tire pretty easily. Do you want to get the tire iron out of the trunk?”
“The tires are fine.”
She flicked on the overhea
d light. She looked him with a raised eyebrow. “I didn’t mean for the tire. I meant for other purposes.”
He flicked off the light. “You’re letting your imagination run wild.”
“Are you afraid I will end up with the tire iron in my hand?”
He really wanted to hit her.
And there was no reason why he couldn’t.
He wasn’t in such bad shape for pussy that he needed to put up with this shit. He could do her right now. And be done with her.
But she opened the car door and hopped out. And he let her. She strafed the flashlight over the road. He got out and grabbed the flashlight.
“I’ll hold the flashlight this time.”
“Okay,” she said sweetly. She reached over and linked her arm with his. “I’ll let you be in charge.”
“I am in charge.” Which only made him sound stupid.
She tightened her grip on his arm. “Of course, you are. Don’t you get that’s what I like about you? About us?”
“There is no us.”
“There is for this moment.”
They climbed over the gate and started into the park, past the darkened ranger cabin and finally down the path they took before.
She leaned into him, still gripping his arm. “Here’s the thing. After Edward and Emmaline have their—their encounter in the woods beyond the tobacco fields, they meet again and again and again. They always meet in the woods because they’re afraid that if the servants find out someone will tell Josiah. You see, Josiah has gone to the state capital for the legislative session. But someone from the neighboring plantation spies Edward and Emmaline in the woods, and the owner of that plantation finds out. And he sends a letter to Josiah. So Josiah rides home immediately, furious.”
Scarlett stopped and dropped her hands from his arm to push her hair from her face. “Whoo. I’ve got to rest.”
He was sweating, too. He remembered this part of the path all too well. This was where she’d lifted his piece.
“So anyway,” Scarlett said, still breathing a little hard, “Josiah rides home, but there’s this really long drive coming up the house, and when Emmaline looks out her bedroom window she sees it’s Josiah, so she tries to escape. On horseback. So she gets to the barn and jumps on a horse by the time Josiah reaches the house, and he gallops after her.”
He was keeping the flashlight aimed toward the ground, so the light wasn’t good, but he could have sworn she was smiling at him.
“I guess you were pretty mad last night when I ran off with your gun,” she said.
“I wasn’t happy.”
“We should have gone to buy you a new gun today. I could have bought it, and it would have been in my name, so, you know.”
“You know what?”
“It couldn’t be traced to you.”
“I wish you’d stop with that shit.”
“Wanna make me?”
And fuck, she was off. Running like a fucking gazelle. No flashlight. No nothing. But at least this time he wasn’t shit-faced, and he had the flashlight.
But still she beat him, barely, sure, but she beat him to the ledge. She stood just a few feet from the edge this time. Right where those dickhead college students had been.
“Get away from the edge,” he said.
He stepped toward her and took her arm. She didn’t resist. She just stared down at the water, dark and shining in the moonlight. “Maybe we should both go right now,” she said. “Suicide pact.”
“Fuck are you talking about?”
She looked up at him. Lethal smile times ten. “You love me, but you’re supposed to kill me. And if you don’t kill me, we’ll have to go on the run together. And whoever hired you would find us eventually.” She grabbed his arm with her free hand. Jesus, she had a grip. “We might as well end it all right now with one grand gesture.”
She was mocking him. The cunt. But suddenly he could see how easily she might pull him over with her.
He yanked her hard, away from the edge, and kept dragging her. And then they were back to the spot where they had fucked the night before.
Suddenly, she dropped to her knees and threw her arms around his legs. “Oh, Josiah, I don’t know what you heard, but I am a good and faithful wife.”
“Liar,” he heard himself saying. He grabbed the back of her hair and yanked her up. “I’ll teach you.”
The word teach ran like lightning the length of his body, and the look of pain on her face made the cockweiler throb. He slapped her with his free hand. She had gotten entirely too comfortable, the stupid bitch. She thought she could treat him any way she wanted. Thought she could cheat on him and he wouldn’t do a fucking thing about it.
He punched her in the stomach. She bent double.
And the world went deep red.
Enough with the fucking games.
D A Y T H R E E
The woes of Wednesday
THE COPS
Murphy peered over the edge of the building. Twenties stories. About six seconds on the way down.
“The neighbor wasn’t really sure about the scream. And the whole building seems to know she was up to her ass in debt since her husband checked out.”
Yablonski was looking up at the sky. Peaceful blue but a few dark clouds. “Wonder if it’s gonna rain today.”
“We go see Russell Stockton, I expect he’ll rain some more bullshit on us.”
“Should we surprise him at home?” Yablonski checked his watch. “Just about breakfast time.”
“Nah,” Murphy said. “I’m hungry. Let’s grab a bite ourselves.”
RUSS
Russ glanced at Amanda’s sleeping face, which looked less moneyed in the early morning light. Not that it mattered. He never wanted to see that face again. Even though he knew he would have to. Unless she chose to cut him loose. He spotted his tie lying on the floor but he lingered much longer at the view from the living room window. Such a long way down, but hanging by this thread wasn’t exactly comfortable.
Out on the street, he bought a coffee and walked around the park. What a gorgeous place. And it was completely free. Did a person have to have money and success in order to live in this city? In order to bear this city? Was it possible to live here at eye level without at least one of those things? Plenty of people did. But then plenty of people dreamed of those things, and it was the dreams that ran this city as much as the money. It was the dreams that harnessed people to the yoke of the city’s vast engine.
He downed his coffee, tossed away the cup and checked his phone, realizing with a bitter smile that he no longer had to dread those #YouToo messages now that Eleanor had hunted down the perpetrator.
A message from Eleanor: Liz called me worried sick. Where the hell are you?
He didn’t bother to lie. Trying to save my ass.
She texted back immediately. Call me.
“Don’t ask me about last night,” he said, when she answered.
“Fine. Let me tell you about last night. Anna Beth McGann died. Either she jumped, or she was pushed off the roof of her apartment building. And I don’t need to remind you that you were overheard just yesterday—by the biggest mouth in the building, I might add—threatening Anna Beth with bodily harm. Why the hell weren’t you home last night where you were supposed to be?”
Anna Beth dead. As the news sank in, he realized he didn’t really care. In fact it made him happy. Honestly, he’d always hated that bitch.
“Russ, you don’t have to tell me, but you know the police are going to ask you where you were. For no other reason, you may well have been the last person to speak to Anna Beth before she died.”
“I spent the night with Amanda Bayard. She’s—”
“I know who she is.”
And probably Eleanor already knew where he’d been last night. And had known about Amanda for God knows how long. Eleanor probably somehow knew he was going to bed Amanda Bayard even before he knew he was going to bed Amanda Bayard. She was simply making him say it out loud.
Confession. Which was not good for his soul so far as he could tell and he wanted to resent Eleanor for it, but he couldn’t. She loved him in a way that no one else ever would.
“I don’t know if you should come into the office today or not,” she said, and for the first time she sounded tentative. “It would look good for the brass if you kept working as usual, but the cops are probably itching for the chance to frog march you out of here. Rattle your cage.”
He leaned back, stretched his arm across the park bench. There had been a time when no one could rattle his cage, because he had ranged freely across the city. Cage-free cock. He smiled bitterly at the bitter joke. It was only in the last few months, and the last few days, that he had been clapped into confinement. Claustrophobic fear. And why?
“I’ll think about it and call you back,” he said and ended the call.
Another text. Larson: I can help you. Come to me now.
He sighed.
Maybe last night cleared his head. Maybe he was swearing off sex altogether. But suddenly he was seeing things straight. He had known Larson was calling from a burner phone—Gabe had checked the number for him. He hadn’t told Gabe why, and he had always thought Larson was his secret, but maybe he hadn’t been so discreet. And yes, he had a photo of her naked, but she hadn’t really given any detail that only the two of them would have known.
As usual, he had let his cock do his thinking for him.
Someone was yanking his chain.
He thought of the tie lying on the floor of Amanda’s apartment.
He was going to yank back.
There was one other person who knew about Larson.
And he was dead.
He texted Larson. See you tonight.
He called Eleanor back. “I’m going early to your house down in North Carolina. Today. Can I get a key?”
“No, you can’t!” Eleanor spluttered. “You can’t leave town. They’ve told you. Not with this hanging over your head. They’ll find you and haul you back just to make a point.”
