Mark for Blood (Mason Dixon Thrillers Book 1)

by Nick Thacker

  She came around the other side of Joey’s car and I stumbled a bit, realizing I should have gotten out and opened the door for her. Instead, she’d caught me gawking. The best I was able to do was flick at the inner handle a bit with my right hand fingers, catching it just as she pulled on the outside handle.

  And preventing her from being able to open it.

  We did it again a couple times until she was laughing and I was all but ready to break the damn thing off and kick it open, and finally she got it. She swung in and fell into the squishy seat, then closed it and turned to me.

  “How you doing?” she asked. Then, “what happened to you?” her face soured.

  “It’s… nothing. A scuffle.” I would explain — maybe — but not right now. Right now, I was focused on her face. My God, she’s stunning.

  I tried to change the conversation back again by answering her first question. “Good — uh, good.” Doofus.

  “So you don’t know how to open a door for a lady?”

  I felt my cheeks flush. I was embarrassed, a feeling I’m not sure I’d felt since junior high. “No, I, uh, I’m sorry. It was just…”

  She raised her chin a bit and gave me a smirk. “Was it just me?”

  Damn.

  “No, I was admiring Marley’s handiwork by the garden. You see those —“

  Suddenly I felt my face pulled to hers, and her hand on the back of my head. She pulled me in and kissed me. Just a little one, like promise of more to come, then it was over.

  “I — uh…” my cheeks were going nuts.

  “That was for last night,” she said.

  “Um, thanks?”

  She laughed.

  “Usually my clients just leave tips, but I guess I could get used to this.”

  She was still holding my head, but she turned serious. I thought I could even see her eyes glossing over. “I’m not joking. Thank you. This — this has all been so crazy. We have the funeral in a few days, and — “

  “I know,” I said.

  “You know?”

  “I know what it feels like to be forced into something. Something that breaks the chain of expectation. Your father, now this traumatic experience. Yeah, I know.”

  She nodded, let go of my head, and looked straight out the front window.

  I matched her gaze and started driving. “So,” I said, “we have something to talk about.”

  “Yeah, we do. My dad —“

  “Not your dad,” I said.

  She flicked her head back and stared at me. I kept my eyes focused on the road.

  “You. We need to talk about your real involvement in your dad’s company.”

  “I told you, I don’t have any — I don’t know what they do. He always kept me out it, and my brother only knows a little bit of it.”

  “What do you know? You’re a part-owner of Crimson Club, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, but… but I couldn’t even tell you the names of the other board members.”

  “Fine,” I said. “Let’s start there. It was — is — board-run?”

  “Yeah, they manage it. But my dad was definitely the most involved one. Probably the most powerful. That was important to him, I think. We always had a great house, and he was always entertaining, always taking people out to his yacht. Wanted to show off a bit, I think. He used to tell me all the time, ‘the secret to a great business like mine is in the yacht.’” She laughed. “Like that was it — you just buy a fancy yacht, and immediately your business is successful.”

  I didn’t know anything about multi-million dollar businesses or yachts, so as far as I knew, the old man might have been right. “Did he ever talk about what sort of importing they did?”

  “No,” she said. “When I was a kid, I thought it meant exactly that — like he was buying stuff in other countries and bringing it into the United States. He used be gone for weeks at a time, but then he would come back and he wouldn’t have anything with him except the luggage he left with. So I didn’t understand what it meant.”

  “But later?”

  “As I got older I figured out that it was a business, not a one-man operation. He could have been doing just that, buying things and getting them into the country, but doing it through his company instead of actually carrying stuff with him. Still, I never knew what he imported. I asked him once, and all he said was, ‘whatever pays the biggest margin,’ like that was supposed to mean something to a nine-year-old.”

  “But he treated your brother differently?”

  “Yeah, definitely. When he was getting through high school they were nearly inseparable. They hunted just about every weekend during the season, and they camped throughout the year. My brother always liked him, but it was a respectful sort of ‘like,’ not really a typical father-son relationship.”

  “And what does a typical father-son relationship look like?” I asked.

  She smiled. “I have no idea. I guess I mean it seemed like my brother was always afraid of him just a little bit, like he was trying to please him or make him proud.”

  “You know, actually, that sounds exactly like a typical father-son relationship.”

  “Yeah, but most dads aren’t doing illegal importing.”

  “Why do you think he did anything illegal?”

  “Well, like I said yesterday, I got the impression he was in with some bad people. I know it’s a big world out there, and there’s a lot of money to be made, and I knew my dad to be the kind of guy who wouldn’t really bat an eye at the how as long as the how much was big enough.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I know the type. But he never said or did anything that made you think that?”

  “Not really. Not directly. Just… a feeling, I guess.”

  “You have a good gut about this stuff?”

  “Yes, sure. Maybe.”

  “Well, I’d trust it. Your old man was your old man. No one probably better to say that than you.”

  She sat, silent, for a minute. I swung by the single gas station on this side of the road, stopped, and filled up. I liked to do things for Joey like this every now and then. I’d had a boss a long time ago that did this sort of thing, and it always made me feel so much better about my job. And it made me like him even more.

  She waited inside while I did it, then I jumped back in and started the engine.

  “Hannah,” I said. She looked over, and our eyes met. “I like you. Probably not a secret, and I’m probably not the only one who’s said that to you. You’ve got — you’ve got a ‘special something’ about you, and I promise it’s not just that you’re a knockout.”

  She smirked again, then raised her eyebrows, silently asking for the ‘but…’

  “But,” I continued, “I have to trust you. I need to know if you had any involvement in what Crimson Club really does.”

  She swallowed, then nodded. This time, she started to cry for real. “No,” she answered. “I don’t have any involvement in what they do. My name is on a few documents that give me an eight-percent share in the company, but I can’t even do anything with it. I am telling you the truth.”

  “Okay,” I said. “I trust you.”

  I sped up, heading for my bar just past the end of town and around a slight bend in the road. We were a minute away.

  “You wouldn’t ask me that if you didn’t already know,” she blurted out. “You asked me that question because you already know what my father’s company was up to. It was one of the calls you had to make this morning, wasn’t it?”

  I clenched my jaw, wondering what to say. I was obviously going to tell her, but I hadn’t quite worked out the how or the when just yet. In my world, sharing deep secrets with people just wasn’t something I did often. I heehawed for a moment, trying to figure out a way I could tell her something else entirely, maybe just for the time being.

  In the end, I did the right thing.

  “I’ll tell you what I know, and what I want to do about it, but it’s the kind of telling that needs telling over a drink.�
�

  She seemed to agree. “I can get behind that,” she said. “Old fashioned?”

  “No,” I answered. “Not this time. I’ve got something else in mind.”

  15

  SHE SNIFFED IN THE GLASS and did the scrunch-nose thing that I’d come to adore. “That’s disgusting,” she said. “What is it?”

  “I’ll have you know that this is a fine cognac. A brandy from the Cognac region of France.”

  “But there’s nothing else in it? No ice, no — what’s that little thing you squirt in there — or anything else?”

  I sighed. “You mean bitters? And you don’t ‘squirt’ it in there, you ‘dash’ it. Just a couple dashes. And no, this isn’t a cocktail. No ice because the warmth of your hand is meant to get around the cognac and let the bouquet open up.”

  “You’re kidding me, right?”

  She looked at me like I was trying to tell her that her car was out of blinker fluid.

  “It’s meant to be had straight, like a nice bourbon or Scotch. An ice cube is acceptable for some people, but not to me. Fermented just like wine, using grapes or another fruit, then distilled. You still get the graininess of a solid whiskey sometimes, but there’s that grape hit in there, too.”

  “I’m not sure I’m a fan of straight liquor.”

  “That’s just because you don’t know how to enjoy it.”

  “Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m telling you,” she said.

  “No, but you can learn this stuff.” I walked across the back of the bar again and grabbed four snifter glasses I had cleaned and dried earlier. I placed them next to one another on the bar top, then walked over and made some selections from the massive oak cabinet that housed my nicer stuff.

  “It’s easy, really,” I began. “We can smell all sorts of cool things, but we often can’t make the connection in our brain that a particular smell is called a particular thing. For instance, you can imagine the smell of lavender, right?”

  She sniffed, pretending. “Sure, yeah.”

  “Okay, so that’s easy. But what about coriander?”

  She closed one eye as she thought about it. “I guess — I know I’ve smelled it before, and I’ve cooked with it, but I don’t think I’d be able to pick it out of a bouquet.”

  “Right, exactly. So it just takes practice to be able to say what you’re smelling and tasting.” I gave her the first of the snifter glasses, and I took the second. “Lift it up, spin it just like wine, and then let it rest a second or two. Then smell. Keep your mouth open.”

  She did, and then looked up at me. “I don’t smell lavender or coriander.”

  I laughed. “No, I guess you wouldn’t. That’s an American whiskey. But how about caramel, vanilla, oak?”

  She tried again. Her eyes widened a little. “Okay, yeah, I think I got that.”

  “Perfect. Now taste.”

  She did, she made the same face she’d made before with the brandy. “Sorry — she said. It’s strong.”

  “It’s perfect,” I answered, raising my glass and downing the shot.

  “You’re a nerd. But thanks.”

  I gave her a wink and settled into the bar seat next to hers. “So — want to get started?”

  She nodded. “Yeah, I guess it’s about time I hear what my old man got himself into.”

  I jumped in, telling her everything I knew about Crimson Club thus far. I started from the beginning, explaining that I had a contact who might have some information, and how he desperately asked me to back down. I told her that meant this was something the feds were already neck-deep into, and it was highly likely I wasn’t going to be able to find anything they couldn’t. I explained that I had never been in a situation quite like this before, and although I truly wanted to help, there would be a chance I wouldn’t be able to do anything of value.

  She looked at me quizzically, and I waited for her to talk.

  “That’s a pretty solid disclaimer,” she said. “Now get to the point.”

  “What are you talking about?” I asked. “I’m trying to make sure you understand —“

  “Look,” she said. “I know what you’re trying to do. It’s admirable, even. But there’s no way you can back out of this now.”

  I raised my eyebrow so high I thought it might jump up and land on the top of my head. “Whoa, slow down. I ain’t trying to back out of anything. I’m just making it clear that all of this stuff we’re about to get into has multiple layers, like an onion. And when you cut an onion, it stings. The deeper you go, the more it stings.”

  “I just found out my father was killed and he might have been involved in a much bigger and messier situation than I could have imagined. How much more do you think this can sting?”

  I looked her up and down, sitting there next to me on the barstool. Her legs were crossed, and she had her elbows drawn in where they touched the table, as if she was cold. She didn’t have goose bumps on her skin, but I knew what was happening.

  She was bracing herself.

  She knew that I was about to cut this onion in half and look at the center of it all, to bring out into broad daylight what her father had been poking around in. She knew that I had more information than she did at this point, and she wasn’t going to let me off the hook easy.

  “Okay,” I started. “Let’s do this. Your father — remember, I didn’t know him — your father was in some deep shit. I don’t know much about the details yet, but it’s all going to surface when the feds get done investigating whatever they are looking at. All I know at this point is your old man was sitting on an absolute fortune, and I believe it made him a pretty massive target to someone who wanted it.”

  “A fortune in importing? I mean, we were always very well-off, but…”

  “No, Hannah, I’m not talking about importing anymore. You probably saw the wealth built from that enterprise, but at some point during your father’s career he got into some pretty nasty stuff.”

  She was nodding along silently, so I continued.

  “The guy I talked to said they are investigating the overseas accounts of an organization called Crimson Club for illegal activities including the selling of underage pornography, sex trafficking, and other similar affairs.”

  I watched Hannah’s face very carefully as I dropped the bomb. This incident would tell me something crucial about her character: she either had no idea what her father was involved in, or she did. Or, I guess, she was in on it the whole time and would fake one of the above two scenarios. I trusted my gut, so I watched her face as she reacted to what I said.

  First, her mouth opened and closed like a fish a couple times, slowly, like one that had been laid out on the dock and was still in shock, wondering if it was really unable to breathe or not. Second, she turned and did a full circle in the barstool, bending her neck around to take in the entire place. Finally, she swiveled back around and stared at the mirror behind the bar, her eyes locked in place even as I stood up and walked around.

  I intercepted her gaze and waited until she focused on my face.

  “Hannah, I’m sorry. I —“

  “Don’t,” she said quickly. If she hadn’t been whispering I would have thought she’d snapped at me. “Just don’t.”

  16

  SO FAR, MY GUT WAS telling me that this was a woman who had just found out her father had been involved in some very reprehensible activities. Hell, they weren’t even questionable activities. If what my contact had told me was true, her father was guilty by association even if he had never set foot outside the country. If Crimson Club was in fact engaged in this sort of crap, he would have known about it. He would have had something to do with it being set up under his nose.

  What’s more, the man had set up his own kids with a portion of the business, likely to make it seem as though they were all equally responsible, or at least to diminish his own role in it all. To even the blame a bit, among the man’s own children.

  Reprehensible.

  I was disgusted already, an
d if wasn’t for the drinks I’d already poured down I might have had a harder time with breaking the news to her. But she hadn’t had the luxury of being able to sit with the information for as long as I had. I had the benefit of not only knowing about her father for a few hours longer, but also that I dealt with schmucks like this every day.

  But my gut was definitely not wrong about this one. Hannah Rayburn had had no idea that her father was dabbling in — or running — a sex-trafficking ring. I could imagine the emotions running through her mind. Hell, I could see them on her face. Posted up there as plain as day. And she hadn’t struck me as someone who wore their emotions on their sleeve.

  We waited, me standing inside the bar area and her across on the stool. She swiveled left and right slowly, just a bit, still letting the information marinate. I wanted so badly to interrupt her, to ask how she was doing. To try to help.

  If being married had taught me anything, it was that these next few minutes of silence were crucial for her. She needed to be alone with her own thoughts for a while, to let her own brain sort through it all and figure out heads and tails of it. Then, and only then, would I be in a position to speak.

  So I let her be. Just walked away, down to the other side of the bar. It was still early, so the place had been empty, but a youngish couple had walked in and sidled up, waiting for me to notice them. I served them, a couple martinis, then checked in on Hannah.

  She was still swiveling and staring, so I came back to the couple. Found out they were on their way to the drive-in movie theater that had opened last summer. It was a new thing around here, except way back when during the times when a drive-in theater wasn’t so much a new thing. But the city folks especially, who were lucky enough to find a solid theater that sold them popcorn for three times the price of their ticket and their feet didn’t stick to the floor, a drive-in theater was all the rage. So I’d seen it before, plenty of times, and I certainly wasn’t arguing with the additional business it brought in.