Smoke

by Lisa Unger

  “All I’m saying is that you might just ‘escalate’ yourself out of what you want to know.”

  “If you think you can do better, be my guest,” he said. He turned and left, leaving Lydia and Jeffrey alone in the cellar with Underwood. Jeffrey didn’t hear the door at the top of the staircase open or close so he knew Chiam was nearby, listening.

  “Mr. Underwood,” Jeffrey said softly. “If you talk to us, we might be able to help you out of this mess.”

  Underwood jumped at the sound of his name, struggled to sit up and couldn’t. Another low groan accompanied by a gurgling sound in his chest.

  “You’re thinking if you tell them what you know then they’re going to kill you. And you might be right. But if you cooperate with me, I’ll do my best to see that doesn’t happen.”

  Manny turned to look at Jeffrey, moving his head slowly to the side. His face was purple and swollen and Jeffrey doubted that he’d recognize the man before the beating he’d received.

  “Did Trevor Rhames hire you to steal those diamonds?”

  He jumped at the sound of Rhames’s name but didn’t say anything. Jeffrey waited a minute for him to speak.

  “We found a pink diamond in an abandoned house in Riverdale that we know is connected to The New Day. We believe that diamond was in the cache stolen from the dealer who was killed at the JFK airport. Who hired you to do that job?”

  Still nothing from Underwood. Jeffrey waited a beat and then released a low sigh.

  “Okay, this is what we’re thinking, Mr. Underwood. We’re thinking that Rhames had an issue with Tim Samuels, your former employer. That he bought Body Armor when Samuels put it up for sale and has been using it as a front to launder stolen money and gems. We think that you went to work for Rhames when he bought the company, just like the mercenary that you are and shifted easily from doing legitimate bodyguard work to being a thug for hire. You were unlucky enough to get caught by the people whose diamonds you helped to nab; now you’re stuck. No one’s going to help you because you’re a mercenary. If you give up your employer, you’re going to die. If you don’t, you’re going to die. So what are you doing-just buying time?”

  Underwood started to shake a bit and made a low, horrible noise. “You don’t understand,” he said.

  “Make me understand,” said Jeffrey

  More shaking from Underwood. It was disturbing, making Jeff uncomfortable. He looked over at Lydia who was leaning against the wall with her arms crossed, eyes narrowed on Underwood.

  “He gets in you. Whatever they do to me here can’t compare to what he can do.”

  Jeffrey heard Lydia draw in a breath and release it slowly.

  “Rhames?” he asked.

  Underwood nodded. Jeffrey noticed that a pool of blood was collecting beneath him, thick and black in the dim light.

  “Manny, he can’t do anything more to you.”

  “You saw what he did to Samuels and his family. And they were friends once. Imagine what he’d do to my kids.”

  Jeffrey watched as tears mingled with blood and traveled down Manny’s face. He reached for Jeffrey’s arm and gripped his wrist hard. “He knows everything. They’ll never be free. No matter where they go or how they try to hide. And he’ll wait until they think they’re safe, until they think he’s forgotten them or that he’s dead. And then he’ll move in and lay waste to their lives. That’s what he does.”

  Jeffrey looked at Underwood’s eyes and saw that he was starting to get a dazed look. He wasn’t sure what to ask next.

  “How did they know each other?”

  “I don’t know. It was a long time ago; that was the rumor anyway. There was bad blood. No one knew what.” He was using all his strength to force the words out; it was painful to hear the horrible croaking of his voice.

  “They worked together at Sandline?” asked Lydia.

  Underwood didn’t say anything. He turned his eyes back to Jeff; his face was too ruined to read his expression.

  “Do yourself a favor,” he said softly. “Stay out of it.”

  Jeff nodded. Underwood’s eyes went blank then and he didn’t say anything else. Ever.

  Thirty-Two

  They brought the Kompressor to a stop in front of Lily Samuels’ apartment building and idled.

  “We shouldn’t be here. What if we’re wrong?” said Lydia anxiously.

  “Well, then. We’re wrong.”

  “We need more evidence before we bring this to them. Right now we just have our hunches, the damaged memory of an injured police officer and the word of a man who was being slowly tortured to death,” said Lydia. “Lily’s fragile, just barely able to accept that her brother is gone. If we bring this to her and then it turns out that we’ve made another wrong assumption, we’ll be hurting someone who doesn’t need any more hurt in her life.”

  “So what are you suggesting?”

  “Let’s go home, regroup, and try to corroborate some of this info.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know,” she said with a sigh.

  “Why would Underwood lie? He knew he was dying; that’s why he told us as much as he did.”

  “Why does anyone lie, Jeffrey? Because they can.”

  “Awfully cynical.”

  “Just drive. Please.”

  Before the elevator doors opened into their loft, they heard the television on inside. Jeffrey reached for his gun and Lydia quickly put her hand on his.

  “Dax has a key, remember?”

  Jeffrey rested his hand on the Glock at his waist but didn’t draw the weapon. He’d given Dax a key when he was charged with protecting Lydia from Jed McIntyre and never asked for it back. Dax hadn’t been up and around without their help much in the last year so he hadn’t had the need to let himself in recently. Still, it wasn’t good to make assumptions.

  The doors opened but the apartment was dark except for the large flat-screen television in the living room. A huge dark form sat on the edge of the couch, feet up on the coffee table. An episode of South Park was turned up too loud. An arm the size of a jackhammer reached out and the light on the end table came up. Dax turned to look at them.

  “What are you two looking so tense about? You said it was urgent, yeah?”

  Lydia started to breathe again and wondered when she’d become so jumpy.

  “Yeah,” she said, dropping her leather coat over one of the chairs and stepping down into the sunken living room. “It’s urgent.”

  “Great,” he said. “Can we talk over pizza? I’m starved.”

  She sat on the coffee table and looked at him, reached for the remote, and flipped the television off.

  “This is what I’m thinking. I’m thinking all of this started a long time ago. I’m thinking Rhames and Samuels both worked for Sandline.”

  The smile dropped from Dax’s face and he got that granite look, those flat eyes he got when she pushed too hard into his past.

  “I think Rhames and not The New Day was trying to ruin Tim Samuels’ life. And I think he convinced Mickey to help him.”

  Dax sat silent and Jeffrey came up behind him.

  “What I don’t understand is what Tim Samuels did that could cause Rhames to hate him so much for so long, what could cause Mickey Samuels, the boy Tim raised like his own, to join forces with a psychopath and do all the awful things he’s done.”

  “And you think I know the answer to that?”

  “I think you know something about Sandline. And if you do, maybe you know something about what might have happened between those two.”

  Dax got up and walked toward the window on the other side of the television. He drew in and released a breath.

  “If I knew something that would help you, do you think I would keep it from you?”

  “If you had to or thought you had to, yes,” she said to his back. “There are huge parts of your life we know nothing about.”

  He nodded but kept his back to her. “And that’s probably not going to change. But I’m tellin
g you the truth when I say that I don’t know anything about this situation.”

  Lydia sighed and leaned back on the couch. She looked at the familiar form of their friend and thought he seemed like a stranger. She didn’t think he would lie to her but she realized she didn’t know for sure. And she wondered what that meant about their relationship. Can you trust someone who chooses what he reveals about himself? Can there be a true friendship with someone who hides huge parts of his life? Lydia didn’t know. She felt a strange sadness, an odd distance from him as he came to sit across from her on the low, stout cocktail table.

  “What I can tell you is that no one talks about Sandline. Everything about them, including whatever you’ve done for them, is classified. You violate that agreement and they burn your life down-not just your life, but the life of anyone you’ve told.”

  “If that’s true, then I don’t know where to go from here.”

  He shook his head and looked at the floor. “I don’t know what to tell you.”

  “There’s only one place we can go, I think,” said Jeffrey.

  “Grimm, right?” said Lydia, leaning forward looking at Dax. “How do we find him?”

  Dax smiled. But the smile was cool and didn’t reach his eyes. “You’ll never see Grimm again.”

  “There’s only one person who knows what links Rhames and Tim Samuels,” said Jeffrey, coming to sit beside her. “There’s only one person who might know the secret that would cause Mickey to turn against his stepfather like this, destroying his whole family in the process.”

  Lydia rubbed the tension from her neck. “Monica Samuels,” she said. “She wouldn’t tell us before.”

  “Let’s try again,” said Jeffrey.

  Thirty-Three

  They found Monica Samuels at Lily’s apartment, looking pale and shaken.

  “The police were just here,” she told them as she held the door open for them. “They say Mickey may be alive, that he tried to kill a police officer. Can that be true?”

  She looked at them with wide eyes and her skin was gray and papery. She seemed fragile, barely solid, as though the news the police had brought her might carry her away like a tornado.

  “Where’s Lily?” asked Lydia, looking around the small apartment.

  “She left,” said Monica, looking at the door.

  “To find Mickey?” asked Jeffrey.

  “Mostly to get away from me, I think,” said Monica, sinking into the couch and curling her legs up beneath her.

  “You fought?” asked Lydia sitting beside her. Jeffrey leaned against the granite countertop. Lydia released a breath when Monica didn’t answer.

  “Let us help you,” Lydia said. “This has to end. Whatever you’re hiding has destroyed your life.”

  Her face stayed blank, her eyes glazed over. “It’s too late, I think. The family is shattered, just like he wanted. Just like he’s wanted since he was a little boy.”

  “Why would he want that?”

  She rested her forehead in her bony, well-manicured hand. “Because he thinks we killed his father.”

  “Simon Graves?”

  Monica nodded. “They’re so alike, that same dark place inside of them. They disappear in there. It swallows them… the anger, the sadness.”

  Lydia didn’t say anything, waited for her to go on.

  “Simon had Mickey with him that day when he walked in on Tim and me making love. We were at Tim’s house on the island, you’ve been there. Simon and Mickey came strolling in. We were by the fire.”

  “They knew each other?”

  “They were close friends,” she said, looking at Lydia. “And they worked together.”

  “At Sandline,” said Lydia.

  Monica startled, like the sound of the word frightened her. She lowered her voice to a whisper. “How do you know that? We’re never to talk about that.”

  “So all of them, Rhames, Samuels, and Graves worked together?” Jeffrey said from the counter.

  Monica gave the slightest nod. But that’s not what she wanted to talk about. There were other things she wanted to lay down before Lydia. “Mickey was too young to really understand what he was seeing. And because he was there, Simon just picked him up and left us without a word.” She laughed a little. “Part of me was glad he found us. All the lies and sneaking around were finished. I figured he’d leave me; we’d all pick up the pieces and move on. I could finally be free of that darkness that leaked out of him like a fog. It was killing me.”

  “But he killed himself instead.”

  “Several weeks later, yes,” she said, her hand flying to her mouth, the tears starting to fall.

  “And Mickey blamed you and Tim.”

  “At first, yes,” she said with a quick nod, wrapping her arms around herself.

  “What changed?”

  She seemed to shrink a little here, wanted to make herself as small as possible. “He was young, too young to really understand what he saw. Simon tried to spare Mickey by hiding his anger that day. But you can’t really hide things from children. ‘You made Daddy so sad and now he’s gone,’ he’d say to me afterward. ‘Why was he so sad?’ ”

  She paused here, released a shuddering sigh. Then, “We couldn’t take it. We didn’t want Mickey growing up with that memory.”

  “And you didn’t want him reminding you.”

  She looked at Lydia and shook her head. “Over a period of months, we were able to convince Mickey that he hadn’t seen what he thought he saw, that it was a dream.”

  Lydia shook her head, not understanding. “How?”

  “Using the psych ops Samuels learned in the military?” asked Jeffrey.

  She looked at him as if she had forgotten he was there. Then she nodded. “With the help of Trevor Rhames. It was his area of specialty, tampering with people’s minds, their memories, creating or erasing the events of their lives to comfort or torture them depending on his agenda. We thought we were helping him.

  “But you can only calm the surface. The depths of him were teeming with these repressed memories. The depression that Lily never knew about, the medication, that’s why?” Lydia tried to keep the judgment out of her voice but she wasn’t sure she’d succeeded.

  Monica shook her head. “He was prone to depression to begin with, just like his father.”

  “But this didn’t help, tampering with his memories.”

  She shook her head again, more slowly. “No. It didn’t help.”

  “So Rhames and Tim Samuels were friends once,” said Jeffrey. “If he helped you to erase Mickey’s memory, there must have been a relationship. What happened?”

  “I can’t talk about these things,” she whispered, pleading to Lydia with her eyes.

  Lydia leaned into her. “It’s time. All of this-don’t you see that it’s toxic, it’s poisoning your life? There’s not much left to lose.”

  Monica looked at Lydia and wrapped her arms tighter around herself. She shook her head and pulled her mouth into a straight line. Then she seemed to soften, to change her mind about something. When Monica spoke again it was little more than a whisper.

  “They knew each other long before Sandline. This all happened before we even knew Sandline existed. But that’s all I can tell you.”

  Lydia wanted to grab Monica Samuels and shake some sense into her but she was surprised by a voice behind them.

  “Tell her, Mom. Tell her everything. She’s the only one we can trust now. Sandline’s gone; they don’t even exist anymore. It’s Rhames we have to worry about.”

  Lydia turned to see Lily standing in the doorway. She wore jeans and leather boots, a long black coat. Without her hair, her face gaunt and still, she looked haunted. And Lydia guessed she was and would be-maybe forever.

  Monica looked at her daughter with sad, frightened eyes. She seemed to steel herself.

  “I don’t know if Tim would have called Rhames a friend, even then. They’d served together in the Marines. Tim consulted with him in the private sector over th
e years. They were colleagues, I suppose, more than anything. I guess Rhames might have thought they were friends. But I was always a little nervous around him and so was Tim. Rhames had tremendous skills in certain areas.”

  “And you used those skills to erase Mickey’s memories,” said Jeffrey.

  She nodded, her head hung.

  “So at some point they went to work together at Sandline?” asked Lydia.

  “Rhames went to work for Sandline. Tim only operated as a consultant. He had his own security firm by then, though it wasn’t called Body Armor yet. But he had a team of people who worked for him; sometimes the whole team would go to work for Sandline, but only on a job-by-job basis.”

  “So what happened?” asked Lydia. “Why did Rhames grow to hate your husband so much?”

  She sighed. “Rhames was reckless, dangerous. He was brilliant with the psych ops but on the field he was a kamikaze. During a Sandline op he made a tactical error and about ten men were killed. He led them into an ambush that most soldiers would have seen coming a mile away. That represents a big loss to a company like Sandline, loss of manpower, plus big payouts to the families.”

  “So they wanted to get rid of him,” said Jeffrey.

  Monica nodded.

  “And they commissioned Tim Samuels to do that?” asked Jeffrey. “Because they were friends, because Rhames trusted him.”

  Monica smiled sadly. “No.”

  She sat up then, put her feet on the floor. She straightened her shoulders and seemed to come alive a bit. “Not Tim,” she said. “Me. I shot Trevor Rhames and thought I’d killed him. I emptied my gun into his chest and he fell three stories.”

  “You worked for Sandline,” said Lydia, incredulous. The waif before her looked as if she could barely support her own body weight.

  Monica nodded. “Not for Sandline, per se. I was one of the people on Tim’s team. I wasn’t always the emotional mess you see today.”

  “No,” said Lily. “Once you were a killer just like my father.” The vitriol in her voice was palpable. Monica looked at her daughter with blank eyes.