by Julie Kriss
I pointed to my face. “He meant it,” I said. “My guess is that Carter White is getting a phone call right now. If not from Officer Kyle, then from someone along the food chain. And he’s being given my name.”
Even Dex looked pale at that. Carter White was a big name in organized crime in Michigan: drugs, hookers, automatic weapons. There were rumors he’d bought half the politicians in the state, but even I hadn’t found any evidence of that.
Still, I’d informed on plenty of Carter White’s underlings in my career as a CI. He was the man Dad’s entire stolen-car operation had reported to, and that was in ruins. I’d pulled the rug out from under a few of his other operations without being detected—enough that he would be very interested in learning that the leak had been me.
Dex stared at me. His joint was forgotten on the table. “Jace, what are you going to do?”
“There isn’t much I can do,” I said. “If Officer Kyle has called me in, then I won’t live past nightfall. It doesn’t matter what I do or how far I run. He has an entire network that can find me. If Carter White wants me dead, it doesn’t matter if it happens six hours from now, or ten, or twenty. In the end, I am fucking dead.”
Fuck. It was hard to think about. Life hadn’t been easy for me, but there were a lot of good things along the way. I’d met some good people—a few—and I’d read some good books. I had half a shot at connecting with my brothers for the first time in my life.
But it was Tara that made it hurt. She was the best thing that had ever happened to me. The best thing that could possibly ever happen to me. And for a short time, she had really been mine. Her courage and her relentless curiosity and her perfect skin and her sexy body. She had been all mine.
What do you want, Riggs?
All my life, I’d never taken the time to ask myself that question. I wanted to survive my childhood. I wanted enough money to pay the bills. I wanted someone to talk to. I wanted another good book to read. I wanted to get justice for my worthless father. I wanted to be good at something. I wanted to get out of prison. I wanted to be left alone.
I wanted Tara.
I wanted her. I wanted to be wherever she was. I wanted to know every piece of her. I wanted to drive her crazy and make her laugh and exasperate her. I wanted to fuck her and claim her and be the only man she ever looked at ever again.
I had never wanted anything like I wanted Tara Montgomery. Like I had from the first minute she looked at me from across that desk.
What do you want, Riggs?
“Jace,” Dex said.
I looked at him. “Dex, do you remember the time I asked Dad for a bike when I was seven?”
Dex rubbed his ear, a gesture he didn’t even know he was making, and I knew the answer before he spoke. “I remember it,” he said, his voice flat. “I remember everything. Every time he hit me, called me a loser or a retard. I remember every time he called us names and every time he got drunk and forgot about us and every time he laughed at us. I remember every fucking thing.”
“I wanted to get revenge on him,” I said. “That’s why I did what I did. But there was something else I always wanted. Something maybe I want even more. I wanted to do better than him. Be better than him.”
My oldest brother looked, for the first time I could remember in a long time, dead sober and entirely sane. “Why are you here?” he asked me. “Of all the places you could have gone. Why did you come to my apartment?”
“Because you’re the only one who can help me,” I told him.
“Me?” he said. “You think I can actually help you out of this?”
“Of course you can,” I said. “Did you think I was just going to lie down and die? I have a plan, dipshit.”
He looked surprised, and then his eyes got that Dex gleam in them that I knew so well. “That sounds dangerous.”
“It is. We could both get killed.” I thought over the outcomes. “Or we could go to jail. But prison isn’t so bad. I’ll give you some tips. You just have to put up with a lot of jokes about dropping the soap.”
My brother grinned.
“Tell me,” he said. “I’m in.”
Twenty-Seven
Tara
“I’m fine,” Luke said. “The cops have sweated me before, Em. It’s no big deal.”
“Are you kidding me?” Emily said, her voice high in exasperation. “They interviewed you for three hours.”
Luke cracked a beer open and shrugged. “Your mother sweated me in that same interview room a few months ago,” he said. “Or don’t you remember?”
“Luke, they raided the shop.”
“Which your mother did a few months ago, too.” Luke took a long swig of his beer. He looked a little tired, and he was drinking a beer at one in the afternoon, but he genuinely wasn’t worried. “I’m a Riggs. I’m used to cops assuming I’m up to something.”
We were in the kitchen of the Riggs house. Like the outside of the house, the inside showed a place that had long been neglected but was starting to get some attention. The cups were mismatched, but the floor and counters were clean. There was a stack of mail on the table, but there was also a tray with a hand-labeled sticker: Important Bills!!! It wasn’t perfect, but someone cared, I could tell.
Emily was pacing the linoleum, freaking out. I gathered that Emily wasn’t the quiet, stoic type. She was wearing jeans and a snug Tigers T-shirt that showed the shape of her breasts, a visual that Luke was obviously watching as he sipped his beer.
“Except you were up to something,” Emily said. “You burned that stupid car.”
Luke snorted. “The Thunderbird is nothing. So a few cars caught fire in Casey’s junkyard, so what? Casey didn’t see a damned thing.”
Sitting at the kitchen table, I felt my stomach turn again. I thought I might throw up. Luke had told me the story about finding the coke, about getting rid of it. Jace must have been sick with worry when he found it, but he’d never let on to me. Of course he hadn’t, because Jace was used to facing everything alone. Whether it was informing on his father’s dirty business or finding coke stashed in the first car he got after getting out of prison. Jesus, Jace, what must you have been feeling? Why didn’t you tell me?
I had texted Jace ten times, twenty. Called over and over. His phone was off.
It was probably for the best that he hadn’t told me about the problems he was having. It was my ex-boyfriend, after all, who was determined to see him arrested or dead.
It’s easier if they just go, Kyle had said. So we arranged some encouragement.
I said, “It was a setup. The whole coke thing. The drugs were planted by the Westlake PD.”
“You’re fucking right they were,” Luke said. “I figured that out as soon as they got me in the station. We were idiots not to figure it out sooner.”
Emily glared at Luke. “You’re saying that my mother had cocaine planted in Jace’s car? I swear to God, you are never getting laid again.”
“No,” Luke said calmly. Emily’s freak-out seemed to be having no effect on him, like it was an everyday thing. “Nora wouldn’t do that, but she isn’t the only cop on the force. The cops always despised Dad, and the rest of us by default. Your mother felt the same until she sweated me last time and found out that I’m not so bad.”
“That’s just a theory!” Emily cried.
“It isn’t a theory,” I said. “My ex practically admitted it. He probably told Jace the same thing when he pulled him over. Which means that Jace knows that the Westlake PD is after him along with the criminals he informed on for all those years.” I looked down at the table, my gaze taking nothing in. “This is all my fault. All of it.”
Luke put his beer down and looked at me. “It wouldn’t have mattered,” he said.
“What?” I asked.
“If you’d told Jace about Officer Fuckface. It wouldn’t have mattered to him.” He shook his head. “I may have been away for eight years, but I know Jace. He’s quiet but he’s fierce. When he’s set on something
, he’s fucking set on it, come hell or high water. And he’s never been set on a woman the way he’s set on you.”
You don’t know the half of it, I thought. He never had a woman at all before me. But that was Jace’s business, and the last thing I was going to do was spill it to his brothers. “It’s stupid,” I said. “I should have warned him. But I was terrified I would lose him.”
“You wouldn’t have lost him,” Luke said. “Not Jace.”
“Well, I’ve lost him now,” I said, still sick to my stomach.
Luke looked thoughtful. “I doubt it.” A ringtone rang out, and all three of us tensed. It was Luke’s phone. “Ryan,” he said when he looked at the number. Then he answered. “What’s up?”
There was a minute of talking on the other end. “No,” Luke said. Then, “No. Oh, really?” He sighed. “Well, shit. I should have guessed. Got it. Bye.” He hung up. “Ryan doesn’t know where Jace is either, but guess who isn’t answering his fucking phone? Our oldest brother, Dexter Riggs.”
Emily had stopped pacing. “Dex?” she said. “Jace went to see Dex?”
I straightened. “What?” I asked them. “What does that mean?” I didn’t know Dex. I didn’t know Ryan, either. But Luke and Emily looked genuinely alarmed. “Is there something wrong with Dex?”
“That’s a complicated question,” Emily said.
“Yes,” Luke said. “Dex is crazy.”
“He’s also in Detroit,” Emily said. “Or at least, he’s supposed to be.”
I opened my mouth to say something. I didn’t know what. Maybe to say that Jace wasn’t with Dex. That Jace had possibly just gone into hiding. He was smart and sensible, and the Riggs brothers weren’t close. Jace wouldn’t take this into his own hands and do anything crazy. That wasn’t his way.
Then my phone pinged with a text, and I read it. It was Jace. He must have turned his phone on.
Tell me something true, he wrote.
Everything went away. The house, Luke and Emily, the world around me. There was just him and me.
I didn’t even hesitate. I typed, You’re beautiful.
There was a second’s pause, then the dots moved. Tara. I’m not.
You don’t see what I see, I wrote. It’s the truth. Your turn.
You stole mine, Jace, wrote, but I’ll try again. The reason I picked a fight with you in our first session was because I knew I couldn’t have you, and I couldn’t stand it. So I was a jerk. If you hated me, I thought it would be easier. It was the only thing I could think of to do.
My throat was thick. The words themselves were pure Jace, but I felt panic rising in my chest. It didn’t work, I wrote. I woke up the next morning having a sex dream about you.
Another pause, and the dots moved again. I didn’t know that, Jace wrote. I like it.
Why does this sound so strangely final?
Is it? Jace wrote. I don’t want it to be.
Come back, I wrote. We’ll figure this out. We’ll figure everything out. In case you hadn’t clued in, I’m in love with you.
I don’t deserve that, but I’ll take it. And I’m trying my best to come back. But I have to turn my phone off now.
“No,” I said out loud. I typed furiously. Don’t you dare. CALL ME.
But he was already gone, I knew it.
I looked up and saw Luke and Emily watching me. How long had they been standing there? What had they seen, what had they said that I hadn’t heard? I had no idea.
“He’s doing something crazy,” I said to them, my voice cracking. “We have to go to Detroit.”
Twenty-Eight
Jace
It was some kind of poetic justice that Carter White met me at one of his chop shops. It was a warehouse on the outskirts of Detroit, in one of the many industrial parks that were only semi-occupied. It was five o’clock in the morning, and except for a restless hour of semi-sleep plagued by nightmares, I’d been awake for nearly twenty-four hours. I was simultaneously exhausted and floating, my head as light as if it were detached from my body, my eyes stinging, my feelings numb.
I got out of Emily’s Tercel in the empty parking lot and walked to the back door, as I’d been instructed. I knocked twice and the door opened, revealing a big heavy guy in a suit. He carried a Glock in one hand as easily as if it were tissue paper. “Get in,” he said.
Inside were two other guys, equally big and equally armed. They patted me down, looking for weapons or wires, and found nothing. They took my phone, saw that it was powered off, and one of them put it in his pocket. Then they took me to the main warehouse, sat me on a chair in front of a table, and stood behind each shoulder. Neither of them spoke.
It was a huge space, dimly lit. This was one of White’s workshops, where stolen cars were brought to be made over and resold. It was as familiar to me as my own hands. I could smell metal and motor oil, that tangy smell I knew so well. I’d always thought I’d like to die smelling that smell, and I realized now that I might get my wish. I kept my face a blank and waited.
He made me wait, of course. Men as important as Carter White didn’t just show up to any old meeting, even the ones that they’d called. Maybe someone was checking me out through a camera somewhere; I had no idea. It was tempting to fidget, but I’d done a lot of waiting in my life, and a little more wasn’t going to kill me. I sat still with a silent man behind each of my shoulders and thought about nothing.
Eventually, a slim man in a well-cut suit came around the corner. He, too, carried a Glock. He did so elegantly, easily, as if he carried one all the time. He pulled out a chair and sat across from me, still holding the gun.
“Jace Riggs,” he said.
“Yes,” I replied.
He wasn’t a bad-looking guy. He was white, his face a little narrow, his nose a little big. He looked at me with eyes like dark stones, flat and hard.
“I’m surprised you showed up,” he said. “You know I called you here to kill you.”
I did know that. I knew the minute my phone rang with an unknown number and a disguised voice on the other end told me where to go. I’d informed on men like Carter White long enough to know they didn’t fuck around. “Was there any point in running?” I asked.
He smiled briefly, humorlessly. “No. Of course not. Still, most people don’t walk into their own death.”
I glanced at the Glock he held in his lap, gleaming and silent. I had no doubt it was loaded, the safety off. Carter White was known for making people disappear, never to be seen again. It would take a split second to kill me, and then what? Did he have somewhere to put my body? He must have a concrete pit or something. If I knew where that pit was, I’d have told the authorities about it. Now I was likely going to end up in it.
“You could have had one of your guys do it,” I said to Carter. “When you called me to a meeting, I figured you want to talk. Maybe there’s something that will get me out of this.”
“There isn’t,” Carter said, and when his eyes gleamed I realized that beneath those flat stones he was angry. Very, very angry. “You’ve cost me a great deal, Riggs. I’ve had operations shut down and moved. I’ve had associates arrested. I’ve had to pay a fortune to lawyers and to make certain people stay quiet. You’ve wasted my money and my time, and today I learned that you were just a low-level car thief. Just some idiot, the son of the idiot who ran the Westlake operation.” He shook his head. “I thought someone had it out for you, but the fact that you came here tonight proves it’s true.”
“I wasn’t going to convince you otherwise,” I said. “I got nailed by a cop because I fell for his ex-girlfriend.”
“I hope she was worth it.”
“She was. What do you want to know?”
“The truth,” Carter said. “I want to know who hired you to do what you did.”
“No one hired me,” I said, which was true.
“Bullshit,” Carter said. “You have nothing to lose anymore, Riggs. If Alfonso hired you, tell me now.”
“I don’t know wh
o that is,” I said. Also true—I had no fucking idea what he was talking about.
But Carter leaned forward, never taking his hand from the gun lying on his lap. “Listen to me, you piece of shit,” he said in a low, furious voice. “Alfonso isn’t going to cover for you. He isn’t going to save you. He’s going to let you go to the dogs. You have no reason to be loyal. Tell me the truth, and I might make this quick.”
Cold sweat started on the back of my neck. I didn’t know any Alfonso, had never heard of him. This wasn’t how I’d thought this would go. I’d thought that Carter would ask me questions I could actually answer so I could buy time. I had to buy time.
“I’ve been inside for twenty months,” I said. “I’m not in the game anymore. I don’t know who Alfonso is, and he sure as shit didn’t hire me. I did what I did because I hate my father. For free.”
For a second—just a second—I thought I’d convinced him. Then Carter lifted a finger, and one of his goons grabbed each of my arms. Before I could move, they’d handcuffed each of my wrists to metal rings that were sunk into the table. I jerked my arms, looked down, and saw that the table was cemented to the floor.
No, this was definitely not how this was supposed to go.
Carter gave another signal, and I heard a rustling behind me. I looked over my shoulder to see that one of the goons was laying down plastic sheeting on the floor.
“Jesus, Carter,” I said. “You don’t have to do this. I don’t know who Alfonso is.”
“Yes, you do,” Carter said, standing up. He came around the table, the gun in his hand. “Do you want to know something interesting? A percentage of those who try to blow their brains out don’t succeed. They blow part of their skull off instead.” He touched the gun to my jaw. “Some of them just blow off a section of their jawbone and the bullet doesn’t hit the brain at all. Others rip out the backs of their throats. It’s an extraordinarily painful experience. And in the end, they don’t even die.” He paused. “I think I’ll experiment.”
