by JB Lynn
“How can you be so sure?”
I shrugged. I couldn’t be.
“Something else occurred to me today. Maybe it’s good news.”
“I could use some of that.”
“Delveccio got what he wanted. His son-in-law is dead. I really don’t think it makes good business sense for him to pay someone to kill you.”
“He doesn’t have an MBA,” I told the lizard. “He’s in the M-O-B mob. I’m not sure good business practices are high on his list of priorities.”
“Think about it. He’s got no reason to want you dead. He just doesn’t want you and Gary the Gun bickering about who should get paid for services rendered.”
“Which should be me,” I reminded him.
“Yes, yes, yes. But is it worth having a cellmate for the rest of your life?”
I rolled over and studied the ceiling, imagining I was lying on a bunk in a cell.
“Maybe you should just let Gary have the money.”
“And what about Katie? What happens to her?”
“Maybe you should just try to come up with the money for Katie’s bills another way.”
“How?”
“You could ask your father for the money.”
I closed my eyes. “He won’t do it.”
“You won’t know until you ask. Just explain it to him.”
“You don’t know him.”
“You don’t have any other options.”
Yes, I was having a lizard tell me that the only chance I had to save my own butt and my niece’s life lay in the hands of the guy who’d pawned my bicycle. I wasn’t feeling hopeful.
Chapter Thirty
STILL, GOD HAD been right about other stuff, which is why the next morning I stopped by the Galaxy Diner in the hopes of running into Patrick.
Sure enough, he was there at the counter, a pile of jelly packets stacked up like a game of Jenga. I wondered if that was some kind of signal and he was waiting for someone to join him, so I took a seat at the opposite end of the counter and waited for him to him to make eye contact. It took a while, because he appeared to be lost in thought, staring into his coffee as he stirred it.
He finally did look up, sweeping his gaze over the entire place, slamming to a stop when he saw me. When he didn’t offer a greeting of any kind, I inferred that he was waiting for someone, so I threw a couple of bills on the counter to cover the coffee I’d just ordered but hadn’t even sipped and walked out.
I considered tucking a note under his windshield wiper, but I couldn’t figure out a euphemism for my question, which was: Is Delveccio going to have me killed?
“Lifesaver?”
Turning around, I found Patrick standing behind me holding out a cylinder of foil-wrapped mints.
I shook my head. “I have a question for you. Will—”
“Do you remember how to get to the cemetery?”
I nodded.
“Okay, I’ll meet you there.” Without another word he climbed into his truck and drove away.
I watched him go. If Delveccio did want me dead, the cemetery would be a good place for Patrick to do the deed.
I slowly climbed into my car, wondering if showing up to the Galaxy had been the brightest of ideas. Still, I needed an answer to my question, because that would determine if I’d go ask my father for the money. At the moment I wasn’t sure if dying or begging was worse.
A couple of minutes later I rolled to a stop behind Patrick’s truck. He’d left the vehicle. Crouching to read the epitaph on a headstone a few rows away, he seemed oblivious of my arrival.
I got out of my car and waited beside it. It was bad enough that I’d driven to my own execution, if that was in fact what I’d done; I sure as hell wasn’t going to just stroll over to the proverbial hangman’s noose.
After a moment, the redhead straightened and headed toward me. “What do you want your tombstone to say?”
I swallowed hard. I should have listened to my own gut and ignored the urgings of that stupid lizard.
Looming over me, Patrick tilted his head, waiting for my answer.
“Same shit . . . different asshole.”
He threw his head back and laughed.
And when he wasn’t looking at me, I hit him.
In the gut.
Which, if I’d paid any attention during his self-defense lesson, I would have known was a mistake. I should have gone for his balls.
He gasped, and the air whooshed out of him when I socked him, but he stayed on his feet. “What the . . .”
I tried to yank open my car door to make my escape, but he reached over me and slammed it shut.
“What—”
I drove my elbow backward, trying to do more damage, but he was ready for me this time. Grabbing it, he swung me around so that I was facing him. Faster than a ninja he captured both my hands and held them at my sides. I flattened back against my car. He followed, pinning me with his body weight. It was both frightening and intimate.
“What’s going on?” Slightly breathless, he spoke as casually as if we’d been discussing the weather. “Did Delveccio tell you to kill me too? Because if he did, he shouldn’t have sent a little girl to do the job.”
I shook my head. I didn’t know which was stranger. The idea that he thought I’d been sent to kill him, or that he seemed so freaking unperturbed about it.
“Then why did you hit me, Mags?”
“I . . . I thought you were going to kill me.”
“Why the hell would you think that?”
“You asked me what I wanted on my tombstone!” Okay, I’d been paranoid before that, but that little question was what had driven me over the edge. “You’re hurting my wrists.” That complaint wasn’t true; he was holding onto me firmly, but he hadn’t caused me any pain. I just needed some space.
“Sorry.” As if he understood that, he released me and backed away a few paces. “I didn’t mean to.”
Feeling guilty for the lie, I looked away.
“I was just wondering if you were going to have the usual family relationship stuff or a philosopher’s quote, or if you were going to go for something original.”
“Oh.” When he put it that way, it didn’t sound all that menacing.
“I should have known you’d already have something unique picked out.”
I looked back at him, trying to figure out what that cryptic statement meant, but as usual his expression was unreadable. “I don’t like the ‘beloved’ or ‘in loving memory’ crap. I’ve already buried two sisters, my third’s probably dead too, and I just want anyone who reads my stone to know that life is crap.”
“She’s not.”
Working at Insuring the Future, I had heard people call their cars, boats, motorcycles, and jet skis she. I’d never heard anyone refer to life as one before, but it kind of made sense in a “life’s a bitch” sense. Not wanting to get into a philosophical argument with a guy who ended lives as a side gig, I just sort of shrugged.
“You don’t want to talk about it?”
“Not particularly.”
“Okay, but if you ever do . . .” He seemed puzzled by my reaction, but I didn’t elaborate.
My sisters were gone, my mom was a lost cause, and my dad was locked up. All I had left was my comatose niece, a crappy job, my wacky aunts, and a job I hated. There was a good chance I’d run over the next person I saw wearing one of those ubiquitous LIFE IS GOOD shirts.
“You had a question for me?” Patrick prompted gently. “That’s the reason I had you meet me here. It wasn’t because I had some violent end planned for you.”
“So G—” Holy crap! I’d almost told him God had been theorizing. If I did that, he might think I was cracking under the pressure and might have to actually kill me. “So . . .” I started again, more deliberately, choosing my words carefully. “So guess what I was thinking?”
“What?”
“It doesn’t make sense financially for Delveccio to have me killed.”
Patrick nod
ded slowly. “As long as you don’t go opening your mouth, there’s no reason at all.”
“So if I let Gary the Gun keep my fee for killing Cifelli, no one should want me dead, right?”
Patrick nodded enthusiastically.
“Then maybe I’ll do that.”
“Really?” A pleased smile stretched Patrick’s features. Approval sparkled in his eyes.
“Maybe. I’ve got to look into an alternative method of funding Katie’s care, but if it works out . . .”
“That’s great, Mags. Really great. It’ll keep you safe.”
I felt badly that he seemed so excited about the possibility. There was always a chance my father wouldn’t go for the plan. If that was the case, I’d definitely have to try to take out Gary the Gun.
And that could turn out to be very dangerous, indeed.
Chapter Thirty-One
BECAUSE I HAD to make a decision about how to proceed before Cifelli’s corpse showed up, I feigned getting sick, just before my lunch break. In all honesty, it wasn’t much of a stretch, considering the call I’d gotten was from a guy who wanted to know if Insuring the Future was going to cover the cost of removing the bloodstains from his passenger seat.
Apparently his wife had mouthed off to him, and he’d slugged her, breaking her nose, and “the bitch had the nerve to bleed on my seat.”
Like I said, pretending to feel sick wasn’t a challenge.
So I left work early and drove out to the prison to make my plea. I’d mentally rehearsed what I was going to say, but my well-constructed speech was forgotten the moment he walked into the visiting room.
I gasped when I saw him, and I immediately felt sick to my stomach. For real.
His face was one giant bruise, one eye was swollen shut, and a line of fresh stitches zipped his forehead closed.
“Not looking my most handsome today,” he quipped, his speech slightly impaired by the fat lip he sported.
“What happened?” I was surprised at how upset seeing him like this made me. I’d made the decision long ago not to care about him.
“You should see the other guys.”
That wasn’t an answer, but obviously he wasn’t going to tell me. Maybe he figured that when a guy in prison looked like someone had beaten the crap out of him, chances were that was exactly what had happened.
“Why are you here, Maggie? Is Katie . . . ?”
“She’s fine. The same. Actually that’s the reason I came to see you.” I took a deep breath to fortify myself before taking the plunge. “I need money for her hospital bills.”
He nodded, almost smugly. “Told ya the insurance would only be a drop in the bucket.”
“You were right.” That admission didn’t come easily to me, but I thought it might help to soften him up. “Can you help?”
“I’m sorry, Maggie May, but my prison salary doesn’t add up to much at all.”
Rage burned in my gut. This was his granddaughter we were talking about. I closed my eyes for a second imagining my submarine doors slamming shut, containing my anger. “They’re going to move her to a state-run facility.”
“I live in a state-run facility,” he reminded me, like I wasn’t fully aware of the concrete walls, uniformed guards, and jumpsuited prisoners surrounding us.
But you deserve this, I wanted to say. Katie doesn’t. Instead I took another slow, deep breath, just like Alice had taught me. I didn’t feel any calmer. I was starting to think this stress-reduction technique of hers was a load of shit. “I’ve been told that Katie’s best chance at recovery is to continue receiving treatment where she is. The doctors she’s seeing now are the best in treating cases like hers.”
An alarm sounded in another part of the prison, causing the convicts and their visitors to shift uncomfortably in their seats, but Dad and I pretended not to notice.
My father waved his hand in front of his battered nose as though to dispel and unpleasant scent. “Legal robbery! That’s what doctors have figured out how to do.”
I nodded. Delveccio had said something pretty similar.
“She needs to stay there. I need the money to keep her there.” I looked him in the eye. “I need you to give it to me.”
“I told you, Maggie May, I—”
“What about the jewels?” I hissed, having had enough of his pauper act.
Sitting back in his seat, he crossed his arms over his chest. “You do know that I pleaded not-guilty, don’t you?”
“Yeah, I know. Just like I know that they convicted your lying, thieving, murdering ass.”
A flush spread up his face, darkening his bruises. He didn’t like being talked to like that, certainly not by his daughter.
I, however, wasn’t in the mood to give a flying shit about his feelings. “It’s not like you’re ever going to get a chance to use whatever you’ve got hidden away.”
“Allegedly hidden away, and you don’t know that.”
I rolled my eyes. “You really think you’re going to escape again?”
“I’ve filed an appeal.”
“Yeah? Good luck with that.” I used my most sarcastic tone and was rewarded by him jumping up out of his chair, fists clenched and eyes wild.
A guard bellowed, “We’ve got a situation. Everyone’s got to get out of here.”
I spotted the violent monster lurking in him, and it frightened me, but I was more scared for Katie. “Where are they?”
“They’re a popular topic this week.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
He pointed at his face. “I get jumped and drilled about the stash and then you show up asking about it. You expect me to believe that’s a coincidence?”
“You think I had something to do with your getting beaten up? I didn’t. I just want to help Katie.”
“You have a strange way of asking for help.”
“Everyone up and out,” the guard ordered.
Ignoring the instruction, I stared down at my sandals, noticing that the strap on the right one was frayed. Like everything else in my life it was on the verge of coming undone. “Please,” I whispered. “Will you please help me to save Katie?”
He was silent for so long that I started to think maybe he was considering it. I looked up at him hopefully.
“I can’t.” He sounded almost sad about it.
“You mean you won’t,” I shouted, knowing full-well the reason he wasn’t helping me was that he didn’t want our recorded conversation to be used against him when he filed his appeal.
Everyone in the room, despite the fact that they were saying good-byes to their loved ones, turned to look at us. I glared at them defiantly.
“I mean I can’t, Maggie May.” Dad sounded choked up about it, but I dismissed that as a side-effect of the beating he’d endured. “I’m sorry.”
“If she doesn’t wake up, it’s your fault!”
“No, it’s not. And it’s not yours either. It’s the fault of the drunk driver who ran the red light.”
“You keep telling yourself that.”
The guard grabbed my arm and yanked me to my feet. “You’ve got to get out of here, ma’am. It’s not safe.”
Without another glance in my father’s direction, I stalked out.
I knew full well how “not safe” I was. I also knew that somehow, some way, I was going to have to kill Gary the Gun.
Chapter Thirty-Two
IT’S REALLY HARD to come up with a plan to take out a killer when no one will leave you the hell alone . . . including him.
After my disastrous confrontation with my father, I went to visit Katie.
Okay, that’s a lie. I went to the nearest donut shop, bought a dozen assorted and one of those giant cups of coffee you practically need two hands to lift to your lips, sat in my car, and threw myself one hell of a pity party. I wolfed down nine of the donuts in the hope the sugar and fat would make me feel better.
They didn’t. I mean I ate nine of them . . . one right after the other like I was loa
ding coal into a furnace. All I felt was overwhelming nausea.
And sticky. I was definitely sticky. I’d managed to get powdered sugar, jelly, chocolate frosting, sugar glaze, sprinkles, cream filling, vanilla icing, and strawberry frosting all over myself.
That was the condition I was in when I stumbled into my niece’s room: ready to vomit and looking like a confectionary shop had puked its contents on me. “Hey there, Baby Girl.”
She of course didn’t respond.
I sighed and glared at the stuffed toy on the bed beside her. Dino, the one her grandfather had been so concerned she had with her. The reason I’d allowed myself to believe he might actually pitch in and help with her bills.
Sinking into the seat beside the bed, I took her tiny limp hand in mine. If I could have cried I would have done it then.
“Your niece is such a cute kid.”
The guy who’d frightened me so badly days earlier stood just feet away, his face a malevolent mask that caused a knot of dread to lodge in my throat.
My gut churned as I got to my feet, watching warily as he rounded Katie’s bed, taking up position on the side opposite me. Something felt wrong, and I didn’t think it was just because I’d binged on doughnuts.
“Do I know you?”
He smiled, a spiteful grin that left me feeling cold. My heartbeat, turning into a frenzied tribal drumbeat, thundered in my ears.
“We haven’t been introduced, but I’ve seen your work.”
And I knew with a certainty that changed the donuts in my stomach to lead who he was. Gary the Gun.
When he reached for his pocket I made a mad grab for Katie’s IV pole, the only weapon at hand.
“Easy there, Margaret,” he chuckled. “I’m just taking out my phone.”
On guard, I watched as he pulled it from his pocket. “What do you want? Why are you here?”
“You are an impulsive one. You really should get that under control. I just wanted to show you some pictures I have.” He held out his phone so that I could clearly see the image of myself pointing the gun at Alfonso Cifelli.
“It’s a whole slideshow. Want to watch it?”
