by Keri Lake
My whole body is tense and shaking, wondering where he is in the room. I yawn and work my jaw, knocking the muffling from my ears, and though I can hear sounds again, I don’t hear Gordon at first.
For a good minute and a half, I’m trapped in darkness, waiting for pain to strike out of nowhere.
A buzz comes with another flicker of light, dimmer than before, and I find Gordon slumped against the wall, his hand pressed to his stomach, which bleeds out onto the concrete floor beneath him.
“Ah, shit. This sucks,” he says, his strained voice colored in a small bit of amusement.
Pounding at the door draws my attention, and I keep the gun on hand, just in case Gordon’s men come bounding through it.
“Damon? Damon, are you in there?” At the sound of Ivy’s voice, my muscles sag with relief.
“Yeah! I’m in here! I’m all right? Are you all right?”
“Yes. Looks like the generators kicked on. Okay, there’s some debris in front of the door! I have to clear it away to open it. Just sit tight, okay?”
“Sitting as tight as ever.” As much as I don’t think Gordon is a threat at the moment, I keep the gun trained on him, anyway. The man didn’t build his ruthless reputation by laying down and dying, after all.
“Man, she sounds like a firecracker. If you weren’t a priest, I’d call you a lucky man.” Even with a mortal wound, he manages a wily grin and a wink. “Then again, you never let that priest shit stop you, right?”
With a groan, I shake my head. “Piss off.”
On another cough, he shifts, wincing, and blows out a hard breath. “Could’ve been great friends, you and me. Had barbecues together. Gone out for beers and swapped stories about our wives.”
“Fuck you.” Even I have to admit, there’s an unsettling feeling to finding out he was the bad guy all along. His charm and likability is probably the most dangerous thing about the man. “Why? Why you?”
“It breaks your heart, doesn’t it? When you find out the monster isn’t such a bad guy.” With a shrug of his shoulders, he shakes his head and coughs. “He just does bad things. We’re taught in life and in the church that evil is obvious. The devil is this beastly thing with horns and a tail and a forked tongue.” He raises an excessively bloody hand, gesturing at his head and mouth to emphasize his point. “And yet, we forget that he was an angel before all of that.” He blows out a breath and lights up a cigar that he pulls from the front pocket of his shirt. “We all have our demons inside of us. You and I? Are we that different?”
“I never murdered innocent children.”
“And yet, if my son were here right now, wouldn’t you murder him in front of me? To force me to feel your pain? I killed your wife and daughter. Surely, you’d be forgiven by God for wanting me to suffer alongside you.”
My jaw shifts with the grinding of my teeth, because he’s probably right. Maybe I would murder his son in front of him. Or maybe the last few months have been nothing but a waste of time. Perhaps I’m just a man who needed the distraction of coming down here, believing that I was capable of taking out a criminal like him. “I still have the gun, in case you’ve forgotten.”
“It isn’t about killing an innocent child. It’s making another human being understand the magnitude of what was stolen from you.” A casual puff of his cigar, and he goes on, as though his wound isn’t robbing him the last bits of life. “Summer of seventy-two. I had an internship down in Mexico with the company I planned to work for someday. I wanted to build cities. Watch them grow and thrive. But I laid eyes on a pretty thing sitting alone at a restaurant. Suddenly, I was staring at everything I wanted more.” His eyes seem spacier than before, and I wonder if death has begun to creep over him. The white pallor of his skin confesses he’s lost too much blood. “Like the idiot I was, I’d gone and fallen dick in the dirt over a dangerous man’s woman.” With a chuckle, he shakes his head and puffs his cigar. “I had dreams of this woman and what we could be, though. And she wanted it as much as I did.” In the pause that follows, his eyes are lost to unseen thoughts. “Twenty-six minutes was all it took for that dream to become my nightmare. For the man to sell his soul. In twenty-six minutes, two men raped and murdered the love of my life in front of me, then my daughter, and scarred my son.”
His brows come together, and when he sniffles, I realize this man is pouring his heart out, just like the blood oozing from his wounds. It’s an agony that’s all too familiar for me, and I have to push thoughts of my own wife and child out of my mind.
“I’ve been in pain every day since. And no matter how many people I’ve killed, it just grows bigger, and bigger, and bigger. You almost took my grandson from me. Not because you hated me. But because your pain was bigger than your will.”
“Your son raped an innocent girl. One who might be dead, for all I know.”
“And the wheel, it spins and spins and spins. Her family carries pain, I carry more pain. Pain fuels the engine, and we don’t bother to stop it. We can’t.” He tips back his hand, seeming to examine his wound, and flinches. “You wouldn’t think that a three-year-old boy would remember watching his mother die. But my son watched it every day in his head. Just like I did. I couldn’t forget. Neither could he. Took his own life at the age of forty-five.”
“Tell me where Ariceli is, and I won’t blow your brains out right here.”
A cough sends him forward, the pressure pushing more blood through his wound, and he grimaces. “Planning for college, I’m guessing. Shit, you think I could hurt Ariceli? She’s like a daughter. Like the one I didn’t get to raise.”
The door swings open, and Ivy storms into the room, her eyes on Gordon as she rounds his body on her way over to me. “Oh, my God! Damon! What did they do to you?” She plants careful kisses to my cheek, before falling to my side, going to work on my binds.
“I’m okay. The question is, what the hell did you do?”
Despite the weary look of worry in her eyes, she smiles. “Ah, you know, kidnapped a priest at gunpoint. Tricked a ruthless gang into thinking they were under attack with fireworks. Blew up half a drug smuggling tunnel. Typical weeknight. How bout you?”
“Got my ass beat.”
Behind her, Father Javier stands in the doorway, scanning the room, and when he finds Gordon, his eyes are wide, brimming with incredulity, like it’s the first time he’s actually had to look at the man’s destruction. The first time he can’t just look away.
Takes a few minutes for Ivy to work the knots of my binds, and when she does, the ache in my shoulders is flooded with the warmth of relief. I circle my elbow in the air and the joint pops and crackles, the blood flowing back into my fingers again. Reaching out for her, I pull her to my face, and in spite of Father Javier standing there, watching us, I kiss the shit out of this woman. “How the hell did you find me?”
“Divine intervention.” She glances back at Javier for a beat. “Threatened to blow off his testicles with an M-eighty. He’s cooperating now. He’ll be escorting us to Mexicali.”
Brows winged up, I clear my throat. “How creative. I trust you’ve gotten rid of them.”
“The testicles or the M-eighty’s?”
“The M-eighty’s.”
“Of course.” She gives me one more kiss, then pushes to her feet and reaches down to help me to mine. “But should you piss me off, just know, I’ve got a supplier.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” I swipe up the gun from the ground, and together, we hobble toward the door, but I come to a stop beside Gordon. “Give me a second, okay?”
She looks to Gordon and nods. “A quick second. It’s a long walk to Mexicali from here.”
At my frown, she nods. “Yeah. We blew up the tunnel, so the only way out is through Mexico.”
“Fantastic. I’ll make it quick.” As she exits the room, I stare down at the wound oozing blood from Gordon’s stomach. Fatal wound, by my estimates. I lower my gun, tossing it behind me.
“Ain’t ya gonna finish me off?�
� He snorts, and a wet barky cough throws him forward. A rivulet of blood trickles from his blue lips, and the stain in his shirt is almost black with saturation.
“I’m stopping the wheel.”
Head rolling against the wall, he gives a weak smile. “If I live, you’ll be the first man I come after.”
“You won’t live. I doubt you’ll survive the night.”
He sniffs and shakes his head, his eyes weary with the weight of death. “It doesn’t end for me. Not like this. It takes more than a bullet to kill this El Cabro Blanco.”
“It’s not the bullet that’ll kill you, Gordon. It’s the fact that no one gives a damn enough to save you. Vaya con Dios, my friend.” I turn away from him and begin my trek back across the border.
“Damon!” he calls out from behind, his voice echoing through the empty tunnel, but I ignore him. “Damon! Finish me!”
My father would’ve killed him. He would’ve ensured every bit of his legacy perished. After tonight, though, one of the most widely known criminals in the country will die alone in an empty tunnel, miles from his home. No one will find him.
And no one will believe he ever actually lived.
39
IVY
Two months later ...
“Excuse me, Ivy Mercier?”
Wiping my hands on the towel tucked into my jeans, I look around the small diner, where I’ve picked up afternoon shifts until I can find a job. So much for California being The Golden State. There’s nothing golden about having to serve greasy cheeseburgers and smelling like onions everyday. My gaze lands on the guy standing behind me. “Who’s asking?”
A pudgy man with graying hair and the red cheeks of a bonafide alcoholic stretches out a hand toward me. “Thomas Granger. I work for Granger and Fox Law Firm in Los Angeles. You’re not an easy woman to track down, Ms. Mercier.”
With a frown, I reluctantly return the handshake, before stuffing my hands into the pockets of my food-stained apron. “And why are you trying to track me down?”
“I have an important matter to discuss with you. Is there somewhere private we can talk?”
Here we are. The moment I’ve dreaded since the day Calvin walked into my life, offering to eliminate all my problems. The same day my luck went to shit. “Look, if this is about my grandmother’s fees, you’re barking up the wrong tree.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t know anything about any fees.”
Shrugging, I fold my arms over my chest, well into defensive territory. “Then, what …? What are you looking to discuss?”
“Again, if we could talk privately, that would be best.”
“Privately about what?”
“Your inheritance.”
A cough sputters past my lips, and for a second I can’t catch my breath. I hold up a finger, watching the man’s face pinch to concern. “I’m sorry. I choked …” I swallow again. “On my spit.” Another cough sends spittle onto the floor and across the man’s shiny, patent, black leather shoes. “I’m sorry. My what? Did you say inheritance? What inheritance?”
He glances around the diner. “Perhaps there’s an office, or somewhere we can talk?”
“Sure. Yeah. Sure.” I lead him to one of the back offices, my body cold with shock, as I mechanically pull a chair out from the break room table, across from him. “What inheritance? Last I checked Mamie had nothing but debt.”
“Your grandmother was executor to her uncle Renaud Mercier’s estate and trust. He passed away of natural causes at the ripe age of ninety-two, about four months ago. With your grandmother’s passing, that makes you the only living heir to his fortune.”
“Fortune?” I clear my throat and shift in the chair, pinching my skin beneath the table. Did I doze off during my shift? “What about my father?”
He rolls his shoulders back and entwines his fingers. “Were you not aware that he died of a drug overdose two years ago?”
Lips pressed to a hard line, I shake my head. “I haven’t seen my father since I was a small child.”
“I’m sorry.”
With a dismissive shrug, I wave my hand. “Anyway, continue.”
“Your great-uncle was a magnate in France. A highly respected businessman. He established his estate and trust through our sister firm in Paris.”
Mamie never spoke of him, aside from a few anecdotes about how her uncle never came around much, and when he did, he often argued with her father. Never sounded to me like the charitable type.
“When you say fortune. What exactly … I mean, how much is that exactly?”
His brows and shoulders wing up, as though I’ve asked him to calculate some unsolvable math equation. “Between his business and personal assets, the estate and trust is valued at approximately five hundred million.”
Another cough sends me forward, and I beat on my chest to loosen the saliva I’m drowning in right now. “Um. I’m sorry. I, um … it sounded like you said five hundred million.” An involuntary snort escapes me, and I clap a hand over my mouth. “Like … dollars?”
“Euros. It’d be a bit more than that in US dollars.”
“And I’m the sole heir to this fortune? There isn’t, like … a cousin, or something, to split this with?”
Frowning again, he tips his head. “Not that we’ve determined, no. Your grandmother did have an older brother, who passed away, but no children, it seems.”
While he reaches into his briefcase, and pulls out a folder, I’m digging my nails into my skin, desperate to figure out if I’m dreaming, or awake, right now. I scan the walls of the room, taking in details like the brown water stain on the ceiling, the crack in the drywall that’s been painted over blue, and the unsavory scent of burnt coffee on the air. Surely, I wouldn’t pick up on that level of detail in a dream.
Meanwhile, Thomas prattles on about the process of disbursement through foreign trusts, and I’m only listening to about half of it. All I want to do is buy a few gallons of chocolate syrup and take a sundae bath with Damon. A thought that makes me chuckle smack in the middle of Thomas’s explanation.
He looks up, brows furrowed in concern, and it’s then that my tears magnify his face.
“I’m sorry, this is …. This is just a little overwhelming. Like … I feel like I’m going to pass out?”
“I understand.” He sets his hands out, like one would if they were trying to gauge whether, or not, the nutty chick across from him is about to lose her shit, or throw up. “Perhaps you’d like to meet at another time?”
“No! God, no. I’m just … shocked. Fucking happy as all get out. More shocked.”
“Completely normal. Deep breaths and laughter are the best ways to handle the shock. Maybe some liquor later.”
“So, um … I should probably tell you I’m about a month behind on rent. My boyfriend, he’s a priest.” I flinch, quickly shaking my head. “Was a priest. He’s looking for work, too.”
“I’m happy to loan you an advance, until everything is settled.”
“Oh. Well, I didn’t mean you had to give me an advance. I didn’t realize ...”
“It’s okay, Miss Mercier. There isn’t a financial entity in this world that would deny you a loan at this point.”
I’m trying to let that sink in, but it won’t. It can’t. How can I have struggled for so many years of my life, to one day turn around, and all of a sudden, every one of my worries just disappears? It’s not possible.
“You may want to pursue dual citizenship in the upcoming months.”
“Sure, okay. Um. Is that required to claim the inheritance?”
“No … but … you own quite a few homes in France, and there is the mansion there, as well.”
“Mansion?”
“Yes, all the property details will be discussed in a more formal setting. I’m just happy we can finally get the ball rolling.”
“Yeah, me too.”
He reaches across the table for another handshake. “Welcome to the world of wealth, Miss Mercier. I look forward to actin
g as your trusted advisor in the upcoming months.”
I snort again, and I can only imagine the goofy smile plastered to my face right now.
40
DAMON
I stare out the window of the plane, watching Los Angeles shrink into nothing but specks and lines on a multicolored canvas. A cold, clammy hand clutches mine, and I turn to see Ivy, sitting stiff as a board, eyes clamped shut. Harsh breaths rush out of her nose while her fingers dig into my skin.
“Almost over,” I whisper, trying to hide my smile.
“I can do plane rides, just not take off.”
The pressure seems to lighten, and the seatbelt sign finally dings off.
She blows an easy breath and opens her eyes. “That’s better.”
“I told you. Piece of cake.”
She lifts our clutched hands into the air, examining them. “Sorry.” Her nails loosen their lodged hold, and she kisses the back of my hand where deep crescent grooves mark my skin. “All good now.”
“Good.”
I’ve flown firstclass before, but this is something else entirely. A private jet with plush, leather seats that fold out into beds. Flat screen TV, a bar, and a couch, too. Only seven passengers total, including the stewardess, pilots, two lawyers, and Ivy and me. I glance around and catch one of the lawyers, Thomas, staring down at papers over his spectacles. He looks up briefly to offer a smile, before going back to his work.
In spite of Ivy’s trepidation, it’s the first time in months I’ve had the opportunity to relax and breathe easy. Literally. Thanks to Gordon, I ended up with two fractured ribs that had me laid up the first couple of days. As I recovered, a part of me wished I had gone back to finish him off, though I’m fairly certain he perished within hours of being left behind. Reports from neighbors resulted in a search of the rectory and an investigation into Father Javier. As far as I know, he’s agreed to work with authorities in exchange for immunity. After finding out my real name during our walk back to Mexicali, he’s made a point not to mention my short time working for the parish, either. Fortunately, Gordon was telling the truth, and Ariceli remained unharmed, in her parents’ home, as he said.
