“No. There was a reason,” she said. “What was it?”
“They wouldn’t share,” he said simply. “They had what I wanted, and they wouldn’t let me have it.”
“Besides the little Asian girl, who you were trying to buy?”
He frowned and straightened up. “Did you get into Nico’s laptop?”
“Oh, yeah, we got into his and your laptops,” Rodney said. “Interesting read. We got into the chat and saw that you didn’t like the price.”
“Then you came after me and rescued the little girl anyway,” he said. “What a waste.”
“Well, I don’t think so,” she said. “I’m pretty damn sure there is more to that than meets the eye.”
“Whatever,” he said. “That stupid Nico. He was a mess, and he should have just given me the damn girl. Then none of this would have happened.”
“Instead you killed him.”
“And took all the money he had with him,” he said. “There was a lot, and I was grateful to have it.”
“You speak so casually,” she said, “as if you don’t really care.”
“Well, I don’t,” he said in surprise. “What’s to care about after you’ve been through jail? Life is not the same anymore.”
“That doesn’t mean you have to go around making it worse,” she said.
“It’s just a fact of life,” he said. “It’s all about surviving, making something out of life for yourself to enjoy.”
“Says you.”
“Yep, says me,” he said. “Besides, that’s not what my life could be like now. I’ve got my brother’s cards now too. I could take the money, whatever I can get, and run. He will lose this house, just like I lost mine.”
“What makes you think you’ll just walk away so easily?” she asked.
He smiled and said, “Remember the gun?” He looked down at the little boy in the bed, drugged, and lined up his gun to the child’s head.
“And you would kill a child for that?”
“Well, I have to clean up loose ends,” he said.
“If you fire at that child, I will take you out.”
He looked at her, smiled, and said, “Women are so simple.” Just then, he moved and pointed the gun her way. But she was already running toward him. He immediately fired once and then turned it on Rodney and fired a second time. She felt the hit slamming into her shoulder, as she went down from the blast. But she refused to listen and had already bounced onto her feet, heading toward him again.
“Fuck you,” he snapped, lined up for a shot again.
But an arm snaked around his neck from behind, pulling York backward, his gun arm flying upward, as another arm came around, grabbed his trigger finger, and fired into the ceiling, until all the bullets were spent. She watched in shock as Simon slammed York into the ground and dropped on top of him, pinning him there. Simon grabbed York’s hands, pulled them behind his back, then looked at her. “Are you okay?”
She nodded, wavering a little bit on her feet. “I’m fine.”
Simon pointed at her partner. “What about him?” She raced to Rodney’s side and saw that he was out cold. “He’ll be okay,” she said. “The bullet wound is just a graze. He must have hit his head when he fell or something. He’ll be pissed off when he wakes up.”
“But at least he will wake up,” Simon said. He looked down at Yale’s brother, York, and said, “So, asshole, Yale finally told me all about my childhood and my connection to your family.”
“Yale told you, did he? That’s funny,” York said. “Did he also tell you that he used to curl up in bed beside you at nighttime and that you were the child who made him want to cuddle and to save everybody? The one who made him want to collect all these poor souls,” he said. “I bet he didn’t. He’s just that much older than you that, of course, you don’t remember.”
“No, I don’t,” he said. His voice hard, bland. “I don’t plan on remembering him anymore either. Now that we’ve got the two of you down, it’s over, as far as I’m concerned.”
“I don’t think so,” the older brother said. “Yale could bring it all out and make sure everybody in the whole world knows.”