“Mr.Thompson”—the attorney clears his throat—“you are here as a courtesy. Please remember that. Also, they can’t hear you.”
“Is it her husband?” Gersh presses. “Were you trying to get to him?”
I glare at the boyfriend, but he just sits there in silence, that obnoxious little smirk stuck on his face.
CHAPTER 64
MIKE
There is a point in every problem when you must decide whether to solve the problem or run. My problem is simple—I need this damn encryption key, and it takes only three hours of looking for me to realize that I am not going to find it, not soon enough to satisfy my clients. Which is a shame, because running is going to be a huge pain in my ass. Like, colonoscopy-prep levels of gut-wrenching shitassery.
I have, of course, prepared for this. You don’t work thirteen years for an organized crime syndicate without having backup plans stacked on top of backup plans. I have three cars at various lots in the city, each gassed up, their trunks full of suitcases, food, weapons, and cash. I have two alternate aliases for Lillian, Jacob, and myself, and Bitcoin balances in both US and foreign accounts that could fund us for the next three years, which is plenty of time to set up new lives and employment.
The issue is that once I step off that ledge, once I go dark for longer than a few minutes, I will be marked, and then there will be no going back, ever again. It won’t matter if I find the key and move Colorado in time to save the day. It won’t matter because trying to deliver Colorado will create a trail, and the minute that last digit is entered, my fingertips will be cut off and my eyelids peeled back, and I will be forced, fromthat position, to watch as my child is tortured because doing it improperly is not acceptable.
I am out of time and out of options because this city has swallowed up this bottle and I am the idiot who put it within arm’s reach of a borderline alcoholic with some belief that nostalgia would prevail. Who gives an F if nostalgia worked for the last nine years? It was stupid, and as a result, I have to run, which means Jacob has to run.
I park in the driveway beside Jacob’s car and walk up to the house, holding my breath as I check the recycling bin by the side door, on the off chance that Lill chucked it there. Nothing. The side door is unlocked, and I step inside. Another rule Jacob hasn’t listened to. Always lock the doors. Always. Tick. Tick. Tick.
Mentally, I assemble a list. Grab Jacob, get a few blocks over, flag a taxi to the closest flee car—the Mazda in the Century City parking garage—and leave. I call out his name as I climb the stairs to the second floor, my mind clicking through the rest of what I should do before we leave the house. Wipe the computers. Leave the phones. I knock on the door to Jacob’s room and turn the knob. I need to take the—
I stop because there’s a man sitting on the edge of his bed, smiling at me. I look for Jacob, but the room is empty. I look at the bed but don’t see any blood.
“Michael,” Luis says warmly. “It’s been a long time.”
CHAPTER 65
MIKE
“What’s going on, Mike?” Luis folds one ankle up on the opposite knee and looks at me. “You have not started to move Colorado. Why?”
Jacob’s bathroom is just off his bedroom, a Jack-and-Jill layout that connects to the guest room, and I listen, hoping and also not hoping that he is inside. Luis follows my gaze and shakes his head. “He’s not here, Mike.”
I sink against the dresser in relief. “He doesn’t have anything to do with—”
“Oh, Mike.” Luis tsks. “The young never do. But that doesn’t mean that they don’t suffer the sins of their fathers, right?” He shakes his head sadly. “I mean, take your father. You suffered from his sins. Both you and your mother did.”
I don’t respond, and my relief at Jacob not being here is replaced by the growing fear that Luis is the reason that he isn’t. “Where’s Jacob?”
“He’s safe, Mike. You understand, of course, why we had to take him.”
I shake my head. “Luis, I’ve worked for you all for thirteen years, I would never run—”
“Of course you wouldn’t,” he says broadly. “I’m not worried about that. Because you know, Mike. You know how we would react to that.And it’s a shame, with you already losing your wife ...” He stands and claps his hands on either side of my shoulders, and I remember when I first met him. I’d found him charming. We’d met at a Vegas craps table and then taken shots with cigars, and he’d asked me a dozen questions about diversification of portfolios, and I had come home and bragged to Lillian about the new client I had. The new client, who was bringing over a mid-six-figure account. Back then, I thought that was big. Back then, I was so impressed by Luis and his future possibilities that I bent a few securities laws. Wee ones. Unimportant ones.
I stepped over the line and it moved. Then I stepped over it again and it grew fainter. Blurrier. I took a few more steps, and now I’m here, and my son is somewhere “safe,” and all I need to do to bring him back is move $400 million that I can’t access.
His hands tighten on my shoulders, and he is looking up into my face and giving the same warm, encouraging smile that he gave to Wes Flockhart, right before he used a drill bit on his left collarbone. “We want to make sure you’re okay, Mike. Because my partners, they are getting nervous.”
As they should be. They should be shitting their pants, because if this savings account is gone—and it is gone—every one of them is ruined and dead. Including me. And including Jacob.
He smiles again, but I can see the fear in his eyes, and I wonder if he’s the one who put that bug in Lillian’s calendar. “So let’s go together, Mike. Let’s go and transfer Colorado to where it belongs.”
CHAPTER 66
LILLIAN
Something has changed, and Aerosmith and Tank Top are all business, and they are moving Jacob down a staircase and into the basement. Now is when my mothering instincts scream the alarm because nothing good exists in this basement. There are shackles—actual shackles—attached to the wall and hanging, waiting for someone’s wrists and ankles. I don’t have to see this. I could fade away, return to the morgue, where I could watch as they pin my skin back together in a way that will look natural for the funeral. Or I could go to the house and watch as my husband continues to coldly rearrange his life to accommodate one fewer person. But if Jacob has to be here, I will be here. I will feel each pain and watch and agonize because that is my duty as a mother, even if I feel like I’m fading with each hour that passes. Even now, as they say something to him, as they push him into the chair and one of the men draws his gun ... their voices are beginning to muffle, and Jacob is blurry, then sharp. I blink rapidly and try to ground myself, try to stand in between his chair and the gun, try to say something that someone will be able to hear. I plead that we have money, that we will pay, that they do not need to kill this boy.