Tony appeared in the doorway with a wet spot on his yellow T-shirt that read ‘31 Flavors’ over a cat head licking its paw. He had bags under his eyes, and his massive shoulders sagged. Dude looked like shit. “I make a small change to that cat’s obstacle course, and he pukes on me.”
“That’ll teach you,” I said and pushed past him into his apartment.
In case it wasn’t crystal clear, the guy had a thing for cats, Major in particular. After eighth grade at the same school, Tony had moved to South Carolina just before his parents died in a car accident. With no living relatives and because of the horror stories he’d heard, he tried to make it on the streets instead of going to foster care. He skimmed over some of the details of what he’d gone through, but basically he and the then homeless, but just as feisty, cat Major helped each other survive. Now, back in D.C., Tony made a living filming all of Major’s tricks and posting them on YouTube for his three hundred thousand subscribers. Genius idea for a cat man. And after one look at him and hearing his story about his love for all things pussy-related, the ladies practically beat down his door. Usually one lay sprawled somewhere between the hundreds of cat toys and carpeted ramps mazing through the rooms, but not today.
Down the hall, the elevator door opened for the cat, and Tony shut his apartment door behind him with a sigh. “I could come with you, you know. Give Major a chance to cool that temper of his.”
I shook my head. We’d already talked about this. Because I had no idea what Hill’s true intentions were, today was all me, and it would end with Hill behind bars for pimping out Rose, for ruining her life, for crawling out of the goddamn pits of hell. Revenge would be short and so sweet.
“Stay here so you can roll a doobie for Major.” I smiled so he would know I was half joking.
Tony reached for the ramp he’d nailed above the front door and grabbed a small black box with a lens attached to it. “Remember how to use this?”
“Yep,” I said, taking the camera from him.
“Remember how expensive it is?”
I put it carefully inside my jacket pocket. “I even remember the threat that went along with borrowing it. Something about an ass squirrel?”
“Just hope you don’t find out what that involves.” He slapped me on the back and then took something else from the ramp above the door. A gun.
I froze. He held it out to me, but I didn’t take it. I hoped it wouldn’t come to that, but this was Hill I was about to deal with. If anything, I could expect the unexpected with him. Slowly, I reached out to take it, the cold steel icing my fingers.
“You know this is a trap, right? I don’t know what he’s after, but you’re about to walk right into it,” Tony said.
“I know, man. But why pretend there is a debt when there isn’t? Why say he’s going to turn my brother and Dad’s dick pics over to the press when he doesn’t have shit? Why have me be his delivery boy these last two months? I need to know.”
Tony crossed his arms over his chest, wrinkling the shirt’s cat paw so it looked like it was giving me the finger. “I get it. Hill’s a shit bandit. But what if he hired Sam Cleary for a reason? What if you’ve been the target all along?”
“Then I need to know why,” I said and tucked the gun into the back of my jeans. We had gone to the shooting range plenty of times, so I knew how to use it without blowing off one of my own fingers. “Look, I’ll call you if things get crazy. I’ll use a safe word like...” I remembered Paige’s safe word for when things got too out of control between us, and it sure seemed to fit this situation. “Apocalypse.”
“Fine.” He opened the door for me. “If there’s an apocalypse, I’ll come running.”
Hopefully he wouldn’t have to.
* * *
NEVER BRING A CROWBARto a potential gunfight.
In the backseat of my Chevy, I still had the crowbar that Hill had used to gouge my knuckles. Not a shovel like he had originally requested all those weeks ago. Sneaky bastard forgot to remind me to bring one, and now I knew why a shovel would come in real handy.
A chain link fence wrapped around the warehouse. Climbing up and over was out of the question unless I felt like being sliced and diced with the three-inch long needles of barbed wire on top. So while kicking up dust and following the thin, curved tracks a horde of snakes had left behind through the dirt, I circled the perimeter to look for a gate. Only there was no gate. Not that I could see. No padlocks. Nothing.
Which left me one choice—dig underneath the fence. With a shovel I didn’t have. Goddamn that fucker Hill.
Was he laughing it up somewhere with some of his druggy buddies from the inside of the warehouse? Somehow I didn’t think so. The fence was obviously a way to keep people out, but there had to be another way in. Too bad I hated riddles almost as much as prostitution and blackmail.
So, I took off my jacket and became an excavator with a crowbar. Luckily it had rained recently, so underneath the dry topsoil, the earth was damp and cool. I worked quickly, shoveling a hole I hoped wouldn’t be the first few feet of my own grave. The sun beat down on the back of my head. Soon my shirt and jeans clung to places they really shouldn’t. By the time I showed up to Paige’s presentation at three o’clock, I would probably look like I took a dive in a swimming pool of dirt, sweat, and my own snapped nerves.
What if this didn’t work? What if I was walking into something bigger than a trap? And what if I never walked out again?
If it meant Hill was behind bars, then it would be worth it. He had pimped Rose out in exchange for her daily fixes, my little sister who could be so much more than a hat-knitter with a junkie past. Bile climbed into my throat. I stopped digging to fight it back down. A man like Hill didn’t deserve to live, let alone string more innocent girls along until desperation made them strike a deal with the devil. He had to be stopped, for good, one way or another.
Which could destroy any future I might have with Paige. I loved her, much more than I ever thought I did as a kid. But she was part of the reason I was here, too. I had to continue to play Hill’s games so I could put a stop to them with concrete evidence I could hand to the police, not just the word of a twenty-year-old first semester college dropout. Then I would come clean to her, lay everything on the table. Hope I could be enough.
The hole now looked large enough for me to slide underneath the fence, so with the crowbar still in hand, I stomach-planted myself and wormed through. The bottom of the fence snagged my T-shirt and jeans, but I made it under.
Dirt caked my front, but I hardly noticed. My gaze locked on the steel door of the warehouse. Get in. Get out. Go see a hot librarian make her presentation. I could do this.
