“Oh, for Pete’s sake. Shut your damn trap, whoever the hell you are,” Lurlene snarled, pointing the gun in Riley’s face. “Tape her up good, Royce.”
“Don’t get your panties in a twist.”
“If you think forone secondI’m going back to scrubbing country club toilets or worse, you got a rock in your head where God shoulda put a brain. We have a billion dollars on the line here. I’m not walkin’ away from yacht money.”
“All right. All right. No need to lose your dang mind again. If you want Dolly dead, she’s dead,” Royce muttered. He grabbed Riley’s hands roughly and wrapped the tape around her wrists several times.
“Wait,” Riley said. But the next piece of tape covered her mouth. Which was a stupid, amateur mistake to make seeing as how she could just reach up with her bound hands and remove the tape. But she decided to keep that information to herself until she could use it to her advantage.
There was a very distinct hiss behind the grate.
Royce made quick work of taping her ankles together. “Happy now?” he demanded, tossing the tape. It bounced off the floor and hit the grate, knocking it askew.
“Not yet.” Lurlene crossed her arms and tapped her foot.
Royce made a big show of being annoyed when he pulled a knife out of his belt and opened the blade in Riley’s face. She flinched and flattened herself against the wall.
She wasnotgoing to die in a stinky closet during Nick’s birthday party.
“Wait,” Lurlene said suddenly.
Riley sagged against the plaster wall behind her as a trickle of sweat slid down her back.
“Don’t kill her yet. I’ll get that bitch Sesame, bring her up here, and then we’ll torture Second Dolly to make Sesame tell us who knows what. She’s too do-gooder-y to hold up to that.”
“So you don’t want me to kill Second Dolly yet?” Royce confirmed.
“Why God saddled me with a moron, I’ll never know,” Lurlene said to no one in particular. “No. Don’t kill her yet. Wait for me to get back with Sesame.”
“You want me to look for Tommy in the meantime?” he asked, closing his knife and putting it back on his belt.
Riley breathed a sigh of relief through her nose.
“I don’t trust you to pick up the dry cleaning. You can’t even kidnap the right Dolly.” Lurlene was working herself back up into a state. “Stay here and make sure she doesn’t move a muscle. I’ll be back with Sesame, and then we’ll kill ’em both.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And try not to draw any attention to yourself,” Lurlene ordered.
She left, turning off the light and shutting the closet door.
They were plunged into darkness.
“‘Try not to draw any attention to yourself,’” Royce muttered in a falsetto. “That woman is the worst. I can’t wait until this deal goes through and the brakes on her Ferrari ‘accidentally’ fail.’”
Riley assumed he wasn’t expecting an answer, so she kept quiet.
She heard a muffled vibration, and then Royce was shifting around. The interior of the closet was lit with the blue screen light from his phone.
“Yello,” he said.
She used the distraction to reach up and start to peel the corner of the tape free.
“No, I do not want to extend my car warranty, ya dang robot. I drive a brand-new Range Rover. Now quit callin’ me!”
He disconnected, and Riley dropped her hands.
“Dunno what this world is comin’ to,” he complained. “I got robots callin’ me all hours of the day. Do they think they’re foolin’ me? I worked my ass off as an identity thief for twenty years, and they think they’re gonna trick me? Ha! I’m untrickable.”
