“Nick?”I call back.“Tom asked nicely.”The slurping stops.Nick reaches over and adjusts Tom’s seatbelt, pulling it tighter across his chest.
“Wouldn’t want your neck to snap too easily,” Nick mutters, then settles back into his seat.Tom looks like he’s about to hyperventilate.
“Relax,” Jake says cheerfully.“We’re not here to hurt you.Unless of course you give us a reason to.And you wouldn’t do that, would you?”
“I swear I wasn’t cheating?—”
“So you admit you knowingly engaged in conduct with another woman while in a committed relationship,” Jake cuts him off smoothly.“Got it.That’s going on the record.”
“What record?!”
“The one I’m keeping.”Jake pulls out his phone and starts typing.“For documentation purposes.You never know when these things might come in handy.”
I take a particularly sharp turn, and Tom grabs the dashboard.“Where are we going?”
“Nowhere special,” I say.“Just driving around.Having a chat between men.”
“Do you like hospitals?”Nick asks suddenly from the back.
Tom twists around.“What?”
“Hospitals,” Nick repeats calmly.“How do you feel about long stays?”
“I—What kind of question is that?”
Nick shrugs.“Just wondering.”Then he goes back to slurping his empty beer bottle.
Tom turns back to me, eyes wide with panic.“Please, just take me back to the bar.”
“In a minute,” I say.“We’re still getting to know each other.Jake, tell Tom about your connections.”
“Oh, right.”Jake leans forward, speaking directly into Tom’s ear.“See, the thing about being a lawyer is...everybody owes me favors.Mechanics, judges, bartenders...If someone were to vanish tonight, no one would ask too many questions.”
“Are you threatening me?”
“Threatening?”Jake sounds genuinely hurt.“I’m just making conversation.I’m not saying you’ll get hurt if you ever call Megan again.I’m saying...accidents happen.People slip.Cars break down.Things catch fire.”He pauses, then adds cheerfully, “Funny how that works, right?”
I make another sharp turn, and this time Tom actually whimpers.“Please,” he says weakly.“I get the message.I’ll stay away from Megan.”
“Will you?”I ask, glancing over at him.“Because we really like our sister, Tom.And we don’t like it when people hurt her.”
“I won’t hurt her!”
“You already did,” Nick says quietly from the back.“Question is, what are you going to do about it?”
Tom looks back at him, and I can see his hands shaking.“I’ll...I’ll break up with her.Cleanly.No drama.”
“Good choice,” Jake says approvingly.“And Tom?”
“Yeah?”
“If we hear you’ve been spreading stories about her, or saying anything that might damage her reputation...”Jake’s smile turns cold.“Well, let’s just say I have an exceptionally vivid mental canvas when it comes to making people disappear from social media.And social circles.And society in general.”
I pull back into the bar’s parking lot and put the car in park.Tom immediately reaches for the door handle, but I hit the locks.
“One more thing,” I say.“If you ever hurt another woman the way you hurt our sister, we’ll find out.And next time, we might not be so friendly.”
I unlock the doors, and Tom practically falls out of the car in his haste to escape.Jake tosses his phone at him, and he barely catches it.He stumbles toward the bar without looking back, and I watch him go with satisfaction.
