"We have your woman," the mechanical voice said. "If you want her back, meet us at Jordan Park in an hour."
Before any of us could question them further, the call ended.
"Is there any chance this isn't a trap?" Ares said with a sigh.
“Unlikely." Mannix slipped the phone into the back of his jeans and grabbed up his keys. "It's a trap. We need to get there first. If they think they can trap us, they're in for a nasty surprise."
"Funny, that's my favourite kind of surprise," I said.
They both smirked at me. They knew me better than anyone. They accepted that I was sweet and cheerful on the outside and justslightlyunhinged on the inside. Only a little bit.
Right now, if I had a hinge, I'd jam it down the throat of whoever took our woman.
Actually, that gave me an idea. I could make a small door and attach it to their chest. Then I could open it up and take out bits, one organ at a time. That would be fun.
I made a mental note to try that the next time I had someone down in my workroom. What was the point of life if you couldn't think up new ways to have fun? Life was too short to be serious.
Tell that to these guys, though. I'm almost certain they shared the same middle name: Mannix Serious Cassani and Ares Serious Turner.
If the situation wasn't so serious, I'd laugh at my own thought.
"To the Revenge Mobile." I gestured toward the garage and followed them both in that direction.
"Revenge Mobile?" Ares asked over his shoulder. "I think you finally lost it. Assuming you ever had it to start with."
"You're so sweet," I told him, giving him a soft smile.
"I think that's the first time anyone called Ares sweet," Mannix observed.
"Fuck off," Ares told him. "I can be sweet if I want to."
Mannix snorted. “When? I've never known you to be sweet."
"Of course you are," I told Ares, hurrying over to jump into the front passenger seat of Mannix's SUV.
He didn't like me driving his car at the best of times, and this was not the best of times. This was time for me to hold on to the handle and hope like hell he didn't kill us all by driving too fast to the park.
While he backed the car out of the garage with a squeal of tyres, I sent off a text message to some of our friends, asking for their help. We'd given them lots of it in the past, so they owed us. Even if they didn't, they'd want us to owe them.
No one in this town did anything without a good reason, that reason usually involved a favour that ended up being regretful. Right now I didn't give a shit. The only thing that interested me was getting Kennedy back.
"We're going the back way," Mannix said. "If we take the direct way, they'll be watching for us."
"They'll be watching us for us to go the back way." Ares shut the car door and leaned over into the space between us.
"Stop breathing down my neck," Mannix snapped.
"He's right," I said. "They will be expecting us to take the long way."
"What am I supposed to do?" Mannix snapped. "I can't take the direct route and I can't take the back road. Newsflash, this car can't fucking levitate either."
"I knew we were missing something," I said. I snapped my fingers. "I'll make a note to buy a helicopter with guns and bombs attached to it.”
"They'd never see us coming then," Ares said sarcastically.
"They'd hear us coming, but we'd see them when they tried to run," I pointed out. "Although, if we blew them to smithereens, where would the fun be in that?"
"Don't fucking blow Kennedy to smithereens," Mannix growled.
