Melissa stared, chest heaving, gaze darting everywhere. She was smart. The act was worth a try, but she had to know there was no fooling anyone.
Nobody in this basement believed this was a random abduction.
With a final deep breath, Melissa lifted her head. All traces of sniffling panic were gone. “Who do you work for?”
Now they were really talking. Bishop needed all his concentration now, because this was the part he could fuck up.
“Either you already know, or you don’t need to know,” Bishop said. Which was a cocky asshole way to avoid the question—but that fit the character.
Melissa lifted her chin, matching his energy. “You can cut the bullshit, too.”
Pretty good bravado, given her situation. Silence had worked earlier, so Bishop fell back on his impassive mask. He waited. Melissa wanted to talk. Bishop just needed the right lever to pull.
A powerful, secretive criminal organization’s usual enemies were other powerful, secretive criminal organizations. Melissa must have theories about who Bishop was. Who he worked for. Which gang was she thinking of right now? Which cartel or family?
Bishop waited, silent, aware of James and Kit watching even though he couldn’t take his eyes off his hostage.
Finally, the silence weighed too heavily. Melissa wilted. “Is he really back?”
Bishop’s intuition seized on the question.
Someone who left. Someone who was never found. The ragged, gaping absence in San Corvo’s underworld.
A text from James buzzed in, echoing what Bishop already knew.
James:viper
Bishop hadn’t heard anything about the Viper being back. He filed that away as a bad rumor to investigate later. He had more immediate matters to focus on.
“If you don’t see the body,” Bishop said casually, “the snake isn’t dead.”
Melissa shuddered. Which meant Bishop and James had guessed correctly. But Bishop couldn’t let her dwell too long on that, because he didn’t work for the Viper. He didn’t have an organization at his back. Just a few friends who liked getting their hands dirty.
“Enough about my boss,” Bishop said. “Let me hear about yours.”
“I want to help,” Melissa said, with a pained grin. “I just don’t know much.”
Bishop braced his hands on the table behind him. His left rested next to the gun. His right rested next to the knife. Time to really cut the bullshit. “I want a name, Melissa. Who is the Rat King?”
In the shadows, James shifted his weight. He still held Kit in front of him, and Bishop was really fucking glad Kit was down here. Otherwise, he’d be tempted to tie James to a chair too.
Melissa took a deep breath, straightening as much as she could in her bindings. “Can you get me out of the country after?”
That was promising. “Why should I?”
“I’ll talk,” Melissa said, nearly as calm as Bishop. “I have the name you want, and I’ll talk if you help me. I want out. I’m fucking sick of this. You can’t retire, you know?” Her grin wasn’t happy. “You do too much shit, you learn too much, and you can’t retire.”
This would rely on James’s and Darius’s resources more than Bishop’s. “That could be possible. I want you to tell me something else first. Something small. Something I can verify.”
Melissa nodded sharply. “Let me think.”
As she racked her brain, Bishop’s phone buzzed.
James:ask why she thinks the viper’s back.
Resting his chin on Kit’s shoulder, James shamelessly read the message Kit had sent on his phone. Smart fucking kid. If they were working for the Viper like Bishop was pretending, their captive would think they could verify the information. While actually it would give Bishop something new to investigate.
James hugged Kit closer, tracing possessive shapes into the tension of Kit’s waist. Verbal praise would have to wait until the interrogation was over.
