Vero glanced up at me with a sheepish expression. “Not exactly in the bank,” she said, gnawing her lip. “Remember when I said I would get rid of the Aston…?”
I gasped. “You and Ramón were supposed to destroy that car!” They were supposed to put it in the giant crusher behind his garage, then bury every last trace of it.
“It’s a good thing I didn’t!” she argued. “Even with bullet holes, that car is worth more than what I owe. If we strip it, we can get rid of the carandmake enough to pay off Marco. All we need is someone who knows where to sell the parts.”
“You promised your cousin you wouldn’t tell anyone about the car.” He’d refused to help her sell it, too afraid his business would get implicated in whatever shady dealings the car had been involved in. He’d been adamant that no one—not even his best friend—ever know about the Aston Martin we’d left in his garage.
“Ramón doesn’t have to know. If I ask Javi to keep a secret for me, he will. He’s done it before.” Color rushed to her cheeks, hinting at the kinds of secrets Javi had kept hidden from Ramón. “I’ll tell Javi to meet us at the garage tomorrow night after it’s closed. I’ll show him the car and ask him how much he thinks he can get for the parts.”
“What you’re asking him to do is probably illegal.”
“It’s nothing he hasn’t done before.”
My head felt heavy as I stared at the picture on the table, taken at the crosswalk in front of Delia’s school. It felt disturbingly like thekind of veiled threat Feliks would have sent. If Feliks Zhirov wouldn’t settle for half a job, why should I assume Marco would settle for twenty percent of the money Vero owed him?
Maybe Vero was right. Like it or not, we were still in possession of Feliks’s car. With any luck, we’d be able to sell enough of the Aston to get Marco off her back. And if the car was scattered far and wide, then all that would be left was a piece of paper connecting me to Feliks Zhirov. As soon as Feliks was shipped off to prison, I’d find a way to destroy that, too.
“Okay,” I said, rubbing my eyes. “Set up the meeting with Javi.”
CHAPTER 4
My sister, Georgia, knocked on my door promptly at eight the next morning. When I opened it, she brushed past me into my kitchen and helped herself to a mug of coffee from the pot.
“It’s good to see you, too,” I said, passing her the carton of milk from the fridge.
Georgia’s shoulder-length hair was pulled back in a fancy twist, her slacks were pressed, and a pair of low heels peeked out from under the hems.
“If I’d known you had something important to do, I wouldn’t have asked you to drive Delia to school.”
“It’s nothing important. Just a normal day,” she said, stirring her coffee hard enough to make a few drops swirl over the rim. “Where’s Vero?”
“Upstairs in her room.”
“Why couldn’t she drive Delia this morning?”
“She’s… not feeling well,” I said, fumbling over the lie. Georgia stopped stirring. My sister wasn’t necessarily a germaphobe, but she didn’t cope well with contagious diseases. Knife injuries, gunshot wounds, and blunt force trauma she could handle at close range. Snot, the runs, and projectile vomiting was enough to send her running for the hills. “Cramps,” I added.
The tension left her shoulders and she nodded into her coffee. I’dcalled my sister the night before, right after I’d called Steven. Vero couldn’t take Delia to school in the Charger, and letting her drive my minivan was far too risky. The person who’d taken that picture of Vero could track my license plates here.
I’d considered letting Delia stay home for the day, playing it safe until Steven’s flight got in from Philly and he came to pick up the kids, but then I’d had another idea. If the creep who took that photo was waiting at the school and saw Delia get out of mysister’s car—a car with a few extra antennas on the roof and a dome light on the dash—maybe he’d have second thoughts about stalking my children’s nanny.
“Why couldn’tyoutake Delia?” Georgia asked.
“I have a meeting with Sylvia.” My sister raised an eyebrow at my snowman-themed pajama bottoms. “It’s a Zoom,” I said, doubling down on the lie. “Why are you all dressed up?”
“I have a meeting this morning, too. It’s not a big deal.” Her cheeks were pink and her lips were glossy. She avoided my curious stare, picking a lint fuzz off her sweater. It was a deep hunter green that brought out the flecks of it in her eyes.
“Holy shit, Georgia!” I shoved her shoulder. Coffee sloshed over the rim of her mug and she swore as she mopped a few drops from the toes of her shoes. “You’re seeing someone at work!”
“I’m not seeing someone at work.”
“At the lab, then?” I racked my brain, struggling to remember the last time I’d been there with Nick. “Is it a tech?”
“No,” she said gruffly.
“The M.E.?”
She pulled a face.
