“It improves your chances,” I agree.
“Fine, fine! Listen… I don’t know where they are.”
“Then why are we talking?” Leaning up, I aim the gun down, but Clark continues to babble at my feet.
“Listen, man! We were just fucking around, y’know? Cops ain’t supposed to act like this!”
“Cause they ain’t cops, dipshit,” snarls the kneeling man through a mouthful of blood. “What are you, hired mercenaries?”
“No.” I fix my attention on him. “You stole from very powerful, very angry people, and I’m being kind by telling you that dying here is a mercy, do you understand? No one steals from the Mafia and gets away with it.”
His face turns ashen in a blink and he glances down at Clark who’s still babbling over and over about how he doesn’t know where the other members of their team are. His panic and my reveal seem to unlock something in the kneeling man, and he looks back up at me.
“Shit, man, shit.Shit!We didn’t know, alright? We didn’t… shit. This is… listen, we don’t know, okay? We really don’t. We all split after the robbery and we’re just waiting on a call from Harris. When things cool down, we’re supposed to split everything, I swear. That’s all I know. That’s all I know!”
“You fucker!” Clark yells. “I was gonna tell them that!”
“Well, I ain’t waiting around to die because you can’t get your fucking words out,” he snarls back.
“Harris,” I repeat. “Who is he?”
“Harris Bolton. He’s a friend. Well, sort of. He needed some people and we were available. But he moves around, lives out of his truck, so I don’t know where he lives, but we’re waiting on a call, I swear. I swear!”
Frank and I exchange a look. “Thank you. You’ve been very helpful.”
“So, you’ll let me go, right?” The kneeling man glances around with a nervous smile while Clark wails on the ground. “I told you so you’ll let me go, yeah?”
“I said it would increase your chances,” I reply coldly. “Not guarantee them.”
Turning my back, Frank and I exit the apartment to the sound of two final gunshots that silence Clark’s babbling for good.
“Harris Bolton,” Frank murmurs. “I’ll get Raven on it.”
“Good.” If we find Harris, then there’s a very good chance we’ll run into Zira again, and if I’m right, she’s the weak link that’ll resolve this whole mess.
9
ZIRA
“Peter!” Dragging my jeans over my legs, I chase Peter through the apartment. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Peter comes to a stop in the living room and tears through the wall unit. “Where are your car keys?”
“You’re not taking my car. It’s not road safe, remember? Why do you think I take the bus?”
“Where are the fucking keys?”
“Tell me what’s going on!”
He throws his hands in the air and spins to face me. “They’re dead, Zira. What more do you want to know?”
“Who?”
“The other half of Harris’s group. The men who robbed the ship while we were stealing from your store. Fucking hell, can you try and keep up?”
Dead?
How can that be? Harris, as much as he’s a complete asshole, is usually pretty damn smart when it comes to shit like this. It’s the only reason he hasn’t ended up in prison all these years, because he’s usually one step ahead of the cops.
