entrance? An Englishman was waiting for me at the fortified doors, at the far end of this plank walkway. I’d seen him before, actually—at the Marriott? And then walking a dog? Anyway, I guess I understood, without being told, that all I had to do was walk across the bridge over the water and I was in forever.”
The words dried up at that point, Matthias’s brows going down hard, his eyes training on the ground.
“Annnnnnnd?” Jim bit out on the exhale.
“I couldn’t do it. I knew if I crossed over there was no going back—I mean, I couldn’t believe where I was. It was awesome, but…not for me.”
“Let me get this straight. You’re volunteering to go to Hell?”
“Not at all. The Maker came from out of nowhere and we talked. In the end, I just gave up one version of the place for another that was so much better. For me? Heaven is with that woman, and I’m going to spend the rest of my life trying to prove it to her—even though there’s no guarantees about…well, shit, so much on that one. But I’m clear on the fact that I want to give it a shot.”
“This can’t be right.”
“What can I say? The Maker’s a fan of free will—maybe because if people make good choices, it affirms His creation? I don’t know.”
Jim got right up in the guy’s grille, a strange fury driving him. “This is bullshit—if you get to pick, why doesn’t everyone just stay with the ones they love?”
Like his mother.
Like his Sissy, for godsakes?
Man, he was too fucking tired of being jerked around by this game.
“People do come back from the dead,” Matthias said. “Happens all the time.”
“Not everyone.” Not his dead. This was such bull
“I got lucky. Look, if you have a problem with it, go talk to Him.”
Jim stalked around, smoking, cursing—to the point where he nearly gave the dead operative’s body a kick just because he could.
“Jim?” Matthias said slowly. “What’s going on in that head of yours, my man.”
At that moment, the solution presented itself, something that Nigel had said in the beginning of the round returning to him, taking root, and sprouting into a plan that was so heretical, it gave him pause even in his anger. But then he remembered things that Matthias had told him about the down below—and looked into the other man’s face, his living, breathing, like-he’d-never-been-shot face.
The violent heat in Jim’s gut was utterly familiar, the same force that had led him to fuck Devina, the same burn that sometimes took over and made him cruel, the same shit that had brought him to his first killings—of the men who had taken his mother’s life.
This was the devil in him, he thought, this fury that had flared…and would soon settle into a cold determination that was going to change the shape of the game.
But goddamn it, as Matthias had said, some things you have to do yourself.
“Listen, Jim, how about we get rid of this body, and then go looking for the car he came in? I could really use a set of wheels that’s not a rental, and with some work, I could locate the GPS on it and get rid of the thing.”
“Yeah,” Jim said offhandedly. “Sure.”
“Are you okay?”
Nope. “Yeah.” He stamped his cigarette butt out on the heel of his boot. “Sure.”
Chapter Fifty-six
The dawn’s peachy rays were filtering through the forest and creating long shadows by the time Jim and Matthias accomplished their night’s work.
Which had involved so much more than just getting rid of the stiff.
As Jim lit up the last of his cigarettes, he double-checked that two of the Harleys were secure in the bed of the F-150. It was a tight squeeze, but they weren’t leaving Eddie’s ride behind.
He was going to drive them out. Matthias was on Ad’s bike. Adrian was taking the Explorer.
Because that was where Eddie had been packed.
“We ready?” Matthias asked.
When Jim gave the nod, the man put a pair of Ray-Bans on, jump-started the Harley, and pumped some extra gas into the motor, the growl rising and falling in the quiet early morning.
The flotilla left with Jim in front, and oh, what a shame, he split the police tape as he pulled out of the garage, the grille of the truck ripping it apart.
Sorry, CPD.
But at least they were leaving Matthias’s rental behind so the unis had something tangible to get excited about.
Hitting the main road, he went north at an easy speed. They were going to travel around the city for quite a while, just making sure their tail was clean. Then at ten a.m., they were pulling into their new HQ.
Long night—and it felt good to sit on his ass for a while. Packing up the garage’s studio hadn’t been the issue; he didn’t have a lot of personal shit. It had been dealing with the operative. The good news was that Ad had known right where to take the guy—a sinkhole in the mountains in which his buddy had been previously dropped like an anchor.
It was better that way. XOps was probably not going to care in the not-too-distant future, but in the interim, they could busy themselves finding the pair of bodies and feel good about themselves.
On the way out to the sinkhole site, they’d discovered the requisite sedan at the side of the road close to where number one had parked his ride—but Jim had talked Matthias out of using that vehicle. They were going to give the truck to his old boss as soon as they got to the new safe house and unpacked. Safer than trying to find the GPS on the unmarked, and license plates could be bought cheap if you knew where to go—
Jim’s stomach let out a howl so loud even Dog, who was curled up in the passenger seat, lifted his head.
“Yeah, sorry—bet you need some food, too,” he said gruffly. “Like maybe a turkey sub—right, Dog?”
As he glanced across the seat, the “animal” met his stare evenly, those almond-shaped brown eyes unblinking. Then one of those shaggy little paws lifted and grabbed at the air between them—like he was putting in an order for two—no, three hoagies.
So the Maker was with him, Jim thought. And had been all along.
Wonder what the big guy was going to think of his next move.
Going by Dog’s grave face, Jim wondered if He knew already.
“Sorry,” he muttered. “But some things you have to take care of yourself….”
By the time the digital clock read nine fifty-four, Jim was pulling into the driveway of their new Casa d’Angel, and as the Explorer and the Harley came in behind him, someone whistled in appreciation.
Which was clearly a statement of irony.
“This place looks haunted,” Matthias said as he cut the bike’s engine.
“It’s cheap and out of the way,” Jim groused through his open window.
And however ugly it was, he didn’t sense Devina anywhere around the place.
Picking up Dog, he got out from behind the wheel to find even Adrian looking a little surprised—which, considering what was on the angel’s plate, was really saying something.
“I thought Rent-A-Wreck only did cars,” the guy muttered.
Okay, fine, the bastard had a point. But who the hell else was going to rent to a shady character like Jim? Without asking for references?
And wreck was right: The mansion was cast in a palette of gray, everything from the cupolas on the third floor, to the stone porches at ground level, to the cockeyed shutters in between, painted with grisaille technique. Hell, even the vines that snaked up its flanks and crowded its huge front door were without leaves, the skeletal roots like an infection that had sprung from the black earth and was spreading.
The land that the thing was on covered some twenty-five acres, a ragged meadow running out in all
