The second part might have been true. Anthony never talked about his father. He didn’t have much to talk about: William Costello died when his son was only three.
“Then where’s his portrait?” I asked.
“What?”
“At the country house. There’s a great big painting of you. There’s one of your father. But where’s Bill?”
He shook his head as if he was dealing with a lunatic.
“I’m going to enjoy this,” he said. “I’m going to enjoy it very much.”
“Is that why those veins are bulging on your forehead? I always thought Anthony was paranoid, but it’s true, isn’t it? Bill Costello was the real brains. He set it all up. He just wasn’t ruthless enough to keep it going. That was your special talent.”
“I’m warning you,” he said. “There are slower ways to die.”
“So one day Billy just disappeared, his body never to be found. You cried so convincingly the cops skipped right over you. They looked at cartels, rival families, even a serial killer who’d been racking up bodies. But never at you.”
“They had no reason to look at me.”
I ignored him.
“You call yourself a man of principle? You’re a fake. A fraud. A con man. You stole your brother’s life.”
“Shut your mouth.”
“‘Brothers kill each other all the time.’ Isn’t that what you said? How’d you do it? A bullet to the back of the head? Quick and painless? Then again, I guess we can never really know about the pain part.”
“Enough!” he screamed, rearing up out of his seat. “I’m going to—”
But as he rose the suppressor went flying, and the gun slipped from his hand. He looked around, confused, blistering with hatred—for me, for Anthony, for himself. I lunged forward, grabbed the dinner knife, and drove it into his chest.
Chapter 50Sarah Roberts-Walsh
VINCENT’S OUTDOOR militia milled around under the porte cochere, smoking and laughing and shuffling their feet. Now and again one of them would glance in our direction. They’d probably never seen an economy car parked outside Vincent’s castle before. Either that or they wondered why we were sticking close by when their boss had so kindly spared our lives.
“We can’t just sit here while he murders her,” Serena said.
“What are we supposed to do?”
“I’m calling the police.”
“Even if you found a cop who wasn’t in Vincent’s pocket, he’d never get here in time.”
But she already had her phone out and was punching in the access code. That brought the militia running. They surrounded the car, drew their guns but didn’t point them at us. Their foreman banged a flat palm on the hood right above my head. I cracked my window. Serena stuck the phone back in her pocket.
“This is a no-loitering zone,” he said.
“We’re just waiting for our friend,” I told him.
“No need to worry about her—Mr. Costello will see she gets where she’s going.”
His grin was more than Serena could bear. She dove across my body, tried to gouge his eyes out through the glass. The ape laughed. His buddies joined in. Their laughter made them look grotesque, like gargoyles come to life. Serena cursed at them in Spanish. I clapped a hand over her mouth, wrestled her back into her seat.
“All right,” I said. “We’re going.”
I turned the key in the ignition. They backed away to let us pass.
“You’re serious?” Serena hissed.
“We won’t go far,” I said. “But we can’t stay here.”
I shifted into Drive, had my foot hovering above the gas pedal when Serena grabbed my arm.
“Look,” she said.
I turned my head, saw Anna through the house’s open double doors. I nearly screamed with relief. Then I saw Nigel on her heels, holding the barrel of a revolver against the small of her back.
“Mierda,” Serena said.
“Just stay calm,” I told her.
Vincent’s goons tucked their guns away and scrambled back to their station. You’d have thought they’d seen a dead woman walking. I shifted back into Park, kept the engine running.
Anna wasn’t saying anything, and neither was Nigel. They headed straight toward us, Anna keeping the pace at a crawl, careful not to give Nigel a reason to pull that trigger.
“Come on, come on, come on,” I whispered.
Serena was gripping my leg. I felt her nails digging in. We couldn’t have been more than a dozen yards from the doors, but it felt as though we were watching them cross the Sahara. When they were close enough, Anna gestured for me to roll my window all the way down. She put her hands on the hood where Nigel could see them, bent her knees, and leaned in.
“You mind popping the trunk?” she said.
This was a rental: by the time I found the button with the right icon, Anna and Nigel were already standing behind the car, waiting. I watched them in the rearview mirror until they disappeared behind the raised hatch. My mind was racing, trying to keep ahead of whatever might happen next. I thought Nigel would shoot her, push her in, have us drive her body to the Everglades.
But then Anna shut the trunk, and I saw Nigel walking back toward the house, the gym bag dangling from one shoulder. Anna climbed into the back seat.
“Sorry, girls,” she said. “I promise I’ll make it up to you.”
Chapter 51
One Month Later
WE WERE gathered in the kitchen for a kind of farewell dinner party. Aunt Lindsey had a fresh batch of her triple threat simmering on the stove—the high-end kind, made with heirloom beans and chunks of tenderloin.
“Seems like the right dish to serve given the company,” she said. “God help anyone who trifles with you three.”
The smell reminded me of my childhood, seemed to erase all the ugliness of the past few months. At least for a short while.
“Us?” Anna said. “What about you? You kept Goliath at bay all by your lonesome.”
“Weren’t you scared being alone with him in that house in the woods?” Serena asked.
“Nah. You should see some of the characters who end up in my ER. Anyway, between fixing his leg and cleaning up after his playmate, I
