“Describe them.”
“They wore black ski masks. Big guys. Two of them were average height; one was pretty short.”
“What happened then?”
“We went to the drop point. Moretti’s man was waiting for us, the same one who came by our shop. We explained what happened, and he gave us another week to get the money, told us the time and location to drop it off.”
“Which ended up being your first meeting with me and the two from Pensacola,” Jake said.
Kip nodded. “Right. We got the money, headed for the drop point, and it happened again. The same men, the same black vans. Then at the meeting, your man, the mean one, the one with the stocky build, demanded the cash with twenty percent interest in five days.”
“So before you came to make that payment tonight, you were intercepted once more?”
Kip threw up his hands, shook his head. “We went to a different bank branch, took a different route to the drop point, and they still found us. And now your man wants fourteen grand and is only giving us until tomorrow. I’m not going to be able to raise that kind of money. We’ve just lost thirty-two thousand dollars! We have no more money, and—”
He paused. Proud tears welled in his eyes. His wife hopped off the loveseat, crouched beside him, took his hand. He looked at her, ran his thick fingers along her face, then turned to Jake.
“I think it’s Moretti,” Kip said. “He’s having his men stage these robberies. Taking our money over and over until he bleeds us dry, then he’ll move on to the next one.”
“No,” Jake said. “It’s not Moretti.”
“How do you know?”
Because I just sat across from him an hour ago, Jake thought.
“Just trust me. It’s not him.”
“Then who?”
Jake leaned back, the squishy sofa cushion accepting him with a wheeze. He looked at the plastered ceiling.
Who indeed?
“If it’s not Moretti…” Jake paused, looked to the floor, watched the Hot Wheels cars exploring the rug. A sick thought occurred to him… “If it’s not him, someone had to have tipped him off. And it had to be someone who knew you were being pressured by Moretti, someone who—”
There was a metallic click from behind.
Across from Jake, Kip’s eyes went wide, going up and to the right, looking over Jake’s shoulder.
Jake slowly turned. The wooden bones of the sofa creaked.
Wesley was behind him. Teeth bared, clenched. Brow furrowed. Eyes that belied his countenance, showed his fear.
And in his hands was a revolver.
Aimed at Jake.
Chapter Seven
Silence remembered the strange reaction that had fallen over him that night when he’d turned to find Wesley Bowman’s gun pointing at him. It hadn’t been panic; it hadn’t been fear. His mind simply continued forward in police officer mode, chiding himself—Why hadn’t you seen this coming?
On the table was his shitload of scrambled eggs. A big, yellow, steaming mound. Eight eggs, Val had told him. He appreciated that she’d taken his request for a copious amount seriously. He’d put the plate at the back of the table—by the paper napkin dispenser and salt and pepper shakers—while it cooled.
In front of him was the phonebook he’d requested, open to the gray pages of alphabetical listings within the business section. He’d flipped to the Bs. There was no listing for Bradshaw Incorporated.
He shut the phonebook, pushed it aside, and centered his notebook in front of him, gave some thought to what he’d written earlier but was distracted by a constant stream of speech from Val. She was crouched inches away from him, arms crossed on the tabletop, chin resting on her right forearm.
“My ex left me five years ago,” she said, eyes downcast, looking over the laminate as though studying the washrag swirl patterns. “Left me and my six-year-old son. But he’d had a foot out the door the whole time, for the entire year we dated before Toby was born. Haven’t gotten a call from him, let alone any kind of child support. I need this job. It’s a good job, believe it or not, for what it is. Tips aren’t bad, and the tables roll over fast, being right off the highway and all.”
Silence wrote WESLEY BOWMAN, circled it, and drew a line connecting this new bubble to the BENITO RAMIREZ bubble. He hadn’t looked up, but he could feel her eyes upon him in the break in her speech.
“You know, you’re a good listener. Unlike most men. Maybe it’s ’cause you don’t talk.”
He glanced up at her then, blank-faced.
“You really don’t talk much, do you?”
“No.”
She didn’t jump back as she had before, but her lips parted and she squinted, as though searching his face for the cause of his growl.
“That’s a heck of a voice you have. You sound like a bullfrog with a smoking habit, like, three packs a day.” Her hands instantly covered her mouth, her pretty brown eyes going wide over her thumbs. “Oh my god. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean anything by that.”
Silence shrugged.
She removed her hands, squinted at his face again. “Sounds like it hurts. Does it?”
Silence nodded.
A grimace-smile formed on her lips, one of genuine sympathy. “Aww. I’m sorry. That’s gotta suck.” She studied him. “What’s your name, by the way?”
Earlier he’d considered giving a pseudonym to Adriana and decided against it, but this time his decision was in the affirmative. The fake names he gave himself were always one-syllable, easing the strain on his throat a tad, and since he was in Bobbie Sue’s Family Restaurant, he went with, “Rob.”
Not Bob.
Rob.
He liked Rob better.
Val smiled. “Good to know you, Rob.” She folded her arms on the table again, put her head on her forearm and resumed her study of the laminate. “You have a good heart. You’re a good guy. I can tell. I’m good at reading people.”
Silence was good at reading people too. C.C. had pointed it out to him during his days
