“Why not just tell him now?” Denise asked. “He’s your partner. He deserves to know.”
Those eyes back in the rearview. “I want to put a little more distance between us,” he said. “Just to be safe.”
“Safe from what?” Then she lowered her voice and said, “Is this what that FBI guy warned you about?”
He turned and took her hand. “I just want to be careful.”
What that FBI guy warned you about.
Robert knew more about what was going on than I initially gave him credit for, no question about it. It was a conversation we needed to have. But not right now. I had more pressing matters to deal with.
“You still have that field kit?” I asked Erica, feeling the blood drip between my fingers and onto the clean, gray upholstery.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Before Erica worked on my leg, I insisted she clean the gash on Maggie’s head and make sure it didn’t require further attention.
“I’m fine,” Mags said as Erica dabbed the last few drops of blood away from what turned out to be little more than a scratch.
God, she was lucky. Ghost didn’t miss often, and certainly never twice.
When Erica went in for one last swipe with the Steripad, Maggie jerked her head away and turned to face her over the back of the seat. “Seriously, I’m good,” she said. “Help my dad now, okay?”
Even though she was pissed, it still sounded lovely to hear her call me dad. Erica obliged without protest and tossed the wadded up, red-stained gauze into the pocket in the armrest of her door.
“Take your pants down,” Erica said to me as she pulled out a fresh wipe. I fought the urge to make a “you need to take me to dinner first” joke. Didn’t take a genius to read the room and realize it wasn’t the best time for quips.
I unbuckled my jeans and pulled them down, along with my boxers, just far enough to expose the wound. Erica cleaned it off without warning, and I gritted my teeth against the sting from the alcohol.
“Hold still,” she said. I don’t know if Robert heard her and decided to be funny or if a pothole simply appeared at that exact moment, but the Chevy swerved hard enough to knock Erica off balance and send the suture needle right into the raw, exposed flesh she’d just cleaned. A sharp moan escaped through my clenched teeth but at least I fought back the urge to scream MOTHERFUCKER! at the top of my lungs.
“Sorry,” Robert said, sounding anything but.
“Let’s try this again,” Erica said. This time Robert kept the wheel steady, but without a local anesthetic—or at least a shot of whiskey—the experience was far from pleasant. I felt every needle puncture, and the tug of thread through the freshly formed holes. My surgeon knew what she was doing, though, and in less than five minutes, eight close, tight stitches were in and tied off. Erica smeared antibiotic ointment over the whole thing, covered it with gauze and then held it in place with a large Band-Aid from the first aid kit. I pulled my pants and boxers back up, each torn and damp with blood. They would need to be replaced, as would everyone else’s clothes.
“Thanks,” I said as I eased gingerly onto the seat.
“Are you better?” Denise asked.
“I’ll live.”
“Too bad. Now tell me what the hell is going on.”
“Denise, I’d rather not get into it in front of the—”
“In front of who, the kids? Your girlfriend just drove a van through the front of our house and shot two people in front of them, so I doubt anything you say could traumatize the kids any more than they already are. They deserve to know why they were almost killed tonight. We all do. So start talking.”
“She’s not my girlfriend,” I said lamely.
“God damn it, Ben!”
I took a deep breath and started talking. No sugarcoating anything. Quick and to the point, like a doctor delivering the news to a terminal cancer patient. “The man who tied you up is a professional killer. An expensive one. He was hired to take out Robert and frame me for the murder. I found out about it and came here to try to stop him.”
“A professional killer,” Denise said. “And you’re connected to him.” It wasn’t a question.
“I was the one who recruited him, yes.”
“And why would you do that?”
I could have told them about my missing fingertip and the knife to my eye, but that would have been taking the easy way out. Those were the reasons I accepted the job, true, but not the reason it was mine to accept in the first place. I planted those seeds long before Ponytail flashed her shiny blade, and nobody forced me to.
“Because it’s my job,” I said.
“Jesus Christ, Ben.” There were ten years of anger and pain and disappointment in those three words.
“Believe me, Denise,” I said with my head down, “I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. I didn’t know Robert was involved until after the fact. As soon as I did, the very instant, I did everything I could to stop it. Including coming back here.”
“Well that makes it all better, then.”
“Denise—”
“What happened to you?”
“Nothing good.”
“And human trafficking? You’re involved in that, too?”
“No,” I said, trying like hell to sound as sincere as possible. “That was a lie. Denise, come on, you know me.”
