CHAPTER 51
CHAPTER
ON THE WAY TO SHOCK’S training facility Temple turned to Nash, who was driving his Range Rover, and said, “Mindy wants me to marry her.”
Nash shot him a look. “Jesus, Rhett? Your stepmother?”
“Yeah, I know,” he said, looking miserable.
“It was a big mistake letting her stick around. I guess I’m too kind-hearted for my own good.
She loves living in the big house, and even though she has plenty of her own money she wants the ring and status that comes with being married to a Temple. Again.”
“Yeah, you are quite a catch,” Nash said drolly.
“And you know her kid?”
“Yeah, Amanda. What about her?”
“She’s not my father’s child.”
Nash gave Temple an eye roll. “Really? What a surprise.”
“What, you mean you knew?”
“I suspected. When I first met her I thought she looked a lot like you.” Nash obviously couldn’t tell him that years ago Temple Senior had bragged to Nash about his vasectomy, and his relief in not being able to help conceive, or having to support, any more children.
Temple said, “She’s a good kid, she really is.
I. . .I actually like being around her. I never thought I’d have children.
I wanted complete freedom to do what I wanted to do because under my father’s thumb I never got that chance.
But the thing is, if we get married, people might start assuming Mandy is mine, and maybe they start thinking my father didn’t kill himself. ”
“Do you know that he didn’t?”
“No, I mean, no. I. . .look, he jumped, okay? He was dying from cancer and took a shortcut. But the police may think otherwise if Mindy and I get married. You know, bump off the old man so we can get together and inherit the money.”
“Okay. But more to the point, do you want to marry her?”
“No, I don’t. She was married to my dad. It. . .it would be weird as shit. And I don’t want his sloppy seconds.”
“You already slept with her, Rhett,” Nash reminded him.
“That was an impromptu romp in the hay because my old man dropped a bombshell on me. Marriage means being faithful till death do us part.”
This made Nash think of the adulterous Judith. “For some people it doesn’t.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Then tell her no and your problem goes away.”
“I’ve tried, but she won’t take no for an answer.”
“She can’t make you marry her.” Nash glanced sharply at him. “Can she?”
“I. . .she. . .look, just forget I said anything.”
They drove in silence for a bit before Temple said, “Hey, in your line of work, do you know anything about disappearing?”
“What do you mean by that?” Nash asked.
“I mean, maybe you encounter people on the run, or in hiding. That’s why they need security.”
“So you’re really asking me how you can disappear to get away from Steers? And Mindy?”
“No, I’m asking for a friend. Yes, I’m fucking asking about me!
I got all this money and my own jet, and I’m still trapped by these women.
It’s driving me insane. I could be golfing in Scotland right now or bedding hot chicks in Thailand, but instead I’m going to that dump of a place to look through the trash cans.
And when I get home, there’s Mindy. And the kid.
With Steers looking over my shoulder like some homicidal big sister. It’s freaking me out, it really is.”
“You made your bed, Rhett.”
“I’ll pay you. Name a price.”
“And if Steers found out, I’d never get a chance to spend the money. Look, you left me behind with that woman. So don’t ask me to liberate you, okay? That’s going way over the line.”
Temple slumped back, looking defeated. “Okay, okay, I get your point.”
“But if we can find Nash, maybe she’ll cut you loose.”
Temple scoffed, “Fat chance of that. I’ll be tied to her until I’m dead or she is. Thanks a fucking lot, Dad,” he screamed out the window.
When they reached Shock’s training facility, they used some tools they had brought along to allow them to get in the same way they had before.
“We have to be careful that we don’t trip that alarm again,” warned Temple.
“Yeah, we’ll need to be really careful,” replied Nash, who knew that Shock had remotely triggered the sirens that had driven them away from the place the first time.
They spent hours searching the facility from top to bottom.
Later, they sat side by side near the front entrance, Temple looking dejected and Nash looking relieved, because the tattoo binders were gone.
“Well, that was a big waste of time,” groused Temple.
“But it shows we’re trying.”
“Steers doesn’t give a shit about trying, Dillon. She wants results. And she gave us a month. The clock is ticking.” He perked back up. “You said someone tried to kill her? Who?”
“Not sure. Probably the same person who runs that prison. I forgot to tell you one thing. That elderly woman they used to switch Masuyo with?”
“Yeah? What about her?”
“They sent her head back to Steers via DHL.”
Temple looked like he might throw up. “My God, these people are animals, they really are.” He suddenly glared at Nash.
“So why the hell didn’t you let them kill Steers?
Both our problems would be over if you had.
I really can’t believe you passed up that opportunity, Dillon.
I would have let them fill her full of bullets. ”
“First of all, my job is to protect her. Second, I don’t care who it is, I’m not going to stand by and watch a defenseless person get gunned down. And third, do you really think they were going to let me live?”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it,” Temple conceded. “We can’t catch a break, can we?”
“Well, since you weren’t there when the shooting started, I’m not sure your statement is accurate. And Steers and I did catch a break. We came out of it alive.”
Temple, who obviously wasn’t listening to Nash, said, “You think they’ll try again?”
Nash thought about Steers now planning to host the person who owned the prison and had perhaps tried to kill her. “Anything’s possible.”
“You better have an army guarding her, then. Any person who can own and run a prison in the middle of Myanmar must have both big bucks and a lot of pull.”
“No argument there.”
“And on top of that sending a head by express delivery? I mean, that’s Godfather shit. How did Steers take it?”
“She wasn’t happy about it, obviously. But she took it in stride.”
“The lady has ice in her veins. She is vicious and vindictive. Look what she did to Lynn Ryder, not that I’m crying any tears over that bitch.”
Nash chose not to enlighten the man about Ryder being very much alive. He thought it better that Temple believed Steers had no compassion or conscience.
And, despite what I’ve learned about her and seen, does she, really? That’s what Shock was trying to tell me. That, in the end, it’s a binary choice: me or her.