Chapter 19 #2
“No, the convenience store clerk.” I told him about her voicemail, then said, “I think we should go see if the girl shows up.”
He glanced at the clock on the nightstand. “It’s a little after six. We need to see Razor sooner rather than later.”
“I don’t want to go see Razor,” I said flatly. “I think we should go see if the girl shows up.”
He didn’t respond.
“You’re not going to argue with me?”
He studied me a beat longer. “Are you nervous about seein’ Razor? You don’t have to go at all, Harper. I can handle it myself.”
My jaw dropped. “Are you seriously insinuating that I’m scared to eavesdrop?”
“It’s not an insult.” His tone stayed even. “It’s more than simple eavesdroppin’, and you know it. You should be nervous.”
“I’m nervous, but not for me.” I leaned forward, my frustration rising. “I’m nervous for you. You’re talking about going into a biker bar and confronting a guy who will probably shoot you on sight to collect Knox’s bounty.”
“He’s not gonna shoot me in a bar.”
“Fine, he’ll wait until you’re in the parking lot.”
Irritation flicked in his eyes. “I can handle it,” he grunted.
“Yeah, you probably can, but you’re still not on top of your game, and if you show your face tonight, every person who thinks themselves a bounty hunter or a hit man will be searching the city for you.
” My voice turned sharp. “It’ll make it a hundred times harder to find what we need to bring Knox down. ”
He frowned but didn’t answer. He wasn’t arguing, which probably meant he knew I was right.
“For what it’s worth,” I said, “I think we should still talk to Razor. We just need to put it off for now and hopefully get more information first. And maybe find a better place to confront him. Like his house while he’s sleeping it off.”
“Fine.” He sounded irritated as he reached for the hotel landline. “But I’m ordering dinner from room service.”
“Cassandra said the girl shows up around eight, so we should be there about a half hour early.”
“All the more reason to get our order in now,” he grumped, glancing at me. “What do you want?”
I ordered a chicken and rice dish while he asked for a steak and baked potato, then told them if they got the food to our room in under thirty minutes, his tip would be “extremely” generous.
When he hung up, he still looked irritated.
I placed a hand on my hip. “You don’t agree with my plan?”
He exhaled and shifted toward me, some of his frustration bleeding away. “Harper, I wouldn’t go along with a plan I didn’t agree with.”
“You sure don’t act like you’re happy about it.”
He sighed. “I’m not pissed about your plan. You made good points. I’m pissed that I’m not at a hundred percent. I’m takin’ too long to get over this damn concussion.”
“It’s okay.”
He scowled. “It’s not. It makes me a liability.” His expression softened slightly. “As you pointed out.”
“I wasn’t accusing you of—”
“Stop.” He paused a beat to make sure I was listening. “You were right.”
My heart sunk. I knew that had to be hard for him to admit. “I’m sorry.”
He gave a soft chuckle. “For being right? Or for callin’ me out? Because you shouldn’t be sorry for either.” He slid off the bed. “What do you need to do to prep for meetin’ the girl tonight? Do you want to wear a disguise?”
Did I? I hadn’t planned on it, but it wasn’t a terrible idea, even if it made me feel weird.
“I suppose I should,” I said. “I don’t want to be recognized.” A new thought hit me. “And Knox might have told his people to be on the lookout for me too.”
James had been walking around the end of the bed, but he stopped and turned to face me.
“What?” I asked when he didn’t say anything.
“Miguel said Knox has a hit out on me,” he said slowly, “but he didn’t mention you.”
I shook my head. “Maybe he didn’t think it was important.”
His brow lifted. “When I have a woman fitting your exact description sittin’ in a chair in his office?”
He had a point. “Okay, so maybe Miguel didn’t know. But then again, maybe he did. His comment about me wearing black was also odd.”
He shook his head, slow and deliberate. “No way. If Razor is talkin’ and he knows all the facts, he’d include you.”
“But Razor heard it from the driver—Nixon. Maybe he didn’t know.”
He gave me a pointed look. “Harper. If Knox had hits out on two people who were last seen together and expected to still be together, people would know.”
I took a second to consider that. “So… what does that mean? That Knox doesn’t have a hit out on me?”
“I don’t think he does.”
My brow furrowed. “That doesn’t make any sense. I’m the one who shot his mother. I was the one who took out all his men. Not you.” I released a dry laugh. “If anything, he should be on the hunt for me, not you.”
His jaw tensed. “Exactly.”
“What do you think it means?” I asked again, a chill running down my spine.
He studied me for a beat. “Nothin’ good.”
With that alarming prediction, he headed to the bathroom and shut the door.
I got off the bed and walked over to the windows overlooking the river.
Did this mean Knox wanted me alive? But, if so, wouldn’t he have told his people to be on the lookout for me? Or did he assume they’d find me when they found James?
Unless there was a bounty on my head and Nixon knew it … and had chosen to keep that part to himself. If that was true, then the bounty on me was a hell of a lot bigger than the bounty on James.
My blood turned to ice.
I’d killed Gerald Knox’s men. I’d hurt his mother.
Gerald Knox wanted James dead, maybe because of past grudges, maybe because James had been a thorn in his side in the past. James said he’d been part of a group who’d tried to take over his territory. That had to have caused bad blood.
But me…
I was guessing Gerald Knox wanted revenge.
He wanted me alive—and once he had me, I’d probably wish I wasn’t.
I went numb for several seconds, trying to wrap my brain around the fact that a crime boss wanted to hurt me in ways I couldn’t even imagine. Because I knew what men like him were capable of.
Other than James, I had nothing tying me to Arkansas.
My mother was dead, and my father … he might as well be.
After everything I’d learned last week, I never planned on having any kind of relationship with him.
Sure, I had my grandparents and my aunt now, and I wanted to reconnect with them, but I’d gone this long without a real family.
I could walk away from them and my aunt.
If I were smart, I’d run. Far, far away.
But I guess I wasn’t smart.
My fear started to shift to anger, then it caught fire and turned into a blaze.
Gerald Knox and men like him thought they could take whatever they wanted at the expense of everyone else, never giving a damn about the lives they ruined. People were pawns on a chessboard. Inventory. Product.
Gerald Knox was a sociopath, and the world would be a better place without him.
In the end, I suspected it might come down to him or me—and I sure as hell wasn’t leaving this world without one hell of a fight.
Maybe I wouldn’t have trouble pulling the trigger after all.
The bathroom door clicked open and James walked out.
“I think we should leave Little Rock,” he announced in an authoritative tone.
I crossed my arms over my chest, keeping my gaze on the river. So, he’d come to the same conclusion I had.
“Why?” I knew what he was going to say. I wanted to hear him say it.
“He plans to kill me, Harper.” His voice dipped. “But he plans to torture you. I should have realized it sooner.”
I still didn’t turn around. “And if the positions were reversed, would you run?”
“This is my world,” he said, his voice going dark. “I’ve done things that Detective Adams wouldn’t have hesitated to lock me up for and throw away the key. You’re used to playin’ by the rules.” His eyes pinned mine. “Men like Gerald Knox don’t play by any rules.”
“I don’t know if you noticed,” I said dryly, letting my arms fall to my sides, “but I stopped playing by the rules a while back.”
He shook his head. “That’s patty-cake compared to what Gerald Knox does.”
A humorless laugh escaped me. “I’m not running, James.”
He closed the distance between us and grabbed my upper arms, keeping a couple of feet between us. “As you pointed out, I’m not a hundred percent.” Pain flashed in his eyes. “Which means I’m not on top of my game enough to protect you.”
I glared up at him. “Who the fuck says I need protecting?”
“Do you think that makes you weak?” he demanded. “Because I guaran-damn-tee you that Gerald Knox doesn’t see you that way.”
“I don’t need protecting,” I repeated, sharper this time. “If the roles were reversed, you wouldn’t back down.”
His hands tightened on my arms and his voice rose. “That’s because I never thought I had anything to lose!”
His words pierced my defensiveness, but I still couldn’t make myself believe him. “So you’re saying if Knox wanted to torture you, you’d run away.” My eyes narrowed. “And don’t you dare lie to me.”
His jaw set, but he didn’t respond.
“Exactly,” I spat, yanking free of his grip. “I need to get ready.” I brushed past him, headed for the bathroom.
“If we retreat, it doesn’t mean we won’t come back,” he called after me, anger sharp in his voice.
“You wouldn’t retreat,” I countered, not looking over my shoulder.
“Because I’m a goddamned idiot!” he shouted.
I stopped and turned.
“I’m stubborn and hotheaded,” he went on, his chest heaving, “but damn it all to hell, Harper—if the roles were reversed right now, I’d consider pausing.”
I tilted my head, my eyes narrowing. “Pausing? But not running.”
He speared his hand through his head, grunting in frustration.
“You. Wouldn’t. Run.”
“You are not me!”
I froze.
I knew he meant it as a compliment, but in the moment, it landed like a cut. Like he was telling me I was weak.
“No,” I said quietly, my throat tight. “I’m not you. But I have my own tools to work with.”
I went into the bathroom and shut the door, then sat on the side of the tub and covered my face with my hands.
What the hell was I doing?
James was right. He wasn’t a hundred percent, and if Knox was gunning for me, I needed backup. Protection.
We should regroup. We should wait and make a plan more concrete than chasing an accountant who probably wouldn’t talk to us, and a girl at a convenience store who may or may not have been trafficked. And even if she was, she wasn’t likely connected to Knox’s network.
Moving forward was insanity.
But deep in my gut, I also knew I couldn’t back down. Because Knox would see it as a weakness, and men like him only respected strength. If I ran and came back, he’d see me as smaller than him.
But… was that so bad?
I could play into that belief. Let him underestimate me.
Was I this adamant about staying because I feared Knox would see me as weak, or because I would?
I drew a deep breath, held it in, then let it out.
Staying was foolish. I knew that. But after the shooting last fall, I’d let myself get beaten down into an alcoholic mess, with zero confidence and nothing to live for, because I’d played it safe.
Followed the rules. I’d let Keith and all the higher-ups destroy my reputation, destroy me, and I was fucking done with letting men steal anything else from me.
I wasn’t backing down.
And before I started berating myself for my stupidity, I thought about the girl I hoped to meet at the convenience store tonight.
Who was fighting for her? Or the other women Knox was trafficking? What about Wilhemina from the Velvet Room, who had likely been kidnapped and trafficked, all because she fit some man’s sexual fantasy? The police sure as hell weren’t looking for her.
Who was going to save them?
I stood and moved to the sink to get ready, but what I saw in the mirror stopped me cold.
I’d been hard and no-nonsense before, but the woman staring back at me now … there was fire in her eyes.
I’d been looking at this all wrong. I’d started out wanting to bring Gerald Knox down because his mother had killed mine. Because he’d threatened both James and me.
I needed to change my motivation. I needed to stop making this about myself and make it about them. I needed to save those girls. Nobody else gave a shit about them. But I knew what that felt like, because other than James and Louise, no one gave a shit about me either.
I didn’t have a badge anymore, but maybe that wasn’t a bad thing. I could do things a cop couldn’t.
The rules had changed.
Before, my job was to find evidence to arrest the monsters, with the ultimate goal of getting them off the street.
But what if I skipped the tedious part and focused on the end goal?
That would make me judge and jury, something I’d always sworn I wasn’t when I wore a badge. But I’d never needed a judge or jury to tell me the truly evil ones were guilty. And I’d watched too many of them hire high-powered attorneys and walk free.
If Gerald Knox got arrested, he’d probably do the same.
And then more girls would be at his mercy.
I drew in a breath, and a steely resolve settled in my bones.
Knox wanted to destroy me in retaliation.
Which was why I was going to destroy him first.
Where did that leave James and his deal with his handler? I’d sort that out later.