Chapter 7
NOAH
He’s looking too closely at the fucking car.
My fists clench, and I clear my throat. “Let’s get this over with.”
Netty pulls his eyes from the windshield and meets mine. “Gina’s going to have questions about this. I need to be the one to do it.”
“That’s fine. You can leave your wife out of it.” I follow him into an interior room within his garage, weaving around toolboxes and motorcycle parts.
“I won’t do as clean of a job as she would,” he says, closing the door behind us. “But I’ve helped her enough, I think I can handle that.” Netty opens one of the cabinets and pulls out medical tools I don’t care to pay attention to.
I ease down into the black leather desk chair in the middle of the room and immediately feel the pounding of my heart. It’s racing like I’m in a sprint.
Oh shit.
“What’s wrong?” Netty eyes me as he continues to sift through the contents of the cabinet. “You look…off.”
“I don’t know,” I can’t quite put together the words. “I think I might pass out.”
Netty doesn’t react. “You’ve put your body through hell, Noah. It’s not going to feel good.” He reaches for a remote and then turns on a TV hanging on the wall. “Here, distract yourself while I work.”
My eyes flicker to the screen as it comes to life, the early-morning news playing. It’s already fucking four-thirty in the morning.
“Recovery efforts for Thomas Noah Peterson and the missing diver will resume at daybreak per an updated statement from the U.S. Marshal Service.”
I stare at the news anchor, her red lips moving almost robotically, and Netty pauses, his scissors mid-cut in my long sleeve.
“They think you’re dead.”
“Yeah, we’ll see if it stays that way,” I mutter, my eyes flicking to the door, where I know Rue is worrying herself right now.
I want to comfort her. I want to lay her down and make her feel so much goddamn pleasure she forgets this entire thing.
But… Something is stopping me.
And I don’t have time to pick through those thoughts right now.
“Fuck,” I seethe as Netty starts cleaning the wound. Sweat beads up across my forehead, my arm burning like hell.
“Lucky for you, it went all the way through,” Netty says, letting out a sigh. “It’s not nearly as bad as I thought it’d be. I’ll clean it up, wrap it up, and get you some antibiotics for the road.”
I nod as he keeps working. “I need to make a break for the border.”
He stiffens, his dark eyes catching mine for a second. “Mexico ain’t the answer for everything, Noah. Plenty of guys disappear domestically.”
“I know you have contacts,” I say carefully, knowing good and well the mules that Netty ran—and probably still does.
His thin lips flatline, and he shakes his head. “I don’t know, Noah.”
“Come on, Netty,” I press, gritting through the pain as he keeps working on my arm. “I need to take the shot while I still can. If they find any trace of me…”
He reaches for the gauze. “Your face is plastered on every fucking news channel. All it takes is one misstep, and you’re done.”
I let out a breath as he finishes the wrap. “I know.”
“Is your getaway driver trustworthy?” He nods toward the door.
“Yeah.” Just highly un-fucking-stable.
“Then keep them, and make them drive you as far as they can go,” Netty says, handing me a black duffel bag. “There’s a change of clothes in here for you.”
“I really could use that contact,” I repeat, unzipping the bag to see a couple of pairs of jeans, sweats, and shirts. “I’d be safer in Mexico. I could head south, cross in Texas, make it to Belize somehow.”
He shakes his head. “I don’t run across Texas anymore. It’s too risky.”
“Okay,” I stand to my feet, feeling slightly better and worse, all at the same time. “Then I guess I could ship through Miami?”
“Nope. Don’t run through there either anymore.”
“Well, what the fuck, Netty?” Agitation fills my chest.
“I only have one pipeline,” he says calmly, handing me an orange pill bottle. “And in that pipeline, only one fucking coyote I’d trust not to turn you in for that hefty fucking reward.”
“Where’s he at?”
“Down by Maricopa,” Netty answers me flatly.
“Holy shit, Arizona?”
He chuckles, shrugging. “Yeah, quite a road trip for you. And it’s one hell of a hike through the reservation to get across once you are there. I don’t really think you’re up for that.” He nods to the white gauze on my arm. “You need weeks of fucking rest.”
“Fuck,” I groan, running a hand over my face. “Maybe I should hightail to Canada then.”
“No fuckin’ way,” Netty’s voice sharpens. “I’m telling you. You find a rural place that doesn’t give a shit, and you fit in. Problem solved.”
I sling the bag over my good arm. “I still want the contact. Just in case.”
He stares at me for a moment and then shakes his head, giving in. “Fine. But don’t use them unless you have to.” He grabs a piece of paper and a pen and scribbles some shit down that’s barely legible.
I eye it as he shoves it in the back pocket of the duffle bag.
“It’ll make sense when you get there.”
“Okay,” I say, a moment of distrust bubbling up in my chest. For all I know, Netty could have the Marshals on their way right now.
But I push that thought away and slip back out into the garage, where Rue and Bullet are still waiting in the car.
There’s no way that damn dog will make a hike through the desert. I’ll have to drop them off somewhere along the way.
And the thought makes my stomach sick.
I just have to keep reminding myself it’s for the best.
“I’m sorry for what happened to you,” Netty’s voice catches me off-guard, and I stop, a few feet from the Pathfinder, turning back to face him. A sad expression is etched across his face. “And I know the truth, Noah.”
My chest tightens. “What?”
“Of why you killed that shithead?”
I blink twice. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yeah, you do,” Netty chuckles dryly. “You wanted to be like your old man. It never got him far, Noah. It never did. The son of bitch was so loyal, it killed him. You got that same blood in you. Sometimes loyalty is a disease.”
I glance back at the car, where she’s waiting.
And immediately know he’s right.