Chapter 26
Nicole
Maynard put on the turn signal to move up alongside the back of the bus, but Nicole raised her hard. “Not yet.”
“But I have an opening,” he said. “Just use the nail gun.”
“No,” she said. “Wait.”’
“For what?” he demanded.
“For them to get closer to the rest area, you fucking idiot. Do you want to cuff her and muscle her into the back of the SUV in front of fifty witnesses on a slow highway? Were you dropped on your head as a baby?”
“No need to be rude,” Maynard said. “If we’re going to work together—”
“No, Maynard. We do not work ‘together,’” she cut in. “I’m team leader. You work for me, not with me. It’s an important distinction. Are we clear?”
He looked at her swollen, bruised jaw, and then his gaze flicked down to her breasts. “Yeah, boss,” he said softly. “We’re real clear.”
Ohhh. Death was too good for this turd.
Her phone buzzed. Nicole murmured obscenities under her breath as she pulled it out. Probably Vincent, micromanaging like the priggish, controlling little bitch that he was. Her jaw throbbed sickeningly as she squinted at the display.
Not Vincent. It was her asset in the Masters complex. A gift she’d offered to Vincent that the idiot did not appreciate. She picked up. “Mick. What have you got for me?”
“The blonde woman ran away,” Mick Drummond reported, his voice low, as if he were muttering in a dark corner. “She crawled out a window and gave Ethan’s guys the slip. They’re all looking for her. Word is, she’s headed for the downtown bus station.”
“Hmmm. This news is pretty fucking stale,” she replied. “We’ve known she was on the move for some time now. Which begs the question, Mick. How committed are you to keeping up your side of our bargain?”
“Bargain?” Mick’s voice was bitter. “Hah.”
Nicole clucked her tongue. “Do I detect self-pity? Looks like poor Jay will have to go without his pain meds again. It’s excruciating to listen to, but we all manage so much better now that I’ve had him moved down to the basement level. Now no one can hear him screaming.”
“No,” Mick said swiftly. “Please.”
“Those metastases in his spine, ouch,” she said. “His bones are like chalk. The last time I kicked him, I think I broke three ribs in a single blow.”
Jay was Mick Drummond’s great-uncle, the man who had raised him.
Drummond was pathetically attached to the old coot.
After she’d had him abducted from the care home, he’d deteriorated sharply, and he was dementing fast, but he was an effective lever to manipulate Mick.
With the help of some very graphic videos.
“Maybe I’ll crush his kneecap,” she mused. “Or I could shatter his pelvis. It wouldn’t take much, at this point. Like crumpling paper.”
“Please, no,” Mick said hastily. “Don’t. I have news that will interest you. About Kat Banner.”
“Is that what they call her? Kat? That’s cute. Like a little pussy-cat,” Nicole tittered. “So? Let’s hear your news.”
“Give Jay his meds,” Mick said desperately. “Don’t hurt him. And I’ll tell you.”
“You dumb prick,” she said coldly. “Do exactly as you’re told, or I’ll livestream a session with the meat cleaver. Don’t waste my time.”
Mick let out a strange sound, like air hissing out of a balloon. “l, ah…I put that software on Ethan’s phone. I listened in while he called our contact in the FBI, Arch Dorne. Today, he got confirmation for the story she told him about her past.”
“And this should interest me exactly why?” The traffic was still crawling along, but they’d approach the rest stop soon. There was no time for Mick’s dithering.
“Kat Banner was put into the Witness Protection Program when she was fourteen,” Mick said.
“She testified against the mobster who murdered her sisters. An older one, nineteen, who was the mobster’s mistress.
The younger one was seven. Her name was Francesca Lovero.
She’s been flying under the radar ever since. ”
“Interesting,” Nicole said slowly, and she wasn’t even being sarcastic. That was probably why Kat had learned to fight. She knew a fight was coming, sooner or later.
“So? Is that enough? Will you give Jay his meds?”
Nicole considered it as they crawled down the roadway. “Well, he’s not completely off the hook, because you were not at all timely in updating me,” she said.
“But I only just found—”
“Shut up. I won’t break any more bones, but no morphine today. Be grateful.”
She hung up on Mick as she saw a sign for the rest area. “Pull up now.”
Maynard muscled himself in front of a car so he could pull up alongside the back of the bus. Nicole checked out the cars nearby in her mirrors. The guy driving the van behind her was busy arguing with the woman in the passenger seat. Perfect.
She rolled down the window, poised her body, and in one swift, seamless gesture, she shot the nail gun at the tire.
“Let it pull ahead,” she instructed.
The bus shuddered, wavering on the road. Maynard braked slightly, and they followed the big vehicle as it lumbered forward, slowing down. The turn signal went on, which gave her a pleasant little thrill of anticipation.
This was going to be fun. By all accounts, Kat Banner was a worthy opponent. Nicole seldom had an adversary that stimulating, and particularly not a woman.
Freya had been an unwelcome surprise. No one had warned her about Freya. But oh, was she ever primed for a rousing catfight with this uppity blonde bitch.
“Maynard, just so we’re clear. This should be obvious, but it’s you, so I’m triple-checking. Kat Banner, Ethan Masters, Holly, Freya…when we do take them, they have to be unharmed. Not killed or maimed. We have plans for them. Is that clear?”
Maynard rolled his eyes. “Yes, I did grasp that,” he said sourly.
“Good,” she murmured.
They pulled into a parking spot not far from the bus, and watched the whole scene as the driver stomped his big, swag-bellied frame to the blown-out back tire.
He kicked the good tire, and got on his phone. His conversation degenerated into shouting. Clearly, this asshole was not going to attempt changing one of those monsters himself. He needed a repair truck, a replacement bus, or both, and that would take time.
That gave her a moment to process this new information, which reverberated in her mind. That data was significant. A secret weapon of some kind. So improbable, it had to be useful. She just wasn’t sure how yet.
A tragic backstory. A fake name. A fake life. Violence and trauma. She loved that stuff. She was an artist, and violence and trauma were her favorite medium.
The bus was at a standstill. She had all the time in the world to run Kat Banner down.