Page 30 of Small Town Secrets

He couldn’t get too confident. Not again. He’d been blindsided with defeat once, but unlike last time, he now had even less to lose. Not much more than his life and freedom. Everything else, they’d taken from him. So, he’d take too.

He’d take everything that mattered.

And maybe his problem last time was that he’d been too cautious. Maybe the key would be to strike and strike fast. Bring his original plans forward.

Besides, time wasn’t in his favor on this one. Rudolph wanted his payback and Mark wanted freedom from the syndicate. And, of course, revenge. Though the question remained, how much would he be willing to sacrifice to reach his goals?

Making a decision, he stormed across the room and wrenched his office door open, catching Stix faithfully pacing the living room just outside.

The man’s bald head and deep brown eyes turned to him. An invitation Mark took to put his plan in motion. “A new opportunity opened up, we have to gather men and we have to act fast. Get the other leaders on board. We have a town to destroy.”

Eighteen

After another long night shift at the grocery store, Laila stepped out of her car and into the morning’s eerie quiet. The memory of flashing lights from the new roadblock still hung in her mind, along with having to produce ID just to get home. She’d grown used to her routine. To this town’s early morning hum and the tranquil trill of birds and crickets whilst most everyone else slept. But today, that hum sounded different. It sounded off. Or perhaps it was more the constant clash of thoughts in her head.

She steeled herself for the walk to her front door, to the added pressure to shut down the unease churning through her. Would she even be able to carry out her normal routine of having a nap or finding any kind of comfort before her parents came by with Whitney? One thing was certain, the Coopers’ fire, followed by that town meeting, changed everything.

Her foot landed on the first porch step, where a folded sheet of red paper caught her attention, causing her heart to stumble its next beat. She clung to the hope that this would be another of Adrian’s kind gestures. Kindness being something she felt deprived of right now.

So, she bent for the note, picturing his profound or romantic words and how they’d somehow succeed to settle her restlessness. But flipping the note open revealed something else entirely.

A hard and immoveable weight took up space in her tummy. There were no nice words. Not even a sign of careful penmanship. Only one unambiguous word scratched out in thick, black marker.

“LEAVE”

Her stomach clenched and she wanted to be sick. That someone came to her door to... to what? To threaten her? They offered no further explanation. No signature. Nothing. Just that one word. LEAVE.

She peered around herself, to the details of her porch and then the empty expanse of her lawn and the street beyond. As if her letter-dropper would have stuck around to gauge her reaction. But no one else was here. Only the morning quiet and isolation to deepen her panic and turn her insides stone-cold.

She had nowhere to pour her fear. No one to blame. Just hints on why they sought to scare her, while her sole certainty was that she would not be getting any rest now.

Her head pounded and her eyes felt overly dry, not just from fear or anger, but from her previous days of meeting assignment deadlines, entertaining Whitney, work, and now, severe sleep-deprivation…

Welcome to motherhood and the hellscape of living in Harlow at this particular point in time.

Feeling vulnerable and alone on her porch, she rushed to her front door and hurried inside, wrenching her phone from her purse as she walked. She had her mom on the line soon enough. While she clutched the threatening letter in the palm of her hand, a part of her still needed to confirm all this was real.

“I know what you’re calling about and we got one last night.” Her mother held a muffled voice, likely because Whitney still slept in a nearby room. “I’ve already heard from Ally, and she got a letter too. So did Sarah, though I haven’t spoken to Emilia and Blaine yet.”

“Seems someone’s been busy.” Laila dropped the note to her kitchen counter and squeezed her eyes shut, attempting to stem a rise of overwrought emotions.

She’d made so many sacrifices throughout the years, tried so hard to make positive changes in her life, and now it all came down to this. A group of self-serving men who didn’t think twice to toy with a whole host of other people’s lives, much less hers and Whitney’s, as if either one hadn’t already had their future altered by just one selfish man…

She let out a sigh and stared blankly ahead. “They’re making good on the promise to take matters into their own hands.”

“Oh. Laila.” Her mother’s tone dropped, weighted with a sense of sympathy. “With what the syndicate did to Ally, this is getting beyond scary. Maybe it is past time we leave Harlow.”

Despite the rapid beat of her heart, a harsh scoff shot free of her. “And go where? Harlow is the only place any of us has called home and it’s also the only place offering any protection. Who will stop the syndicate from tracking us down in any new hiding place? Who will help us or notice anything amiss anywhere else? They followed Chip all the way to Boston, remember?”

“I know. I know.” Her mother’s voice remained a tight whisper. “It’s just that nowhere feels safe. Yah know?”

Laila bit her lower lip and debated stating that nowhere was safe, but a steadfast knock hit her front door and she turned from her kitchen. The tension pulling at her chest eased once she recognized Adrian’s dark figure filling the space behind the door’s frosted glass.

“We always figure something out, don’t we?” Still, her churning insides held none of her word’s certainty, but then, this was her mom and Laila didn’t want to leave her on a hopeless note. “Someone’s at the door, I have to go. Just tell Whitney I miss her and can’t wait to see her again, okay?”

She and her mom said some final goodbyes, and then Laila hung up to answer the door. Adrian’s worried gaze peered down at her, before sliding lower to the red note in her hand.

She stared across to a similar note in his hand, soon shrugging and putting on a dry tone. “Can’t say the people of this town aren’t thorough.”

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