Page 86 of Alfie: Part Two

“I won’t tell you twice.” He pointed to the car. “What part of ‘the inner circle doesn’t go to prison’ don’t you understand?”

Who was gonna catch me out here?

“I’m sorry, are the cops hiding behind the house?” I asked incredulously. “There’s nobody here!” I threw my arms out.

He got in my face again, and he jabbed a finger at my temple. “There’s something missin’ in here too. A safehouse isn’t all about a remote location, for chrissakes. Did you speed here? Are you sure you weren’t followed? Do you have a protocol in place in case a traffic camera caught your ass?”

“I think I can afford the ticket,” I snapped.

“It logs your fucking location, you dumb shite! Who’s gonna remove that for you? Huh?” Once again, he pointed to the car.

My ears burned, and the embarrassment weighed almost as much as my anger.

“When we go to a safehouse, we let Eric know our exact route so he can turn us into ghosts,” he told me. Then he walked over to the shredders and hauled them off the road again. “Iknewyou were gonna pull some stupid-ass stunt.”

I gritted my teeth. Fine, I sucked. Happy? I’d messed up.

“I wanna kill them, Finn.”

“And I wanna be home, licking ice cream off Emilia’s ass, but here I am.”

My eyebrows flew up.

He walked toward me again. “Gimme the keys.”

“Uh…they’re in the ignition.”

So I guessed he was just gonna steal my car? He got behind the wheel and gave me an expectant look.

Fine.

I opened the passenger’s door instead, and he revved the engine.

“You asked us to make sure you didn’t kill them,” he stated.

“I know. Then I saw the video where one of them beat Mom to a bloody pulp. People can change their minds.”

“Hence, why I’ve been here for three fucking hours already,” he muttered. “I had a feeling something would happen once Eric told Colby to look for those videos. There wasn’t a chance in hell he’d keep it to himself if he found anything.”

I looked out the window, toward the house. It wasn’t big, maybe two or three rooms, one story. Red brick. The front yard had seen better days, and the fence had rusted.

It was definitely secluded, though.

“I’mma let you go to town on their asses. Torture them all you want, but you’re not snuffing out the last light.”

I glanced back to him as he drove up the driveway. “Can I ask why you give a shit?”

“Because we’re family. I just gotta keep you straitlaced enough so your man won’t leave you again.” He killed the engine and got out.

I swallowed hard. West wouldn’t leave me for this. I was sure. Sort of. No, I was. I knew his worries came from a different place. West was afraid I’d fall into a depression or something because I’d taken a life. Two lives.

I followed Finn to the house, and he walked right in. Small kitchen to the left, where I spotted Bran sitting in a lawn chair at a table that couldn’t be worth fifty cents at a yard sale. To the right, however… I stopped short at the sight.

They’d covered the entire living room in thick plastic, and the two men were tied to chairs at the center of the room, bags over their heads. A spotlight sat on the floor in a corner, casting shadows on the ceiling.

Finn eyed the men and leaned against the doorway. “Meet Jakov and Luka. We’ve confirmed that Jakov was the one who assaulted your ma.”

“He confessed?”

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