Page 13 of Prodigal Son

Fox peeked around the end of the sofa and met his dad’s gaze. Devin (Not Devin? Whatever, it was too confusing, his fucking name was Devin, alright?) looked put-out, but not worried. “Not through the door,” he said, and then mouthedbedroom. In case the place was bugged.

Fox nodded. “Right.” He took Eden’s wrist in his hand – her pulse thumped wildly against his fingers – and tugged her in that direction. “Come on, the old man says it’s this way.”

They belly-crawled their way into the master as the sniper continued to shoot blind through the window. Suppressive fire, Fox guessed, or else the guy was the worst sniper on earth. If it was suppressive, then that meant there was a team on the way up. Limited window – they needed to hurry.

“Just like the good old days, huh?” he asked Eden.

She snorted. “They were nevergood.”

Ouch.

Devin shuffled in, bent double, faster and more flexible than he had a right to be at this age. “Here, Charlie, help me with this,” he urged, going to the nightstand and shoving it to the side.

Fox did, and beneath the heavy piece of furniture – really heavy, had to be a hidden gun safe – there was a rug, and under that, a trapdoor. “Clever.”

“Isn’t it though?”

It was a heavy trapdoor and it took both of them to lift it, the underside the smooth white sheetrock of the ceiling in the unit below.

“Here.” Fox reached for Eden, but she waved him off, braced both hands on the edge and slid down feet-first, graceful as ever.

Devin smirked. “Don’t think she’s glad to see you, son.”

“Bite my ass, Dad.” He followed her down…

And landed in a pink bedroom full of pink furniture, where a little girl in a pink princess dress sat at a small pink table surrounded by stuffed animals, pink ceramic teapot held in one hand, imaginary tea overrunning the cup in front of her. She stared at them, gobsmacked.

“Hello, love,” Eden said, managing a smile and a wave. “We’ll just be out of your hair, then.”

Devin landed with a thump. “Christ, all this pink.”

“Get moving.” Fox put a hand between his shoulder blades and shoved, following Eden out of the girl’s bedroom and into a hallway that led into a kitchen identical in floorplan to Devin’s upstairs, but overrun with homey knickknacks and silk flowers.

A woman, presumably the girl’s mother, shrieked and threw a plastic cup at them as they passed.

“Sorry, sorry,” Eden said, wincing, shielding her head with a hand. “We’ll see ourselves out.”

They did, and once they were in the relative quiet of the corridor, Fox could hear thundering footsteps one floor up.

“That’ll be the reinforcements,” Devin said with a wry look to the ceiling.

They took the emergency stairs in the back, concrete and musty and dimly lit. Eden led the charge, light-footed as a doe, making a quick call on her phone as they went. Muttered, “Good,” and slipped the device back in her pocket.

“Who are you calling?” Fox asked, only half-exasperated, the other half curious.

“My assistant.”

His snappy comeback died in his threat when he nearly turned an ankle on the next step. Shit. He needed to pay more attention.

Behind him, Devin smothered a laugh, the shithead.

By the time they reached the ground floor, Fox was internally cursing all the time he spent drinking, smoking, and eating Darla’s cooking. He didn’t look out of shape in the mirror, but he wasn’t as spry and sharp as he used to be.

Eden held up a staying hand and pushed the door open a fraction, letting in a ribbon of gray afternoon light. She peeked through the gap and then pushed the door wide. “Come on. Ride’s here.”

And it was.

A dusty black Pontiac GTO sat at the curb, engine rumbling as it idled, windows cranked down, dual exhaust pipes shaking. The sight of it was so totally American and incongruous against the London backdrop that Fox faltered a step.

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