Page 21 of Greed
“I ain’t telling you anything that will get me time.”
“You were caught red-handed stealing from the jewelry store,” Griffin added incredulously. He was already doing time.
“No. I was caught sitting in the jewelry store with my hands tied. Nuthin’ more than that can be proved. I could’ve been in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Griffin couldn’t believe the nerve. “You just said you were raising a ransom.”
“Yeah, well, that could mean anything.”
“Please, Nathanial. Any light you can shed on the deaths will be helpful,” Lilo added.
Nathanial looked at Griffin, then back to his cousin. “If I do this, will you help your father?”
“I can’t promise anything, but I can try.”
Griffin closed his eyes and exhaled. Damn it, Lilo.
“We got stopped—”
“We?” Lilo interrupted.
“Yeah, me, Big Jo-Jo and Ruff-Nut.”
“Big Jo-Jo’s dead?” Lilo’s eyes widened.
Nathanial nodded solemnly. “We were there… that’s all I’m saying about that, but the fucking ninjas turned up and—well, that’s how I got tied up, you feel me?”
“Go on.”
“Okay, so, I’m sitting there on the floor of the store, minding my own business, and one of the ninjas—”
“Are you talking about the Deadly Seven?” Lilo asked.
“Yeah.”
“Any idea which one?”
“The one in blue, and the one in green.”
“Two?”
“Yeah. So, the one in blue splits, but then comes back. Except, when he’s back, he’s got a gun this time.”
“You must be wrong,” Griffin interjected. “They don’t use guns.”
Well,hedidn’t. Occasionally Parker did and Tony did. And Liza did, but that was in the line of duty. Guns were loud, messy, and not conducive to stealth missions in close quarters and, besides, he’d gone home after he left the jewelry store. The man must be mistaken.
“You weren’t there,” Nathanial accused. “I was, and I can tell you, that the blue ninja came back and shot my friends point blank in the head.”
Lilo shook her head. “Griffin’s right. Shooting isn’t really the style of the Deadly Seven. I read the official police report and none of that was in there. Only that the Deadly Seven originally foiled a robbery and then left the secured perpetrators for police to take into custody.”
A loud bang shattered the air, imploding in Griffin’s eardrums.
Every nerve and sensation in his body went haywire. On instinct, he tugged Lilo close and rolled to shield her body with his as a secondbangshook the room. Something hit him in the head, pain exploded at his temple, and everything went blurry. A rock. From somewhere. Warm blood dripped from his temple and he touched the wound. It came away sticky and red. The blurriness shifted, and the floor tilted toward him. Griffin staggered, blinking, confused. His boots crunched underneath and instead of seeing the inside of a cell, he saw red dirt. Flashes of other red, pulpy and broken things went before his eyes. Disgusting sights from when he was tortured in the Middle East. He smelled the acrid scent of petrol and a resulting burn up his left arm, and for a moment, he was lost in the panic of his memories—when they’d doused him with fuel to get him to talk. Gray haze covered his eyes. Ringing deafened him. He blinked a few more times before he understood what happened.
A bomb had gone off. The external wall had caved in.
Lilo?
