Page 57 of Clean Slade
I’d known whatever he’d ask me to do would be dangerous, but I’d never expected him to throw me in with the wolves at a time when the whole island was on high alert.
I checked my watch and stuffed the letter in my pocket. I didn’t have much time to waste.
“Courtney, Nat, do you think you can handle the appointments for a couple of hours. I’ve got to run an errand that can’t be postponed.”
“Of course, King. Everything okay?” Nat asked, spritzing a poodle with bubblegum perfume.
Nope. Nothing was okay. I had a dirty job to do, and I didn’t want to. But I had to if for no other reason than to solely give my father the false sense I was going along with his plan, whatever it was and however it was supposed to work.
“Everything’s great. Just one of those things, you know?”
They nodded as if they knew the torrent inside my head, and I left for Bishop’s Point, which was on the southwest side of the island.
It wasn’t a part of Mayberry I visited often. Or at all. Bishop’s Point was where serious money lived, and I had no business there. Most of the Mayberry Holm residents had no business there unless it was to work at the high-end resort that had misplaced thousands of families when it was built over nine years ago.
Bishop’s Point tried to present itself as an island in and of itself, as if detached from the rest of Mayberry Holm. Not that the rest of Mayberry was a hovel, but I guessed when you had billions, you liked to pretend even those pesky millionaires were a nuisance.
Not that I’d know from experience. I may have come from money—dirty money even—but I’d never had it myself. It had always been borrowed and bloodied.
I parked in the White Holm parking garage, a whopping ten dollars for an hour, and walked to reception.
I didn’t miss how the older man looked at me as I approached or how he turned his nose ever so slightly, as if he was the one with all the money.
“Could you point me toward the restaurant?” I asked him.
If all went to plan, I’d never have to see this man again, so why should I care what he thought of me or the way I was dressed?
“I’m afraid the Queen Margaret is fully booked today. If you’d like to make a reservation, I can check our schedule. How does September sound?”
I was confident that if I were a guest in this resort, I’d have been waltzed in with a whole band to welcome me, but seeing as he thought I was a peasant, he’d recited from the script committed to memory.
Too bad it wouldn’t work. He should have given me a date two years down the line if he wanted to get rid of me.
“I believe a reservation has been made in my name.” Or at least I hoped it had. That was how it used to happen. Things would be arranged behind the scenes so we could do our job uninterrupted.
“Name?”
I paused and bit my lip. I hoped everything had stayed the same and I wasn’t about to make a big mistake.
“Rex,” I said.
The man scanned something behind the desk and, moments later, looked up at me, beaming.
“Mr. Rex, welcome. We’ve been expecting you.” He turned his head to the side, pressing his hand to his ear, and mumbled something.
A minute later, another employee appeared to usher me to a table in the far corner of the restaurant, in front of a floor-to-ceiling window with an ocean view.
As soon as I sat down, I checked the time. I was early, but hopefully, I wouldn’t have to wait long.
This didn’t feel right. None of it did. Not the location nor the meeting set up for me. But most of all,Ididn’t feel right. I didn’t like how easily I’d slipped back into it. And the worst part was, it made me feel like I was nineteen again.
The thrill that coursed through me was unmatched by anything, but the confidence was missing. Nineteen-year-old me hadn’t quite known how wrong this life was.
“Kingston?” someone said, and I took a deep breath before I turned.
I expected to find the drug dealer I was supposed to meet. Instead, I found Parker and his pink-haired boyfriend, Hwan.
They were both something akin to celebrity on this island, what with Hwan’s bubble tea shop and the Instagram live that had gone viral back in November when a bunch of criminals tried to burn it down. I wasn’t friends with either of them, although I’d been at Carson’s Grill more than enough times to be friendly with Hwan back when he was still a host there.
