Page 96 of Deja New
“He’s serving a life sentence,” Angela reminded them. “He’ll never see his family again. He’ll be in a cage until he dies. I think we can safely say that ICC has this.”
“Speaking of ICC.” Leah helped herself to a glass of orange juice and sipped while she looked at her phone, then up at Archer. “I spoke with CO Maller and it looks like we’re going forward.”
Leah hadn’t been talking to her, but Angela jumped in anyway. “The guy with the gambling addiction?”
“Gambling problem. Yes.”
“He got canned yesterday,” Archer added, “so Leah’s gonna see about getting him a new job.”
“He did? She is?”I slept for four hours and missed all sorts of updates!
“Angela got someone fired again?” Jordan shook his head. “You’re a general menace, you know that, right?”
“It wasn’t me this time, it was Leah. And Uncle Dennis, who had something of a breakdown that after today we’re not going to discuss anymore.”
“Why’d you do that?” Jack asked Leah.
“Whendid you do that?”
“I set up an interview for him an hour ago, and I’ll meet with him next week,” Leah replied, seeming surprised at the sudden interest. “What? We always need good security people. A client tries to smack one of us around every month or so.”
“Can we talk again about how much I hate that aspect ofyour job?” Archer said. “Because I fucking hate that aspect of your job.”
“Leah can take care of herself,” Jack said stoutly.
“Of course she can, I knew that within ten seconds of meeting her.”
“Hey, that’s right!” Paul poked Archer in the shoulder. “She stabbed you!”
“Twice. So, yeah, Leah can take care of herself. I just hate that she has to.”
“Regardless. We’re always in need of good security, so.” Leah shrugged. “I made some arrangements.”
“Except.” Angela cleared her throat. “Technically, he’s not a good security guy. He totally ignored the rules because you butted into his personal life.”
“That’s another way to look at it,” Leah admitted. “But we all know it was more complicated than that. He did us an enormous favor and suffered for it. Why wouldn’t I try to help him? Chances are he won’t make the same mistake twice.”
“You hope.”
“I hope,” she conceded.
“But how did Maller even know to reach you?” she asked Leah. “Oh, wait—he must have gotten your personal info off one of the intake sheets.”
“Actually.” Now Leah was the one clearing her throat. “Detective Chambers called and told me a couple of hours ago.”
“He calledyou?”What are you freaking out for? You made it clear he sure as shit wasn’t supposed to call you anymore.Still, she couldn’t help saying it again. “You?” First the pastry swan, now this? Usurper!
“Yes.” Leah was doing a wonderful job pretending this was an ordinary morning. “And I think he’ll be stopping by today.”
Angela could feel herself getting pale, which was clinically interesting.So that’s why people faint. All the blood leaves your head and it becomes too hard to stand up.“No. Oh no, he won’t.”
And because this wasn’t an ordinary morning, because the Drake family could never have an ordinary morning, that was when someone knocked on the kitchen door.
“In fact,” Leah continued, “I’ve got a very strong hunch that he’ll be here any moment.”
More knocking.
“Son of abitch.”
