Page 34 of Fool’s Gold

Matt bowed his head. “I get it.”

“Damn it, Matt.” Jack tried to catch his eye, but Matt wouldn’t let him. “That’s not what I meant.”

“I know what you meant, Jack. Look, I’ll see you at the hospital. I know you have to catch up with the others.” His face froze over, and he nodded to the EMTs.

They got him onto the stretcher and loaded him into the ambulance.

The EMTs wouldn’t let Jack ride with him. He could only watch as they drove away, sirens blaring.

CHAPTERFIFTEEN

Hospitals are bullshit.

Matt forced himself to calm down. No one liked being in the hospital, but he needed to be here for the time being. It was easiest to keep him safe in a small space like this, both from a logistical perspective and from a medical point of view. He was, to put it bluntly, messed up. His leg needed work and plenty of it.

Then there was the whole internal bleeding thing.

It could have been worse. It could all have been so much worse. The airbags had all functioned as intended. The rented SUV had kept them as safe as possible. Everyone had some cuts and such from breaking glass, but it hadn’t been too bad. Samaira had been sitting behind Matt and she had a broken leg, but the impact had pushed her just far enough away from the seat that she hadn’t been crushed.

Jack had been mostly okay—a few bruises, a few cuts, and that was it. He was going to walk away to whatever job came next.

Norah had some deep bruises from the seat belt, but that was all. Samaira had thrown herself over Norah to keep her safe from breaking glass, so she was safe from the worst of it. Doctors had kept Norah for a few days to monitor for whiplash and internal bleeding, but she was fine. She was staying in a luxury hotel with one of Samaira’s daughters to help her out.

Matt spent the first three days after the wreck in a haze of pain and anesthesia. His leg had been broken in three places. He’d lost enough blood to be considered life-threatening. He had several broken ribs, and oh yeah, his spleen had ruptured. Apparently, the spleen was important and had a lot of blood, so they’d partially removed it and were crossing their fingers for the rest.

Swell.

After three days, he’d asked to be weaned off the painkillers. He had zero desire to end up like his mother, and he had a business to run. Plus, someone was trying to kill him. That seemed important.

Between the pain in his leg and the pain in his gut, he wondered whether it might not be worth just letting them. Or paying them to get on with it.

Of course, Matt being laid up and semi-conscious didn’t mean no one else was doing anything for three days. It just meant Matt was only peripherally aware of it. He had vague impressions of various Five Star personnel going in and out of his room. He knew there were uniformed police officers stationed outside, but he mostly lay there like a lump. He was vaguely aware of being lonely.

Once he was more cognizant of his surroundings, Agent Morales brought him up to speed.

“All right. You’re probably wondering what’s going on. How much do you remember?”

Matt ground his teeth, which felt like they were coated in mold. “I remember a guy in a giant Caddy. He was trying to rear-end us, but he wound up hitting us from the side instead.”

“That was probably good thinking on your part. After impact, the driver got out of the car with a semiautomatic firearm. Mr. Vessely acted to remove the threat, and then he and a civilian tended to his injuries to ensure he would survive to be questioned. It’s a good thing they did because the driver would otherwise not have survived.”

Morales passed him a cup of water, and Matt took small sips. He hadn’t graduated to solid food yet, but he could handle water.

“Has anyone thanked the civilian yet?”

Morales chuckled. “We’ve been a bit busy, but we did get her name and address. Jack also press-ganged another civilian and her daughter into giving you first aid, and we got their info as well. I’m sending it to you now.” He swiped something on his phone screen.

“Thanks.” Matt made a mental note to send them both something. The thought of ordinary people getting caught up in his mess made him want to throw up, but he didn’t have anything in his stomach but water.

“The attacker—who, you may be curious to know, has active arrest warrants in thirty states and fifteen countries—was more than happy to let us know who hired him. It was that easy. It’s never that easy, but it was in this case. Doug Salmon hired him. He actually put it in writing.”

Matt stared at him. “I’m sorry. The opioids must still be in my system, they make me so incredibly stupid. I’m hearing things. I know you didn’t just say a retired general was stupid enough to make an agreement with a hit man, in writing.”

Morales doubled over laughing. “I know, right? The fact is, the guy is older and doesn’t really ‘get’ how the tech works. And after their first attempts failed, they were getting desperate. Desperation makes people sloppy, especially people who aren’t exactly criminally sophisticated.”

Matt rubbed his temples. “Well, they’re sophisticated when it comes to financial crimes anyway. Not so much when it comes to—what is this, red-collar crime?”

Morales scratched his head. “I don’t even know. To tell you the truth, I haven’t put much thought into it. It’s murder, whatever it is. And, boy, is your board bad at it. As near as we can tell, they figured that if Salmon was the only one to make contact with the hit man, he would be the only one taking the fall. But two other guys had electronic communications conspiring with him to make the deal, and they didn’t even bother to hide those communications.” He cracked his knuckles. “I didn’t even have to break their passwords. Your IT department did thatfor me. They did it oncompany accounts.”

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