Page 10 of Abduction
I didn’t want to see myself right now. No point. I wasn’t sure I liked the guy looking back at me. I was already wasted from everything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours, and I didn’t enjoy trying to navigate the way I felt about him, either. I just wanted to put all of it behind me, my fuck-ups, my mess, even though I’d have to talk to my father about it sooner or later.
He was always a man of his word, a man who made sure he followed through on anything he promised, and I wished I could say the same about myself. I felt like all I had been doing lately was fucking up, over and over again, making a mess of my life so many times over I wasn’t sure what it would take to put it all back together.
Maybe I just needed a little inspiration.
Laurence appeared with the suitcase full of money he always had for us—I had told him he could just hand it over in cash, but I was sure some part of him liked the theater of the whole thing, enjoyed knowing he was playing into some part of history with this sleek attaché case and the wads of cash crammed inside.
“Thank you,” I told him, and I put my lighter away at last, popping open the case to take a look at what he had for me. I thumbed through the stacks of hundreds, counting inside my head, until I was satisfied I had everything I needed.
I closed the case again, carefully clipping it shut so it didn’t spring open at the wrong moment. This was supposed to be subtle, and if I left piles of money falling out of this case as I walked down the street, I’d be anything but.
“Is it okay?” Laurence asked. I could see a sheen of sweat on his forehead, and I nodded, doing my best to soothe him. I knew he wanted me out of there as soon as possible, but honestly, I was in no rush. The art gallery was peaceful and quiet. I was sure he had done his best to make certain we weren’t going to be interrupted by anyone, not today, because explaining what a person like me was doing here would have proved too difficult for him to handle.
“It’s fine,” I replied, and I started to head to the door when a painting caught my eye. A large frame, nearly as tall as me from top to bottom, depicting a wild and stormy seascape—the sky dark gray, the waves crashing, the details so perfectly rendered I could almost hear the sounds in my ears as I looked at it.
“I like this,” I remarked to Laurence. I could see at once the panic on his face as he realized I wasn’t going to be leaving as soon as he thought.
“Oh, yes, it’s lovely,” he replied, vague and obviously distracted. He wrung his hands together, shooting another look at the door, clearly wondering what it was going to take to get me out of there.
“How much is it?” I asked. He paused, surprised, and then cleared his face quickly and responded.
“Fifteen thousand.”
I grinned and shook my head. I pulled the lighter from my pocket again and lit it, letting the sound of the flickering flame fill the space between us. I drew it a little closer to the picture I had been admiring, letting the flame lick dangerously around the bottom of the frame. I could see Laurence tensing up. I knew I could have just paid the price he had asked—not like I couldn’t afford it—but I enjoyed this approach so much more.
“How about now?” I asked.
Laurence parted his lips, clearly wishing he could tell me to stop, but what was the point? He knew I could go to my father and turn this around on him in an instant if I wanted to. I could light this painting on fire and walk out of here and leave him to pick up the flaming pieces, and there would have been nothing at all he could do about it, no point of recourse he could take to get his revenge or make us pay for it. Try as he might—and I could see his mind running at a million miles an hour as he tried to figure out what to say to me—there was no way out of this for him.
“Five thousand,” he offered. It was still more than I had hoped to pay, but significantly less than he had first quoted me. Besides, the work was impressive, and the artist deserved at least some kind of windfall for creating it. I closed the lighter and dropped it back in my pocket, watching as Laurence let out a visible sigh of relief, his shoulders sagging as he caught his breath again.
“Sounds good to me,” I replied. “I’ll wire the money to you. Have it delivered to my apartment. I’ll send you the address.”
“Of course,” he agreed immediately, and I could tell he would have gone along with anything I said in that instant as long as it meant I got out of his gallery. I wasn’t welcome here, and every moment I spent there was one he wished he could end sooner.
He walked me to the door, and I stepped out on to the street. The air outside was cool, cooler than it had been last night, when I had slept on my balcony to try and smooth out the overthinking in my brain. The streets were busy and full, and I would wager most of the people wandering around didn’t have a single clue what was going on behind the closed doors of that gallery. What kind of secrets Laurence was doing everything he could to keep, and how much he was willing to pay to make sure they didn’t get out.
People staked a whole lot on their reputations, I supposed—my father sure did, making sure everyone knew where he stood and what they could expect from him. That was the reason he had been so pissed at my failure before, my inability to bring home the cash he’d wanted from the errant client we’d been dealing with.
I would make it right. Bringing home this cash would go a long way to proving to him he had nothing to worry about when it came to me, and I hoped he would be able to see his way to forgiving me for this fuck-up. I promised myself I wasn’t going to give him any reason to doubt me, not after this, and I intended to do everything I could to see through the duties he had assigned to me.
If Tommy could do it, I could, too. It was that simple. I needed to stand up against my twin brother and prove I was just as good as him—even if, sometimes, I found myself wondering just what the hell I was doing with my life.
And how the hell I was supposed to live with it.
