Shade messaged me at 12:30, and we came back to find four bikers in the living room. The first thing I noticed was that the Reapers weren’t wearing their colors. I’d never seen them without the distinctive, patch-covered vests.
It was weird.
The second thing I noticed was that our living room was way too small for four big bikers. I could hardly turn around without hitting one of them. They seemed to be using up more than their fair share of the air. I knew Dopey, but the other two were strangers, and Shade didn’t introduce them. They didn’t waste any time, taking a few minutes going over the plan, which was mostly just Hannah calling Randy and convincing him to come over.
They’d take it from there.
“You ready?” Shade asked her. She nodded, but she looked nervous. I caught her hand, giving it a squeeze.
“Hey, Randy,” Hannah said, somehow managing to hold her voice steady even though her hands were shaking. “We should talk. I found some drugs in the bathroom. You need to pick them up in the next ten minutes or I’m throwing them away.”
She held the phone away from her ear as Randy exploded, shouting “Fucking cunt!” and “I’ll kick your ass, you little bitch.”
Nice. Classy to the end. She waited for him to run out of insults, then spoke again.
“I don’t care what you think,” she said quietly. “And you can yell at me all you want, but I’m not having this shit in my house. Get your ass over here and pick it up or I’ll throw it away. I don’t care how much money it’s worth.”
Another explosion, but this time it didn’t last as long. We all watched as she held the phone, waiting for her chance. Finally, she managed to get in another sentence.
“Last chance, asshole. You’ve got fifteen minutes. Then I flush.”
“Nice,” Shade said, and he seemed to mean it. Hannah gave him a strained smile, sliding her phone into her pocket.
“Now what?” I asked.
“We wait. When he gets here, you’ll let him in and then we’ll discuss whether he’s got anything else hidden in the house. After that, we’ll move on to figuring out who his friends are.”
“And you’re sure he won’t bother her again?” I asked, swallowing. It just seemed too good to be true. Too easy.
Shade offered me a feral smile. “Yeah. I’m sure.”
I believed him.
Ten minutes later, Randy pulled up in his battered little car. It was some kind of hatchback that spewed black smoke every time it started and couldn’t go more than fifty on a good day.
Still better than what the mother of his children had.
The bastard looked like he hadn’t slept in a week. His hair was all messed up and his clothes were wrinkled. He scowled as we peeked at him through the window, stomping up onto the porch like he owned the place. I guess in his mind, he did. I glanced toward Shade, who nodded toward the door.
Hannah reached for the knob and started to open it. Randy shoved through, nearly knocking her over in the process.“You fucking cunt,” he hissed, raising a fist. “You touch my—”
“I don’t think so,” Shade said quietly. He’d been standing behind the door, waiting. Dopey stepped out of the bathroom, followed by the other two Reapers. That’s when I realized one of them was about the same size and build as Randy, with similar coloring. Coincidence? I swallowed, making a conscious decision not to think about it.
Randy had frozen, staring at Shade with an almost comical expression of shock.
“Who the fuck are you?” he asked.
Shade smiled. “I’m the man who’s gonna kill you if you don’t tell us everything. Girls, go wait outside and don’t come back inside no matter what you hear. And make sure nobody bothers us, okay? If anyone asks you why Randy’s car is here, just say he came to pick up some of his stuff and you wanted to give him space.”
Maybe it made me weak, but I was thankful for the reprieve. Randy didn’t deserve our pity. Now that this was really happening, though… Well, I didn’t feel good about it. But I sure as hell didn’t feel bad enough to stop them, either.
Hannah and the girls will never be safe with him around, I reminded myself. And his friends are a danger to other children, too. You shouldn’t have to go to jail to protect this asshole, and your sister shouldn’t have to live in fear, either.
“Let’s just sit on the porch and hang out,” Hannah said. “It’ll be okay. It’s all going to be okay.”
God, I hoped she was right.
Shade
Turned out, Randy boy wasn’t quite as much of a badass when his victims weren’t women. We made him strip and then duct taped him to a chair, immobilizing his hands and feet as we “discussed” the situation. It’d only taken three hits before he started crying, and then I’d pulled out my gun and pointed it directly at his head. Probably could’ve started with the gun, but I enjoyed punching the bastard.
He started talking so fast I could hardly follow the words, admitting that he’d hidden more meth and some other stuff in the electric baseboard heater in the children’s room. Lucky thing we hadn’t had a cold snap. I sent Dopey after it and smacked Randy again, this time for being such an irresponsible cockwad.
Five minutes later, Dopey came back with one baggie full of crystals and a second one full of pills. He also held a wad of cash—not much, maybe a hundred bucks—that Randy hadn’t bothered to mention. Fucking moron. I had a damned gun to his head, yet he was still spewing bullshit.
“Found this in the light fixture,” Dopey said, holding up the cash. I turned to Randy, seriously considering just shooting him on the spot. Unfortunately, we needed him to find the others. This guy was just part of the problem.
“I don’t think you understand what’s going on here,” I told him. “If you don’t tell me the truth—all of it—in the next ten seconds, I’m going to kill you.”
His eyes widened.
“You can’t!”
“Give me one good reason.”
“Because I don’t even know what all’s in here,” he babbled. “A couple of times the guys came over while Hannah and the kids were gone. They probably left stuff around, too. You’ll never find everything unless I talk to them. You can’t kill all of us.”