Page 67 of The Ice Queen in the Corner Office

“I can get them fifty-thousand tomorrow by noon,” I said to Lee over the phone. I was still sitting in that parking lot, smart enough to know better than to try and drive while I was having this conversation. I couldn’t stop my knees from bouncing and my body thrummed with a restless energy, the need to move, the need to do something. “Do you think they’ll take that with a promise of more as soon as I can get my hands on it?” I didn’t know how I was going to get more in any kind of a hurry, but I’d figure that out later.

He groaned. “I’ll talk to ‘em, but how long is it going to take, man? How long are you going to let Willow rot in there?”

“I’m going to do everything I can, Lee. I promise you that. But I can’t make money from nothing.”

“Bullshit. You own a company worth millions of dollars, you have friends who are loaded. You’re just being a cheap bastard and looking out for yourself.”

I knew Lee was scared and pissed off and taking it out on me, but it didn’t change the fact that he was being a raging dick. “Fuck you, Lee. You think the millions of dollars the company is worth is piled in my basement? You think all my rich friends keep cash stuffed in mattresses?”

“If you really wanted to get it, you’d get it.”

“Just find out if they’ll take fifty now and the rest later.”

He hung up, but I knew he’d do it. He didn’t have any other options. It occurred to me to wonder why Hunter wasn’t calling me directly, but it was a momentary thought. I had other, more important things to worry about.

I parked in front of my dad’s house a few minutes later. I got out and shut the door gently behind me. I knew my dad had to be wrecked and, if he was getting some much-needed sleep, I didn’t want to wake him or scare him.

The house was quiet and dark, so I used my key and let myself in.

I stepped into the living room. There was a loud pop, followed by something whizzing by my ear, and a rain of plaster. I dropped to my belly, my crutches clattering to the floor next to me, and prayed Hunter wasn’t there waiting for me.

“Dad,” I shouted. “It’s Alex.”

There was a familiar grunt and a click. “For fuck’s sake, boy,” Dad said. “Why the hell you creeping up on me like that?”

I got to my feet and brushed myself off as my eyes adjusted to the dark room. My father, in his recliner, shotgun across his lap, was lit by the streetlights. I shook my head, crossed to the couch, and dropped onto the sagging cushions. “I thought you might be sleeping. What the hell are you doing sitting here in the dark with the rifle?”

“They took Willow, what’s stopping ‘em from coming for me? I’m not gonna go easy.”

I almost smiled, but the situation weighed too heavy for humor. “You need to come stay with me for a while, Dad.”

“You gonna pay them the money they want?”

I sighed. “I’m going to give them everything I have, but it’s not as much as they want.”

He grunted. “Your brother is a fucking idiot. If they don’t kill him, I’ll do it with my own hands.”

I might have argued with him, but I knew better. “Rick’s likely never going to darken your doorstep again. He’s not dumb enough to come back here.”

“What the hell happened with that boy? I raised him just the same as you and Willow. Where did I go wrong with him?”

“He’s a grown man. He made his own choices and that had nothing to do with how you raised him.”

“I’m going to pack you a bag and you’re going to come on home with me.”

He looked over at me, his eyes dropping to my casted ankle. “What the hell happened to you?”

“I slipped.”

He stared me down, waiting the way fathers know how to wait when they want answers.

“I was in the woods, hiking to impress a girl, and we slipped on a steep mountainside.”

He grunted. “People got no good reason to go into the woods. That’s what we got houses and streets and cities for, to avoid the wildlife.”

“Jill would agree with you,” It hurt to say her name, to think of the soft openness we’d shared and would likely never share again.

“You serious about this one? You going to bring her around to see me sometime?”

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