Page 15 of Triple Threat

“How long are you planning on keeping me here?” I finally asked sometime later as he clipped up the last of my hair to cure.

“As long as Lach requires,” he said with a shrug.

“You always do what this Lock says?” I demanded.

He limped around me and leaned his butt against the makeup counter in front of me. He folded his gloved hands in his lap and met my eyes and unequivocally said, “Yes.”

I shuddered and looked away. I didn’t know what to make of his fervent sincerity, I just knew that I had to get out. Somehow, someway. I had this stifling feeling that staying here would not end well for me.

Chapter Seven

Lachlan…

The house at Bootlegger Head was a very comfortable place. Roan very much loved his creature comforts, the overdone kitchen, the mock tavern bar thing, all the halls and rooms, locked doors, the massive television, and all the rest. He talks about some foreign word that means the longing for home when you’re traveling. Maybe that was a thing for someone who didn’t travel like I did and who had always had a home to return to... Me? I didn’t long for the big house on the head, but I was a creature of comfort, too. I stayed in five-star hotels at exclusive destinations, and everything was the best that could be had.

The Lamborghini gave a contented growl as I pulled into the garage. I had the urge to rev the engine, just to listen to the sound of the Italian V12 echo off the concrete walls.Fuck it.I revved the engine, grinning with satisfaction as the tach jumped to 7,000 RPM. After a minute, I cut the car off, and the silence was almost deafening.

I let myself in through the garage access door. The sedan totally looked like shit; the side shredded by the guardrail I’d hit to avoid Sadie. I hadn’t thought about it in the last day or so, but that was the point of avoiding the house for a few days, besides the usual post-job cool-off. I knew he had it under control, but it was annoying just the same to see the car was still there.

I deposited my travel bag near the inside door and paused. Roan wasn’t clumping up the hallway yet, and I didn’t hear anything else. The concealed door to the Bat Cave was a few feet inside, hidden in wood paneling. I pressed in the right place and the latch gave a consenting click and then popped open. One thing I did particularly like about this ancient house was all the secrecy it held, the hidden doors, the spyholes, all of that Prohibition era jazz. I stepped in and then down several steps.

The room was large enough, it had been a private speakeasy, and a place where business deals were done. There were three doors – one led out onto the grounds, an escape tunnel through the boathouse, the second was a winding staircase to the roof, and the last was the door I had just used. The center of the room was dominated by a multi-screen desk, computer monitors, light-up keyboards, and the rest of that hacker business. The Bat Cave, the Roan Corral – he hated that one.

My knuckles cracked and I shook my fingers out, like a concert piano player before playing, and I attacked Roan’s keyboards. I shuffled through several significant numbers, guessing at his passwords, and hit the green lights with 1664, the number of his recovery room after he lost his leg. I shook my head, all the times he fussed at me about using predictable passwords and personally significant numbers.Jeez, man, take your own advice.

I clicked around until I found the closed-circuit security system. Almost every room in the house had a concealed camera or three. The Bat Cave didn’t have any cameras, the closets didn’t, but almost everywhere else did. I found both of them. Sadie seemed like she was sulking in her new room. The dress looked like silk, hair was suitably dark, but it looked like an amateur job, no lowlights, no highlights, just monochrome. I didn’t like it. It still wasn’t her. I bet he’d done it himself, or just gave her a box of dye. Still, I had to give it to him – she looked better now that she was clean.

Roan was sitting in the living room, something playing on the big ninety-six inch television. It was all streaming, and it only took a minute to find that feed. I waited a second before switching whatever western he was watching for something much more suitable, like a home shopping program.

And waited.

I heard Roan come clomping down the hall. The door latch made its little sound, and when the door opened, I was poised in a perfectly disrespectful pose. I saw the indignation tighten around his eyes, his lips. My feet were propped up on his precious workstation, keyboards shoved out of place, and I took a drink of his special alcohol-free botanical whatever.

“What in the, and I cannot stress this enough, actualfuck, are you doing, mate?”

“This?” I pointed at the bottle. “This is just awful. Is this cinnamon and orange?”

“It is, and it’s mine, and bloody hell, use a glass,” he said, and made to snatch the bottle out of my hand.

“Easy there, Admiral,” I said and kept him from grabbing it. “Do you seriously drink this?”

“When I feel like it, yes,” Roan said. “I would ask when you got back but I’m pretty sure the entire bloody countryside heard you pretending to be a redneck in the garage.” I grinned at him, and relented, letting him finally have his bottle of whatever it was. He gripped it tightly, fingers white.Man, you need to get out, blow off some of this steam.

“I’ve taken care of your girl, but she’s a bloody wildcat,” he complained.

“I saw.” I gestured to the bank of monitors.

“How did you get in?” Roan demanded.

“I ran a hacking… subroutine, and it… decrypted… the frag drive…” I said, groping around for whatever the fuck sounded good.

“You bloody ass,” Roan hissed.

“Sixteen sixty-four, man, you deserve worse,” I said. “You keep anything real hidden around here or do I really have to walk all the way to the Buckingham Bar?”

“It’s the Black-Eyed Susan,” he said.

“It’s the home bar, and no matter how hard you try, Roan, you can’t force an American version of the Rose and Crown,” I said. He gave me a rude gesture, and I grinned. “And you need to lighten up, just a little bit.”

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