Page 3 of My Solemn Vow
“Or we can do this the hard way. I extract a variety of?—”
Three beeps from the tablet behind me demand my attention.
Quickly, I move back to the tablet and find the alert for the motion detector in Kerrianne’s room. She’s tossing and turning in bed.Go to sleep, little raptor. Deep breaths, count the spikes on a stegosaurus.Because why would my child count sheep when she could be the little badass she is and want a stegosaurus instead?
“What’s going on?” The man tries to get my attention, which seems counterintuitive.
If someone tells you he’ll kill you, maybe try to get out of his way and be less seen or less heard.
Kerrianne rolls over one last time and stops moving. I give her another couple of seconds before turning back to the dead man.
“Listen, as much as I wouldn’t mind staying up all night torturing you, I’m running out of patience. I would like to go sit down, pop open a beer, and enjoy my evening. How about you tell me what I know you know, I kill you quickly, and then I get on with my life?” I stalk back toward him, grabbing a tool off the table, not even looking at what it is until I’m closer.
“I don’t know anything. I don’t know who you are. I don’t?—”
He screams as I hit him in the chest with the tool. I apparently grabbed a handheld gardening rake, and the three tines dig in under his collarbone. It should miss the lungs.
“I don’t have all night.” I warn him, but if he wants to play stupid, then I’ll let him know what I know. Maybe he’ll fill in the gaps.
I leave the gardening rake in his chest—you’re not supposed to pull out embedded objects, after all—and grab the paperwork my father left me. There’s something nice about the analog nature of this act. Technology, no matter how good you are, is easier to hack into than a manila folder with contents printed on flash paper and locked in a drawer, rigged to start on fire at the flip of a switch.
“You’re Mick ‘The Brick’ Sharpman,” I tell him, looking him over. There’s nothing very big or blocky about him to warrantthat nickname but whatever. “You’re a low-level money launderer. Apparently, you don’t care too much about paying out your dues to the right family. Seems you’ve been paying us ten percent but taking fifteen percent to Don D’Medici and... delivering information along with that money to him.”
“No. I never even. I don’t know who Don is.” Mick ‘The Brick’ stumbles over his words.
“No, Don isn’t his name, it’s his title.” I pinch the bridge of my nose. “What about Gregorio, or are you working with his consigliere, Eduardo? They’re slimy. Italian businessman types.”
The realization has Mick sputtering. No words escape his lips, only broken syllables.
“Tell me.” I step toward him, this time with a hammer in my hand. “Everything I need to know about what you and the D’Medici family were up to.”
“I didn’t know he was the Mafia guy. I didn’t. This guy Greg and his brother, Ed, approached me. The guy... He said that if I gave him fifteen percent of my earnings, he’d invest it. If I couldget him information on where the next big fights were at and if there were any shipments moving, he’d... he’d...” Mick eyes my hammer, and I heft it up, letting it flop heavily into my palm.
“He’d what exactly?” I lean forward, getting eye to eye with Mick.
“He’d make sure that my investment did well. That he’d personally back it with interest on the payout at the end of the year.” Mick keeps his eyes on the hammer.
“Don’t worry, Mick.” I step back from him and put the blunt instrument on the countertop. “A hammer doesn’t work when you’re looking for more detailed information. It’s more of a ‘yes or no answer’ kind of implement.”
I exchange it for a pair of shears, and Mick bellows, imagining, I’m sure, what I’ll do to him with these. The sound is so loud that I miss the first buzzer. But his wail dies in his throat, and the proximity sensor of Kerrianne’s bedroom door goes off.
I dart back around to the screen, abandoning the shears on the table. Kerrianne is in her wolf form. The little dark gray ball of fluff is destroying her already shredded pajamas and trying to tear through the bedding and the mattress.
Again? It’s the third time this month.I let out an exhausted sigh and look back at Mick.
He’s not in a good way, but he most likely won’t die in the time it takes me to get my pup back to bed.
“Sit here and think about what you’ve done, Mick. When I get back, I want a full report of all the things you’ve told Greg and Ed.” I wag my finger at him and walk toward the exit.
After closing all the layers of soundproofing, I head back through the secret passage to the main part of the house.
Up another flight of stairs and down the hallway, I hear her little growls and snarls. The ferocity of a forty-pound puppy brings out my wolf instincts. But I don’t shift. Instead, I open the door, and the movement startles her.
When she sees me, she whines and cries. Kerrianne nearly trips over her big puppy feet as she hops off the bed and makes her way over with her head lowered, knowing what she’s done wrong. I kneel on the floor before her, and Kerrianne crawls into my lap, nibbling and biting up my neck. Her puppy breath reminds me again and again that she’s just a baby.
She won’t be this little forever.I sigh and drop myself down to my butt and settle in on the floor. Her puppy form is so much closer in color to Holly’s than mine. Dark brown markings are becoming clearer in her coat, and the lighter spots seem to grow smaller with each growth spurt.
My little pup is struggling, and I love her more than all the pajamas and bedding in the entire world.
