Page 62 of Rooke
Jared Viorello’s lifeless eyes stare up at me, his neck a mangled mess. He was obviously balanced upright on the seat, but the movement of me shoving Jericho back there jostles the car and the head topples over, revealing blood and sinew, bone and tendons.
“Fuck.Me.” I give Jericho one last push and slam the door closed. On the other side of the street, Jericho’s heavies are leaning against the railings of a tall walkup. Alfonse points his fingers at me—a makeshift gun—and fires. “One hour. If he’s not back at the garage in one hour, you’re fucking dead men,” he shouts. “Your girls. Your families. Your friends.All. Fucking. Dead.”
Three seconds later, Jake and I are burning through the snow in a stolen Nissan with an unconscious gang leader and a decapitated murder victim as cargo.
“How bad is it?” I try and pull Jake’s hands from his stomach, but he holds them there tight. He’s ghostly pale and shaking.
“About as bad as you’d expect,” he says evenly. “I’ve been shot in the stomach. I’m probably fucking dying. Go on. You can say it.”
“Say what?”
“I should never have grabbed that guy’s gun. I should have sat fucking still. I should have—”
“Shut the fuck up. Right now. Shut the fuck up. This is on me, not you.” I punch the steering wheel, growling under my breath. This is not good. This is seriously not fucking good. “Don’t worry. I’m gonna get you fixed up.”
Margot is the last person who will want to see me right now, especially after this afternoon’s encounter, but there aren’t any other options. Jake passes out on the journey to her place. I park in the underground lot beneath her building, and then I drag Jericho’s still lifeless body out of the backseat and I heft him into the trunk. Skylines aren’t known for their roomy storage space; it takes three attempts to get the damn thing to close. I take off my jacket and I throw it over Jared’s head, still on the back seat, and then I’m carrying my best friend to the elevators. His gunshot wound seems to have stopped bleeding now, and I’m fairly sure that’s not a good thing. He’s probably just out of blood.
On the fifth floor, I stand outside the door I practically hammered down only a couple of hours ago, and I do it all over again. I smash my fist against the wood until Margot opens up. She takes one look at me and shakes her head.
“Oh no. No way.You have got to be fucking kidding me.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
THE BRIDGE
SASHA
A watched pot never boils. How many times have I heard this during my lifetime, and why do I keep on staring at this damn cell phone? I physically cannot stop myself. He hasn’t called. He hasn’t texted. It’s been three hours and I haven’t heard from him at all.
“For crying out loud, Sasha, quit bouncing your knee. You’re making me nervous.” Ali puts the third cup of coffee she’s made for me down on the coffee table, shooting a hateful sideways glance at Andrew in the process. He’s standing at the window, looking out onto the street, his back to us, but I’m pretty sure he must be able to feel the fire and brimstone Ali is sending his way. He hasn’t said more than three words since we got here.
“Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Ali hisses. “What the fuck ishedoing in town?”
“I can hear you, y’know. I came because I was worried about Sasha. Is that a crime?”
“A bit late to be showing your sensitive side now, isn’t it?” Ali snaps.
My head is spinning and I feel sick to my stomach. I am going out of my mind with worry. “Stop! Just stop. Please. Jesus wept. You’re driving me mad. Can you both please just…not? The deafening silence was better than you two bickering.”
Ali sits down, dealing me a cool look. She’s just trying to protect me, I know, but I’m wound too tight right now. I shouldn’t have snapped. I should be keeping my head but it’s so hard when—
My cellphone bursts into life. I nearly drop it in my haste to answer, adrenaline firing like gasoline through my body. “Hello? Rooke, god, where are you?”
“Ms. Connor?” The voice on the other end of the line does not belong to Rooke. It belongs to someone much older, far gruffer, if that’s humanly possible. The hope that just flooded my body disintegrates in a heartbeat. “Ms. Connor, this is Detective Jacobi. You may remember we met at the hospital recently?”
Jacobi. How could I forget? I can’t hide the disappointment in my voice. “How can I help you, Detective?”
“I thought you’d like to know that we’ve apprehended the man who broke into the museum and assaulted you. His name is Casper Reins. An ex-Marine. He was found wandering the streets in the early hours of the morning, disoriented and badly injured.”
I lean forward, elbows on knees, pressing the phone against the side of my head, unable to blink. “You found him? He’s in custody?”
“Yes. He suffers from severe schizophrenia. And you were right. You hit him pretty hard by the looks of things. He was admitted to Mount Sinai this morning.”
“Am I in trouble?”
“No. No. You were defending yourself. And he admitted to killing the security guard. There’s still some paperwork that will need to be—”
He talks on the other end of the phone for a while, but who knows what he says. They have him. The cops have Casper. The relief I experience is crushing. I can hardly catch my breath. No more worrying that I’m going to wake up in the middle of the night and he’ll be there, standing at the foot of my bed. No more looking over my shoulder.
