then toed it open enough to catch it with her elbow. “Billy Joe? I’m back. My car’s battery died again. That’s why I took the Toyota.”
She set the beer on the kitchen counter and listened. Nothing. The house felt empty. Where was he? He was always waiting at the door to make sure she got back from the grocery store not one minute later than he’d told her to be—with his cigarettes and beer.
An ominous thought occurred to her. Had something happened to her mother? She went through the house, but as she’d known, it was empty. Billy Joe wasn’t there. Nearly panicked, she ran back outside. The setting sun reflected on the tin roof of the garage, but she thought she could see a light on inside it. Billy Joe never left a room without turning off the light, just like he never left the house without checking the locks three times. And woe to anyone who didn’t put a tool or a book or even a ballpoint pen back exactly where they got it, down to the millimeter. So if the lights were on in the garage, then Billy Joe was in there.
From the first moment her mother had let him move in a few months ago, he’d taken over the garage. He’d kept it locked and never let her or Hannah near it. His reasoning was because he was working on his prized vintage Mustang Cobra and the engine had to stay free of dust. He was as obsessive about his cars as everything else.
Hannah walked across the driveway to the garage, her shoulders stiff, her heart thudding so hard it physically hurt. Maybe her mother was in there? It wasn’t the first time she’d thought that, but she was genuinely afraid of Billy Joe. After all, he’d pushed and slapped her mother a couple of times.
She wasn’t sure what she thought—or hoped—to find when she looked through the glass panes of the side door, but she couldn’t continue to sit by and do nothing while her mother was missing. Luckily, she’d just had her dialysis and wouldn’t need it again until the end of the week. But Hannah didn’t trust Billy Joe to take care of her. So although her stomach was already churning with nausea and a painful headache was making her light-headed, she was determined to see the inside of the garage.
Then she heard Billy Joe’s voice. She nearly jumped out of her skin. In the first instant, she thought he was yelling at her. But by the time she’d heard three or four unintelligible words, she realized that his tone wasn’t angry, it was afraid. Then she heard another voice. It was low and menacing, and she didn’t recognize it.
With horrible visions swirling in her head of her mother dying while Billy Joe and some buddy of his drank beer, she approached the door cautiously. She slid sideways along the outside wall until she was close enough to see through the glass panes, her heart beating so loudly in her ears that she was positive the people inside could hear it.
When she peeked through the dusty glass panes, Billy Joe’s back was to her, so she couldn’t see his face. He was standing in front of his workbench, arms spread plaintively, talking in an oddly meek voice.
Her gaze slid to the man standing in front of him. He was twice the size of Billy Joe. Not quite as tall but much larger. He had on a dark, dull-colored T-shirt that fit his weightlifter’s torso and beefy biceps like a glove. On the back of his right wrist was a tattoo. It was red and heart-shaped with what looked like letters in the center. Hannah blinked and squinted. Did it say MOM? She thought so, although the O wasn’t exactly an O. It was a dark circle. Before she could focus on it, the man reached behind his back and pulled a gun. The fluorescent light glinted off the steel barrel. Hannah stared at it, her pulse hammering in her throat.
Billy Joe froze in place. His voice took on an edge of shrill panic and he stepped backward and turned his palms out. “Hey, man, watch out with that thing. It could go off.” He laughed nervously. “I swear! You know everything I know. I’d never cheat the boss. I ain’t that stupid.”
Hannah saw a quick smirk flash across the other man’s face and knew he was thinking the same thing she was. Billy Joe was pretty stupid.
“So what happened to the drugs and the money?” the man said, not raising his voice. “Because our customer says he was shorted, and the last payment you sent to Mr. Ficone was short, as well. Mr. Ficone depends on his distributors to pay him so he can pay his suppliers. Now his suppliers are expecting to be paid everything they’re owed when Mr. Ficone meets with them in three days. So you’ve got three days to get that money to him.”
“I don’t know what happened to them, man. I had to use a new courier because my regular guy got picked up for not paying child support. Maybe he took it. I swear it was all there when I sealed the envelope. Or, hey, it coulda been the girl. Hannah Martin. My girlfriend’s daughter. Smart-mouthed bitch.” Billy Joe was sweating, literally. “She’s always snooping around. She probably stole the money out of the envelope. That new guy coulda left it lying around.”
The man with the red tattoo looked bored and disgusted. “I don’t think Mr. Ficone’s going to be satisfied with somebody else must have done it. He doesn’t like people that can’t control their people. That delivery was short almost twenty grand.”
“Twenty? That’s im-impossible,” Billy Joe stammered.
Beneath the fear, Hannah heard something in his voice she’d heard before. Billy Joe was lying.
He took another step backward, toward the door. “I’m telling you, it had to be Hannah Martin. She’s as sneaky as a fox. She musta got into it. I wouldn’t be surprised. But I swear, when I sealed that envelope, it was all there. I counted it.”
Hannah felt a heavy dread settle onto her chest, making it hard for her to breathe. He was throwing her to the wolves. She’d known he was trouble the minute she’d first laid eyes on him, and she’d tried to tell her mother, but Stephanie had never been smart when it came to men.
The man with the red tattoo shook his head. “Money doesn’t disappear from a sealed envelope,” he said. “I’ve got better things to do than stand here and listen to you lie. Mr. Ficone needs his money and he needs the drugs that were missing from your last delivery to our customer in Tulsa.”
“But, man, I swear—”
“Shut up with your whining,” the man yelled. “Where’s the money?”
Hannah jumped at the man’s suddenly raised voice. She shrank back against the wall by the door, terrified. He was holding a very big gun and his voice told her he was sick of Billy Joe’s rambling excuses.
What if he shot him? Everything inside her screamed “no!” Billy Joe was the only person in the world who knew where her mother was. She wanted to burst into the garage and beg the man to make Billy Joe tell her where her mother was, but the man looked ruthless and he was already sick of Billy Joe’s whining. If she called attention to herself, he was liable to shoot her, too.
“All right, punk. Mr. Ficone has no use for you if you’re not going to talk about where the money and the drugs are. That’s all he wants.”
Hannah shifted until she could see through the door again. She saw the man lift the barrel of the gun slightly, aiming it at Billy Joe.
“What he doesn’t want is screwups like you working for him. He hates people who can’t control their women. He hates thieves and he sure as hell hates loose ends.”
“Listen. I’ll get the money back. I’ve got a plan,” Billy Joe said, his hands doubling into fists. “My girlfriend’s sick. Real sick. And I kidnapped her. I’ve got her hidden away.”
Hannah gasped. Where? Tell him where, she begged silently.
“I
