Slow Agony (2 page)

What the hell?

“You’ve got mail,” said my phone.

I jumped. Jesus.

I opened the new text.

“Tell Griffin to call this number or your friend dies.”

I dropped the phone.

No.

No, this was not happening. It had been over a year since men from Op Wraith were chasing me and trying to kill me. It had been over a year since I’d gotten the phone call from my friend Stacey. I could still hear her terrified voice on the phone, telling me that men with guns wanted me there.

I hadn’t been in time to save Stacey.

I’d never forgive myself for that. Not really.

Why was it happening again? There was no one left at Operation Wraith. Two of the heads of the operation were dead, and my father and Jolene French both had complete amnesia. There wasn’t anyone left to try to hurt me.

Except this message was for Griffin, wasn’t it?

Whoever had done this wanted Griffin, not me. Not Naomi. We were both caught in the crossfire here. And the problem was that I had no idea where Griffin was. I hadn’t seen him since February, and he’d been so angry when he left that he hadn’t bothered to give me a way to reach him.

I picked the phone back up. I looked at the picture of Naomi. I bit my lip.

Hell.

What was I going to do?

I could try calling this number and explaining that Griffin and I broke up, and that I didn’t know where he was. But I was pretty sure that wouldn’t get me anywhere. They wouldn’t believe me. They’d probably just kill Naomi.

So.

What should I do? Should I call the police?

Yes. That was the smart thing to do, right? I’d call the police. I dialed 911 on my phone.

“So, this Griffin guy is your ex-boyfriend?” said the police officer in my living room. He was holding my phone. There was a fire truck, an ambulance, and two cop cars parked outside my apartment. Apparently, a 911 call like this was out of the ordinary for Thomas, WV.

I nodded.

“And he was messed up with bad people?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I don’t really know much about it.”

“You don’t know where he is.”

I shook my head.

The police were not being a lot of help. First of all, they’d called the number the texts had come from, even though I didn’t want them to. I was afraid it would mean that Naomi got hurt.

But it hadn’t caused any negative consequences. They got a voice mail that said that Griffin needed to meet Marcel in Atlantic City in two weeks.

“And you don’t have any idea who this Marcel is?” said the police officer.

I shook my head again. “I never heard of anyone like that.” It was true. He could have been someone else from Op Wraith, I supposed, but I really didn’t know. Griffin hadn’t talked about that stuff very much. It was painful for him, and I hadn’t pushed.

“All right,” he said. “Well, we’re looking for your friend, Naomi. And if you can think of any way to get in touch with your ex-boyfriend, maybe you should.”

And that was it. They said they’d have a cop car making the rounds near my house in case anything happened.

Then they left.

I felt like calling the police hadn’t been particularly productive. They were looking for Naomi, so that was good. But right now she was still tied up somewhere. Hurt. Scared. And because of me. Because of Griffin. Because I dated Griffin. Trouble seemed to follow me, it seemed. And the people I became friends with.

I couldn’t let anything happen to Naomi. I stared at her picture on my phone, at the fear in her eyes. I needed to do something.

That was when I saw it.

In the background of the picture, right behind Naomi’s head, I saw the edge of a windowsill. I recognized it.

Before I met Griffin, I used to sometimes party out in this abandoned house a few miles out of town. There had been a fire there, and it was only partially standing. It was completely ruined, a falling-down, gutted place. I hadn’t been there in a while. But there was something distinctive about that windowsill. I would know it anywhere.

I knew where Naomi was.

I started to dial the police again.

Then I stopped. They hadn’t been all that helpful just now, had they?

Instead, I went to my kitchen, opened a drawer and pulled everything out of it. I threw it on the counter—rubber bands, beer caps, knick knacks, and other junk. The drawer had a false bottom.

I moved it out of the way, and there was a gun hidden down there. Griffin had insisted we have them just to be cautious. He’d taken some of the hidden guns with him when he left. But he hadn’t taken this one.

I took it out of the drawer, along with a box of ammunition. I began to load it.

I parked pretty far away from the abandoned house. I didn’t want to spook whoever had Naomi. Assuming he was still there. He’d taken the picture here, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t loaded her into a trunk or something and driven off.

It was May, and it had been pretty warm the past few days. Even though it was the wee hours of the morning, it wasn’t too cold. The jacket I’d put on to conceal the fact I’d tucked the gun into the waist of my pants was a little too warm. I was sweating.

Maybe I was only sweating because I was terrified, though. I’d never done anything like this on my own before.

After I got out of my car, I walked into the woods and traveled near the tree line until I got close to the abandoned house. It was what Griffin would have done.

But Griffin would have been quieter than I was. He could creep through the woods. I never seemed to be able to do it without making the dead leaves crunch under my feet. Too loud.

I walked as carefully and quietly as I could, keeping my eyes out for anyone who might be watching for me.

I didn’t see anything but trees and undergrowth and the starry night sky.

The abandoned house came into view within a few minutes. It had been white once. Now, most of the siding had been singed off, and it was dulled by the smoke from the fire that destroyed it. Mud and time hadn’t done it any favors either. I couldn’t describe the color as anything other than a dingy gray now.

One side of the house had collapsed, but the other side still had a roof and even some windows with cracked glass in them. The tall grass was littered with beer bottles and cigarette butts. Like I said, this place was used as a party hangout in the summer.

I crouched in the woods behind a tree, looking and listening. Was there anyone inside the house?

I couldn’t see anything. The house was dead and dark. Nothing stirred behind its windows. All I could hear was the distant sound of an occasional car traveling down an adjacent road and my own heartbeat crashing against my skull.

She was probably gone.

Or maybe she wasn’t here at all. Maybe she was some other place with distinctive windowsills, and I was completely off base.

A low whistle cut through the silence.

I froze, gripping the tree trunk. My heart thudded even faster.

There was someone inside that house, and he was whistling “Oh My Darling, Clementine.”

Oh God. I swallowed hard, unsure of what to do.

Was it the person who’d captured Naomi?

I had to get closer. I had to see.

I stayed low as I left the cover of the woods, darting through the overgrown lawn until I was right at the house. I flattened myself against the dingy siding, struggling to keep my breath soft and steady.

I could swear I was gasping far too loudly.

The whistling continued uninterrupted.

He hadn’t heard me.

Slowly, I crept along the side of the house until I came to a window. I peered inside.

It was the old kitchen. The appliances had long been ripped out, and there was only a sink along the wall, its faucet glinting dully in the moonlight. The paint on the cabinets was warped and peeling from the heat of the fire.

I moved past the window to the next one.

That window had been busted open, and there were shards of glass outside. They crunched under my feet as I got close.

I stopped moving at the noise, trying to melt into the house.

The whistling stopped.

Chapter Two

Shit
. He’d heard me.

What the hell was I doing here, anyway? Why hadn’t I called the police? I didn’t know what I was doing. Griffin was the one who was good at this stuff, not me. I’d always just tagged along for the ride. I bit my lip hard, waiting.

There was the sound of footsteps within the house. A man’s voice, heavy with a New York accent. “You hear that, sweetheart?”

A muffled sound, almost like a cry. Was that Naomi?

“Maybe our Griffin’s already found us. Wouldn’t that be nice?”

It was him. And Naomi must be here too.

Anger surged through me, white hot. I reached into my jacket and took the gun out of the waist of my pants. It was cool and heavy in my hands. My heart seemed to steady, and my breathing evened out. Holding the gun had calmed me.

I took a step forward, looking in the window. The voice hadn’t sounded too close, but I couldn’t be sure.

The room inside the window was empty except for a moth-eaten blanket in one corner and an empty six pack of Bud Light.

Clutching my weapon, I kept moving.

“Griffin?” said the man. “That you? Did you miss me? Your old jailhouse pal?”

He was in the front of the house. I could hear that now. I quickened my movement, heading up to the corner.

“I missed you. I missed everything about you.”

He was just around the corner. I lifted the gun, took a deep breath.

And whipped around the front of the house, gun first.

He was as tall as Griffin, maybe taller. He was wearing a clingy white tank top that showed off all his muscles. His arms were covered in winding tattoos. He was sneering, but he was surprised to see me. “You?”

“Where’s Naomi?” I said.

“Where’s Griffin?” he countered, taking a step towards me.

“Hold it,” I said. “I
will
shoot you.”

He laughed. “You really aren’t that scary, blondie.”

I squeezed the trigger.

Motherfucking safety was still on. I disengaged it, feeling flustered.

He was really laughing now, still walking towards me. “Come on, now. Why don’t you just put down that gun, and—”

I pulled the trigger again.

The gun kicked in my hand and the sound exploded through the air.

The man gurgled, his expression stricken. His hands were clutching his neck.

I could see that he was bleeding, blood gushing from his throat. I grimaced, feeling sick. I’d just shot a man.

He gazed at the blood on his hand in disbelief.

I took a step away from him.

He reached for me with his bloody hand, staring at me, pleading with his eyes for me to do something.

I put my hand over my mouth. Oh. Oh God.

He fell to his knees, one hand still clutching his throat.

Then he fell face down on the porch of the abandoned house, thudding against the old wood.

I was shaking. I lowered my gun. I walked around his body and into the abandoned house. “Naomi?”

I heard her cry out, but her voice was muffled.

I followed the noise until I found her. She was tied up just like she had been in the picture. I knelt next to her. “Oh God, Naomi, I am so sorry.”

I pulled the duct tape away from her mouth.

She shrieked.

“Sorry,” I said again, wincing.

“Leigh? What the fuck is going on?”

I got to work untying her. “It’s complicated, Naomi. I don’t really know, but we need to get out of here, okay?”

“Are the police with you?” she said.

“No,” I said. “We can call them, though.” Or... Should I do that? I’d just killed a man with a gun that I didn’t have a permit to own. “Well, maybe we shouldn’t call them.”

Her hands were free, and she helped me work on the knots at her feet. “Why not?”

“It’s complicated.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

I helped her to her feet. “You’re okay, right? You’re okay?”

“No,” she said. “That man kidnapped me and tied me up and hit me over the head.” She touched the wound on her forehead. “I’m the farthest thing from okay there is.”

“Right,” I said. “Well, let’s get you back to my apartment so that you can get cleaned up, okay?”

“Your apartment? Leigh, I want to go to the hospital. I want to file a police report against that asshole, and I want him locked up. And I want—”

“He’s dead,” I said. I led her out of the house, onto the porch. His body was lying there. His blood was soaking into the wooden boards. There was a lot of blood.

“Oh my God, Leigh,” said Naomi. “What happened?”

“I shot him,” I said.

Naomi backed away from me. “You what?”

I looked back at the man. “I had to.” I turned to her. “I don’t like killing people, but he was hurting you, and he was threatening Griffin, and—”

“You killed people before?”

“Only one,” I said.

“Only...” She shook her head very slowly, horror all over her face.

I gulped. “Naomi, please. We have to get out of here. And we can’t go to the police, because I’m not supposed to have this gun.”

Of course, there was the little problem of the fact that I’d reported all of this to them earlier that night. How was I going to get around that? Tell them it was all a misunderstanding? This was a mess. I had no idea what to do.

Naomi took a shaky breath. Then her eyes rolled up in her head, and she fell to the ground. She’d fainted.

Naomi was wrapped in a blanket, sitting on my couch. She’d let me clean and bandage the cut on her forehead. She seemed fairly calm. She was taking most of this okay. “So, you’re saying that Griffin used to be an assassin.”

“Yeah,” I said. “He worked for a secret wing of an arms corporation. But last year, we shut them down, so I don’t know who this guy was. He said something about jail, so maybe he didn’t have anything to do with Op Wraith. Maybe he was someone who was in jail with Griffin.”

“Griffin was in jail?”

“Yeah, when he was a kid. He robbed a store with a toy gun and got tried as an adult.”