Ceasefire (20 page)

I
thought about Joey.  My stupid decisions may have ruined his life when all I
wanted was to make it better for him.

I
thought about Dreama.  Maybe she was right.  Maybe I was a disappointment.

I
thought about Finn.  Finally, we’d found each other again, and we were about to
be ripped apart.

I
thought about Michelle, trying to understand why she was in Roman’s office.

If
it hadn’t been for her, we could’ve run.  I had enough in the bank to buy a new
start somewhere.  It wouldn’t be much, not at all, but we could’ve been far
away.  We could’ve thrown some things in a suitcase and vanished.  Maybe with
Finn, maybe not.  I’d like to think so.

No. 
I know so.

Why,
Michelle?  Why were you here?

I
stood in front of Roman’s closed office door, listening.  I couldn’t hear
anything.

My
legs were numb.

I
knocked.

Roman’s
enraged voice boomed from the other side.  “Get in here!”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

I
stepped into Roman’s office not knowing what to expect.  Would the place where
I’d agreed to work for him now have two dead bodies on the floor?  Would the
place where I’d manipulated him with sex, long before I ever considered that I
had feelings for him, now be a crime scene?  I’d been there so many times, but
it felt like I was walking into a place I’d never seen before. 

The
spotless furniture.  The thick, beautiful area rug, ruined.  The rows and rows
of books.

So
familiar.  So foreign.

Warm
sunlight cast yellow swaths across the room.  The river ran lazily along
outside.

The
air smelled different.  Metallic.

Roman
stood in a blood-smeared suit.  Harris’s limp, lifeless body had been dragged
off into a corner.  I got lightheaded looking at it.  I’d been to funerals
before and had seen people—mostly grandparents—in their caskets, but nothing
can compare to the sight of someone that’s just so…
dead
, in a place
where they shouldn’t be that way.

I
didn’t have time to dwell on it.  I averted my eyes, trying to pretend it
wasn’t there, yet it was unavoidable.

Michelle
sat behind the desk with her hair in matted tangles, mascara streaking down her
face, lipstick smeared off to one side.  It was as if someone had taken a dirty
rag to her normal, spotless excellence and swiped at it, haphazardly and
without regard to what she might look like after.  She’d been crying, but now,
she sat with resigned tolerance.  Lips pursed, nostrils flaring, staring into
nothing.  Not making eye contact, so frightened that she was in shock or had
slipped into a catatonic state.

Roman
stood behind her.  He held a knife against her throat, the tip of it digging
into her vein.  He glanced up at the clock.  “Three, two, one.  Thirty minutes,
Kim.  You almost cut it too close.”  He chuckled.  “Listen to me. 
Cut
. 
Such an appropriate word,” he said, then lightly twisted the tip of the knife
into Michelle’s skin.

She
winced.  The small jolt of pain snapped her back to reality.  She didn’t move
her head, but instead, she managed to turn her pleading eyes up to me, silently
mouthing, “I’m sorry.”

“Let
her go, Roman.  This is between you and me.  She didn’t do anything.”

“Oh,
is that so?” he said, shaking his head.  “She didn’t help you cut my business
in half?”

“Let. 
Her.  Go.”  I inched toward the desk, fists clenched, then remembered the
plan.  Ever so slightly, I began moving to my left, toward the windows.  I
needed Roman to turn toward me.  I needed his back facing the rear entrance.

“Stop!”
he barked.  Roman poked the knife deeper.  A trickle of blood seeped down
Michelle’s neck.  “That’s far enough.”

Damn
it, no, it isn’t, I thought.  He’d be able to spot Finn from the corner of his
eye.  Just a little further.  A couple more feet. 

Did
I dare test him?  Would he
really
kill Michelle if I continued trying to
angle him around?  I didn’t know.  I couldn’t know. 

Think
about it, Kim. 
Think
.

Roman
was smart enough to realize that Harris the hitman was the type of person that
wouldn’t easily be missed.  Killing someone so underground and off the grid
like that might take weeks before anyone would notice.

Michelle,
on the other hand, had plenty of friends and family in the area.  She had a
well-known, well-connected realtor husband that would be expecting her home. 
Even if Roman killed us both, the risk of being identified as the murderer was
too great.  He’d called.  He’d given me thirty minutes.  He wasn’t an
irrational person.  He had to understand that I could’ve talked to any number
of people during that time.

Okay,
no, I thought.  He’s posturing, trying to threaten us.  He’s never made a move
without weighing the risk against the reward.  It’s all for show.  Harris’s
death was probably in self-defense and he’d never kill us, angry or not.  Kill
us and lose all this?  No way.  It’s a scare tactic, Kim.  Keep moving.  Turn
his body.

I
held up my hands and said, “Roman, please, just put the knife down and we’ll
talk, okay?”

“Stop
moving, Kim!  One more inch and I shove it through her neck.”

Michelle
gasped.

I
froze.  I waited until he glanced down at her and then quickly peeked over his
shoulder.  The angle was risky, but doable.  Finn could do it if he timed it
well enough.

Roman
almost caught me.

I
raised both hands up to the side of my head, palms outward.  “Roman—Roman, I’m
sorry.  I’d say it was just business, but we both know that’s not the truth.  I
was hurt and angry.”

“And
you were stupid.”

“Yeah,
stupid.  So stupid.  Look, I promise you…let Michelle go, let me go, and we’ll
shut ourselves down, okay?  I’ll make sure that Lucy and all the rest of them
come back to you and it’ll be like before.  You’ll be the king of the mountain
again and…and, we’re done.  We walk away and things go back to the way they
were.  That’s what you want, right?”

“It’s
not that easy, Kim.  Aren’t you forgetting something?”  He tilted his head at
Harris’s lifeless body.  “You tried to have me killed.”

The
stillness hung over us, thick and cloying.  It was true, and I had no excuse
for it.  While I fumbled for the right words in my mind—an apology wouldn’t be
enough—I heard the soft click of the rear door from down the hallway.  If I’d
heard it, I was certain Roman had, too.  I was right.  He flicked his head
around.

To
distract him, I shouted, “I was terrified, Roman.”

He
turned back to me.

Good,
good, keep looking this way, you bastard.

“You
had that guy almost kill Lucy.  And Melissa.  And Hillary.  You put them in the
hospital, Roman.  If you would’ve seen them, if you would’ve seen how close to
death they’d been, all those bruises and broken bones, then you’d know why I
was so scared.  I thought you’d come after
me
next, and I was trying to
protect myself, and Michelle.  And our business.  So, yeah,” I continued,
pointing at Harris’s body, “he was supposed to kill you.  I’m sorry.  I know
that doesn’t make up for it, but whatever, I don’t have anything else to say
about it, other than—other than, it was self defense.  I thought you wanted to
kill
me
.  That’s it.  End of story.  Take it or leave it.”

My
words were risky, but I had to keep him distracted long enough for Finn to get
down the hallway.  It worked.  From the corner of my eye, straining to keep my
focus ahead and not give him away, I saw a hint of movement.

The
expression on Roman’s face was one of total confusion.  A single arched
eyebrow, mouth hanging open, upper lip partially curled.  “What’re you talking
about?  They were in the hospital?” he asked.

“Roman. 
Seriously.  Playing dumb is beneath you.”

“Are
they okay? 
What
guy, Kim?”

I
scoffed and shook my head.  I lifted my top, showing him my bare stomach and
chest.  “Not wearing a wire.  See?”

“One
last time—what guy?  I didn’t hire anybody.”

“You
didn’t?”

“No,
I don’t know what you’re talking about.  When did it happen?”

“You
didn’t hire somebody to hurt them for revenge?”

“What? 
For God’s sake, no.  You think I’d take that chance?  What if it got traced
back to me somehow?  I’d lose everything.  And, and, even if I had found out it
was you who’d stolen my girls before today, why in the hell would I ruin my
product if I wanted to get it back?”

Either
Roman should’ve earned an Academy Award for his performance, or he legitimately
had no idea what I meant.  He’d moved away from Michelle.  She remained
seated.  Roman’s back was completely to the hallway where Finn waited.

“Wait,”
I said, slinking backward, closer to the window.  “You didn’t find out until
today
?”

Frustrated,
he shook his head.  “You covered your tracks well, and damn, whatever you were
paying the traitors that left me to keep their mouths shut, it worked.  I
couldn’t get a peep out of them, and I definitely didn’t sign them up for a
beat down.”

“Then
who did?”

“Wasn’t
me.  The only thing I know is, that guy right there,” he said, pointing the
knife at Harris, “he shows up here this afternoon asking questions, threatening
me, pulls a gun, but he’s big and slow, so I get him right in the neck with the
knife.  Stupid me, I’m so freaked out that I killed somebody, I didn’t go up
front and lock the door.  The one day Alice is gone.  Can you believe it?  Ten
minutes later, your girlfriend plows into my office like she owns the place
while I’m sitting here trying to figure out whether or not to call the cops.

“She’s
so jazzed up, she doesn’t even see the body at first, so she’s standing there
rattling off all this stuff about how things had gotten out of control and she
just wants it to be over with.  She wasn’t making any sense at all, so I asked
her what she’s talking about and she says you guys stole
my
escorts for
your
business.  Then, here’s the funny thing, she tells me she doesn’t want to see
anybody else get hurt and she thinks that I might be in danger, that you might
have one of Wickam’s people coming after me, and I’m like, ‘You mean that guy
right there?’  She screams and faints on me, then I lost it and called you. 
Now, after all that, after all this shit, you tell me, Kim.  Who did you piss
off enough to hurt Lucy and the others?  Because it wasn’t me.  I love those
women like they’re family.  It wasn’t me.”

I
was glad that Finn hadn’t made a move yet.  I needed to hear that, but that
left me clueless as to who the culprit could be.  Roman was right.  Who did I
piss off enough to put three women in the hospital?

We
stared at each other until Michelle’s voice broke the silence.

Softly,
barely above a whisper, she said, “He wasn’t supposed to hurt them so badly.”

Roman
and I turned to her, unsure of what we’d heard. 

Michelle
stood up from the desk.  The blood seeping down her neck from the knife’s
pinprick had stained her white top.  She looked drained.  Pale.  Exhausted.

“What
did you say?” I asked, moving toward her.  “Roman, put that knife down. 
Roman—please.” 

He
threw it to the floor, moved to the side, and sat down in a chair with a hand
covering his mouth.

I
repeated, “What did you say?”  Michelle reached out to hug me and I shoved her
away.  “Michelle?  What did you do?”

“Kim—I
never meant—please—”

I
had to shove her again.  “Get away from me.  Did
you
do it?  Did
you
hire somebody to hurt them?”

Michelle
nodded, tugged at her sleeves, face twisted in agony.

“
Why
? 
How did you even know where to hire some—some thug?”

“Through
a client.  He…he had connections.”

I
didn’t know what I was feeling.  Anger.  Confusion.  Disbelief.  “Why?  Why
would you do that?”

“Because,”
she whimpered, “because I wanted the old Kim back.”

Veins
bulging, muscles clenched, I roared, “You helped me start the business!  Why? 
Tell me!  It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Think
about it, Kim, you were an escort.  A call girl.  A prostitute, whatever.  You
disappeared on me, my best friend.  You were my sister.  You were a
hooker
and you lied to me for months and I just wanted you out of that life,
completely.  But then that thing with him happened.  You were so…so upset about
him,” she said, acknowledging Roman, “and at first I thought, yeah, I’d help
you get over him.  I thought maybe the whole process of starting the business
would get it off your mind and then you’d finally decide that shuffling escorts
around wasn’t for you.  But then you just kept going and going, so I spent more
and more of your money hoping you’d get frustrated and call the whole thing
off, but then that didn’t happen either.”

I
wanted to slap her.  I didn’t.  I screamed again instead.  “Michelle!  We sat
right there in my office—that morning that I was having doubts—and you were the
one that encouraged me to keep going.  ‘For the cause,’ remember?”

“That
was a mistake.”

“Then
why did you say it?  Why did you encourage me?”

“I—I
got caught up in the moment.  The idea of so much money, and Aaron was already
making plans about all these things he wanted to buy.  I thought…I thought
maybe it could work.  But then, the further along we got, once we actually
started dealing with clients—those people were pure scum, Kim, and I hated
every second of it.  Those rich bastards trying to put their hands all over me,
asking me why I wasn’t on the menu.”

“They
did that to you?  Why didn’t you tell me?”

“You’re
not the only one that can keep secrets.”

“You
could’ve talked to me.”

“I
never had a chance.  You were working so many hours and you hid in your office
all the time.  You were disappearing again.  I just wanted you out.  Out,” she
said, stamping her foot, hands clenched at her sides, like a child.  “Out, out,
out!”