“Agent Spittle,” I say quietly when he answers. “Or ex agent, I should say.”
“Who’s this?”
“We need to talk about your whereabouts tonight.” I smile when he inhales, and I point my remote control at the bank of screens before me, directing the curser to the send icon on the video displayed on the center TV. A video of him walking away from a man, Adrian Wallace, who I know has contacts in drug trafficking and was recently in touch with The Bear’s men. Spittle has a briefcase in his grasp. He gets in his car outside a derelict warehouse and drives away.
Another inhale. “Oh, you’ve not seen the best of it yet,” I taunt, just as a gunshot sounds and Adrian Wallace, also known as The Eagle, drops like a sack of shit. “That bit,” I muse thoughtfully. “It’s my favorite part of this movie.”
“He’s dead?” Spittle breathes, undoubtedly dripping beads of sweat all over his phone as he stares at Wallace’s lifeless body.
“I’d say so, but his body has yet to be discovered. I’ve got to say, it doesn’t look all too good on you, Spittle. So what were you doing meeting a man known to have associations with drug dealers? Feeding a personal habit?”
“Fucking hell,” he breathes. “Who the fuck are you?”
“I’m the beginning of your end.” I kill the screen and bring up Adrian Wallace’s mug shot, tapping out DECEASED across his file. “Or I could be the beginning of your beginning. Up to you.”
“You’re British.”
“I can see how you made it in the FBI.” What a fucking cock. “Is my nationality a problem, or do you only bend for certain ethnicity groups?”
He laughs, and it’s nervous. “Well, you British have a habit of leaving a lasting impression around here.”
“So I’ve heard.” He’s talking about The Brit. The Angel-faced Assassin. Savage. Merciless.
Dead.
“What do you want?” Spittle asks.
“I’m not sure yet, but be on standby.” I hang up and roll my shoulders, feeling the tightness there. Not of my muscles. But my skin.
“There’s probably no good time to tell you this,” Goldie says, and I shoot my stare to her at the doorway. “Beau Hayley has appealed the ruling into her mother’s death.”
I breathe out, old ghosts coming back to haunt me. And new ones it seems. I can feel Goldie watching me. Monitoring me. Wondering what the fuck I’m thinking.
“What the fuck are you thinking?” she asks, coming over and taking a seat on the other side of my desk. “I hate that look on you.”
I cup my chin, feeling the roughness as I mold into it with my fingertips.
“James?”
I give her a moment of my eyes, my mind whirling. And then I reach for the phone again, calling Spittle back. “Find out how the appeal into Jaz Hayley’s death is going.”
“Jaz? What do you want with Jaz?”
“You’re not here to ask questions. You’re here to answer them.”
“The appeal is being rejected,” he says quietly.
“And the daughter?”
“What about her? She doesn’t know yet.”
“Yet,” I murmur, reaching for my temple and rubbing away the tension. She’s not going to give up until she gets justice for her mother, and of all people, I know there is no justice in this world. My back tingles, as if to reinforce it. And images of my family, my whole fucking family, parade through my mind. I quickly push those thoughts away and refocus on the problem at hand. Beau Hayley.
For fuck’s sake. Does the woman want to die? I would say that was a stupid question if I didn’t know her medical history since her mum’s death. And I can relate. Been there. Done that. Wanted to die over and over again. Like I said, there is no justice in this world. So I learned to make justice my way. “Send me her number.”
“Whose number?” Spittle asks, confused.
“Beau Hayley’s.”
“Why?”
“Did you just ask another question?”
“No.” He sighs, sounding as defeated as a man could be. “Jesus, I’m tired.”
“Me too. Exhausted. Exhausted of fucking waiting.”
“Tell me who you are.”
“Get me Beau Hayley’s number.” I hang up and toss the phone back in the drawer, breathing out my frustration.
“What are you going to do?” Goldie asks. “Call her and ask her nicely to back off?”
I turn my eyes onto her, but I say nothing. I don’t need to. My face must say it all. Fuck off, you sarcastic bitch.
Goldie tilts her head. “It’s been two years. You got Jaz’s phone records. Nothing on them. I’ve checked all records on safety deposit boxes. Nothing. If she shared or hid information on you, your name, anything, you’d know by now.”
“I have a bad feeling.” I get up and head for the sauna. I need to sweat out some of this stress.
I need to burn.
Burn and know I won’t die.
I strip off, leaving my clothes in a pile at the door. The heat hits me like a brick, and I look at the thermometer on the back wall. One eighty.