Taken (Dark Desires 1)

I suddenly felt like a criminal myself, as if I’d just been caught committing a major crime. I said, “I’m not sure what you mean.”

She reached into her jacket pocket and brought out five Polaroid mugshots and lay them out on the table one by one as if she were dealing cards. The five mugshots were of Rick’s crew. The first one was Rick and the last one was Eddie. Chunk, Ronnie, and Pete were the middle three.

She tapped a fingernail on the table. “Miss Duval, can you identify any of these men?”

I didn’t look down at the photos. I looked her in the eye and said, “No.”

Her eyebrows shot up like window shades. She grinned at me. “No?”

“No.”

“Miss Duval, have you been working at a dive bar called Dick’s Place for the past week or so?” She asked the question and gave me a stern look, waiting to see if I was going to lie. I clenched my teeth together and tried not to cry.

“Are you following me?” I asked quietly.

She ignored the question to ask, “Have you seen any of these men at the bar?”

When I didn’t answer, she put the cap on the pen and tossed it on the table. She leaned back with her arms over her chest and swept her eyes over me again.

She said, “You’ve certainly changed your looks since I last saw you.”

“I just thought I’d try something new,” I said shyly, tucking my hair behind my ears. I tried not to sound defensive, which was hard since she seemed to have the ability to see right through me. I tried to hold her gaze. I tried not to blink. My eyes started to water.

“This one, Eddie Wright,” she said, tapping the fingernail to Eddie’s mugshot. He was grinning. The silver tooth on display. “We’re pretty sure this is the one who killed your fiancé.”

She tapped on Ronnie’s mugshot.

“This was the guy who was with him. We have the surveillance video from the shooting to match them for height and weight, a description of the car, and a confidential informant ready to testify that they were criminal associates of the clerk. It was a deal gone wrong. At least that’s what I thought until I got the report from the surveillance team that’s been watching them for a week.”

She let the words hang in the air for a moment.

I said, “I don’t understand.”

“This one, the one you’re sleeping with.” She tapped the fingernail to Rick’s photo and left it there. “I believe the other two were following his orders. He was responsible for your fiancé’s death, Miss Duval, and now you’re fucking him. It makes me wonder, were you in on the murder, too? I know your fiancé had a sizable life insurance policy. Did you conspire with The Wright Brothers to kill Brent Griffin? Because that’s the way it looks to me and I’m pretty sure the D.A. will see it the same way.”

“No… I would never… I loved Brent…”

“You’ve got a damn funny way of showing it,” she said, her voice filled with disgust.

That did it.

My resolve broke and my eyes slowly lowered to Rick’s mugshot. I couldn’t believe that he had anything to do with Brent’s murder. I had convinced myself that it wasn’t possible. Rick was a good man, regardless of what she was saying. Or was he just good at deceiving stupid women who fell for his charms hook, line and sinker?

She picked up the pen and took off the cap, then leaned into the table. “Miss Duval, I’m going to give you one chance to make things right, for the sake of Brent Griffin, a man you once claimed to love. If you had anything to do with his death, or if this is just one huge coincidence, you have one chance to come clean. Otherwise, you’re going down with the rest of these pieces of shit.”

I wiped my eyes on the back of my hand and took a deep, shuddering breath. For Brent’s sake, I said, “I just wanted to kill them all…”

RICK

Chunk was behind the wheel of the panel van he had stolen for the Crown job. It was pale blue when he stole it from a Wal-Mart parking lot two days ago. Now it was white with a fake license plate and a City Electric magnet on the side.

I was in the passenger seat. Eddie, Ronnie, and Pete were in the back. Dottie was sleeping peacefully in Barstow at the Motor Inn. Sandy was probably at home. Waiting for my call.

The plan was for Chunk to drop us off at the curb in front of Crown’s, then remain behind the wheel with the motor running, parked half a block down. Me, Eddie, and Ronnie would go inside. Ronnie would take out the security guard with a stun gun and Eddie would watch over anyone that happened to be inside. I would force old man Crown to hand over the diamonds. Pete would stand watch on the sidewalk and alert us if any trouble headed our way.

We had to be in and out in less than three minutes because that was the average response time for LAPD in this part of town. Any longer and our chances of getting caught increased exponentially.

I had one firm rule when we were pulling a job that involved people. No guns. Ronnie had the stun gun, Eddie and I had the telescopic steel batons; neither of which were considered a deadly weapon by the state’s legal system. The reason I did not allow guns on a job like this was the amount of time you’d serve if you got caught in the act of robbery with a deadly weapon.