Chapter Fifty-Six

NICK DIDN’T KNOW if his knees gave out and he sank onto the couch beside Effie, or if Breecher pushed him down. The room seemed to be turning slowly, ticking back on itself like the hands of a broken clock. Effie’s hand gripped his own, drenched in sweat. On the coffee table near where he had been sitting earlier, his phone began buzzing. Probably Bill. The silence in the room and the smell of the gunshot pulled him out of himself, away from the screaming of his mind at Vinny lying dead in his chair.

Driver turned the gun on Nick as his two men left the room, heading for the stairs.

“The weirdo in the room upstairs,” Driver said. “We’re gonna bring him down. That leaves Bulger, Robinson, the girlfriend, and the bitch who talks too much. Where are they?”

“I don’t know,” Nick said carefully. He lifted his eyes to Breecher. “Bill and Susan have been out looking for Shauna Bulger. She was never in this with us. She borrowed Bill’s car. That’s all.”

“Save it,” Driver snapped.

“Angelica got a room at a motel in town,” Nick continued, the words feeling like razorblades in his throat. “She didn’t feel safe here.”

“What about guests?” Breecher said. “You mentioned there was a mother and child. Overnighters.”

Nick shrugged. “Clay moved them. He’s… he’s got a thing with the mother. A romantic thing.”

Breecher and Driver looked at each other. There were footsteps on the stairs, and Driver’s two men shoved Neddy Ives into the room. The tall, hollow-eyed man folded himself carefully into a little armchair across the room from where Nick and Effie sat.

Driver smiled at Neddy Ives. He nudged the man beside him, gesturing to Neddy with his pistol.

“This is the joker with the hand grenade,” Driver said. He cocked his head, took Neddy Ives in. “I bet you felt real powerful, didn’t you? Making me walk all the way to my truck holding it, just so you’d give me the pin back. I bet you thought you’d made a real pussy out of me.”

Neddy Ives said nothing. Driver lifted his gun.

“Who’s the pussy now?” he asked. He fired. Neddy Ives collapsed and fell off his chair.

Effie tried to leap off the couch, to throw herself at Driver. Nick had to wrap his arms around her middle to contain her, gritting his teeth as she twisted and dragged her heels down his shins.

“Don’t be stupid. Effie! Don’t be stupid!” Nick cried.

“Yeah, same goes for you,” Breecher said and turned to Driver, gesturing to the lanky man writhing in pain on the floor in front of his armchair. “Don’t be stupid. You keep going and you’re going to kill everyone in the goddamn house and leave us with no leverage at all. We need two things: your box and my money. And it’s going to take some bargaining to achieve that.”

“So start bargaining,” Driver said, turning to Nick. In his eyes, Nick could see the mechanical turnings of a soldier’s mind as they moved through battle; calculating, assessing, emotionlessly weighing one move against the next. He knew there was no compassion there. No room for subtleties, nuance. Nick knew that if he didn’t respond correctly now, he was going to die. There was plenty of leverage left in Effie and Neddy Ives. “Start with the box,” Driver said. “Shauna Bulger must’ve stashed it here. I know she did. It would have been the safest option for her. So where is it?”

“I. Don’t. Know,” Nick insisted. “You can trust me on that. I don’t know. And you’d be wasting precious time trying to hurt me or my friends to get me to say anything else.”

Driver clicked his teeth hard. He tightened his grip on the gun in his hand and glanced off toward the other rooms, the dark and silent hall and the yawning corridors upstairs. He seemed to decide, as Nick hoped he would, that he was wasting time here. That now he’d made entry into the house, the most efficient use of his time would be to search for what he wanted, find it, and leave before their window of access was closed by police arriving or residents returning home.

Driver nodded at Breecher, and he and his men left. After a few seconds, Nick heard drawers being ripped open in the dining room, shelves and cabinets smashing to the ground. The windows of the old house shook as furniture was overturned and shoved against walls. All the while Breecher watched him.

“Where’s the money, Nick?” Breecher asked.

“Come on,” Nick sighed. “Don’t you think Driver’s just going to pop you and take the money as soon as you find it? And what makes you so sure I didn’t spend my entire share?”

“Because it’s you.” Breecher shook her head. She seemed suddenly, miserably tired. “You’re the bleeding heart. The moral goddamn compass. That’s the whole reason Dorrich and Master didn’t let you in on the plan in the desert. Because you’d never have gone along with it. I’ll be shocked if you’ve spent a single dollar of that money in all these years, Nick.”

“You’re right.” He nodded. “I haven’t. It’s all still there.”

“Where?” Breecher almost spat the word at him. “Tell me where, so we can end this.”

He remained silent. Nick could feel Effie staring at him, trying to put his story all together. On the floor, Neddy Ives was gripping the carpet with one hand, trying to breathe through the pain.

“Where is it?” Breecher demanded again.

He just stared at her, and she must have seen something in his eyes that made her crumble. She turned away, and that was risky. Nick felt Effie’s whole body tense, ready to leap at the other woman. But he held her back, shook his head. Their time would come. He could hear drawers of utensils smashing down on the kitchen tiles. Breecher seemed angry at herself for letting her emotions get the better of her. For letting her mechanical mind wander. Nick knew it was time to learn the truth.

“You knew, didn’t you,” he said. “About their plan.”

Breecher nodded.

“I overheard them talking at the base,” she said. “Dorrich and Master.” Breecher drew a long breath, let it out slow. “I came back from chow unexpectedly and I heard them running through the steps. Divert off a routine patrol. Hit the house. Kill the family. Shoot up the vehicles.” She shook her head, bitter. “What I overheard must have been an early version. They must have come up with a Plan B later on. Because what happened in the desert that night wasn’t what they said they were going to do.”

“So what was the original plan?” Nick asked.

“They were going to kill you,” Breecher said.

Nick swallowed hard, trying to keep his mind in order. He couldn’t react to this news now. Couldn’t let it carry him away into the blessed rage that was waiting to envelop him.

“And you were OK with that?” Nick’s voice broke as he tried to get the words out.

“I was OK with that,” Breecher said, her gaze locked on his. “I could see their way of thinking. You dying out there would make the massacre look legit, and it would mean we’d each get a third of the money, not a quarter. And it would have made my own plan easier overall.”

“Your own plan?” Nick said.

“I planned to take Dorrich and Master out as soon as they’d finished with you. That’s why I didn’t tell them that I knew what was going to happen. I was going to be the sole survivor,” Karli Breecher said. “Winner takes all.”