Page 27 of Redemption
Before I tear the tape away, I glance at my brother. “You should go.”
“I’m not leaving you alone to do this.”
“You don’t exist,” I tell him, hoping he understands what I mean. He can’t be seen. No one can know there are two of us. For reasons I can’t articulate, I know it’s vitally important we keep it that way.
“I understand, but I need to see the injury first. Let me look before you take off the tape. I have a field dressing kit in the Suburban.”
The kid struggles against the tape, unintelligible sounds coming from his sealed mouth.
“Shut up and stop moving if you want to live longer than five more minutes.”
He stills, belying his words at the cemetery. Also, it shows just how much he can hear despite the duct tape over his ears.
“Get the kit and do what you need to do. Then, I get my answers.”
My brother nods and leaves the room.
“Who the hell are you, kid?” I say to myself as I flip open his wallet.
The blue eyes from the cemetery stare back at me from his ID.
Dumbass. You never bring a real ID to a job.
Clearly, he’s either a moron or a rookie—or both.
But it’s the name that stops me cold.
Remy de Marchand.
“Fucking hell.” I drop my head back and stare up at the metal ceiling. “The Marchands are trying to fucking take me out? After all these goddamn years? You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
My brother returns in the midst of my tirade. “You know the boy?”
I shake my head. “No. But I know his family.” I look down at the license again and do the math quickly. “And they sent a seventeen-year-old to kill me? What the fuck is that about? If Leo and his old man wanted me dead after all these years, why would they send a kid? That makes no fucking sense.”
My brother sets a large olive-colored canvas cube on the floor. “Seventeen? That’s much too young to be having gunfights before noon.”
“No shit. See what you can do to patch up his shoulder. It doesn’t feel right to let him bleed out.”
I stand and turn away from the boy. Staring at the wall, I murmur, “I’m getting too old for this shit.” I drop my forehead into my palm. With my thumb and middle finger, I squeeze my temples. “What the fuck am I supposed to do with him?”
The kid makes a sound that must come from the pain of whatever my brother is doing to him, and I turn to watch.
“Do I kill him? Why would the Marchands start a war with me now? Do they really think I’m that weak? Fuck. This doesn’t make sense. There’s never been bad blood between us. They run their business in a way that doesn’t interfere with mine, and we’ve always had peace. Always.”
My brother looks over his shoulder at me. “Would you really kill a child? Look at him. He’s not even a man yet.”
“Then, why would they send him to kill me? Why wouldn’t Leo, that fancy fucker, come do the job himself? Why send a kid?”
My brother turns back to the silent form taped to the chair and presses what I assume is a quick-clotting sponge to the still-bleeding wound at his shoulder.
“He’ll live. The bullet went straight through. Once the bleeding has stopped, I’ll look closer. I can sanitize it and sew him up, but it would be better if he were taken to a hospital. I don’t know what other damage the bullet might have done to his shoulder.”
“They won’t take him to a hospital. They’ll have their own doc stitch him up. That’s how this shit works. But, fuck, why Marchand? Why?”
I no longer have any interest in talking to the kid. Based on how he shot his mouth off at the cemetery, whatever he says will only piss me off. It’s Leo and Old Man Marchand who will have the answers I need.
Well, at least I know how to get them to talk to me. I have something that belongs to them.
