Thrill Ride (Black Knights Inc. #4)(56)
Why?
Probably because it was a reminder that for every action, there was an equal and opposite reaction. Releasing the ball, R.D. watched distractedly as it slammed into the row of stationary balls, causing the one on the opposite end to shoot out. Kinetic motion at work.
Click, click, click.
Rock was like that ball. He had the power to affect a cascading change that could eventually blow up everything R.D. had worked toward for years. Already, he’d caused a series of ripples that were spreading…
Storm the castle. Kill everyone inside.
That would certainly solve most, if not all, of R.D.’s problems. But, unfortunately, it’d never come to that. Rock would never let it come to that…
“You know as well as I do that Cajun bastard will give up everything, fight to his last breath to protect the innocent, to do what he thinks is right. And if given a choice between sacrificing himself or watching his friends fight a battle they have no hope of winning, he’ll choose the first option each and every time. We can’t have that.”
Click, click, click.
The balls continued to bang against each other, their cadence keeping time to R.D.’s rapidly beating heart and—
“Which is why I’ve secured an alternate ending.”
“What do you mean?”
“I have a hit man in place to take Babineaux out if he decides to do the honorable thing and give himself up.”
Jesus. He said it without any remorse, without any thought to the good work Rock had done for them over the years. Still, R.D. had to appreciate that pragmatism. This was a situation that required one and only one solution.
“The Cleaner?” R.D. asked hopefully. “Have you found him?”
“No. The Cleaner is still off the grid.” Which was just one more thing R.D. needed to worry about. “I have another man in place. No worries. This is almost over.” With that, the line went dead, and silence reigned in the wood-paneled office, broken only by the click, click, click of the balls on the Newton’s cradle.
Chapter Fifteen
“What do we do now?” Vanessa asked anxiously, blowing like a racehorse and glancing around Eve’s plush living room at the harried faces of the Knights.
Harried…except for Ozzie. He didn’t look the least bit harried. Quite the opposite, in fact. The big goofball was grinning like a loon, chomping on his gum to beat the band, and squeezing Rock with one arm while clutching a mean-looking machine gun with the other.
“First things first,” Boss said, running a hand through his hair. “We need to call Becky and Eve and tell them to hold back. We don’t want them blowing in here and giving those CIA pricks a reason to open fire.”
“I’m on it,” Ozzie said, releasing Rock in order to dig his cell phone from his hip pocket.
“Please, don’t do this, Boss,” Rock pleaded, briefly closing his eyes. “Just let me go. Let me—”
“I’ll let you go if you tell me you’re responsible for what happened to those men,” Boss said.
And, oh, no. Oh, crap.
Quite unintentionally, Boss had posed the question in such a way that Rock could answer in the affirmative. If what Rock had told her, about being the reason those men were dead, was true. And, yep, right on cue…
“Oui,” Rock said, opening his eyes and nodding, his hard expression even more stony than usual—which probably had a lot to do with the fact that his face was covered in dust and blood. “I’m the reason they’re dead.”
Everything in the room came to a standstill.
No one moved, no one blinked, no one so much as dared to breathe. The Knights just stared at Rock, their expressions varying from absolute shock to wary disbelief. And Vanessa was about to open her mouth to refute Rock’s claim when, suddenly, in the resounding, pin-drop silence, she picked up on a gentle whirring she hadn’t realized had been nibbling on her subconscious since they’d barged into the living room.
Now, it burrowed under her skin like a chigger, driving her batty.
What is that?
It wasn’t the air conditioner or the clothes dryer. It wasn’t the subtle hum of the refrigerator. No…this sounded familiar. It sounded like…
She glanced around, and that’s when she saw a big blue dick taped to one picture window. She blinked, but there was no mistaking what she was seeing.
Big. Blue. Dick.
And not only that, but the other two windows in the room were equipped with a tube of lipstick. Except each tube of lipstick appeared to be vibrating.
What in the—
“So now will you let me go, mon ami?” Rock asked, his tone tinged with desperation as he stared at Boss’s ravaged expression, which dragged Vanessa’s attention away from the plastic cock and oscillating lipsticks and back to the crisis at hand.
“Bullshit, Rock!” she spat, clenching her hands into fists in order to keep from grabbing him so she could shake some sense into him. “You told me yourself you weren’t the one to pull the trigger.”
And boy, oh boy! If she’d thought the look he shot her when he’d been in the back of that pickup truck was enough to boil her blood, it was nothing compared to this one. Because she’d take the fire of hatred any day—after all, Rock had once told her that love and hate were two horns on the same steer—over this ice cold derision.