My Darling Husband(46)

“I know our relationship is mostly professional, but I like you,” Ed says. “I consider you a friend, which is why I’m going to ask you again. Do you need help? Do I need to, I don’t know, send in the cavalry? Because I’ll do it if you need me to. I’ll make that call. All you have to do is say the word.”

No police.

And for God’s sake, no sirens.

“Thanks for trying, Ed. I’ve got to run.” I hang up and pull into traffic.

I drive down an unfamiliar street and try my damnedest not to throw up. $49,000 and some change. That’s all I’ve got to show for ninety full minutes of hustle, and now it’s too late. The banks are closed. Ed packed up his papers and clocked out, and I have less than an hour and a half to scrounge up seven hundred grand from God knows where. What a nightmare.

Ed’s final words to me echo in my head. I’ll do it if you need me to. I’ll make that call. All you have to do is say the word.

For the first time today, I wonder if involving the police isn’t my best option. There are loads of home invasions in this city, drama you hear about every day on the news. Surely the cops have a SWAT team, a playbook, skilled negotiators who know what not to say. Surely they know to turn off the sirens. Surely they know how to avoid a standoff.

Only, how many of them end in tragedy?

My mind swirls with real-life scenarios I saw on the news. The pregnant lady shot in the stomach by a stray bullet, the girl who watched her twin sister get gunned down, the mother who escaped out the basement window only to have her entire family murdered when the cops busted down the door. I had to flip the channel because their stories were so tragic—and these are just the ones I can remember.

I think about what that would be like, having to live with the knowledge that my mistake cost me my family. Even if the cops came in quietly, even if they snuck through the trees in the neighbors’ yards and managed a surprise attack, they’d have to get inside the house somehow. They could probably get the alarm company to disarm the house, but he’d hear them coming from a mile away. Plenty of time to kill everyone including himself before the cops stormed up the stairs. What if they blow it? That kind of mistake is forever. You can’t put the pin back in that grenade.

No. I can’t risk it. It’s a potential death sentence. Involving the cops has got to be the absolute last resort.

So then...what? Call the house and explain? Beg him to hold off until the banks open in the morning? That would give me the rest of the night to pull together another four hundred thousand and think through my defenses. An automatic weapon. A Kevlar vest so I can take the bullets meant for Jade and the Bees. If I can hold him off until tomorrow, I’ll have time to come up with a plan.

Still, I imagine Jade, sleeping on that blue chair with a gun pointed at her head, sharing fifteen extra hours of oxygen with a psycho kidnapper. One wrong move, one moment of impatience and his trigger finger could get twitchy. The kids would be witnesses, so they’d die, too. Boom boom boom. My whole family, lying in a sticky pool of their own blood. Wiped out in an instant because I couldn’t come up with the ransom.

Which means there’s only one answer, only one possible recourse: get the money and bring it to the house by seven. It’s the only way to keep Jade and the kids alive. Failure is not an option.

And then I remember the fire.

The one that licked my Bolling Way kitchen to death and took out my best source of income. The one that sparked in an outlet next to the cooking oil, exploding into a fireball when it hit the ceiling’s flammable noise panels.

Now it’s like pulling a crumpled lottery ticket from your pocket and seeing the winning numbers, like ripping open the candy bar to uncover the golden ticket. All this time, I’ve been sitting on a pot of money I didn’t even think about. A flicker of hope sparks in my chest, and my lungs swell with gulped air. I yank on the wheel and swerve onto the dirt shoulder, tires kicking up rocks and garbage as the truck skids to a sloppy stop.

Flavio picks up on the first ring. “Finally. I’ve been leaving you messages all afternoon. Where are you?”

I look around, blinking through my windshield at the run-down terrain. Boarded-up buildings and chop shops behind chain-link fences, an occasional fast-food joint—the cheap and dirty kind. Scaryville, as Jade would call this place. Bankhead, I’m guessing.

“Running a couple of errands. What’s the word from the insurance adjustor?”

There are still all sorts of obstacles, I know, but if I could somehow manage to get my hands on a check, I could take it to one of those check-cashing places—Western Union or one of the sketchy ones that stay open late for suckers like me, desperate people willing to pay an obscene rate for quick cash. But even then, even if I had to forfeit what? Ten percent? Twenty? The payout will still be more than what I need. I’d walk away with plenty of cash for Jade and the kids.

“That’s what I’ve been calling you about,” Flavio says. “He wants to know about the building on Pharr.”

I frown. “What about it?”

“Actually, he’s standing right here. Why don’t I let you talk to him.” Not so much a question as it is a statement, and one that ticks a warning beat in my chest.

There’s a shuffling on the line, the cell phone exchanging hands, followed by a new voice, deep and heavy on the syrup.

“Hey, Cam, Matt Brady here. I’m sorry you and I haven’t had a chance to chitchat before today, though I surely regret what’s got us on the phone now. I want you to know, however, that you and I will get to the bottom of this fire. I assure you, I’m here for the duration.”