Secrets Never Die (Morgan Dane #5)(83)

You’re an idiot.

“I have it.” Olivia sounded triumphant. “I’ll drop it in front of you?”

“Yes.”

“Then how will you open the ties?”

Sharp snorted. Without being able to see, it wouldn’t be easy. “It might take a while.”

“If you roll back over, I could do it for you.”

“That makes sense.” Sharp went through the reverse motions of turning onto his other side. He was out of breath and sweating by the time he faced her. Their legs were tangled, and he could feel the heat of her breath on his face. He slid the pick from his wallet and pushed it into her fingers. “You need to work the pick between the locking mechanism and the teeth.”

“All right.”

The zip tie moved, biting deeper into Sharp’s skin as she worked with it.

“Do you think Joe gave the order to kill us?” she asked.

Sharp rewound the meeting in his head. He’d been focused mostly on Joe, not Aaron, but there had been definite anger in the son’s face. “I’m thinking that Aaron is staging a coup. He didn’t seem all that happy that his papa was back from prison.”

“I think so too. Aaron didn’t give the order for us to be killed until his father was gone,” Olivia noted. “Aaron has been running the business for twenty-five years. He might resent having to give up control now because his father’s been released.”

“It has to be a kick to Aaron’s ego to have his weak old father giving him and his men orders after he spent more than two decades at the helm.”

“Do you think Joe or Aaron had Paul killed?” Olivia asked.

“Aaron,” Sharp said, almost surprised at how quickly the answer came to him. “If Joe had done it, he would have had us killed. Or he wouldn’t have asked to meet us in the first place.”

“I’m not sure why Joe wanted to meet with us anyway.”

“He wanted information from us about Paul’s murder.” Sharp replayed the conversation in his head. “He was bluffing when he said he knew everything.”

“And he was hoping we’d fill him in,” Olivia said.

“Yes.” Sharp replayed the interview again. He hadn’t told Joe anything that wasn’t public information. What had Joe been hoping to learn?

Did he want to find Tina? Or Evan?

Sharp couldn’t shake the feeling that he was missing a huge piece of the puzzle.

The car rumbled on and on. Sharp tried to keep Olivia’s mind engaged and off their dire situation.

“I’m sorry this is taking me so long,” Olivia said. “I suspect we’ve gone farther than back to the office complex.”

“It might just seem that way,” Sharp lied. He was betting on a very isolated secondary location, with no witnesses and adequate open space for two shallow graves. But Olivia was already scared. She didn’t need his ideas in her head along with her own fears.

“They will want to take us somewhere very private.” She was too smart.

The sound of tires on pavement became a flat and monotonous track of white noise. Sharp realized the car hadn’t stopped or changed speed for a long time. They were on a long road that didn’t require them to stop for lights or intersections. He’d felt the slight force of the car speeding through curves in the road, but that was all.

“I’ve got it,” Olivia said, her voice excited.

Sharp heard the sound of the plastic teeth moving through the lock. A few seconds later, his hands were free.

He rubbed his wrists, then took the pick from her hands and went to work on hers. He had the lock open in a few minutes. “There you are.”

“Oh, thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Sharp slid the lockpick into his pocket. “Move your hands and feet. Tighten and release all your muscles to keep them from going to sleep. If I can disable or distract the men, I want you able to run.”

Sharp flexed his fingers and rolled his ankles, tying to keep the blood flowing into his limbs as best he could.

“If I can turn around,” Olivia said, “I can try to break a taillight. Maybe I can signal someone.”

“Good idea.” But Sharp suspected they were in the middle of nowhere. He doubted there would be anyone to signal.

The car began to bounce up and down. Sharp wrapped his arms around Olivia to protect her from the jarring. Had they left the road? Dread pooled like acid in his belly.

Olivia tensed. “We’re stopping.”

“Maybe. Position your hands as if they are still joined.”

“I thought I wanted to get out of this trunk more than anything else, but now I’m afraid of that too. They’re going to kill us.” She was bracing herself.

“They’re going to try.”

The brakes made a soft squeal as the car came to a complete stop. When the vehicle remained motionless, Sharp waited. He’d have preferred to be between Olivia and the opening, but the limited space in the trunk did not allow for them to switch positions.

The trunk popped open. The night was dark, and rain fell on Sharp’s face. Thunder crackled as someone reached into the trunk and hauled Olivia out.

Sharp was next.

“You got the hoods off. Now you can watch each other die.” The driver pointed a gun at Sharp. “Get out.”