“Flags,” he repeats, like the word amuses him. “You're worried about flags?” He crouches down to my eye level and I can smell tobacco and something metallic on his breath. “Let me tell you something about your friend. Aiden's been borrowing from the boss for the better part of two years. Small amounts at first. Harmless, really." His mouth twists. “Then not so small. And every single time the deadline came, there was an excuse. Always a reason. Always next week, next month, just a little more time. Do you understand what that does to a man like the boss? What it costs him?”
I say nothing.
“Aiden wasted months of his time. And the boss?” He stands. “He doesn't forgive wasted time. That's the one thing you can’t buy back.”
"The million," I press, trying to keep my voice level. "If I get it to you, does that settle it? Is that the end?"
He laughs at that. like I've said something genuinely funny. "The money's just the opening act."
My stomach drops. "What does that mean?"
"It means the boss wants what's owed. And what's owed isn't just currency anymore." He walks a slow circle around me. "But we're reasonable men. Wire the money first and we'll have a conversation about the rest."
"And if I can't move it fast enough?"
He stops behind me. I can't see him and that's somehow worse.
"Then we start making calls," he says quietly. "There's a woman. Pretty. Dark curls. And a little boy—your son, yeah? Cute kid.”
Every single nerve ending in my body goes cold.
"Don't," I say. My voice comes out lower and steadier than I feel, which surprises me. "Don't you fucking go near them."
"Then get us the money." He reappears in my periphery, moving toward the long wooden table where a leather toolkit is unrolled beneath a poorly lit swinging lamp. I can't make out exactly what's laid out on it but dread fills in every detail my eyes can't. He reaches for something small and electronic.
***
Theydropmeoffblindfolded, barely conscious, hands tied behind my back, in an alley or abandoned street somewhere. My only indication of where I am the zip of cars and honk of horns in the distance. I hear quick footstepsapproaching and flinch, nervous O’Rourke’s men had come back. I can tell someone is kneeling down in front of me, and they gently remove the blindfold from my eyes. It's the first time I’ve seen the sun in days and it makes me want to weep.
“Hey it’s okay, we’re going to help you,” a kind voice whispers. That’s my last real memory before I wake up in the hospital.
***
Idon’tbreatheawordof what happened to me to anyone. Not my parents, not the police or doctors. The only person that I think actually knows the truth, or some version of it, is Kendall. And she’s been asleep at my bedside for the second day in a row.
I recount the fabricated story so many times that I want to scream. I tell them that I had been attacked, kidnapped, and beaten violently and returned somewhere near my apartment.
I didn’t get a good look at them; they were wearing masks and they drugged me.
That’s all I’m allowed to say. Those are my rehearsed lines and I stick to them like my life depends on it, because it does. Keeping my mouth shut ensures I keep my tongue and the rest of my body parts. Although I can tell from the heavy sedatives and the blinding agony in my knee that I’m in trouble. I would never play hockey again. I know that much. I wake up every couple hours in so much pain that my only option is to fall back into an endless drug induced sleep.
But my dreams have transformed into nightmares and so has my reality. Every time I close my eyes, I hear the crack of bone, feel the splintering of tendons and shredding of ligaments all over again. And Jesus, the blood. I’ll never be able to unsee it. I relive the horror that gripped my soul every time he lifted thegolf club and the roaring, explosive pain that followed. It was unescapable. It had reconfigured my DNA and seeped into the marrow. These wounds, this torture, will stay with me for the rest of my life.
It makes me wish I was dead.
Chapter 80
Kendall
Igetthephonecallfive days after he dropped me off at my apartment and fell off the face of the earth. I knew even before answering the phone that something had gone terribly wrong. His mom explains what happened to him—without losing her shit somehow—and my heart shatters.
Abducted? Beaten?
What. The. Fuck.
She’s still talking but my ears are ringing and my chest feels tight. I start rubbing my sternum to try and ease the ache. This doesn’tactuallyhappen to people that you know. This is the kind of thing that lurks in darkness, that people discuss in hushed whispers. The stuff of nightmares. The kind of horrifying stories that make headlines and are broadcasted on the five o’ clock news. These are tragedies that happen to other people, but not yours. Not your person.
Not to Kai.