Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 75642 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75642 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 378(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
My voice cracks, and I hate that I can’t approach this whole damn thing with a little more finesse.
“I’m doing the best I can,” I insist when he just stands there staring at me like he doesn’t give a shit.
His jaw ticks as he runs his eyes over my entire body.
“Want to check my fucking teeth for meth rot?” I growl when I realize he isn’t checking me out in a sexual way but looking for evidence that I might be lying about my role in what he saw upstairs.
“Carlen was tangled up with Keres.”
I freeze, my muscles not allowing even a single micro-movement.
“Wh-What?”
“Keres,” he says. “Ever heard of them?”
I swallow and nod. “Everyone has.”
The name is whispered more now than the Mafia crime bosses that are still lurking around the city.
“So you’re saying you had no clue what they were up to?”
“He,” I correct. “I doubt Janet would ever allow her kids to be anywhere near what the hell was going on up there.”
I point above our heads to the little apartment that held much different memories before I discovered the drug lab a few days ago.
He takes a deep breath, and I already know he’s going to want to spread the blame to my sister.
“I don’t have much information on how they were connected, but I think we can assume from the little lab up there that drugs were being made for the club.”
“So you think that Keres killed them?”
He shrugs, his eyes scanning the street before looking back at me again. “It’s possible, or they were killed by a rival gang. We have no way of knowing.”
“They had kids,” I say, my emotions starting to bubble up. “They didn’t deserve to die.”
How can he speak of his friend dying in such a calm voice?
“Criminals don’t exactly take family into consideration. They don’t have much regard for their own relatives, so it would be foolish to think they’d care about others.”
I can’t tell if he’s making a jab at Carlen and Janet, lumping them both into the same group as the people who killed them.
“Are you implying—”
“I’m saying we’ve both spent a lot of time with Janet and Carlen. Although I haven’t seen them in a couple of years, I know for a fact they don’t do anything without discussing it with each other. I also know that it was more of a co-dependency thing for both of them and not a positive relationship trait. I know Carlen wasn’t up there cooking meth while Janet, who is always latched to his hip, stayed in the house unaware. If you stop to think for a single fucking second, then you’d know I’m right.”
I open my mouth to argue, but how can I?
He’s a hundred percent right. It doesn’t matter whose idea it was. They were only doing it because they both agreed to it. I’d had numerous conversations with my sister about being so dependent on Carlen, but at the end of the day, he was just as dependent on her. I have no doubt that since they were together since like the sixth or seventh grade, they never had much room to grow up without each other. All decisions were made together. All appointments were done together. All arguments and disputes they might have had were together. They shopped together. I don’t know that Janet left the house much when she wasn’t with Carlen. They enjoyed spending time together. They shadowed each other in the unhealthiest ways.
“Carlen lost his job at ShopSmart when the franchise went under.”
I know ShopSmart went out of business, but before I stopped speaking with my sister, Carlen had been employed by another business in town. He’d already been there six or seven months before Janet and I had our falling out.
“I know. He was working at Brinson Mechanics as an accounts manager. He hated it but—”
“His connections to Keres were through his old boss at ShopSmart.”
“That makes sense,” I mutter.
I was present for more than one conversation they’d had about how awful Noah Plank was.
“Oh God,” I hiss, covering my mouth with my hand. “Did Keres have Noah killed too?”
“There’s a good chance,” he says. “It also leads me to believe that you and the boys aren’t safe.”
“What?” My hands begin to shake.
“Keres is known for leaving no stone unturned, Mila. Anyone connected to them, they’ll consider a loose end.”
“I have nothing to do with that club,” I snap, my fear exhibiting as anger.
“It doesn’t matter.”
“We’re not in danger,” I insist, but just as I finish speaking, the roar of motorcycles fills the air.
“Get inside the house,” he snaps, his eyes scanning the streets.
With the noise bouncing off the surrounding houses, I can’t tell which direction they’re coming from or how close they are.
“Mila! Get in the fucking house.”
“Come with me,” I cry, my feet already carrying me in that direction.