Chapter Twenty-Three
Terrance
Saturday
I felt sick to my stomach as I watched Braxton take Morgan down into the lobby to get into a cab. Something bad had happened – there was no way he would’ve come up here so late at night to disturb me when he knew that I had a date if it wasn’t something drastic. Emily was with him and he’d left her to come and speak to me...this was utterly terrifying.
It was them, it had to be. They’d finally come for me, and now I had no idea what to do.
As the door crashed back open, I could see the distress in Braxton’s face. There were a lot of questions, too – questions that I wasn’t going to be able to avoid for any longer.
“What’s going on?” I stammered quietly. “What’s happened?” My fingers made their way up into my hair, where I tugged until I could feel spikes of pain going into my skull.
“I think you know more than you’re letting on.” Braxton took a seat and stared deeply into my soul. “And, I think it’s time to tell me everything.”
I sat down with him, and gave him a pleading look. “Why? What’s happened?”
“I popped into the lobby. I was on my way out to the store to grab something for me and Emily to eat, and the doorman stopped me. He told me that some guys have been sniffing around, asking all about you.”
My heart dropped into my shoes. Ignoring the problems clearly wasn’t making them go away. “Yeah, okay.” I sighed deeply and my head fell into my hands.
“I already know it’s the guys from outside the club, so you might as well admit it now.” Braxton didn’t sound mad at me, but he was clearly disappointed that I’d kept this to myself, which had guilt rolling through my veins.
“Yeah, I imagine it is. I have seen them about, so it makes sense.”
“And, who are they?”
There was no getting out of it any more. I had to just tell the truth. “The private investigator found out more than I ever admitted to you, more than I ever told anyone.” I had his attention now; he was staring intently at me. “I’m sorry for that.”
“Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you go to the police?” I fully understood Braxton’s exasperation. I felt that way myself, to be honest.
“Nothing has been fully proved, not really. I can assume that these men killed Mason, just like the private investigator – but without evidence, what’s the point? Plus...my family isn’t totally innocent in all of this.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that before Dad died, he was in very deep with loan sharks. I don’t know what drew him into that world. I never noticed him struggling with money.” I indicated around me, highlighting my inheritance to him. “But clearly, there was more to that man than I ever realized.”
I sighed deeply, the horrible realization that I didn’t know the man I loved more than anyone in the world hitting me all over again. “He had troubles that he kept from me and my brother.”
“So, are they the loan sharks?” The jigsaw pieces were clicking together in Braxton’s mind.
“Yes, I think so.”
“So...pay them back? Isn’t it obvious? Get them off your back and carry on with your damn life.”
I pursed my lips thoughtfully, and then landed the bombshell. “The amount my dad owed them has grown to the region of seven hundred million dollars.”
“Woah.” Braxton fell back in his chair and rolled his eyes into the back of his head. “That’s intense.”
“Yeah. That’s an almost unaffordable amount, you know? And, it isn’t even my debt, so I don’t know why they’re chasing after me...”
“But if your suspicions were right, then they killed Mason over this. Aren’t you concerned they will kill you, too?”
My expression hardened. I narrowed my eyes as all the internal arguments I’d given myself about this came floating past my lips. “I don’t want to pay them; they don’t deserve the money, anyway. They’re all criminals, and I’m pretty sure that they will kill me even after I pay them.”
Braxton gasped and shook his head, like I was utterly exasperating to him. “Terrance, don’t you get it? They know where you live, everything that’s happened between then and now has been a warning. Them speaking to the doorman was a warning. These men fully intend to kill you, and we already know they’re capable of that. Don’t you see? Money is money – but your life is priceless. You don’t want to end up like Mason, do you?”
I hated him in that moment for being so brutally honest with me. He was calling me out for shoving my head into the sand, when I really didn’t want to face reality. But he was right. I couldn’t keep away from it forever; it was coming for me regardless.
“I don’t even know how to pay them back.” I pouted childishly, not ready to accept defeat out loud. “So this really is a non-issue.”
Braxton stood up and gave me a sympathetic look. “I have to get back to Emily, she’s waiting for me, but I really think you should think about this. It’s silly to be so full of useless pride when your life is on the line. You just need to pay these dangerous guys off and get them off you back. If you don’t, you’ll be looking over your shoulder forever.”
He cocked his head at me, trying to see if any of his words were getting through. “If you need me to give up the expensive home so you can pay them back, I will. I’ll go back to where I was before.”
“Oh no, you won’t, I need you close to me. You are worth your weight in gold.”
I let out a bit of a strangled laugh, expecting him to join in, but he didn’t. He just gave me one more sad look before clicking the door closed behind him, leaving me totally alone.
I sighed deeply and wandered around the apartment, barely thinking straight. My brain was wired, my head all over the place, and I couldn’t lie down to sleep even if I wanted to. I just needed to work out what I was going to do.
Did I do as Braxton suggested, and pay the guys off to get them off my back forever, fully knowing that it’d potentially spiral and they’d ask me for more? Either that or they’d kill me anyway. Or did I continue on ignoring the situation, fully knowing that it wasn’t going away?
The more I tried to pretend that my life was normal, the worse all of this became. And now, they were downstairs, talking to the door man about me, basically threatening me when Morgan was here.
It was safe to assume that doing nothing wasn’t working out for me, so it was time to make some form of decision one way or another...
Ring, ring... Ring, ring...
I grabbed hold of my cellphone, expecting to see Morgan’s name on the screen. I assumed that she was going to be furious at me for having sex with her then sending her away. I couldn’t blame her for that. But it wasn’t.
Private Number.
At this time of night, that was already suspicious, but I hit the answer button before I could really think about it. “Hello?”
“Hello there, Terrance.” The voice was smug. I didn’t know who it was, which had me very worried. “How’s it going?”
“Who... Who is this?” I stammered anxiously. “What do you want?”
“I think we both know what I want,” the voice replied, laughing loudly just to taunt me. “And, we know that I’m going to get it, too. After all, it’s owed to me, and I don’t want anyone else to have to pay for the mistakes your father made.”
My blood boiled at that almost admission of guilt. What I should’ve done was record this call, but it was too late to start worrying about stuff like that now. What I needed to do was make my decision of how I was going to drive this forward. There was no hanging back and pushing it to the back of my mind anymore.
“Okay, so what’s this about? You want me to pay you?”
“Why, of course! What else would I be calling you for?”
“Fine,” I sighed, accepting defeat...at least verbally. Inside, my mind was still flitting from decision to decision. “I will wire the money to you. Where should I send it?”
There was silence through the line. If I couldn’t hear the guy’s breath, I might be dumb enough to believe that he’d hung up. I wanted to say something, anything, to break the tension of the moment, but there was a deep instinct in in my chest telling me to just wait.
“You won’t be wiring any money to me. I don’t want a trace of this transaction, do you understand?” All the jovial nature was gone from his tone. He was furious with me now. It freaked me out more than I cared to admit. “This is going to have to be a more face-to-face sort of deal, okay?”
“Right...” How the fuck was I going to get out of this now? “So, you want to meet now?”
“Oh no, I’m not an unreasonable man. I will give you until Tuesday to get things together. We both know that it isn’t a small amount that I’m owed, so it won’t be easy to get instantly. So, I’m going to be a good guy and give you a couple of days.”
My heart pounded in my throat. The only way this guy could know I was aware of the debt was if he knew about the private investigator. That changed everything. If these men got hold of the man working for me, it meant everything he told me could’ve been false. I wasn’t sure what to think about anymore.
“I... I...” I didn’t know what to say to that. I felt like I wanted to scream. “I...”
“You, you, you will get the money to me on Tuesday. You’ll meet me at eleven p.m. – see how I’m giving you even more time there – and you’ll meet me by Nick’s Garage on the corner by Lights Out. We both know you know where that is, so there can’t be any argument there.”
With that, he hung up leaving me alone with my thoughts. I remained exactly where I was with the phone pressed up against my ear long after he was gone, just wondering how I would make this work.
I didn’t want to pay these assholes anything, especially if they killed Mason. But I also didn’t want to die, either. Even if I had nothing else, I had a strong sense of needing to survive. Braxton was right – I would have to at least pay them something, however much I hated it.
I dialled his number quickly, needing to solidify my decision before I gave myself the opportunity to talk myself out of it.
“Are you okay?” he asked a little sleepily. “Nothing’s happened, has it?”
“I got a phone call,” I told him flatly. “You were right. I need to pay the money back.”
“I’ll help you,” he reassured me, sounding relieved. “Whatever you need, I’ll help you.”
I hoped and prayed that would be enough. I hoped that by going in and paying this money off, it didn’t spark a chain of reaction I couldn’t cope with.