Cut and Run 09 Crash & Burn (13 page)

Digger checked his watch, nodding. “Pizza counts as breakfast, right?”

Zane looked thoroughly scandalized.

Ty fought the urge to wrap his arms around Zane’s neck and demand a hug to make himself feel better. Then he pursed his lips and shrugged. “Might as well. I know I won’t be sleeping any.”

“Oh, yeah. The mattress?” Zane winced. “Yeah, it’s not coming clean.”

“Motherfucker,” Ty huffed as he headed for the kitchen to grab the phone. “Now we got to hike
another
of those fucking things up those steps!”

“Karma,” Owen shot at him.

Ty grumbled but didn’t respond. They’d find Nick, they’d get the whole story, and he’d either apologize or he’d hit him. Maybe apologize and then hit him. Or hit him and then apologize. He was pissed, and Nick had crossed far over the line, but still . . . handcuffing him to the bed had not been the smartest move. Ty was going to have to pull a Zane and start thinking with his head and not his heart on this one. Or maybe just let Zane do all the thinking period for a while, until he got his mind around it all.

He didn’t have to ask the others what they wanted on their pizza, so he just ordered as they talked in the living room.

“What do you think, Garrett? You think Burns could have been dirty?” Owen asked.

Ty averted his gaze, watching Zane in his peripheral vision and pretending not to have heard the question. Zane glanced in his direction, shifting uncomfortably. He leaned toward Owen, lowering his voice, but Ty still heard him.

“I think . . . yeah, he could have been. A lot of the things I was doing in Miami, they never drew blood and they should have. I never did figure out what Burns did with the information I culled down there. And I know for damn sure he had Ty doing things that no oversight committee would have approved of. Add it all together and . . . Jesus, I don’t know. Nick’s story makes sense.”

Ty finished ordering, hung up the phone, and headed for the living room. They all shifted nervously. He threw himself on the couch and held his head in both hands. “What have I done?”

“He’ll forgive you, man,” Digger said after a few uncomfortable moments of silence. Ty didn’t lift his head. “He always does.”

“I think the question you’re really struggling with, baby,” Zane said as he laid his hand on Ty’s back, “is: will you forgive him?”

Ty covered his face with his hands. “I need to see that proof he was talking about. I have to see it.”

“So there’s what we do,” Digger said with a clap of his hands. “First we find Lucky. Then we get that evidence for you. Man, I love to have a plan!” He got up and strolled toward the kitchen, singing under his breath.

They all watched him, entirely baffled.

“Digger,” Owen called after him.

“The man with a plan!” Digger sang, pointing at Ty before sticking his head into the fridge to find something to drink.

“So you’re telling me these people, these fucking people you spent half your life risking your arse for, the first hint you gave them that you weren’t the fucking Boy Scout they thought you were, they turned on you?” Liam asked, his accent thickening into something Nick couldn’t quite identify as the whiskey and the indignation settled in.

He’d started out intending to clean Nick’s wound with the alcohol, but they’d swiftly turned to just drinking it.

Nick stared at him, trying to decipher the feelings Liam’s words gave him. He knew on a basic level what Liam was doing, what he had been doing for almost two weeks now: psychological warfare. The best way to make an enemy your ally was to convince them their friends had abandoned them, turned on them, or just didn’t care about them. Liam’s methods were so subtle, Nick had caught himself falling victim to doubts even as he reminded himself of what Liam was trying to do.

And somewhere along the way, Nick had realized that, despite Liam’s nefarious techniques, there was a lot of truth to his endgame. It had resulted in an odd sort of antagonistic camaraderie between them. Nick believed the man when he said he was after the cartel and the NIA was after him. Nick genuinely wanted to help him. Yet he still wouldn’t hesitate to toss him overboard if given the chance.

“You’re telling me you literally laid down your life for each and every one of those pompous fuckers, including Garrett! And they what? Handcuffed you to a bed when you admitted you aren’t a fucking saint? Why? Were they afraid of you? Thought you’d go all homicidal maniac and kill them? Did they think they were actually going to call the police or some horseshit and arrest you for following through on a government-sanctioned hit?”

“I don’t know. I guess. I don’t know.” Nick took a long drink from the bottle, then handed it off to Liam.

Liam waved it, and its contents sloshed. “Did they realize what would happen to you if the NIA discovered you’d been burned over that hit? The same fucking thing happening to me, mate, that’s what! You’d have been taken to Gitmo and disposed of. Or found in some ravine or lake in a car with cut brake lines. Or hell . . . worse, you’d have been given a new identity and been their bitch until you got too slow to cut someone’s throat.”

Nick swallowed hard, trying not to let the stark fear filter through him. A lifetime of hits for the NIA? His soul was tarnished enough; that would be a fate worse than death for his conscience.

“Right.” Liam nodded as his blue eyes stared into a distance Nick couldn’t see. “This game, O’Flaherty, it’s for people like me. You . . . it’s not for you.”

“Is that why you want back in?”

Liam handed off the bottle, then rested his hand on Nick’s shoulder and leaned closer. “The world needs people like me. It doesn’t have to like it. It doesn’t even have to know it. But it needs me to do the things I do. And it helps if I enjoy them, hmm?”

“That’s very altruistic of you,” Nick grumbled, taking a plug from the bottle.

“Nicholas, you’re not hearing my words.”

“I’m barely
understanding
your words. You go all weird Russian when you drink.”

Liam snorted, and Nick fought back a smile. “See,” Liam whispered, and he pointed at Nick, pressing his finger against the tip of Nick’s nose. “The world needs people like you and your mates, too. The good ones. If everyone was like me? What the hell would there be worth fighting for?”

Nick frowned, moving his nose out of the line of fire. Liam took the bottle from Nick, sighing as he looked it over.

“What the hell happened to you?” Nick asked him.

“Life,” Liam spat out.

Nick cocked his head as Liam stared out the
Fiddler
’s windows.

Liam clutched the bottle to his heart. “I’m done. No more for me.” He slid off the stool, tucking the bottle under his arm. “Good night, O’Flaherty. Let’s never speak of this again.”

Nick watched him head for the stairs, his path unsteady at best. “Hey,” he called.

Liam turned and leaned against the railing, taking another sip from the bottle despite his claims that he was done.

“Have you been alone all this time?” Nick asked. “Since you left? The NIA, all that. You always work alone?”

Liam lowered his head, turning the bottle over. “My partner, she and I were together for a year or so.”

“The one the cartel framed you for killing?”

“The very same. She was called Anna. She was quite lovely.”

Nick searched for the right words, torn between wanting to dig for information and feeling sorry for the man. “I’m sorry for your loss,” he finally said.

Liam cleared his throat. “I’m sorry for dragging you into this by force. I’m sorry . . . my life is such that the only person I could think to go to for help wasn’t a friend, but rather an enemy.” He laughed ruefully.

“I was a friend once. That counts, I guess.”

Liam met his eyes, nodding absently. He was still nodding when he turned around and thumped down the stairs, calling out as he disappeared below deck. “Brace the mainsail, matey!”

Nick sighed and stared off at the harbor. He and Liam had swiftly run out of options and time. The cartel would be on Ty and Zane soon enough, the NIA would be on Liam and Nick, and then nothing would save any of them. Their only hope was to track down the money Burns had stolen and use it as leverage, offer it as a trade for Zane’s freedom. That was what Nick had convinced Liam to do, anyway, instead of the original plan he’d been pushing.

He still had no idea how to clear Liam’s name, but Nick wasn’t losing sleep over that. If Nick had to let Liam crash and burn, he would.

He checked all their safeguards one last time before limping down to his cabin and crawling into bed. Kelly was in town. God, he was so close but Nick couldn’t reach out to him, he couldn’t risk any of his actions putting Kelly in more danger than he already was. And Ty . . . Nick’s entire being ached at the very thought of the way Ty must hate him now that he’d come clean.

His oldest friend. His dearest friend.

Nick curled on his side, burying his head in the covers as the
Fiddler’s Green
bobbed peacefully in the falling snow.

He woke later gasping for air around the hand that covered his mouth. His left wrist was pinned to the mattress in an iron grip, and there was a weight on his hips like someone had straddled him. There was also something dripping on him. It was too dark in the cabin to see much, but Nick struck out with his right hand, grabbing his assailant by the throat. If this was Liam in some fucked-up attempt at cuddling, they were both dying today.

“Nick, it’s me. It’s Doc.”

As soon as that familiar voice broke the silence, Nick’s fingers loosened their hold and his eyes widened. Kelly removed his hand from Nick’s mouth, placing it on Nick’s shoulder instead.

“Kelly?” Nick gasped. He could barely see Kelly’s grinning, bearded face. “How did you find us?”

Kelly bent and kissed him, disregarding Nick’s hand still at his throat. Nick pawed at him, desperate to feel the man and make sure he was real. It was apparent that Kelly had been in the water. He was shivering, and they were both breathless when Kelly finally broke the kiss.

“I knew you’d head for water, searched every marina until I saw the
Fiddler
.”

“Jesus,” Nick whispered, awe and sadness mixing in his tone. He sat up and wrapped Kelly in his arms, pressing his face against Kelly’s chest despite how wet he was, squeezing until the man grunted. “God, it’s good to feel you.”

“You too,” Kelly whispered, and he kissed Nick’s temple.

“You’re going to freeze, you need to dry off.”

Kelly batted Nick’s hands away as they tugged at his wet clothing. “Fuck that, we’re getting right back in the water. I snuck past Bell to get down here. I kind of expected you to be tied up or something.” He knelt back and patted Nick down like he was checking him for hidden restraints. “I watched him for a good hour from the dock; he’s got no fucking pattern with his patrol. He’s just weaving around up top like he’s drunk. If we’re going to get by him, we have to go now. Are there any more, or is it just Bell?”

“Kelly,” Nick said, hesitating as nerves fluttered through him.

Kelly was crawling off of him, but he stopped and turned back to Nick, eyebrows raised. “You can run, right? Can you swim? They told me you’d been stabbed.”

“Yeah, but . . . Kels, I can’t leave.”

“What?”

Nick opened his mouth to explain, but he couldn’t force the words out.

Realization seeped through Kelly’s expression as he studied Nick’s face. He slumped back to the bed. “Oh my God.” Kelly was breathless, as if the revelation had knocked the air from his lungs. “You’re not a prisoner, are you? He didn’t snatch you off the street after you left Ty’s place. Did he?”

Nick shook his head. He couldn’t pull in any air either, and the chill that ran through him made him light-headed. His heart pounded at his chest and his fingers pulsed with each beat as the silence stretched between them.

“You went with Liam Bell . . . by choice?” Kelly asked, his voice cracking.

“Kelly, no. He showed up after my surgery. He told me he’d be coming for my help, and if I refused . . . you’d be the one paying for it.”

Kelly’s shoulders slumped, and the water dripping off his nose into his scruffy beard made him look like some dejected cartoon character. “You’re doing this because of me? You . . . you . . . you’re with Liam Bell because of
me
?”

“No.”

“Yeah, you are! You’re working with Bell because of me. Why the fuck didn’t you tell me? I could have helped you, I could have gotten you out of this!”

“I couldn’t risk that he wasn’t bluffing, and I couldn’t lose you. We both know he strikes from a distance.” Nick took a deep breath, nausea churning his gut. The look of utter betrayal in Kelly’s eyes was almost too much for him. “Once I started actually listening to him . . . he’s not on the wrong side of this.”

But Kelly wasn’t listening to Nick. “This explains why you babbled about wanting to kill him for two weeks when you were delirious.” Then the frown deepened and he turned his changeable eyes on Nick. “Wait . . . you
remember
being in the hospital? You remember after you woke up?”

Nick took a deep, shaky breath. “Yeah.”