Authors: Nadene Seiters
“Yes.”
Simple
, Troy thinks.
“So what you’re telling me, Mr. Trenton is that Mr. Yukon
here hired you as a hit man to kill Mr. Ingles.” Troy nods, and then realizes
he has to say it aloud, so he responds in kind.
“Yes.” More murmuring, more gavel pounding, and then the defense
is standing up to question Troy. The man clears his throat and plasters a
false, bright smile on his face. His hazel eyes bore into Troy’s, and they
promise to disassemble his story. His dark gray suit is so crisp it barely
moves when he does. Immediately, he leans on the railing near the Jury as he
faces Troy as if he’s showing them that he’s including them in the
conversation.
“Do you have family, Robert?” He pauses for effect. “You
don’t mind if I call you Robert, right?” Troy doesn’t respond. His eyes sparkle
with his hatred.
“I did.” Apparently he’s said something that amuses the man
leaning against the railing, because his smile increases.
“You did? What happened to them, Robert?” The prosecution
chooses that moment to intervene.
“Objection, your honor! This has nothing to do with the
current case.” The Judge has a brief conference with both lawyers before they
return to their positions, and the objection is denied.
“They were murdered.” Troy answers coldly staring at the
defense lawyer. The ticking muscle in his jaw is the only giveaway that he’s
enraged at this point. He feels as if his entire body is being pulled apart and
reassembled as if he’s being made into a killing machine again. He wants to
wrap his strong, thick fingers around that scrawny neck and-
Troy immediately stuffs those thoughts down and relaxes.
This is business as usual. He can do this without letting it affect him.
“And do you believe that Mr. Yukon here had them murdered?”
“Objection, your honor! Speculation!” Troy furrows his brow
and wonders if that’s even a reason. There’s another brief meeting held, and
Troy can actually hear their heated discussion this time.
“On the grounds of speculation, really Hank?” The defense
lawyer asks with mirth in his tone.
“Yes! This has nothing to do with the facts! Mr. Trenton’s
opinion on his sister and niece’s murder case has nothing to do with this!” The
prosecutor argues heatedly.
“Oh, if has everything to do with this! Do you really
believe he’d
be
here if they were still alive?” The Judge intervenes as
soon as he’s had his fill of their arguing for the day.
“Alright, where are you going with this, Jerry?” The blonde
with the crisp suit straightens himself and raises his nose in the air.
“He has a motive to lie on the stand, Your Honor. He’s not a
credible witness!” There’s a hint of a flush on the back of Jerry’s neck, and
Troy leans back in his chair with his arms crossed over his chest. He looks
like a farm boy fresh off the farm, but there’s no denying that he also looks
like the grim reaper.
“Do you understand that you are under oath, Mr. Trenton? If
you are found guilty of lying under oath, you will be arrested and sentenced
for obstruction of justice and much more.” Troy leans forward in his chair and
looks straight at Mr. Yukon, who is currently mopping at the sweat with a
napkin. He’s nervous because he knows that if Troy could he would ring this
man’s neck.
“I understand.” The Judge looks worried, but he tells them
all to proceed. Jerry is allowed his question.
“I believe Killian Yukon had my sister and my niece
murdered.”
Because I threatened to go to the police when he hired someone
else to kill
me,
Troy adds silently.
“That will be all.” Troy glances at the jury and sees that
most of them have scowls on their faces as he departs from the stand. He’s
escorted from the room and takes a seat on a bench to calm himself. The agents
that escorted him inside the building wait patiently for him to stand. He
doesn’t want to wait around to see what the verdict is. If Killian Yukon makes
it out of that courtroom without a sentence of the death penalty, Troy will
enact his own.
The hash browns are mush, the sausage is overcooked, and the
egg is not sunny side up. Overall, his breakfast the next morning at the hotel
room is less than mediocre compared to Grant’s cooking. He hasn’t spoken to
anyone other than the two agents in the room with him, and they’re not much for
conversation. In fact, they try to avoid speaking with him at all costs.
After breakfast, he grabs a quick, hot shower and tries to
force the thoughts of Cassidy to the back of his mind. They’ve already told him
that he won’t be going back to the Grant farm, and Troy’s beginning to think
it’s for the best. He doesn’t want anyone at the town to recognize him now that
his face was all over the News this morning. It’s a good thing only a few
people actually saw him on the Grant farm.
His forehead is pressed to the tiled wall of the shower with
his hands on either side of his head, and with his fingers splayed against the
tiles. Flashes of the way Cassidy felt beneath him haunt him as he grits his
teeth against the building regret. He tells himself over and over again that
she is better off without him, but it doesn’t help.
Someone knocks on the bathroom door, and he quickly shoves
his head under the spray of the showerhead to hide the tears. Robert Trenton
never cried over a woman, but Troy Red is tearing up at the thought of never
seeing her beautiful face again. Fourteen days of heaven and hell combined, and
he’s been whittled down to a sniveling fool. Angry with himself, Troy turns off
the water and puts a towel around his waist.
“What?” He calls out angrily.
“Just wanted to make sure you didn’t drown.” One of the male
agents calls back. Troy sits down on the toilet with the seat down and runs his
fingers through his wet hair twice before he stands up. He shakes himself off
like a boxer would before a fight, and brushes his teeth. Today he will wait,
but after the verdict is delivered tomorrow morning, he will be off to his new
location.
He can only pray that it won’t hold anymore captivating
women.
The alarm clock rings through the hotel room and Troy tosses
if off the nightstand in his effort to get it to shut up. He rubs at his eyes and
immediately thinks of what he has to do to be ready for when they whisk him off
to another destination in the middle of nowhere. The dream he was having of
Cassidy flashes before his eyes, and he grunts as he swings his legs over the
side of the bed. The television is on in the living area of the suite, and the
two agents are already up eating breakfast.
Feeling empty, Troy jumps into another scalding hot shower,
and turns it to cold right before he hops out. He doesn’t look at himself in
the mirror as he brushes his teeth, and leaves his hair in disarray. Maybe this
will be his new look since he can’t bring himself to look into his own eyes.
“Guilty!” One of the agents roars as if someone just scored
a touchdown in a football game. Troy doesn’t rejoice with them. He just stares
at the man who will be sentenced to death for his crimes. But first he must go
through another trial for more deaths, with more people as witnesses. But
Robert Trenton is not needed anymore, and Troy Red needs to die.
“What’s my new name?” Troy asks as he pulls a shirt over his
head. He’s wearing a pair of jeans and another black t-shirt, but these don’t
smell like Cassidy.
“Huh?” One of the agents turns with a forkful of eggs almost
to his mouth and pulls a driver’s license from his pocket. He studies it for a
second, and then he tosses it at Troy. His mouth curls up at the corner with
disgust as he stares at his new name.
“Jack Evans?” The other agent sneers at him and returns his
attention back to the television. Neither one of them want to be bothered with
a man they believe should be rotting in a jail cell right now. They’re not the
only ones in the room who believe that.
As soon as they’re finished breakfast, they escort Troy to
the same elevator from the day before, and they put him in the back of another
black SUV with tinted windows. The drive to the airport is quick, and the two
male agents leave him with another male agent. Troy is starting to understand
the pattern. They’re not going to trust him with another female agent, and he’s
starting to understand why.
The flight is eventless and boring. The only good part about
it is Troy gets to listen to music on headphones. The agent has his own iPod,
but he has mostly bluegrass music which Troy cannot seem to enjoy. He has to
hand it back when they begin to land and realizes that the sour taste in his
mouth is disappointment. They’re nowhere near Pennsylvania.
“Hungry, Jack?” This guy is a little more understanding with
his brown eyes and black hair. He’s tan and probably of Italian ethnicity.
“No, I’m not hungry. Let’s just go.” They board their second
flight to Alaska, and Troy groans when he realizes he might be cold for the rest
of his life. Ben, the agent, laughs as they are seated.
“Don’t worry, just another stop along the way.” Troy
inwardly feels relief and tries to forget about the blossom of hope in his
chest. When they land in Alaska, Ben and Troy consume a rather hurried dinner
before they get onto a private jet. It’s a small jet with nothing terribly
exciting, and Ben disappears into the cockpit for the remainder of the flight.
Troy attempts to catch some shut-eye before they land again.
Someone’s shaking him and he has to wipe a dribble of drool
from his chin to maintain his dignity. Ben looks amused as he takes a step back
with a cup of coffee in his hands. He offers it to Troy, but the burly man
shakes his head and stretches his arms above his head. He’s not in the mood for
caffeine.
As they walk into the warm air, Troy realizes that he’s
somewhere in the south. He narrows his eyes as he looks around at the sand
surrounding him, and feels his heart sink.
At least it won’t remind me of
Pennsylvania.
He thinks as he gets off the plane.
“Welcome to Colorado, Jack!” He winces when Ben calls him by
his new name, and tries to remind himself that he will have to get used to it.
“Thanks. Don’t tell me I’m staying in Denver.” Troy’s
secretly hoping for Aspin. Maybe he’ll be able to chase some wealthy tale there
and forget all about the horse loving farm girl he left behind. The thought
makes him want to vomit.
“No, you’re staying in Arriba.” Ben smiles cheekily as he
leads the way to a white sedan with tinted windows. It’s a four door, but Troy
hops into the front before Ben can get any ideas.
“You have
got
to be kidding me. You are, right?” Troy
looks hopeful, but Ben dashes his hopes against the rocks when he chuckles and
shakes his head. They don’t speak much on the ride to Troy’s new home, which
consists of a small one story home on two acres in the middle of nowhere. It
has air condition, at least.
He stares at the sand around him and feels his throat close
up with fear. It’ll be lonely here, and it’ll be Hell. He imagines that the
hottest days here will undoubtedly feel like Hell.
“Welcome home, Jack Evans! You already have a bank account
setup; the information is inside on the kitchen table. Oh, I almost forgot!
Here’s your new birth certificate, and here’s your passport. You get one of
these now.” Troy takes the envelope from the agent with numb fingers and
wonders if anyone will hear him screaming out here. He might actually lose his
mind and do it eventually. Maybe he’ll suffer from isolation sickness.
“Thanks,” Troy whispers as he stares, horrified as a
tumbleweed blows past the house. This feeling is much worse than the one he had
when he was dropped off at Grant’s farm. This is supposed to be
permanent
!
“Alright, well, go on in and you’ll find that it’s already
stocked with the necessities. An agent will check on you every few days for the
first few weeks, and then contact will be cut off. You know how to reach us.
Good luck, Jack.” The man claps him on the back and watches as Troy walks,
stiff-legged, towards his new home.
The inside is cozy and modern with tile floors to keep the
place cool. It’s nothing like the Grant farmhouse, and it feels nothing like
home. There’s barely room for a bed in the master bedroom, but he’s only one
person. There’s an extra change of clothes on the bed, and there’s an envelope
on the kitchen table with his banking information in it, along with a debit
card. The sound of the sedan starting up reaches his ears, and before he can go
outside and tell the man he’s changed his mind, the car is gone.
Glancing around the perimeter to make sure that there are no
nearby homes, Troy raises his face to the sky and lets it rip. His roar of
anguish doesn’t even echo back to him it’s so flat and foreign. He slams a palm
against the post of the porch and tries to get the pain to ebb, but it’s
overtaking him. Cassidy’s name is on his lips as he puts his forehead to the
wooden post and lets the moisture flood his eyes.
“It’s been five weeks.” Grant says to his daughter as she
grooms the foal. He’s exhausted from taking shifts during the night and the day
so that she can sleep. Her hand flutters as she lifts the brush off the foal’s
side and puts it back. He cannot understand why she’s so intent on believing
that Troy Red will return, but she maintains that he must.
“I know, Dad. But maybe he has to stay away for a while.”
Her voice doesn’t quiver, but her hand does when it comes up again. Reese’s
Pieces senses her distress and takes a step away from her, nervous.
“Look Cass, you have to face the facts. He was here for a
short time, and he took advantage-” Cassidy turns a glare on him that would
make any other man turn and run, but he’s her father. “Of you.” He finishes. Her
gaze hardens and he turns at that point to run, and he tries to quell the fear
inside his heart.
“He has to return.” Cassidy whispers as she takes her free
hand and puts it on her abdomen. Her father is too far away to hear her unusually
quiet sob as she puts her forehead to Reese’s Pieces shoulder. He’s getting quite
large and eats like, well, a horse. She sniffles and tries to hide the anguish
that she’s feeling.
Cassidy Grant puts down the brush and grabs her purse from
the tack room. She gets into her car and turns the key without saying goodbye
to her father, and blasts the radio as she makes her slow departure down the
rocky driveway. Reese’s Pieces has been socializing with the other horses much
more often now, and he has no need for her anymore.
The ride home is slow due to a few people pulling out in
front of her, and the test within her purse seems to be burning a hole in it.
Cassidy groans as she pulls up to her house and rests her forehead against the
steering wheel. She’s thirteen days late, and she’s never been late in her
life. Her heart hammers in her chest as she grabs the purse and stomps up the
short walkway to her front door. Her hand shakes as she puts the key into the
receptacle, and twists.
Trying not to panic, Cassidy closes her front door and locks
it again. She has a message on her answering machine and tries not to let her
finger shake as she pushes the play button. Each time she has one, she tries to
tell herself that it wouldn’t be Troy. But that spark of hope always hits her.
It’s a hang-up.
The weight of the world seems to be crushing down on her as
she pulls the box out of her purse and stares at the kit with three tests in
it. She wants to make sure. Ripping it open with her hands, she takes the
little pee sticks back to her bathroom and squats over one. It’s not very
amusing, but she chuckles anyway at the absurdity of this.
It was one night,
she tells herself to calm her
fears. Without looking at the test, she puts it on the sink counter and holds
her breath as she waits. She has to take in four new breaths while she counts
the minutes away, and then looks at the test. The negative sign has her heart
fluttering in her chest as she laughs at herself.
“I’m just stressed,” she mutters as she cleans up the test
and wipes down the counter with disinfectant. The other two tests sit on the
back of her toilet, and she goes about her afternoon chores of cleaning and
preparing dinner. She hasn’t been spending as much time at her father’s farm
because it reminds her of Troy, but soon she’s going to have to get over that.
Her father is too old to be doing all that farm work on his own anymore.
With a lighter soul, she sits down at her computer to do
some trading of stocks. Troy Red is still on the back burner of her thoughts,
but she’s getting used to him always being there. It’s like a tiny feeling that
she just can’t get rid of. Troy Red will forever be the love of her life, even
if he was only that for less than twelve hours.
The phone rings, and she jumps up to grab it. Checking her
hope as soon as it sparks, she picks it up to check the caller I.D. It’s an
unknown number, so she hits the answer button and puts it to her ear. Before
she can even say anything, the person on the other end of the line speaks.
“Cassidy Grant?” It’s a man’s voice, but it’s not Troy. Her
eyes narrow as she thinks about whether or not she should answer. A
conversation she had with Troy that night replays in her hand in record speed.
They might come looking for me one day. Even if you have
the slightest suspicion, call this number for help and get out of there,
Cassidy. I don’t want you to end up like my sister, my niece.
“Yes?” She answers after a half a second. It could be a
telemarketer. The phone goes dead, and she realizes that she might have just
made the biggest mistake of her lifetime.
With shaking fingers, she puts the phone back in its cradle
and stares at it.
I’m overreacting,
she tells herself, but she picks up
her cellphone off the kitchen table and dials her father’s number anyway. He
picks up on the second ring.
“Dad, did you just get a phone call from someone who asked
your name and hung up?” She tries to sound normal, but the undertone of panic
is still prevalent.
“How did you know?” She inhales sharply and hangs up. The
number for Moonlight Rogers is on her fridge. She grabs it and takes her laptop
and cellphone with her as she gets into her car. Someone has come looking for
the people who helped a hit man, and they’re not going to be happy when they
realize that Cassidy and her father have no idea where Troy Red is.
The porch light is on as she pulls up to her father’s house,
but the sun has not set yet. Suspicious, Cassidy sits in her car for a few
seconds before she pulls out her cellphone. If she’s lucky, this phone number
doesn’t belong to a disposable phone that has been trashed. Her heart hammers
in her chest as she listens to the ringing on the other end.
“Hello?” His voice sounds groggy as if he was sleeping, but
she doesn’t have time to worry about
why
he sounds that way.
“Moonlight Rogers?” Cassidy is staring at the front door of
her father’s house and wonders why he hasn’t come out yet.
“Who is this, and how did you get this number?” She almost
breathes a sigh of relief, almost.
“My name is Cassidy Grant, and I got this number from Troy
Red.” Realizing that his name is most likely different now, Cassidy swallows
her fear and quietly steps out from her car. The horses are not in yet, so she
wanders down to the barn first.
“Well, Ms. Grant, what can I do for you?” Moonlight must
know something about Troy and her. His tone suggests it.
“Listen, I received a phone call where a man asked my name,
and hung up when I confirmed. My father received the same type of phone call
around the same time. I’m at his house, and right now I can’t find him. I think
we’re in trouble.” There’s some shuffling on the other end that sounds like
someone sitting up out of bed, and she imagines this Moonlight Rogers wrapping
a sheet around his waist.
“Uh huh, and you’re sure it wasn’t a telemarketer? We’ve
never had a breech, sweetheart. I doubt it’s happening now.” Cassidy doesn’t respond
because she’s at the entrance to the barn. Her heart is fluttering in her chest
as she stares at the carnage before her, and her eyes begin to tear up. The
lump in her throat makes it impossible for the scream to be anything but a
whisper, and yet Moonlight Rogers hears it.
“Cassidy?” He asks in an attempt to grab her attention, but
she’s not listening anymore. The phone slips from her fingers and hits the
gravel outside the barn. It’s still on, and he can hear her slow, deliberate
footsteps.
Keeping the line alive, Moonlight Rogers pulls the sheet off
his waist and shimmies on his pants and a shirt. He puts his own phone in his
shirt pocket, runs a hand through his hair, and grabs the keys to a much more
appropriate vehicle. He’s an hour and a half away, but he can call backup. As
soon as the Viper is started, Moonlight dials a close friend and agent’s number
who lives much closer than him.
“Blake?” He asks as soon as he hears the ringing cease.
“Rogers? What the Hell do you want?” Phone calls are used
for emergencies only, especially when they’re to the agent’s home number.
“The farm not far from you has been compromised. The
daughter was on the phone with me and then she was gone. I need you to go there
and get them out.” Moonlight says each word deliberately so as to get his point
across, and then he hangs up the phone as he breaks every law imaginable on the
roads. At this speed, he’ll make it there in half the time if a deer doesn’t
jump out in front of him.
Blake Adamson grabs his firearm out of the nightstand drawer
and glances over at the woman in his bed. He’s been seeing her for the past few
weeks because he thought this place was secure, and he wouldn’t have to leave
again. Her crimson hair falls over her face as she rolls over, and she doesn’t
wake when he pulls on his pants. Gently, he lays a kiss on her forehead as he
goes to do his job, and wonders if he’ll be coming back.
“I have to retire soon,” He mumbles as he gets into his four
door sedan. The engine purrs to life with barely a sound, and he smoothly puts
it in reverse. The cool, night air washes over him as he rolls down the window
and listens for the sounds of incoming vehicles.
Flicking off his headlights, he curses as he tries to
maneuver the driveway up to the Grant farm silently. It’s no use. He stops the
car, locks it and pockets the keys. Then he pulls out his gun and flicks off
the safety as he creeps up the rest of the mountainside. Cassidy’s vehicle is
still out front, and the porch light is on.
There are no lights on within the house and none shining
inside the barn. The horses are all still outside in the pasture, but most of
them are crowded around the outside of their sleeping quarters as if they’re
wondering what the hell has happened. Blake stops when he hears a sound from
inside the barn’s open door and tilts his head to listen.
His breath wafts in front of him, crystalized by the
freezing temperatures outside. Gravel shifts under one foot as he moves his
weight to face the barn, and his eyes narrow as he tries to see into the dark
enclosure. Hanging from the rafters are two shapes, and not too far away is
another lump. Swallowing the fear that he won’t see the end of this night,
Blake Adamson’s brown eyes dart from left to the right before he ducks into the
barn.
What he finds hanging inside makes his insides twirl around as
if someone is banging on a piñata, but he doesn’t vomit. Instead, he reaches
down to the small, frail shape of Cassidy Grant and lifts her up to her feet
with his fist in her shirt. He drags her away from the bloody mess and tries
not to cringe when his boot slips in the blood.
Blake doesn’t bother looking for Robert Grant because he’s
pretty sure the mutilated body hanging from the rafters is him. The young woman
beside him doesn’t shiver in the frigid air, and her breathing is even. The
vacant look in her eyes is one that Blake has seen all too often in his
lifetime. It’s the look of a human being that has seen too much cannot
compartmentalize. Cassidy Grant will forever be haunted by the pieces of her
father hanging from the rafters of his barn.
Disturbed by the scene himself, Blake’s hands shake as he
helps Cassidy into the passenger seat of his vehicle. He finds it troubling
that she hasn’t fought him off or asked who he is, but maybe she recognizes him
from the times he worked on her father’s farm. Just as he starts the vehicle,
he sees a pair of headlights coming up the drive.
Moonlight Rogers’ Viper pulls up beside his, and the sound
of the bottom of the car scraping against the gravel makes Blake cringe. He
rolls down his window and blasts the heater in an attempt to bring some life
into Cassidy. She probably wasn’t in there more than an hour, but that’s long
enough to chill her to the bone.
“What did you find?” Rogers asks as he leans forward to look
at Cassidy sitting in the passenger seat. She must have touched her father at
some point because there’s blood on her hands and a few streaks in her hair.
“Grant’s dead, probably an hour and a half to two hours ago.
Cassidy’s in shock and I’m going to take her to a hospital. I’ll call HQ and
let them know the situation.” Moonlight nods once as he rolls up his window and
continues to torture his vehicle as he heads up the driveway. He’ll wait there
for the rest of his team to show up before he gets out of his vehicle and looks
around. Then they’ll have to discern what happened. It will be a field day for
the media if they can’t keep this quiet.
“Reese’s Pieces needs fed.” Cassidy mumbles as she looks
down at her bloody hands. She starts to whimper as they shake and her
expression is jumbled as she tries to remember what happened. Blake shifts into
third as he guns it down the empty stretch of highway ahead of them outside of
town. He doesn’t want to be around when she loses her mind, but he has a
feeling he’s going to be.
Just as he takes the exit for the nearest hospital, his
passenger begins to scream hysterically as she stares at her hands.
Remember, it’s Jack Evans now not Troy Red. Jack Evans,
Jack Evans, Jack Evans…
“Fuck, first it’s Robert, then it’s Troy, now it’s Jack! Can’t
a guy ever have just one name?” Fidgeting as he sits in the waiting room, Troy
cannot help the mumbled exclamation. There’s no one in the room with him, so
it’s not actually an issue that he’s talking to himself.
“Jack Evans?” A woman calls from the doorway, and he stands.
It took just one phone call to Moonlight Rogers to have a fake background
created for Jack Evans, labeling him as an expert mechanic. The wages are not
always the greatest, but it’ll be something to do with his hands to keep his
mind from wandering to Cassidy Grant.
He winces when he realizes that he thought the forbidden
name and stands from his position on the chair. The woman notices the flinch. But
doesn’t say a word as she leads him through the crisp, white waiting room
clients sit in when they’re waiting for a vehicle to be worked on. Then he’s
led into a hallway with light brown tiles and off white walls. The woman’s
heels click on the tiles ahead of him, and he tries to stare at her as he would
have stared at Cassidy. But it doesn’t work.