Blood on Blood

TWENTY-NINE

California

The open road was the only place she truly felt at home. She drove the Miata west on a secondary highway. Not fast, but not dawdling, either. Nothing suspicious. Nothing more than a hot blonde in a small convertible on a road trip. No one would guess what she had wrapped up in a handkerchief, hidden underneath the spare tire in the trunk.

The paper grocery bag sat on the floor of the passenger seat, the top folded neatly down. Pretty plain wrapping, but it held over two hundred kay.

That had been gravy, the money. And the easiest part. Finding the slip of paper in Jerzy’s wallet. She knew it was a combination, and what else could it be for, if not the room safe at the Hilton? Jerzy was so predictable. Patrik had said so, but she didn’t realize how right he was until the end.

And now she had Patrik’s money and the diamonds, too. She had a vision of the ugly gangster waiting for her at one of his safe houses, all coked up and horny for her. He probably wanted the money more, but now he wasn’t going to get either one.

“Just stay close to him. Keep an eye on things,” he’d told her just before Jerzy came into Ambrozy’s that first time. “He’s a wild card. I need to know he’s on task. And after it is over, and we get my money back, I will take you on a long vacation. You won’t want to come back.”

He got that part right. She was never going back to Chicago. No matter how easy or how predictable the marks were in that town.

She shook her head at the thought of the Sawyer brothers. Running around like a pair of ass clowns, chasing the dreams of a dead father. What a joke.

But they’d come through in the end, hadn’t they?

Jerzy had been the easier of the two for her to kill. His mean nature played out in that last smile. The world was a better place without him, as far as she was concerned.

Mick had been slightly more difficult. But only slightly. Whether they do it for love or they do it for money, how do you really feel sorry for a mark?

You don’t.

Maybe if their loser convict father had been around to teach them some smarts, the Sawyer boys wouldn’t have made it so easy for her. But that was their bad luck. Her own father had taught her well. Well enough to play both of the brothers and the Polish mobster, to boot.

So now she had two hundred thousand of Patrik’s cash. And she’d get at least three times that much from a diamond fence in San Francisco. That was plenty. Enough to get off the grift for a while. Live a straight life somewhere warm and quiet until the money ran out or the itch to get back in the game became too much. Whichever came first.

Ahead of her, the day’s sun dipped low, sending a bloody smear across the sky. The color of red marked her destination.

Ania kept her car pointed west and drove into the dying sun.