The Messenger

41

As he drove, Evan complained about Adrian, which was nothing less than what Daniel expected. Still, it added to his depression. He looked out of the passenger-side window, hoping Evan would get the hint and shut up.

He had no real hope of that. Or of anything else, he realized. Even when he had been in prison, he had not felt so trapped. There, at least, he knew he would eventually get out.

As they continued up the now familiar road, he began to think of this woman they were after. What would become of her?

He shook himself, as if to throw off the thought.

Why should he care?

Hadn’t bothered him to beat the crap out of Brad. That rich little snot. This was just another superwealthy useless bitch.

He heard Evan mention the word “gun” and refocused his attention. “What did you say?”

“Brought a gun. Picked it up this afternoon while I was running errands for His Royal Roachness.”

“Are you nuts? You know what he said about guns! They’re too noisy, they’re not subtle enough. You can take a girl without a gun, can’t you?”

“I know Adrian wouldn’t approve, but hell if I’m gonna try to stop that dog with a knife.”

“Guns make noise,” Daniel repeated.

“I’ll risk having to explain a few pops out of a gun if it keeps that dog from setting me on fire.”

Daniel knew Evan well enough now to realize that argument would be useless.

Daniel wondered if a bullet could stop the dog. If the dog came charging after him, he wasn’t so sure he would try to resist meeting Eduardo’s fate. Let the dog come at him. Let it free him.

As Daniel thought this, Evan made the turn up onto the canyon road where the woman lived. In a few miles, they would be near the place where Eduardo had died.

He felt a jolt of fear. Daniel quickly began to murmur a prayer, then stopped as he became aware of what he was doing. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Strange. He hadn’t prayed since he was really little. Where had that come from?

He glanced nervously at Evan to see if he had noticed his reaction, but Evan was still talking about how much he hated the way Adrian looked now.

A Lexus passed them. Evan called the driver a dickhead, but the car was too far ahead by then for the driver to have heard him.

Other cars came down the canyon road. “Lot of traffic,” Daniel said.

“Too many cars. We’ll never pull this off with this many people around. As usual, he’s screwed up the planning. He has no idea what the outside world is really like. We’ll have to wait. If he wasn’t such a control freak…”

Daniel tuned out the complaints and focused on their surroundings. They had previously scouted out most of this road, so when they came to a narrow strip of asphalt marked PRIVATE DRIVE, Evan turned down it and stopped just out of sight of the road. Farther down the drive, still nearly hidden from their view by tall eucalyptus and pines, was a darkened house.

Evan parked, lowered the windows, and turned off the engine. He turned off the headlights and the two of them sat listening, watching for any sign of life from the house. It remained silent and still, and no lights came on. Daniel pulled a map of the area from the glove compartment. They didn’t need it, but if someone should ask what they were doing there, they would claim to be lost, looking for a street in the next canyon over.

After a few minutes, Evan lit a cigarette.

“I thought you quit,” Daniel said.

“I did. Started again today.”

“You know that’ll kill you.”

“I can only hope that’s true, but I doubt it. I’d prefer cancer to whatever Adrian has in mind for us.”

“You think maybe he’s going to try to kill us?”

Evan rolled his eyes. “Maybe? Try? I have no doubt that’s exactly what’s going to happen to us.”

“He needs us as his slaves.”

“Does he? Once that creepy-crawly thing has strength in his legs and a little bit of skin on him, we’re goners.” He took a deep draw on his cigarette and stared ahead in moody silence.

Daniel went back to his own thoughts. He could not shake the memory of Eduardo and the dog.