Hell Bent Read online

  He had buzz-cut blonde hair and wore a headband over his forehead. His high tops were brand new LeBron’s. He looked to be somewhere between twenty and forty years old; one of those people who remain ageless for decades. He said nothing to Jack, but nodded at him and then at Annabelle and Dylan. Who nodded back.

  Then he lifted his extra-large shirt and pulled the laptop from beneath it. Jack took it just as Dylan came forward, clearly eager to have it back in his own hands. Jack didn’t hesitate in handing it to the teenager, who took it gingerly and nodded once in thanks.

  “Thank you,” Jack told the tall man.

  The man nodded and smiled, revealing perfect white teeth. “Hey, anything to pay off my debt.” He turned then and left the room. Jack closed and bolted the door behind him.

  “Set up in the family room. I have a power strip that’ll fit.” Jack gestured for Dylan and Annabelle to head into the living room, and he turned and walked through the kitchen, heading for a door in the hallway that Annabelle knew led to his office.

  He returned with a power strip a few seconds later and Dylan accepted it without a word. He plugged the laptop in and set it on the coffee table. As he worked, Annabelle claimed the love seat across the coffee table.

  Within a few minutes, Dylan had bypassed the password protected operating system and gotten into the computer’s D-drive, which was filled with a myriad of documents.

  “What exactly are we looking for?”

  “Something having to do with forests or pastel pink?” Jack took the seat opposite to Annabelle’s and leaned forward on his thighs. “Unless either of you can recall anything more concrete?”

  Annabelle leaned forward as well and closed her eyes. The day was still a blur – a horrible, haunting blur – but pieces of it stood out in her mind like snapshots stuck on pause in a film on fast forward. She concentrated on those pieces, wondering if they might be sticking out in her mind for a reason.

  “Forest pink pastel,” she whispered. Why did those words suddenly ring some sort of bell with her? Forest… pink… pastel… Forest… “Forest,” she said aloud as she recalled something. “One of the jobs that we’re working on required a background change – Cassie was going to try a light forest color. It was for Fresh Foods. We talked about it this morning.” How could she have forgotten about that?

  “Lovely, Bella. That’s something.” Jack smiled at her and turned to Dylan. “The Fresh Foods job wouldn’t, by any chance, have been transferred onto that computer, would it?”

  Dylan didn’t answer. He was too busy checking for the same thing. His finger slid over the laptop’s mouse piece like an ice skater across a rink. His thumb clicked on this and that, opening files and closing them again. Finally, his stern, concentrated expression permitted the tiniest bit of a grin to curl the corners of his lips. “I’ve got something. May be it.”

  Annabelle and Jack both leaned closer.

  “The format’s been changed. I can’t open it in PhotoShop or any other program that will allow images, but I can get the coding up.” He did a few more things on the keyboard and a white screen with a bunch of mumbo jumbo appeared before them. “Here it is.”

  “Okay…” Annabelle blinked and licked her lips. She could recognize some of it right off the bat. A lot of it was her own handiwork. “Hand it here.”

  Dylan turned the laptop to face her and she scrolled down through the text. “The fact that Max would transfer the file onto Teresa’s computer has to mean something. He did offer to help me with some of my work load, but he didn’t mention Fresh Foods. He was going to help with Mackenzie. It’s way different than this.” She stopped talking then as she noticed something. Her brow furrowed.

  “What is it, luv?”

  “Well, the formatting didn’t transfer properly in the first place, which is to be expected. But this part here is totally wrong. He changed the background from the ginger I had it in originally to, of all things, flamingo. That’s pink.” She straightened and looked up at Dylan, then at Jack. “There’s no way he did this by mistake. He meant for us to find it. Fresh Foods wanted a background that better matched their logo – i.e., green. Not pink.”

  “Is there anything hidden around that part of the coding that might help us?” Dylan asked. His expression was pinched, tight. He was on edge. Did he feel as if he was getting closer to the people who murdered his father? His mother?

  Annabelle turned back to the screen and concentrated. Though the text had a few more commas and colons than strictly necessary, there wasn’t much else that she could find wrong with it. She shook her head.

  “Forest pink pastel,” Jack said softly.

  Annabelle looked up at him.

  Jack sighed and straightened. “What would happen if you turned the flamingo pink into a pastel pink?”

  Annabelle blinked. Forest pink pastel. “Well, here, nothing. But if we loaded it into a program that allowed images… Then, I don’t know. Maybe something.”

  “Then change it. We can load it onto one of my computers.”

  Annabelle thought for a moment and then shrugged. “All right, but it’ll take me a minute. The order has been messed up on this. I’m not sure if he did it on purpose or not…” If he did, she didn’t want to accidentally change it back, in case it was the key to showing them what they needed to see when the file was converted to images. She had to be very careful. She grew more focused and drew the laptop onto her lap as she set to work making the changes.

  A few seconds later, the doorbell rang. The sudden noise caused her to jump.

  Jack glanced at the door and then down at Annabelle. Their gazes locked. “How long did they say it would be?” Jack asked. Annabelle had to think for a moment to realize that he was referring to the pizza parlor and the pies she’d ordered.

  “Twenty to thirty.”

  Jack looked down at his watch and nodded. He rose from the couch and moved to the door. Once again, he peeked through the hole at eye-level and then stepped back. He unlatched the three locks and drew the door open. On the threshold stood a very young man in a backward baseball cap, his cheeks covered in acne, his t-shirt and wind breaker a touch too big for his gawky body. He didn’t look much older than Dylan.

  “Hi,” the kid said, not exactly looking into Jack’s eyes. He turned his attention down to the three pizza boxes in his arms. “One large with everything, one large pepperoni, mushroom and olive and one medium no cheese, extra sauce with mushrooms and bell peppers?”

  Jack turned to face Annabelle. She nodded. That was right.

  “Come in.” Jack stepped back out of the way and, after a moment’s hesitation, the kid came in after him. Jack closed the door and then held out his hands for the pizzas. The boy handed them over and Jack moved to the kitchen, where he set the pizzas down and opened the top one. He leaned in for a whiff and then closed the lid again.

  “What do we owe you?”

  “That’ll be twenty-eight, ninety-seven.”

  Jack turned back to face him, reached into his jacket’s interior pocket, and pulled out the gun with a silencer on the end of its barrel. The boy’s eyes widened momentarily and then they narrowed.

  Jack didn’t give him a chance to react. He pointed the weapon and pulled the trigger. A splash of red erupted on the door and wall behind the delivery boy. His body jerked a little backward and then he opened his mouth. No sound came out.

  Instead, he sank to his knees and somehow, by the grace of God, Annabelle managed to close her eyes as Jack moved forward, placed the gun against the boy’s chest, and pulled the trigger once more.

  Dylan was up, his arms out at his sides, his eyes maddeningly wide. “What the- What the fuck? What did you do? Jesus Christ, what the fuck-”

  Annabelle cut through this confused and terrified tirade with a question that, in contrast, sounded utterly calm. “How did you know?” She asked as she slowly opened her eyes again and tried not to look at the puddle that was spreading across the floor. Instead, she concentrated o
n Jack’s eyes. Jack’s blue, blue eyes.

  “The pizza’s cold. The parlor is a block away. And he gave me the wrong price.” Jack answered calmly. He held her gaze a moment longer, as if sensing that she needed that contact, however distant it was. Then he knelt, and after re-holstering his gun, he turned the body over. “Pete always includes the tip in the price.”

  Dylan, whose eyes were still as wide as golf balls, ran a shaking hand through his long hair and turned in place. His color was paling. His breathing was coming too fast, too shallow.

  “What…” Annabelle swallowed. She’d accidentally glanced at the body and its puddle of blood. Nausea roiled in her belly. “What was he going to do? I mean, who is he?” And what are they going to do with his dead body?

  Jack didn’t answer right away. With a practiced precision, he unzipped the young man’s jacket and revealed a holster much like his own. It contained a gun of a different, smaller make, but also equipped with a silencer. Strapped to his chest was a harness of some kind, and in that harness were several small vials of liquid, a piece of what looked like white gauze, and two syringes, also filled with clear liquid.

  “Amateurs,” Jack whispered under his breath, sitting back on his heels and shaking his head. “He’s just a kid. I doubt his employers explained to him the down side of this line of work.”

  “Jesus.” Dylan finally spoke, and sort of fell back into his seat, his face now an official shade of green. Perhaps pastel forest?

  “Dylan, he was going to kill us,” Annabelle said softly.

  “No. Not all of us, at least,” Jack said then as he stood once more. “He was under orders to take someone alive.” He stepped over the body and its halo of thick red liquid and re-entered the living room. His eyes found Annabelle’s and held her gaze. “Most likely you. Women make for easier questioning.”

  “They had no idea that you were-” Annabelle stopped herself just in time and swallowed the lump that suddenly formed in her throat. The color drained from her face and her eyes widened. She’d been two words away from spilling Jack’s secret. It was the first time she’d ever come so close.

  She’d simply realized that whoever was after them had figured the pizza delivery trick would be enough to subdue them all because they’d had no idea who they were dealing with. They didn’t know that Jack Thane was a professional killer.

  Jack watched her for a moment in silence, his gaze as intense as she’d ever felt it. “No, luv,” he finally said, his tone very, very soft. “They had no idea. But they’ll figure it out soon enough now.”

  “Figure what out?” Dylan finally asked, his own voice very soft. Most likely, it was difficult for him to speak around the bile that was probably trying to climb up his esophagus. Annabelle wasn’t sure why the scene wasn’t causing her to feel worse than it was. Maybe it was the Vicodin. Or maybe it was because it wasn’t the first time she’d seen Jack kill someone.

  “We have to get out of here,” Annabelle said then, diffusing the question and the situation the only way she knew how. Besides, she was right. And that wasn’t all. “Cass’s in danger too, isn’t she?” She added, as she at once realized that Cassie would be linked to this mess just like everyone else had. Anyone who worked with or around Max or was related to him in any way was fair game. Whatever was on Teresa’s computer was obviously important enough to these people to kill for. They wouldn’t hesitate to track Cassie down and question her to death about it, whether she knew anything or not.

  “Yes,” Jack said simply, once more pulling his cell phone from his inner jacket pocket. Annabelle stood as Jack made another phone call, assigning someone to watch over Cassie and her family. Cassie lived with her cousin, Trinity, in a two-story brick house in Woodbury. Trinity had two kids, both girls. They were very young.

  Jack hung up and Annabelle could tell from his expression that Cassie and Trinity were still okay. Maybe the bad guys hadn’t thought of them yet. Whatever the case, she trusted Jack to keep them safe. There was just something about him.

  “What now?” she asked when he’d re-pocketed the phone.

  “Now we leave.” He gestured to the laptop on the coffee table. “Save whatever changes you’ve made and shut it down. Bring the machine with you.”

  Annabelle nodded and did as he said. Dylan still hadn’t moved from where he sat on the other side. Jack moved to the teenage boy and stood in front of him.

  “Dylan, your father and mother were killed for whatever information is on that laptop.” He knelt before the boy and found his green eyes. “Do you understand what I’m telling you?” He asked softly.

  Dylan stared at him, as locked in that blue-eyed gaze as anyone ever was. He didn’t answer, but after a few intense seconds of silence, he nodded. Once. He knew. He knew they had to get out of there and figure out what ever it was that his father had thought important enough to die hiding.

  Jack stood and Dylan stood after him. The boy swayed a little on his feet and Jack’s hand came up to his shoulder to steady him.

  Jack turned to Annabelle, who’d unplugged the laptop and tucked it under her arm.

  “Get your jacket from your room and then head through the hallway and to the right. Last door.”

  Annabelle nodded and brushed past them, moving away from the living room and the kitchen beyond it, where a very young, very unsuccessful assassin lay on the linoleum, his eyes glazed over, his blood filling the cracks between the refrigerator and the stove.

  She grabbed her riding jacket and back pack from her room then rushed down the hallway to the fourth door on the right. How many rooms did this vast apartment have? Jack was too loaded for his own good.

  She turned the knob and pushed the door open to reveal a room that was nearly void of all decoration or furnishings, but for a tall work desk along one wall, and an adjacent pair of closet doors. The desk, itself, was constructed of thick, solid oak, and covered with a variety of tools that appeared both complicated and deadly. Annabelle knew, at once, what profession they’d been constructed for. She wondered where Jack got his supplies. Did he have a “Q”, like Double-O-Seven? Why hadn’t she ever thought to ask?

  Behind her, Jack came in after Dylan. He carried a non-descript black bag in one hand. They stepped fully into the room and Jack shut the door behind them.

  Annabelle handed the laptop to Dylan so that she could fold the jacket and stuff it into the backpack. Then she slipped the backpack over her shoulders.

  Jack strode to the table against the wall. He glanced over the tools on its surface, selected a few, and pocketed some of them, placing the larger ones in the black bag. Then he turned back to Annabelle and Dylan.

  “Do you have everything you need?”

  They both nodded. Jack turned back to the table, reached beneath it, and pulled some sort of lever that neither of them had noticed before. Nothing appeared to happen and Annabelle turned to Dylan, who looked at her questioningly. Some of the color had returned to his cheeks. She shrugged, indicating that she was at as much of a loss as he was.

  Then Jack brushed past them to the closet doors and swung them open, revealing a set of stairs lit up by lamps along the wall. It descended several stories.

  Annabelle’s jaw dropped open. How the hell had he managed to dig a stairwell in the middle of an apartment complex filled with other tenants?

  “I own the complex,” he told them flatly, as if he could read her mind. “The escape route was constructed before I admitted tenants. Now,” he said as he gestured for them to enter the closet without further hesitation. “If you don’t mind?”

  Annabelle shook her head, once, and then descended the stairs. They were made of solid stone and free of dust or dirt. Jack had kept them clean. As she climbed down, she could hear Jack’s and Dylan’s footsteps following behind her.

  She reached the end of the stairs and began to make her way quickly down a long stone corridor. There were no windows or turns until she reached the end. As they approached, two large metal exit doors
swung slowly outward. Annabelle’s brow rose. Automated? Or maybe it was that switch Jack had pulled beneath the table. Either way, she was impressed at the thoroughness of this escape route. She wondered whether he’d ever had to use it before now.

  She glanced over her shoulder to see Jack pull his cell phone out of his pocket once more. Dylan walked in front of him, his gaze somewhat distant. He was most likely in shock. Too much all at once.

  Annabelle reached back and took his hand. He glanced down at her. But he didn’t smile. And she didn’t let go. They stepped out of the hallway, into the Minnesota night beyond. It was a moonless, cloudy evening, and the darkness was near absolute. Annabelle moved slowly, unsure of her footing.

  “Around the corner, out into the lot. We want garage number nine.” Jack issued the order calmly, speaking in a voice a mere breath above a whisper, and then turned his attention to the phone in his hand. Someone must have picked up on the other end. “We need a nest for the remainder of the evening. Yes.” He paused, waiting as someone spoke to him. “Perfect. Meet us there.” He closed the phone and re-pocketed it just as the three of them carefully rounded the corner to enter a street that shot straight down between two rows of garages.

  Annabelle’s vision was adjusting to the darkness. She could tell there were twenty garages in all, so Annabelle assumed that Jack had nineteen tenants.

  She located garage number nine and waited to the side of the white-painted metal door while Jack punched a series of numbers into a key pad beside it. Each number made a different-toned beep as he pressed it, and his fingers flew so fast over the pad that it nearly sounded musical. In the absolute silence of the night, the sound was nearly cacophonous and it made Annabelle distinctly nervous. She chanced a glance over her shoulder into the trees that lined the apartment complex. Of course, she could see absolutely nothing. In a second, a mechanical whirring began, another rude noise in an otherwise quiet night, and the garage door slid upward.