Stephanie Bond - Body Movers - 3 Men and a Body

“I lost my sense of humor on the floor,” Wesley said. “Watch your step.”

He prayed that Chance would pick up. After two rings, he did. “Wes?”

“Yeah, it’s me.”

“Where the fuck are you, man? Your sister is worried sick. She came over with some pierced chick and they kicked my ass—”

“Dude, listen. I’m in a bind and I need twenty-five grand. Can you help me out?”

“Twenty-five grand, are you nuts? Have you been kidnapped or something?”

“Or something. Can you get it?”

“Yeah, sure. But it’ll take me a couple of days.”

“I don’t have a couple of days. What can you scrape together in a couple of hours?”

“Bad timing, dude. I just paid my carriers, and my girls, and I bought a new hot tub—”

“How much?”

“It was a steal—a ten-thousand-dollar model, but I got it for five.”

Mouse rolled his eyes and Wesley grimaced. “Not the hot tub! How much can you get together?”

“I could probably find a grand in the couch cushions, but that’s about it.”

Wesley swallowed against his disappointment. “Okay, thanks anyway.”

“Dude, where are you—”

Mouse closed the phone. “You know what this means.”

“Come on, man,” Wesley pleaded. “Give me a mulligan.”

Mouse frowned. “What’s a mulligan?”

Note to self: Don’t use golf terms when negotiating with street criminals. “A freebie. No one has to know.”

“No can do.” The big man went to the door, opened it and shook his head.

The Carver came in still chewing his sandwich, and sighed heavily, as if Wesley were causing him to miss his favorite TV show. He opened the switchblade. “Hold him, Mouse.”

Wesley resisted, but could only look away. It took more strokes to carve an A into his skin, more finesse, more blood. He screamed like a girl.

The Carver used a white handkerchief to wipe the blood off his knife. “I hope for your sake your next call is more productive.” He retracted the blade and left the room.

Mouse held up the phone. “Who now?”

Wesley couldn’t think for the pain. His blood was everywhere.

“Come on, kid. We all want to go home. Give me a name.”

“Liz Fischer. The number is in there.”

Mouse dialed it, then held the phone up to Wesley’s mouth.

Liz had been his father’s attorney and had gotten Wesley off on probation when he’d been busted for hacking into the courthouse database. Recently they’d started banging—everything that Chance had told him about older chicks was true. Carlotta would have an aneurysm if she knew.

Liz answered on the first ring. “Wes? Are you okay? Jack Terry called me asking if I’d seen you.”

So Carlotta was beating the bushes. “Uh, I’m fine … for now. But I have a situation here and I need some cash. A lot of it.”

“How much?”

“Twenty-five grand.”

She gasped. “What kind of trouble are you in?”

“The expensive kind.”

“Wesley, you know I adore you. But I can’t get involved in whatever mess you’re in. I have my career and reputation to think about.”

He tried to keep his voice steady. “I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important.”

“I’m sorry. I just can’t help you. Maybe you should call the police—”

Mouse flipped the phone shut, then sighed. “I should’ve worn a dark suit.” He went to the door, opened it and shook his head.

The Carver reappeared, a paper napkin tucked in his collar like a bib. Wesley considered making a run for it, but he was having trouble even holding his head up. Besides, he was still wearing only one shoe. And he wouldn’t get far with his hands cuffed. Mouse held him for the next carving, but Wesley didn’t put up much resistance as an R was engraved on his arm. He didn’t even have the strength to squeal. The Carver left with no conversation.

Wesley was on the verge of passing out.

“You’re killing me, kid,” Mouse said. “Give me a name—a good one.”

With what little strength he had left, Wesley considered his options—all of them bad, but one of them viable. Objectionable, but viable.

He gave Mouse the name and hoped for the best.

Carlotta stood in her living room and glared up at Jack. “Why are you just standing there? Do something!”

Jack seemed to struggle for patience. “Carlotta, we can’t just send in a SWAT team to storm the place. We need a warrant, and I can’t get one without probable cause. I need some kind of proof that Hollis Carver kidnapped Wesley or—” He broke off. “Or that he’s holding him.”

“You were going to say proof that he’s killed him, weren’t you?”

“No.”

“So that’s the guy’s real name—Hollis Carver?”

Jack nodded.

She threw her hands in the air, and cringed when pain zipped up her left arm. “If you’re on first-name basis with this criminal, why don’t you call him up and ask him if he has Wesley?”

He hesitated. “With Hollis Carver, the communication is one-way.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning,” Hannah interjected, her eyes narrowed at Jack, “The Carver is a narc. And the police leave him alone, right?”

Carlotta looked back to Jack. “Is that true?”

He scratched the back of his neck—she was starting to learn his “tells.” He didn’t want to say.

“Jack?”

“I can’t divulge anything that might impact open and future investigations. But Hollis Carver has been helpful to the APD in cleaning up the city.”

“Cleaning it up?”

He jammed his hands on his hips, feet wide. “Yes. Believe it or not, Carlotta, there are a lot worse criminals in this city than The Carver. People selling poison crack cocaine. Sickos running pedophile rings. Serial killers—as if I have to remind you. Hollis Carver lends money to foolish, desperate people. Unless he starts killing off nonpaying customers, it’s his business, not the police department’s.”

She stepped as close to him as she could get without touching him, and lifted her chin. “So he has to kill Wesley before you’ll get involved, is that what you’re saying?”

A muscle ticked in his jaw. “No, that’s not what I’m saying. I sent a couple of uniforms to Carver’s warehouse to take a look around. If we find something that might have belonged to Wesley—his bike, for instance—then we’ll have something to work with. Until then, you need to calm down.” He glanced at Hannah, who was parked on the couch. “Help me out here.”

Hannah scoffed. “You’re on your own, Starsky.” She continued flipping through TV channels.

Carlotta looked up at him, changing tack. “I’m scared, Jack.”

He sighed. “Carlotta, you’re not responsible for the decisions made by the men in your family.”

“Why are you bringing up my father?” Her throat constricted and she self-consciously rubbed her arm over the area where the note was tucked into her bra. Her heart beat faster, then she relaxed a little—Jack couldn’t possibly know about the note.

He glanced away. Another tell. He was keeping something from her.

But then, she was keeping something from him, too.

He looked back, his expression akin to pity. “I just hate to see you keep getting dragged down by other people’s mistakes.”

Carlotta set her jaw. “Wesley isn’t ‘people,’ he’s my brother.”

Jack’s phone rang and he stepped away to take the call. Her chest ached with frustration and a clump of emotions she couldn’t identify. Jack’s attitude was a timely reminder that they were too different, that too many obstacles lay between them. And that he had a very low opinion of her family.