Blake Crouch - Confidence Girl - The Letty Dobesh Chronicles

The road curved toward a collection of buildings. At first, she mistook them for a town, but on approach, she saw they were nothing but skeletons. Broken framework profiled against the sky.

Isaiah eased to a stop in front of the remnants of a three-story building.

The only part still standing was its facade.

The rest had been reduced to crumbling mortar.

Ize killed the ignition.

The silence that flooded in was graveyard quiet.

Through the dusty windshield, Letty spotted four cars parked a little ways down the road.

“Whose are those?” she asked.

“Ours,” Isaiah said. “They’re just rentals. I figured we’d split the dough here. Go our separate ways.”

Christian was sitting in the back between Stu and Jerrod.

He cleared his throat, said, “You’re absolutely sure we’re safe here?”

Isaiah glanced back between the front seats.

“U.S. 95 South. U.S. 93 South. I-15 South. I-15 North. U.S. 93 North. U.S. 95 North. Six main arteries out of Vegas. They’re looking for a vehicle that matches your white Suburban. They will check every motel and hotel within three or four hours, which is why we aren’t taking that chance. Why don’t you let the professionals do the thinking, my man. You’re in good hands.”

They climbed out.

It was almost cold in the desert ghost town.

No wind.

Letty glanced back the way they’d come. The dust trail of their passage beginning to settle.

Everywhere she looked—emptiness.

Isaiah walked out into the middle of the road. He stared off at the distant hills.

Then laughed—long and low.

Jerrod and Stu moved toward him, and as he turned, the trio embraced.

A fierce, sudden, emotional huddle.

“I’m so proud. We did it, boys. We did it. They’re gonna make movies about us.”

“Yeah,” Christian said. “And with a big surprise ending.”

Letty looked across the hood of Ize’s Tundra.

It took her a second to process Christian standing in the road with an AR-15 pulled snug against his shoulder, sighting down the Marines.

“Gentlemen,” he said. “Raise your hands and get down on your knees.”

Isaiah’s head tilted. “What the fuck—”

The gunshot exploded across the desert, the round punching through the windshield of one of the rentals.

“Next shot goes through your eye. Ize .”

Isaiah, Stu, and Jerrod exchanged glances.

They slowly lifted their arms, got down on their knees.

“Join them, Letty.”

“What are you doing, Christian?”

“You’re going to make me kill somebody, aren’t you?”

She moved around the front of the car.

“Christian,” Isaiah said. “You want more money? An even split? We can do that. This hard-bargaining shit ain’t necessary. We’re reasonable men.”

Letty eased down into the dirt.

“Your offer of one point five million was generous, but I think I’ll have to settle for everything. Where are the keys to the Tundra, Isaiah?”

“Ignition.”

“Where are the keys to the rentals?”

“Center console.”

Christian fired eight shots in rapid succession.

Letty heard the air hissing out of the tires of the cars behind them.

“Everyone, flat on your stomach, spread out your hands.”

“I’ll find you,” Isaiah said.

Christian backed away, keeping the gun on them as he approached the driver side door of the Tundra.

“I could kill you all right here, leave you in the desert. Perhaps you should be thanking me for allowing you to live instead of making empty threats.”

“Nothing empty about them, my man.”

“Christian, please,” Letty said.

“Thank me, Ize,” Christian said.

“Fuck you.”

“Thank me or you die right now.”

“Thank you,” Isaiah said through gritted teeth.

“You’re welcome.”

Letty watched as Christian opened the door.

Isaiah said under his breath, “Anybody packing?”

“No.”

“No.”

Jerrod said, “I can get there. I can stop this.”

“He can shoot,” Isaiah said. “In case you missed the part where he went eight for eight on those tires.”

Christian reached into the car.

He cranked the engine.

Isaiah said, “I ain’t believing this shit.”

Christian jumped in, slammed the door, the engine revving.

The Tundra lurched toward them.

Letty didn’t even have time to get to her feet.

Just rolled out of the way as the tires slung rocks and dirt, the rubber tread passing inches from her head.

She sat up, coughing, wiping dust out of her eyes.

Isaiah’s Tundra sped off down the dirt road, taillights shrinking into the dawn.

Isaiah jumped to his feet, sprinted twenty yards.

He planted his feet and screamed at the sky, his voice racing across the wasted landscape, ricocheting between the buildings in the ghost town.

He turned and started back toward the group, toward Letty.

When he was ten feet away, she noticed the knife in his hand.

“Isaiah, please.”

She scrambled onto her feet, backpedaling.

“You,” he said. “You did this.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You brought Christian in.”

“I had no idea.”

He rushed her, swept her off her feet.

She struck the ground hard enough to drive the air out of her lungs.

Isaiah—all two hundred and twenty pounds of him—perched on her chest, his knees pinning her arms to the hardpan.

He dug the knifepoint into her face.

“I ought to carve you up right here. Leave you for the buzzards.”

“I didn’t—”

“Where did you find him?”

“I told you. He was my therapist. I ran into him at the Palazzo. He was suicidal. Had lost his family several months ago. He told me he’d come to Vegas to kill himself.”

Isaiah leaned in close.

“What else do you know about him?”

“Nothing. I only saw him in sessions.”

“You think he shoots like a shrink? Think he drives getaway like a shrink?”

“I’m more stunned than you are, Ize. I swear to you. I told that man my darkest secrets for six months.”

“Something ain’t right here.” He drew the blade softly across her throat. “I’ll find him,” Isaiah said. “And when I do, me and Christian will have a talk. He will tell me all of his secrets. If I find out—”

“You won’t, because I didn’t. If you want to kill me because I got played, go for it. But I’d never sell my partners down the river.”

Isaiah pushed the blade against her carotid.

Stu and Jerrod had wandered over. They stood behind Isaiah, staring down at her.

“What do you think, boys?” he asked. “Feel like watching her bleed?”

20

Letty walked alone down the dirt road away from the ghost town, back toward the highway.

Isaiah, Stu, and Jerrod had gone ahead.

She couldn’t see them anymore.

The sun crested a range of barren hills.

The desert went supernova.

She walked on, shoes scraping dirt.

Buzzards circled.

With each step, she became more thirsty, more exhausted, more humiliated.

Occasionally, blinding silver specks would streak across the far horizon. It was the highway, still miles away.

# # #

The sun was high by the time she reached the pavement, beating down with a kind of angry purpose.

There was no sign of Isaiah and the boys.

Sweat poured out of her.

She walked twenty feet down the road and then her legs failed.

She dropped.

Sat down in the dirt.

Stunned/crushed/confused/enraged.

Still trying to process what had happened.

If she wasn’t mistaken, it was four or five miles back to Beatty, the last town they’d passed through. But she was in no condition to make the trek. She’d left her purse and iPhone in Ize’s Tundra. Had a twenty dollar bill shoved down one of her socks, but not another penny, credit card, or form of identification to her name.