Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 78598 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 393(@200wpm)___ 314(@250wpm)___ 262(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78598 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 393(@200wpm)___ 314(@250wpm)___ 262(@300wpm)
Of course, what the father loses, the sons inherit. After he’s gone, Micah and Jeremy must go too. It’s unlikely the Ellises told Foundry’s board exactly what makes Bedlam so special.
With the family gone, their financial backing of the project dries up, and Foundry will be left with land they can’t develop, and a town that’s finally learned what becomes of those that try to change Bedlam.
That event is your deadline. If it passes and Steven Ellis is still alive, I’ll take that as your goodbye to Sheriff Jack.
Then we’ll see if the next person I take does a better job of inspiring you to action.
Signed,
Dante
“De Souza.” A presence fell over me.
I didn’t say anything. Just held out the note for Cairo to take.
“Fuck!” Cairo lashed out, striking the mailbox square. It ripped out of the ground and showered my shoes in dirt. He slammed inside, rattling the windows. The letter stayed behind in a crumpled scrap on the welcome mat.
Honestly, he handled that much better than I expected.
JACQUES
“Community event? What the hell is he talking about?” Arsenio asked. “If there was an event planned, my mother would know about it. She’d have told us.”
I smoothed out the wrinkled page, reading it through for the fifth time. It was me, Legend, Roan, Cairo, and Arsenio in the kitchen. I didn’t know or ask where Ivy was. My need to know where she was at all times was temporarily put aside by the kill order we just received for a man and his sons.
“Pretty sure Dante didn’t waste our time and his by writing down a bunch of bullshit,” Legend said. “There is an event. They must still be planning it. Haven’t booked a venue yet.”
“Then how would Dante know about it?” Arsenio threw in. “Does he have the man bugged? Reading his emails? Tracking his fucking event planner? If he can do all that, what does he need us for?”
Roan got up and left the room.
“Hey,” Cairo barked. “Are we fucking boring you!”
“Not at this moment,” floated back.
“Sex-addicted fuck.” Cairo snatched the letter. “Kill Ellis, then Jeremy and Micah. Worst thing is, he’s probably right. Get rid of the family and funding dries up. They’ll give up on Bedlam unless they know.”
“The fact that we can’t answer that is why we didn’t take that route the first time Legend suggested it,” I reminded. “We don’t know who’s on the board, or how Ellis convinced them to buy large swathes of land in a town that doesn’t allow development. With the way things are going, it’s probably made up of all the Men of Honor descendants that didn’t break from Ellis.
“Slaughtering the Ellises and an entire board of directors would make Foundry national news, and even the slowest, most dim-witted investigator would make the connection between them and Bed—” I halted, holding stiff as the storeroom that was my mind shifted, spun, and re-cataloged itself, putting what I needed to the forefront. “Not between them and Bedlam. Between the Ellises and the Bedlam Boys.”
I met Cairo’s eyes. “They can get rid of Steven, Jeremy, and Micah themselves. Of course they fucking can. They could walk right up to them, and they wouldn’t know they were a threat—unlike us. Dante is setting this up so that after they’re gone, the cops have the motive, means, opportunity, and suspects all wrapped up in a neat bow. None of this gets back to him.”
“No, we’ll have the letters,” Arsenio argued. “We’ll have the sheriff singing of his abduction. Either way, we can prove duress.”
“We won’t get the chance,” Cairo said, fists balling on the counter. “Dante’s going to kill us. Get rid of the Ellises. Get rid of the Bedlam Boys. Fuck, get rid of our moms too. None of us are meant to survive this. After we’ve gone—”
“—Bedlam will be theirs,” Legend dropped. “Davidson the new sheriff, and the Black Letter Crew stepping into all the roles our mothers have. The Men of Honor retake Bedlam.”
“Your father isn’t meant to live through this,” I said. Cairo wasn’t one for platitudes blown up his ass, and I wasn’t one to deliver them. “Even if we do everything Dante says, they’re going to kill him. We have to find him before the event, while Dante is still using him as leverage.”
Cairo threw up his hands. “I look like I’m going to fucking argue? We should’ve found him weeks ago—”
“And now we’ve got days.” Roan climbed off the steps, carrying his laptop. “Guys, the reason we didn’t know about this community event is because it’s not being held in our community. Steven Ellis is throwing it at a country club in Hunter’s Crest”—he spun the screen around—“this weekend.”
Cairo pounced on the thing, eyes ping-ponging in his head. “You are cordially invited to the Hunter’s Crest Country Club for— How the hell did we not know about this?” He snapped to Roan. “How did you?”