Chapter Eight: Old School Interrogation

24 hours later – based on my assumption because that’s what it felt like – I was seated at the table in the kitchen, facing three grown men who were across from me. Someone had turned off all the lights and left one lone yellow light on, to enhance the atmosphere for more effect. Every time the wind blew into the kitchen, the light would sway slightly from where it hung on the beam, causing the shadows to dance, reminding me of Danny’s base.

Honestly, this whole scene was something out of a movie. I thought lone-lightbulb-interrogations were outdated.

“This feels like a movie,” I said slowly, still afraid of Tommy.

“It's not.” Tommy clasped his hands together on the table. Kieran and Adriel sat on either side of him with their arms folded across their chests, muscles taut.

They look serious. Dear Neptune, am I in trouble?

Of course, that’s not what I asked.

“You’re going to say I’m of no use to you anymore and you’re going to rape me before torturing me till I die and filling my empty carcass with stones before dumping my body in the lake where no one can find my remains,” I stated in one breath, eyes wide and fixed on all of them at once.

Kieran gave up the gangster look, letting his hands fall to his lap, rolling his eyes. “What is it with this girl and rape?”

“Deidre, we don’t do rape,” Adriel added exasperatedly.

“We’re not going to rape you,” Tommy confirmed. “Nor are we going to kill you.” He slid a few A4-sized coloured photos over to me. I picked them up cautiously and examined the first one.

“Recognize them?” Tommy asked.

I frowned lightly, scanning over each photo with more dismay than the last. “When and where did you get these?”

“None of your business,” came his simple reply. There was nothing unique about any of them, merely pictures of random people doing random things at random places. Except I knew those random people personally. To an outsider these wouldn't matter one lick. To me it meant that I was in deeper shit than I initially thought.

There was Harry, accepting money in exchange for little baggies of dope from addicts; Moira in shades, leaving Mama’s with a huge sandwich in hand; Brad, counting an unusually large wad of dollar bills in his car; Justine and Josie, standing by a tree talking, their expressions easy.

“What did you do to them?” I demanded, instantly worried that I wasn't the only one in this predicament. Well, not entirely worried. Part of me felt relief too. If it were true and there were others like me then at least I'd have a partner to commiserate with.

“Nothing,” Tommy said. "Yet."

“Yet?!” I shook my head, as if doing that would clear the thoughts racing through it. Oh, people were going to get hurt because of me. Innocent people who had nothing to do with... whatever was going on here.

Infuriating me even more, Tommy clasped his hands together again. “Your boss is a wanted man.”

“No shit, Sherlock!” I exploded. “You and I are wanted too.” There wasn't a choice. Being in this business meant breaking the law.

“He crossed our path.” Tommy’s eyes were dark as he spoke. “You have been here for more than a week and I’m running out of patience. Where is Danny?”

My features hardened. I leaned back in my seat, looking away. It was the only thing I could do to keep myself from panicking. For one simple reason, really.

I honestly did not know where my enigmatic boss went to when he wasn't at base.

When I was younger, smaller, I lived with him. It was nothing like living with a substitute parent. More like a distant relative. He provided me with the basic necessities, basic education, just... the basic. And once I got old enough to join his business, I was out on the streets, searching for a place of my own. He was nice enough to pay for my rent for the first four months, until I was stable enough to stand on my own. But who were we kidding; I'd been on my own way before that.

After I (got kicked out) left, Danny moved. I tried asking around. No one knew where he went to. Didn't blame them anyway. Even when I was with him, we were nomads, never in one place for more than three months.

“We just want to know where he keeps all his stuff. Is that so hard?” Kieran asked.

“It is when I know you want to do something to my friends,” I replied. “Plus, I’m fairly sure you have eyes everywhere. Why not just ask them to steal whatever it is you want from him? Or better yet: just walk up to Danny and ask him straight.”

I was spewing nonsense and they knew it. While my points were technically probable, they were also void. Hence, my kidnapping. You know what? This whole thing was Danny's fault anyway. I didn't have to be such a snivelling kidnapee if he wasn't so freaking incognito. I wouldn't have these cuts on my body if someone didnt always disappear without notice. And these guys. Their beef was with Danny. Why involve me? I didnt know shit about Danny's partnerships, the sort of people he dealt with. If they were as informed about me as they claimed to be, they'd know I didn't have a hand in any of this.

I was shifting my emotions towards them. Ah, Neptune, my coping mechanisms were getting weird.

“This is an issue between the three of us and Danny.” Tommy had another photo, keeping it on his side of the table.

“You made it mine the minute you took me and you know it,” I argued, with valid point too.

“I can erase you from it just as easily, princess,” he said calmly. “Don’t tempt me.”

“We just want Danny,” Kieran said, interrupting us. My upper began to twitch in annoyance at their insistence, disliking them more and more by the minute. Never mind that Adriel and Kieran had been nice to me. Never mind that they’d kept me from being flayed alive by Tommy. Right now, they were on his side and anyone who was his friend was my enemy.

The more naïve part of me wanted to believe that they were all undercover cops or something, what with their eccentric attitudes. Then again, I considered the more likely possibility. Which was more believable: undercover cops who were really good actors or bloodthirsty gangsters who were used to kidnapping?

Kieran, taking over the reins from his leader, plucked the photo from Tommy’s fingers and passed it to me. “Do you know who this man is?”

My eyes landed on a very familiar person in the photograph. I tried to quell the rising fear in my gut by steadying my breathing. Here was solid proof of my earlier guess: a picture with me in the frame. Apparently, they had really good contacts because the shot they’d gotten was from a deal that was supposed to stay between Danny, me and his client. I was there, obviously, along with another man. He was walking me to his car, directly facing the camera, a hand on my lower back to guide me. I bit the inside of my cheek, his name right on the tip of my tongue yet farther than I could reach. Strange. I should have been able to remember his name since this was a particularly important business deal.

Danny wanted me to take his place, to meet this supposedly very powerful client of his in his stead. It was the first and only time I’d been to Cuba. Seeing the picture came with the memories of how terrified I was that time. He smiled very often during our exchange but it never reached his eyes and he projected a coldness I thought only existed in Alaska.

“N – No.” Stupid stutter.

“You’d better not be lying.”

“I'm not!” I held my hands up in front of my face. “This meeting was supposed to be a secret, a business deal between Danny and him only I was sent to finalize things because something had went wrong with supplies back home. I can't remember his name and I was in and out of Cuba in the blink of an eye.”

Tommy didn’t seem to buy my story despite it being the truth. He snatched the picture away from me, tore it in half and stared at me with those dead eyes, making me shrink in my seat. If looks could kill. . .

“Tell me where he is and I’ll let you go back to him. Don’t tell me and you’re stuck here until I decide to let you go,” he told me with an air of finality in his voice.

“I'm telling the truth!” I blurted out, referring to both Danny's whereabouts and the deal in Cuba. "Why won't you believe me?"

“Because you’re his obedient little right hand.” A sick smile spread over Tommy’s features. “You’re practically his daughter.”

He knew about my past. I kept that part of me buried, hoping no one would find out that I wasn’t good enough to be their friend or a part of their family. Praying that nobody would see how desperate I was before. The fact that these guys knew was enough to push me to make a decision.

“What are you going to do to him?” I queried quietly, treading shark-infested waters.

“That’s for us to know,” Tommy responded.

“Why Danny? Why not anyone else?”

“Because.”

“I’m not telling you anything,” I declared, tired of trying to persuade them to believe me and too afraid that if I pushed even more, Tommy might loose his patience. He arched a dark eyebrow at my declaration, knife suddenly appearing in his hand. I started to panic again.

“Then you’re going back to your room,” he said.

All this while, Adriel had been unusually quiet. I noticed he kept looking down at his hands, absently rubbing his left thumb over his right knuckles. Kieran was the one who led me back upstairs but he didn’t tie me to the bed post; he just left me standing there, shutting and locking the door behind him. I rushed to the door right after it closed and jiggled the doorknob, hoping it would come loose.

And what if it did?

I had limited experience in situations like this. Torture simulations couldn’t be compared to this. Even if my survival instincts kicked in like it had when I was tied up, it was impossible for me to go through all three guys and their dogs unless I wanted to escape as a ghost.

Sighing, I stopped throttling the doorknob to lean against the wood instead, body slowly sagging. I didn’t know what to make of my predicament. Supposing I did know where Danny lived. Did I really want to take Tommy’s word that he’d release me? I didn’t trust him as far as I could throw him and I couldn’t even make him budge when he was standing. The facts and options were just a handful but I was getting a headache thinking about them. From the other side of the door, noises could be heard. I didn't let it bother me, until my brain sent signals, informing me that those were voices, not arbitrary noises. I pressed my ear to the door, curious.

“Tommy, for fuck’s sake, just let her go!”

That was Adriel.

“You know that’s not what we do.”

“We have been at this for days and you’re losing your focus. How much more blood do you want to spill until you get this done?”

What?

“I will get her to break. I need you to keep your head on for this. This is the closest we’ve come to finding him since . . .” Tommy’s muffled voice trailed off.

“I know what this means to you, mate, but I don’t think we’re getting anywhere. We could have just done a little more work. You wanted to kidnap her instead. And now look where that’s gotten us.”

“You want to risk us? Everything we’ve worked for? We have leverage this way. She knows him.”

Silence, then, “Are you even sure we have the right girl? She could be just playing along because she’s scared.”

“I know you’re defending her.”

More silence.

“You have gotten attached to her. Kieran, too.”

“So what?”

“It’s going to make things more complicated.”

“We’ve lived with complicated before.”

“Detach yourself before something happens, Adriel.”

I jerked away from the door as if it were an electric fence just coming to life. Dost mine ears deceive me? Were they really... concerned for me?

Oh, my. This was starting to get messy.