Cadillac Payback AJ Elmore (book recommendations website TXT) 📖

This is not good.

“Motherfucker,” she spits and my hand falls to the table. She stands, loudly scooting the chair back on the wood of the porch. The sound feels like it ticks along every bone of my spine.

“Is he . . . dead?”

Oh god. The edge returns to my nerves, and I feel the sharp instinct to start gathering my guns. Except that most of them are safely tucked behind a false wall in Jack’s and Noah's apartment. Silence and apprehension have descended upon us as we wait. Maria has grown quiet when she says, “We'll be back as soon as possible.”

I can hear Jack tell her no. I can't quite make out what else he says, but she finally says, “Keep me posted. We'll be back as soon as it's safe. I'm going to end this, Jack. I'm so sorry.”

She hangs up, drops the phone on the table, and stares blankly at the cards. We're all hanging on the moment, she must know it, but I watch all the warmth fade from her eyes and she struggles internally with . . . who could know. The chill that claims her expression is so similar to the one she wore when she returned from Biloxi and her first act of revenge that I can already pretty well guess at the situation. An act of violence returned for the violence we have given, my violence.

Finally she lifts her eyes and they fall, by default, on me. I recognize and understand the icy rage I can see in that gaze. There's something else in it, though, an affirmation of the words Abuela had spoken upon our arrival. She glances at her grandmother then back at her phone.

“They shot Noah.”

Sure, it's expected, but it still knots my gut into cold anxiety and a fury that could level a city block. I know the extent of Gram's heartlessness better than anyone here, but Noah? Fucking pussy Gram couldn't find any of us, so he took it out on a distant ally. I loose a long sigh full of frustration that no one seems to notice under the weight of the news.

Josh sits back in his chair, muted, horrified. Izzy sighs in his old man, knowing way and shakes a cigarette from his pack. Abuela passes the blunt to Maria with an unreadable expression.

“He was taking out trash. They gunned him down behind the restaurant. He's critical. There are cops everywhere and there's nothing we can do tonight.”

“And if they find our guns and our drugs?” Izzy asks.

Always the practical one. I forget sometimes that he's seen as much death and destruction as I have, until he says shit like that.

Maria says, “As of now they have no reason to even enter the apartment. They're treating it as a random act of violence, and Jack's doing his best to keep it that way. We'll have to get that shit out of there as soon as we can, though.”

She takes a rough hit of the weed and frowns through her exhalation. She passes the blunt back to Josh, and as she does, she nails him with a look as heavy as the drop of an anchor.

She says, “I want you to seriously consider what I said to you all at the hotel. If you want out, now is the time. I don't want to lose any of you to this, but there's shit I have to handle.”

We all know she's talking to everyone, but still she's holding Joshua against his seat with her attention. If he wants to squirm, I can't tell, and if he's feeling shaky, it doesn't show. I'd throw my whole arsenal in the poker pot to wager that we all expect him to freak out, that he wants to freak out, but it seems he has finally taken some sort of lesson from the veterans. His answering expression is stone cold. The blunt burns idly for a stretch, then he hits it, plays the tension, and answers solemnly.

“I told you I wouldn't go unless you turned me out. I meant it.”

It's a scathing bit of honesty, especially coming from him, but it's a sentiment that I can fully appreciate. This is growing up. This is what it's like to feel your heart harden. There's heat in his cheeks, but he stands his ground, holds her eyes. She sighs.

“You're not ready for this,” she says, “but I can't make you go. I won't. It's your choice.”

She looks to me then to Izzy, then she grabs her phone and pushes away from the table. No one says a word as she walks off the porch and into the darkness.

Josh watches her go, taking a long hit, then his gaze skates to Abuela. My attention follows his. She's wearing a tiny smile but her eyes are blank and I have no way of knowing what emotion feeds her expression. It sends a chill down my spine, nonetheless.

I divert my attention so she doesn't look at me, looking to the hand I've yet to see. What the hell. The game's over but maybe my luck will hold.

I pick up the hand. Royal flush.

My cheeks fire. I've never drawn a royal flush on the first deal and it's wasted on misfortune. My brow furrows and my jaw clenches. A familiar rage comes clawing to the surface.

“Would you bet on it, Frederick?” Abuela asks.

My eyes snap to her. I realize I've been glaring at my cards. The anger crystalizes into something colder. I don't twitch a facial muscle when I say, “Everything.”

Josh and Izzy are staring at me and neither says a word. They've become spectators, so suddenly and subtly that I doubt either of them notices.

She smiles, a genuine one that reminds me of a snake. She eyes my stack of chips and says, “I'll match.”

She's nonchalant enough that it makes me nervous, more than I have been in a long time. I'm staring