“I don’t understand how you could forget the password when your password for everything is Sullivan.”
Gianna glowered and strode ahead of Benito, her precious iPad tucked under her arm.
Suppressing a grin, Benito jogged to catch up and caught her shoulder. “Whoa, there. Don’t run off. It’s busy up here.”
“So?” Gianna cast a baleful glance around the crowded shopping centre that smelled of bad burgers and stale coffee. “It’s Milton Keynes, not Oxford Street. It’s not like I couldn’t walk to your flat if we got separated.”
“How about we don’t get separated in the first place and you stop being shitty with me because you fucked up?”
“Don’t swear.”
“Whatever,” Benito retorted, but without the edge Gianna deserved. It was hard to be angry with her. He relied on her for the good emotions in life. “Don’t be a brat then.”
“I’m not. And you’re wrong about the password thing. It’s a passcode, for your information, so I can’t use Sullivan.”
“Yes, you can. Just use the numbers that correspond to the letters.”
Gianna’s sharp gaze flattened. “What?”
“You don’t do that with your phone?”
“I use my thumb for my phone.”
“And the number? You have to have one when you set it up.”
“I can’t remember it. Beni, you know I’m rubbish at numbers. Don’t be a dickhead.”
“Don’t swear.”
“But—”
“Don’t. It’ll get you in trouble eventually.” Benito glanced ahead. The Apple store was twenty metres away, a queue snaking out of the doors. A sigh escaped him and he reconciled himself with the reality that this was going to take forever. “Listen, I’m going to get in the queue. Take my card and go buy some cookies from Millie’s, okay? When you get back, I’ll show you how to spell Sullivan’s name with numbers.”
Gianna wasn’t convinced, but she took the card anyway and stomped to the cookie stand while Benito took their place in the line and kept a sharp eye on her and every face that seemed to look at her a second too long. In his pocket, his second phone buzzed like it had been doing ever since he’d retrieved it from his glovebox and turned it back on. He ignored it and tried to quell the sharp paranoia rising in his chest.
It’s all in your head. You’ve let talking to Mickey feed your own fucking demons.
True story. And the parallels between Mickey’s past and Benito’s present made him sick to his stomach.
That and the barefaced lie he’d told Mickey. “I don’t do that shit anymore.” Fuck. If his night had gone better, there was every chance he’d have told that lie with the scent of packaged product still lacing his skin. With mud beneath his fingernails from burying the dirty cash with another fractured piece of his soul.
Your soul? Yeah, right. Until Mickey, you didn’t give a fuck who got hurt in the game. Don’t grow a conscience now.
“Beni?” Gianna was back. She handed him a white chocolate walnut cookie with a conciliatory half-smile. “I got your favourite.”
“I don’t have a favourite.”
“I know, I know, you don’t like sweet things, but you might like this one—it’s got nuts in. They’re healthy, right?”
Nothing about Benito’s life was healthy right now. He took the cookie and ruffled Gianna’s curls. “Thanks, squirt. You ready to figure this passcode mystery out?”
“Is it hard?”
“No. Just different. Here, I’ll show you on my phone.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t. Leave me alone.”
Benito’s patience wore thin. He shoved his phone into Gianna’s hands. “If I left you alone, you’d be at home with Mum and a locked iPad. I haven’t got time to do this shit every time you mess up, so pay attention, okay? Unless you want to factory reset every time.”
He so rarely snapped that Gianna didn’t protest as he forced her to watch him type in his passcode over and over, while he spelt out the corresponding word, then gave her the phone to practise on. But her silence was mutinous. And suffocating. The front of the Genius Bar line couldn’t come fast enough.
The Apple employee called their number. Benito rooted his feet to the floor and propelled Gianna forward.
She grabbed his arm. “You’re not coming?”
“Nope. Your device, your problem.”
More discontent filled Gianna’s dark gaze. She stuck her tongue out and stalked to the meeting pod, taking Benito’s phone with him.
Sighing, he retreated to a set of white benches to wait for her to realise and bring it back.
She didn’t. And after a while, he didn’t miss it. How could he when the demon phone ruining his life was still angrily buzzing in his pocket? He’d ignored it all day, but alone in the crowded Apple store, it seemed louder than ever.
With one eye on Gianna, he retrieved the phone and cancelled the incoming call while he caught up on the dozen messages he’d missed. All were variants of the same thing.
call me
it’s bad man
they think it’s a rat
call me
we in trouble
i think they made me
Dread filled Benito’s heart, hot and vicious. He rubbed his chest and then his lips as fear laced every sharp breath. If his contact had been made as a rat—even if it was to Benito and not the feds—Asa would take him out. And he’d do it after he’d made him talk. Benito knew how that shit went down. There was zero chance his man inside wouldn’t give him up, especially as he’d yet to receive a penny for his trouble.
So put that right. Maybe he’ll have enough to run.
The burner phone rang again. Glancing around, Benito answered. “Yeah?”
“Finally. I’ve been calling since last night.”
“You shouldn’t be calling at all considering what went down.” Benito fought to keep his mind off Mickey—the only thing from last night that seemed to matter. “What the fuck was that?”
“I dunno, man. Someone tipped the feds.”
“Sure about that? Or have they been watching this whole time?”
“I told you, I don’t know. Asa thinks there’s a rat.”
“There is. It’s you.”
“Not that kind of rat.”
“He won’t see it that way.”
“He can’t find out. I’m a dead man walking if he does.”
Benito said nothing. In another world, he’d have convinced himself the voice at the end of the phone was expendable. That his conscience could take it. But these days, he wasn’t so sure. “He won’t find out unless you’re stupid. Lay low for a few weeks. Let some runs happen. Then I’ll hit a big one before we walk away.”
“That’s your plan? To walk away?”
Benito cringed. Fuck. He’d said too much. And worse, forgotten his contact had been banking on something more dramatic. After all, he’d seen Benito do it before—seen him pull off a coup that had landed Dante Pope in prison and propelled Benito to the top until Asa had played his winning hand.