40

Mackenzie’s father never hit her, but he might as well have.Always the looming presence, a thundercloud ready to burst, watching every move, criticizing, controlling, disparaging. The verbal abuse against Mackenzie and her mother. What to wear, what to say, how to act, when to do it.

They might as well have been slaves in that house.

It was all about the money. Of course it was. What else did that fat, drunken patriarch, other than providing sperm to her mother, have to offer her ?

Mackenzie cared about money as only the super wealthy can: She both took it for granted and understood how rare and precious it was. A ruthless sort of cynicism. Yet as much as she wanted to break free, her trust fund would never be hers while he was still alive. To get paid, she had to walk the path he had charted. A path she hated.

Go to school for global finance. Help run the family empire. Report to him every day. Marry whom he says. Buy the house he picks. Every last detail of her life planned out.

Why couldn’t she just walk away?

She asked herself that question every single day.

But she didn’t have the courage, either for running away or confrontation, so she had chosen a different, timeless route of protest: rebellion.

The drug money came easy. It felt good to earn something for herself, real money, and thumb her nose at her father (silently) in the process. Imagine if he knew! It was almost as good as telling him off to his face!

Bentley had set her up with the supply. She had a nose for business and plenty of friends to get started, and her reputation spread from there.

That was supposed to be it. The extent of her foray into crime. But then she sat in on a family meeting and heard her father talking about some old farmer who was ready to sell Carroll Street Homes, a property she knew her father had coveted for some time. Purely to antagonize him, she passed the opportunity on to Bentley, and he conceived the idea to buy it at any cost, knowing he could flood the trailer park with crime until the Creekville City Council changed the zoning.

The family had a vast investment portfolio, but with the factories long shuttered, Mackenzie’s father made most of his new money from property development. She would hit him where it hurt. Steal an investment in his own backyard. She would tell him about it one day, too. Right before she walked out with all her drug money and started a new life someplace else. She would beg her mother to come, but that would never happen. Her mother’s tea bag had steeped for far too long, the golden handcuffs twisted so tight she couldn’t twitch a muscle.

Rebellion became sedition, and nothing Mackenzie had ever done had felt quite so good. Now, sitting in that white-walled interview room with the detective, in one of those moments of true reflection that sprang from hitting rock bottom, she was self-aware enough to know she had done these things to get her father’s attention as much as hurt him. She both loved and hated him, just as she did herself.

And she despised him all the more because of it. He didn’t deserve an ounce of her love.

It was all going well until that fateful night at the restaurant. Bentley came in now and again, when he wanted to impress a girl. Take her away from the mean streets of East Durham and ply her with steaks and ambiance. It was how he and Mackenzie had met. She had waited on him a few times, heard about his reputation on the street, and approached him one night on the patio, when he had come in alone and stayed until closing. Had he known at the time ? Sensed her vulnerability and wanted her to approach him? She wouldn’t put it past him.

They hashed out their new arrangement on a cocktail napkin, which he burned in the candle flame flickering inside a mason jar in the center of the table. He rarely came in after that, but she met him in other places from time to time, always at his request. He avoided public recognition, didn’t need flash and attention like other gangsters. He had never made a pass at her or asked her to do anything she didn’t want to do.

Not until David.

A handsome kid, sure, but just a high school student. A busboy over the summer. Mackenzie knew he had a major crush on her, and he was a good listener, but he was not in her orbit. Not when it came to dating.

Still, they talked much more than anyone knew. Whenever she needed a friendly ear, or a dinner companion, he would meet her at the drop of a dime. One night in late September, unbeknownst to her, he had parked in the employee lot behind the restaurant, waiting for her shift to end. Feeling restless, he had left his Jeep and used a young crepe myrtle to climb atop the roof. He lay on his back and contemplated the starry sky as well-heeled diners bit into filet mignons and consulted the sommelier. He told her all this later, before his death.

This happened to be a night that Bentley himself had driven to meet Mackenzie and talk business. As David lurked overhead, unseen in the darkness and wondering what the fancy black Navigator was doing behind the restaurant, Mackenzie popped out during her shift, responding to Bentley’s text. Before David had a chance to react, Bentley lowered his window, puffed on a cigar, and talked in a low voice—but not too low for David to hear—in the otherwise empty back lot.

David didn’t hear much. Mackenzie would argue that point later, with Bentley, after he gave his terrible order. Only then would she understand just how merciless and vicious the crime lord was, so domineering he made her father seem like a timid, weak-willed minion.

She was never quite sure how Bentley knew David was there. David claimed he never made a sound, but Bentley said he heard a scuff on the roof after the conversation, ran the plates in the parking lot, and figured it out. However it happened, David himself confirmed it, when he confronted Mackenzie about her life of crime.

That was the worst thing of all. Despite how besotted the kid was, he didn’t ignore what he had heard or tell her it was cool.

He tried to convince her to stop working for Bentley.

He tried to make her a better person.

Even now, the knowledge made her shudder.

The next night, Bentley invited Mackenzie to his house for the first time. Down in his basement, after plying her with expensive cognac, he told her that David had overheard their conversation and said she had to kill him.

Had she heard correctly?

Kill him? Me?

Hell, no, she said.

Oh yes, he replied, in that chill-inducing voice, as hard as it was well mannered. You will indeed. You will do it in this way, and with this gun, on the very next night he comes to see you.

It was all so dreamy, she thought. Unreal. She wasn’t going to kill anyone. She wasn’t going to kill David.

But if she didn’t, Bentley said he would kill David himself, and frame her, and make sure she went to prison for the rest of her life.

How can you threaten me like that? she had said. I’ll just tell them you set me up.

His answer to that was a long, booming laugh.

Eventually she agreed. What choice did she have ? He wouldn’t let her go, and she would say whatever it took to get out of that basement. Except before she left, the last thing he did was make her watch the video he had just recorded.

The one where Mackenzie had vowed to kill David.

So you see, Bentley had said, it is all ready for you. The boy is already dead. Your only choice is whether you will choose to live the rest of your life in freedom or rot in jail.

Except her freedom, she knew as soon as she left that evil house, was already gone. Bentley owned her now.

Please, Mackenzie had begged David in her mind. Leave town or quit school or run away to Siberia. Don’t ever come to see me again.

What happened next was a blur. Everything moved so quickly. David came to see her a few nights later, the night of October 2. He usually respected the barrier between them, the one where she called him if she wanted to see him, but that night he came into the restaurant distraught about his mother. They had just had a huge fight. He loved Claire very much but hated her relationship with Brett. David knew why she was dating him and despised the situation. They didn’t need the money, he kept telling his mother. Just each other. Just their love. They could live in a trailer in Carroll Street Homes for all he cared. Just don’t be a whore because of me.

David said he had told his mother exactly that, and she had slapped him. Hurt and angry, he jumped in his Jeep and fled to the restaurant, where he begged Mackenzie to go somewhere with him, anywhere. When she walked him to his Jeep, thinking only of what she had to do, he said he wanted to be more than friends. They had to go somewhere and talk it out, he said. Tonight. After her shift.

Her cell had buzzed, and she turned away to read it.

<Do it now>

She swallowed. Oh God. He’s watching.

Moving as if in a dream, she told David to meet her in half an hour behind his house, so they could take a moonlit walk in the woods. He had taken her to his house once before, when his mother was away, and showed her the path in the backyard. This was Bentley’s idea. He wanted someplace David would feel secure, but isolated enough for Cobra to clean up the mess.

Mackenzie hated the crime lord’s devious mind. She kept telling herself she wouldn’t do it. There had to be another way out of this nightmare. Yet half an hour later, one of Bentley’s associates dropped her off at the edge of Carroll Street Homes, and she found herself slipping through the woods to David’s house.

How’dyou get here? he asked in surprise, when he left the house to meet her.

Uber. Didn’t you see?

Nope, but I was showering. Why didn’t you knock?

I wasn’t sure about your mother.

He waved a hand. She’s out cold. What’s in the backpack?

Just a few clothes. Her lips curled. In case I need a change in the morning. Didn’t you say your mother never goes in your room?

He slipped an arm behind her back, pulling her in for a kiss, but she pulled away and traced a finger across his lips. Let’s see about that midnight stroll. The woods are sexy at night. She patted the backpack. I might have a blanket in here too.

David grinned. In that case, we’re gonna need some refreshments. He took her by the hand and, before she could protest, led her through the back door into the house. Mom takes a handful of pills every night. She wouldn’t know if an elephant came through.

As he grabbed a bottle of Four Roses bourbon from the study, Mackenzie was both terrified someone would see her and elated by the delay. She wanted a way out, she really did. She wanted his mom to wake up or the cops to come or a tree to fall on the house.

But she knew deep down, without a doubt, that Bentley would kill David no matter what happened. David had heard him discussing business and seen the crime lord’s car, maybe even his face. He could put him away. A chink in Bentley’s armor who couldn’t be allowed to live.

On the way out of the house, David locked up and took Mackenzie by the hand, leading her into the woods, never noticing the nine millimeter she had tucked into her jeans underneath her baggy sweater. When they reached the appointed spot in the clearing, she stopped and took him by the face, kissing him long and hard. At the end of the kiss, unable to help herself, she started sobbing.

Why are you crying?

I just... you’re just so good to me. So kind.

I like you too.

No, you don’t understand.

Understand what?

David . . .

Talk to me. We’ve always been able to talk. This doesn’t change anything.

I’m sorry, she whispered. So very sorry.

Sorry? Why? He lifted her chin and smiled. For not doing this sooner?

Tears poured down her cheeks. Yes, that. Very much that.

He gently wiped her eyes. Is it the drugs? I forgive you, you know. And I know why you’re doing it. But you have to stop. Your dad isn’t worth it.

Oh, David.

You’re only hurting yourself

When he leaned in to kiss her again, she shot him in the stomach. It felt like an out of body experience, as if someone else had taken control of her hand and pulled the trigger.

In disbelief, he moaned and staggered back from the force of the bullet, right before the pain hit him like a wrecking ball. As she dropped the gun and went to him, unable to follow through, her entire body shaking as she helped him to the ground, Cobra glided out of the trees as smooth and silent as a shadow.

Move, he said.

We don’t have to do this, she begged. He won’t tell anyone.

I said move.

No. I won’t.

He nodded at her backpack. You were supposed to put the tarp down. There’s blood everywhere.

I forgot. Don’t do this. Don’t kill him.

Unable to cope, she buried her head in David’s back, still holding him from behind. In disgust, Cobra jerked her away by the hair and tossed her aside.

Then he stood over David and shot him in the head.