Once he reached the upcoming corner, he risked a glance behind him and didn’t see the SUV anymore. He knew he couldn’t stick around here long. Not if Tadeo’s note was real. No, he’d need to steal a car and head out of the city limits. And he knew just the place to go.
Ellie had taken him to a cluster of caves out in the desert once. He’d been there twice since he’d gotten out of prison. It had been clear no one had been there in a long time so he’d used it to stash a run bag. Because he believed in always being prepared. Especially after going to prison. There was no way in hell he was going back. Originally he’d scoped out the caves to see if she’d hidden his money there but he hadn’t found anything. No disturbed earth and no tracks other than from a few coyotes. Hell, he hadn’t even been sure she’d kept his money, but he’d had to look before he contacted her.
Now he was grateful for his hideout. He could stay there for a few days and wait out a manhunt if the cops gave chase. Since he couldn’t ask Tadeo for more details he had no clue if the police would care enough about him to lock down roads or not. He couldn’t take the chance they would and get caught at a roadblock.
Chapter 18
“It’s impressive how well you hid all this,” Jay said to her as he looked down at the dust covered bags of cash on the cave floor.
Ellie shrugged, holding onto the handle of the shovel as she half-leaned against it. A light coating of dust clung to them after the twenty minute trek to the cave from where they’d parked, more after the actual digging. “The small rocks hid the disturbed earth well in case any hikers stumbled onto these caves.”
Jay grunted. “Doubtful, considering how far out of the way this place is.”
“I know, but still. Plus, Kevin knew about this place.” At her words, Jay stilled. The light from the battery-operated lanterns played across his hard features, but it was hard to read him.
“Should I not talk about him?” she asked. Ever since she’d met up with Kevin at the shopping center Jay had been uber protective. But he hadn’t spoken about Kevin directly since then. It had all been in terms of ‘the plan’ and how they planned to make sure he went back to jail. She’d basically been on lockdown with no contact with anyone at work since then. Jay and Wyatt had wanted to make it appear as if she’d left town. They’d been vague when questioned about her by hotel employees and even though she’d been going stir crazy in the suite, she’d understood the need for her to remain out of sight.
Shoulders relaxing, Jay shook his head as he let out a long breath. “You can talk about your past. I don’t ever want you to hide any part of yourself from me. I just hate that guy for bringing so much crap into your life.”
She smiled, understanding. “I get it. And it’s not—”
When Jay suddenly froze, his huge body going impossibly still, a streak of fear raced up her spine. She hadn’t heard anything. He held a finger up to his mouth and immediately turned off the nearest lantern with a quick flip of a switch. As the cave plunged into semi-darkness, he pulled a gun from his ankle holster. Bending down, she started to turn off the other lantern on the ground next to the biggest bag of cash when a familiar, hated voice echoed through the cave.
“Drop the gun or I shoot the bitch,” Kevin said, his voice low and angry.
Ellie’s head snapped up, fear lancing through her as she scanned the mouth of the cave. With the light next to her face and the front of the cave so dark it was impossible to see much except the silhouette of Kevin’s body.
Jay stood about three feet away from her and a couple feet closer to the mouth of the cave than her. She watched as his hand clenched once around his gun. It was angled down as he hadn’t fully stood. By the time he raised it, Kevin would have already shot one of them. She knew he’d shoot her first. She also knew that if Jay dropped his weapon, Kevin would kill them both. While she had no clue why he was here, he was, and that told her he knew she’d lied to him. Her heart stuttered in her chest.
“Don’t drop it,” she said, her voice strong.
Jay still hadn’t moved as Kevin stepped deeper into the cave with them. Now she got a good view of him. Like an angry rain cloud, his expression was as dark as the black clothes he was still wearing from the casino robbery.
“You might hit me, but I’ll blow her head off before you raise it.” Kevin’s voice was calm as he held a gun pointed directly at her. He wouldn’t miss either. Not with this big freaking spotlight illuminating her face.
She still hadn’t stood from her crouched position, too terrified to make any sudden movements and have him get trigger happy.
The silence in the cave seemed like a giant void until Jay finally spoke, his voice low and calm. “I’m dropping it now,” he said as he placed his gun on the hard earth.
Even with all his training, Ellie realized he was too far away to attempt rushing Kevin. Kevin would shoot him before he’d made it two, maybe three steps. She could actually see it unfolding in her mind and fought the nausea swelling inside her.
“What are you doing here?” she rasped out.
Kevin trained his gun on Jay as he stood, making Ellie’s panic skyrocket to epic proportions. He couldn’t shoot Jay, he just couldn’t. She refused to believe it would happen even though she saw the menacing glint in her ex’s eyes.
“I’m still not sure,” he said to Ellie, but kept his gaze and gun trained on Jay.
All Ellie could seem to focus on was that gun, her tunnel vision threatening to make her lose the small window of opportunity she might have. Mentally shaking herself, she looked at Kevin’s face, tried to keep her voice steady. “What do you mean?”
“I mean exactly what I said, I’m not fucking sure,” he snapped. “After the heist one of my boys told me to run because a big bust was going down on De Luca. Something tells me you two know something about that. Was the whole heist a setup? Are the jewels even real?”
“It wasn’t a setup,” Jay said smoothly, drawing Kevin’s attention from Ellie. “But I think your friend lied to you.”
No! Ellie wanted to shout, but understood what Jay was doing, understood that she’d get only one chance to save them. From her still crouched position, she reached back with her right hand and wrapped her fingers around the revolver tucked into the back of her pants. Jay had given it to her for this desert trek. It had been in case they ran into wild animals and needed to scare them off.
Not to defend themselves from a real life monster. Unfortunately that’s what she had to do.
“No way he lied,” Kevin continued, shaking his head vehemently. His hand shook as he punctuated each angry word. And all his attention was on Jay.
On the man she loved.
Overcome by the strangest calm, Ellie used his distraction to her advantage and brought the weapon around. Since it was a double action revolver she didn’t have to pull the hammer back.
She simply fired and kept firing until she’d emptied the chamber. Kevin dropped where he stood, his hands flailing out as she nailed him in the stomach then the chest. The cave echoed loudly from the report, her ears ringing and her hands trembling as she stared at Kevin’s fallen form.
When he didn’t move from the dusty ground, she dropped her arm, but couldn’t stop the shaking that had taken over her entire body. She’d been to the shooting range with Jay multiple times and knew how to use guns. Hell, she lived near the desert, practically everyone here owned a gun. But she’d never thought to use it on a person before. Not unless absolutely necessary.
She could hear Kevin struggling for breath, the ragged sounds permeating the cave until they simply stopped, but she couldn’t force herself to walk any closer to him. Her feet refused to listen to her brain.
Jay moved to Kevin’s body and kicked his gun out of the way before bending down next to him. He stayed there for a long moment, searching for a pulse beneath his jaw before standing and turning back to her. “He’s gone,” he murmured.
Ellie opened her mouth to respond, but couldn’t make her voice wor
k. Jay moved toward her cautiously, as if she was a frightened animal. “You’re okay, baby,” he murmured soothingly.
She blinked once, everything coming back into focus in a rush. Placing the revolver on the ground she nodded and finally found her voice again. “I know. I…he was going to kill both of us.”
Jay nodded, his expression fierce as he gathered her into his arms. She gripped him tight, linking her arms around his waist and burying her face in his chest. Tears burned her eyes, not because of Kevin but because she could have lost Jay. A sob built in her throat but she bit it back and held onto Jay, soaking up his strength. She wasn’t sure how long they stood there holding each other but eventually Jay pulled back.
He swiped a callused thumb over her cheek, his expression gentle but determined. “We’ve got to make a decision here and now. Call the cops and explain the money or leave with the money and never tell a soul about this. No one. I won’t even tell Hayden about this. Just you and me and the desert will know. Before you decide make sure it’s something you can live with. I say we leave this piece of garbage to the coyotes, but it’s not my call.”
She wasn’t sure what it said about her, but she didn’t have to think long about her decision. That money could do a hell of a lot of good in the right hands but if the police were called it would end up in a dusty locker somewhere. Worse than that, if they got involved, it would drag Jay deeper into this mess. How could he explain why he was out here in the desert with her digging up money? And how the hell would she even explain the money in the first place? She couldn’t do that to Jay. She’d acted to defend him and could live with what she’d done, knowing there had been no other choice. Since Kevin didn’t have any family she wouldn’t be stealing closure from anyone if he just disappeared. “We leave and tell no one.”
Relief flooded his expression. Nodding, Jay stepped back from her. He lifted one of the smaller bags of cash and handed it to her. “Take this to the car and wait there. I’ll be back once I’ve taken care of his body and I’ll bring the rest of the money.”
Frowning, she shook her head and dropped the bag before picking up the nearest shovel. “We do this together.” Because there was no way in hell she was making him deal with this all on his own, not when it was her fault he’d been dragged into her mess in the first place.
She knew she could trust Jay with this secret forever. Just as he was showing that he clearly trusted her.