The stupid bastard’s eyes lit up with hope. “Seriously?”
I flicked open the small but sharp knife I’d had cupped in my palm. “Of course not.”
I stabbed the blade through the back of the man’s hand, pinning his palm to the arm of the chair. He opened his mouth and howled.
“Now,” I said, remaining dangerously calm. “I’ll ask you again. Were you at the warehouse before the bomb went off?”
“No! I wasn’t!”
I grabbed the handle of the knife and yanked it back out of his hand.
He let out a sob. His head hung heavy, chin to chest. Blood ran from the wound and dripped onto the flat roof.
Could I be wrong? People were known to lie to try and stir shit up. Who would benefit from me taking out the Gilligans? I knew one family—the Cornells—but they were there the night the bomb had happened. There was nothing preventing one of them from being killed, too, and it might have just been bad luck that my father had been the one to take the brunt of the blast. For all I knew, it could have been Tam Cornell who was the target.
I caught the back of the chair and dragged it across the solid tar and gravel of the flat roof. A lip of only a few inches curved up at the edge, but it was nowhere near enough to prevent someone falling off.
I faced the man towards the massive drop beyond, and, still holding the back of the chair, tilted it up so it balanced on the two front legs.
The man screamed. “No, no, please! Oh fuck. Oh fuck!”
“My hold is pretty fucking precarious here, Ronald. It’s warm tonight, and my palms are sweaty. I’d hate for my fingers to slip.”
I didn’t like to see a grown man cry. Something about it made me uncomfortable, and I didn’t like to be uncomfortable.
“Tell me what you were doing at the warehouse.”
“I wasn’t there. You’ve mistaken me for someone else.”
“If you weren’t there yourself, I’m sure you know someone who was. Give me a name, and I’ll think about letting you go.”
I gave the chair a little jolt, as though it was about to fall. He screamed and clung tighter to the arms, like that was somehow going to save him. I had no intention of tipping him over the edge. A man and chair in pieces on the pavement below would only attract attention.
When he died, it would be silent and invisible.
“I don’t know anything, and the minute the Gilligans hear you’re fucking over their men, they’re going to come after you, too.”
I tutted and shook my head. “Now, now, Ronald. Do you really think this is how you should be acting, considering your precarious position right now?”
“I’m a dead man anyway. If I tell you anything, and you let me go, the Gilligans will fucking kill me. If I don’t say anything, then you will.”
His words gave me reason to pause. “If they’ll kill you, you must know something.”
He realised his mistake.
“No! That’s not what I meant.”
“I guess the choice is that you can either tell me what you know now, or you can go through a fuck load of pain, and then tell me.”
“Okay, okay. I made the delivery, but I didn’t know it was a bomb. It was just a crate, and I was told where to leave it in the warehouse, that’s all.”
“Who gave you the crate? Was it one of the Gilligans?”
“No, a man called Doyle put things in place. There! I’ve given you a name. Get me the fuck away from here now!”
I had made a promise. Though I’d been having fun, I kept it and yanked the chair away from the edge of the flat roof. Ronald exhaled all the air from his lungs and slumped over, his relief at being on somewhat solid ground visible.
But I still wasn’t done with him.