“That’s very apparent. What I’m here to make you get is you’re barking up the wrong proverbial tree. The message is: do not bring my employers any deeper into this situation and you’ll continue to cast a shadow.”
“How do I know you don’t have Rachel and her boys?”
“Because I’m telling you so.” He shifted in his chair, getting more comfortable. “I been keeping an eye on things for a couple weeks, Andy. Been around steady ever since Mr. Vallance decided to check out early. Either that or someone checked him out, not sure yet. But I noticed you. You’ve been a busy boy. Nighttime exploits and visiting Mrs. Barren’s parents. Now this.” He patted his pocket where he’d placed the note. “I’d wonder what your angle is, but I think I know. Seen pictures of the missus. Pretty lady.”
“I just want to make sure they’re safe.”
“And I want to make sure we understand one another.”
I was quiet for a beat. “I’ll give you the business card. That must’ve been what you were after the other night, right?”
“Sorry?”
“It was you in the Barrens’ house. You chased me into the woods.”
“Nah, friend. That wasn’t me.”
“Then—”
“But I will take this business card you’re speaking of.”
“It’s in the black beans.”
“What?”
“The pantry. I’ll get it.”
He panned the gun with me as I stood and crossed the room. I’d shoved the business card down in the beans with Rachel’s spare key after making the call the day before. A quick scan of my surroundings told me there was no nearby weapon I could use before the guy at the table perforated my hide, so I went back to my seat and slid the card to him. He disappeared it like he had the note.
“If it wasn’t you, then who was it?” I asked.
“Not sure. But I will tell you this: there’s more players here than you think. We don’t have the missing wife or her boys, but when they eventually do surface, we’d like to speak to her about potentially settling a debt. She should be well taken care of, what with life insurance and the like. When she shows up, you pass that message along.”
“What if she’s dead?”
“I don’t get that feeling,” he said, beginning to stand.
“What did Vallance owe you money for?” I blurted. What the hell was I doing? It looked like I might actually live through this little encounter with a mob enforcer, and here I was grilling him for info.
He must’ve been thinking the same thing, because his head tilted as he watched me through the dark. “Set of balls on you, don’t ya?” He considered me another few seconds, then said, “Don’t know what he was in deep for, but he said he had a foolproof plan to get paid up the last time he spoke to my employers. Then he was dead. Maybe that was his plan, maybe he was full of shit; who knows?”
The guy walked toward my back door and tucked the gun away beneath his coat. Before he let himself out, he said, “The reason your teeth are still in your head and not littering the floor is I like your books. But you do something dumb again like you did tonight? That’s where my appreciation ends. I’ll be around.”
Then he was gone.
I stood from the table and crossed to the door. Locked it. The backyard was empty, and except for a faint trace of cologne, my visitor might’ve never been there.
My legs did a weird wobble, then unhinged. I sat down quickly.
With my back up against the nearest wall, my mind spun. When I thought I could stand, I got myself a glass and poured three or four fingers of bourbon into it, drank it down. Leaning on the counter in the dark, I tried processing what just happened the best I could.
So this guy, the Visitor, I’d call him （it had a nice ominous ring to it）。 HerringBone had sent him to check in on Ryan Vallance’s death. Right after that, David is shot and Rachel and the boys disappear. But this guy says he has nothing to do with it, that he wasn’t the one in the house with me the other night. I didn’t know about the former, but the latter held some weight of truth. There’s a distinct feeling in the air when someone wants you dead; I knew that now, and I’d never write another chase scene or gunfight the same way. When I fled from the Barrens’， there was no doubt the man pursuing me wanted to kill me, yet if the Visitor was the same guy, he could’ve done it while I was asleep in the living room. Could’ve shot me when I walked in the kitchen or on his way out the door.