Fate Interrupted 3 (20 page)

Thank you so
much for reading
Fate Interrupted 3
!

Find out more
about Brooke & Ben, Tasha and Will in
Brooke
& Ben:
Before
Fate Interrupted
- now
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About
Kaitlyn
Cross:

When not scoring great deals on purses and shoes,
Kaitlyn
Cross enjoys drinking red wine, spending way too
much time on
Pinterest
, and denying that she still
watches
The Vampire Diaries
.

NEW YORK TIMES AND USA TODAY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF:
    
Fate Interrupted

Fate Interrupted 2

Fate Interrupted 3

Brooke & Ben: Before Fate Interrupted

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Life is short,
buy the shoes!

Chapter
Forty-Two

Clay slapped the
folded newspaper onto the metal desk with a hollow thud. He let out a
frustrated breath and put the cell phone to his ear, sweeping a tongue across
his teeth as it began to ring. He could still taste this morning’s powdered
eggs, watery oatmeal and stale bread. His stomach rolled – only eighteen more
months of that shitty breakfast to go, or five hundred and forty-eight days to
be precise.
Tops.
He cringed at the thought.

“Aloha,”
a female voice answered brightly in his
ear.

He plopped onto
his bunk, the bedsprings protesting the weight he had put on over the last
twelve months of incarceration. “
Hello,
is Frank
around?” he said in the same pleasant tone that had helped get him into office.

“He is; can I tell him
who’s
calling?”

A wide grin
swept through Clay’s gray stubble like fire through a dry mountainside.
“An old friend.”

There was a
brief pause, long enough for him to hear Elvis Presley singing
Suspicious Minds
in the background.
“I’ll get him; just a moment.”

“Thank you,
mam
.”

She took the
phone with her and the music got louder. The crowd noise told Clay it was a
live recording. His eyes drifted back to last week’s copy of the
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
. He blurred
the wedding announcements into a black and white blob, his mind going over what
he wanted to say one more time even though he had already rehearsed it a
hundred times before. After all, what else did he have to do? Clean toilets and
watch bad daytime television? No thanks.

The sound of
static traveled across the four thousand miles between them. Then it stopped.

“Aloha.”

“Frank! It’s
good to hear your voice again.”

Frank set his
sweaty Mai Tai down and didn’t answer.

Clay snorted.
“How’s Maui? Bet the surf is fantastic this time of year.”

“How’d you get this number?”
Frank whispered
coldly.

“Oh come on now,
Frankie, you know I still have a trick or two up my sleeve.”

Frank glanced over
at Victoria, who stretched out in the chase next to him and shut her eyes
against the sun. He swung his bare feet to the patio.

Clay rested a
foot on a tiny desk chair, peering out a thin window overlooking the gray day
outside. “I hope you will pass my congratulations on to the new Mrs. Ryder.”

Frank waited
until he was on the other side of the peanut-shaped pool before speaking again.
“If you’re looking for help with your commissary,
you’re climbing the wrong tree.”

Clay leaned back
against a cold cinderblock wall.
“Quite the opposite, Frank.
I was looking to add to yours.”

There was dead silence
on Frank’s end and then he chuckled.
“I
heard they cleaned you out during the trial.
Sold the house
and everything.”

“Well, like I
said, I have still
have
a…”

“Spit it out, Clay, before I hang up.”
He stepped
inside their tropical bungalow and slid the patio door shut, downing out the
ocean waves. Cool air washed over his tan skin.

Clay’s face
hardened. He picked a piece of lint from his orange jumpsuit and let it float
to the concrete floor. “They locked Megan in some loony bin way up in Sheboygan
Falls.”

“I heard.”
He grunted.
“Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, huh?”

“Takes
her mother an hour one way just to visit.”
Clay’s silver eyebrows furrowed
as he thought about it further. “Jack is with Nancy until we can…”

“Save it for the Christmas newsletter, Clay. My
drink is melting.”

Clay didn’t
speak for a few seconds, the tension as thick as molasses. “Did you also hear
that they beat Megan? Dean and Evy, I mean.”

“I heard she shot Jacobs first.”

“And thank the
Lord for small miracles!”

Frank took off
his sunglasses and set them on a wooden bar, glancing at his waterproof watch.
It was almost time for lunch and Victoria would come waltzing in at any minute,
walking on air, loving their new life, no longer alone.
“Is there a point to any of this?”

“I want you to
take her from him.”

Frank watched
Victoria dive into the deep end of their swimming pool. Sun sparkles twinkled
across the surface making him squint.
“Who?”

Clay swallowed
dryly.
“Why Evy, of course.”

Frank’s eyes
rose to the turquoise ocean beyond the infinity pool, a short laugh slipping
from his lips.
“Enjoy your stay at
county, Clay. And if I were you, I’d lose this number. I may still have a
friend or two in your neck of the concrete jungle.”

Clay tipped his
head back against the wall and laughed.

“I’m retired.”

Clay inhaled a calming
breath and grew quiet. “You’re being called back up.”

“You don’t have the authority.”

“Don’t I?”

Frank let his
eyes go blurry, turning one of Victoria’s
Kokopelli
figurines into a fuzzy, humpbacked blob.
“You
should learn to quit while you’re behind, Clayton.”

“Ah, but it’s a
marathon, Franklin, not a sprint – much like a successful marriage.” He paused
to let a heavyset guard shuffle past. “How is Victoria anyway?
Very pretty lady, Frank.
Impressive for an old timer like
yourself.”

Frank gritted
his teeth and looked out the windows, feeling like Clay was watching him at
this very moment. But that was impossible. Frank shuffled his bare feet behind
the small bar.
“Leave her out of this,
Clay,”
he calmly replied, pulling open a drawer and staring at the Beretta
tucked inside.

“Well now,
Frank, I just might have a friend or two in your neck of the palm trees if you
don’t…”

“Then get them to do your dirty work!”
Frank barked,
slamming the drawer shut.

“But I need the very
best for this job and my friends are sloppy. I want to make sure the job gets
done right this time.”

Frank lowered
his voice, reclaiming his cool demeanor.
“Oh,
you mean like last time?”

“I have faith in
you, Frank. Plus, you owe me one.”

“Let it go, Clay. It’s over. Do your time and start
fresh. It’s your only move.”
Frank watched Victoria do a handstand
in the shallow end, the sun splashing against her outstretched feet.

Clay let out a
surrendering sigh. “Well, I thought I’d try,” he said. “Apparently you really
have changed.” He smiled. “I’m happy for you, Frank. I really am.”

Frank traipsed
across the tiled kitchen floor to the front door without responding.

“You take extra
good care of that wife of yours. I know too well what it’s like to lose someone
you love.”

Frank exhaled a
salty breath.
“Now, you’re starting to
sound like one of the bad guys from a ‘Die Hard’ movie. You can do better than
that, Clay,”
he said, peeking out front where a red
Prius
sat parked down the street in front of a white plumbing van. With the sun
reflecting off the windows, he couldn’t tell if anyone was inside either
vehicle. Outside of a kid whizzing past on a Razor scooter, the street was
quiet. Palm trees swayed with the lazy breeze. Frank snorted and hung his head,
amused by his own naivety. Here Clay sat locked in a tiny cell halfway across
the world and Frank was letting him get under his skin. Clay was good. The guy
had lost everything: Power, money, family and friends – all gone in the blink
of a news story and yet he could still get to Frank.

“Oh,
and Frank?”

Frank stepped
back from the window and wiped the sweat from his brow.
“Goodbye, Clay.”

“If you’re
having problems with your plumbing, my friends can help with that as well.”

Frank hesitated
for a moment and then darted back to the window and yanked the curtain aside.

The plumbing van
was gone.

A spike of
adrenaline shot through his system.

Clay laughed
wildly into the phone, making Frank’s heart beat even faster. After a few
seconds, Clay’s laugh tapered off into a clammy silence. He leaned forward and
rested his elbows on his orange knees. “Now…when can you catch the next plane
to Milwaukee?”

Frank folded his
brow and checked the street one more time before going back across the kitchen.
He caught his reflection in the mirror hanging behind the bar. After dropping
ten pounds from all the surfing and kayaking Victoria had talked him into
trying, his skin was tight and tan. There was no denying it, this life treated
him well.

“One last dance,
Frankie boy, and I promise you will never hear from me again. But first…you owe
me.”

Frank blinked
blankly at his reflection. Suddenly, his dead eyes were back and he cursed Clay
for it. He tucked the gun into his swim trunks and pulled a pair of dark framed
glasses from the back of the drawer, slid them on and stared vacantly into the
mirror. Goosebumps rippled across his flesh at the return of the man before him.
He never wanted to see that man again, yet there he was.

“You also owe it
to your wife,” Clay added.

Mr. Ryder shut
the drawer and went into the bedroom before Victoria came looking for him.
“Text me the address.
I’ll call you when I land.”
He hung up
and threw on a brightly colored Hawaiian shirt that went well with his tan and
then pulled a suitcase from the closet and set it onto the bed with a bounce.

Clay leaned back
against the cold wall, not feeling the paint chips fall down his collar. He
stared at the cell phone in his hand, flashing his million dollar smile.

The
end