Stall 2

Chapter 62.

"We'd love to Peaches, we've got a lot of catching up to do," he says with one of his large grins, but as he turns with her to start walking up the hallway to the living room; he looks at me as they pass with his chin stuck up.

"See. At least someone here appreciates me."

"Yeah appreciate a dislocated jaw, idiot," I mutter, rolling my eyes and it makes Steve laugh under his breath and shake his head.

Steve follows behind me, and keeps a bit of a distance behind Abby and Jimmy so she can't hear me. Ludo is trotting along beside Abby.

"How did tonight go?" I say keeping my voice hushed.

"I dunno if you'd believe it if I told you," he whispers, which makes me look over my shoulder at him and pause in my steps, "That Margaret really is somethin' else."

I look up ahead to see Abby and Jimmy have already gone into the living room, so I pull Steve aside and stand near the wall.

"What do you mean?"

"I think she's more nuts than David," he replies, shaking his head like he still can't believe it, "She's been playing David this whole time. She's had everyone fooled, even Jimmy. That woman is terrifying - did you know she killed Andy's father?"

"What?"

I say it far louder than I meant to, and check to see if Abby heard me but hear Jimmy carrying on with her instead, so I hush my voice again.

"What the fuck?"

Steve nods, scratching his fingers against his bald head and sighs, "Yeah. She drugged him. She's been waiting for an opportunity this whole time to fuck David over. She wants to take him to the cleaners and keep everything for herself and that brat kid of hers. I swear she's like the human version of a preying mantis. It made my skin crawl seeing they way her whole personality switched."

You've gotta be fuckin' kidding me.

"So she didn't want the deal? What happened? You went with Plan B?"

Steve clears his throat, "Well she did wanna make a deal - her one stipulation was that we don't hurt Andy."

"Get fucked. No fucking way. Not Happening," I whisper yell before he's barely even gotten the last word out.

Steve holds his hands up, "Hey, Relax. We know that. That's why she ended up with a needle full of sedatives jammed in her neck by Jimmy. Jacobs took her to the place we're hiding her. So now Andy is gonna come to us when he finds out."

I pinch the bridge of my nose, huffing, "Right okay. So how did everything else go then? Did that guy tell you anything?"

Steve sucks in an awkward breath between his teeth, "... Yeah... About that, Jacob kinda beat him to death."

I drop my hand to give him a flat look, "Weren't we trying not to kill all of them now so we could use them against David when you release everything?"

Steve shrugs and holds his hands up in a 'what can ya do?' expression.

"He pissed Jacob off. We both know he can have a short fuse. It happens. We've still got enough of them left, it's not the end of the world."

I can't really talk about having a short fuse. I have one too.

"Right well, aside from that -- is everything else going to plan?" I ask as I rub my hands over my face.

I've been home for barely three hours and I'm already stressed.

"Yeah, so far," he nods, but then he pats his hand against my shoulder, "You still want to give me some of your fathers tapes for the case?"