The silence was nauseating. Jase and Sam sat in the living room watching the clock. It was coming up to nine. A thick haze of smoke floated between them, the only sounds coming from the hissing of cigarettes and Jase's incessant foot-tapping. Sam had never seen him nervous, it leaked over into him.
"Does Madison know she's going with Mitch tonight?" Sam asked. Jase nodded, taking a long drag on his third cigarette in the past hour.
"I told her to pack some clothes."
Sam bobbed his head. He had no words of reassurance to offer and Ramon's order still camped in the back of his mind. His gut twisted with anxiety.
"Are you okay?" he asked, wincing internally as the words left his mouth.
Jase looked at him through his lashes. Part of him wanted to clock Sam around the side of his head for such a stupid question. But then, he wasn't in the best mood with Sam after overhearing what Ramon had instructed him to do and Sam not telling him. To Jase, that meant he was considering it and it only added salt to all his recent wounds to know Sam was willing to turn his back as well.
"Remember when we first got involved in all this stuff, and Benny was going to have you bumped off because of how you were with Janine, and I stepped in and vouched for you?" he asked. Sam's brows furrowed, confused.
"Of course I remember. I thought he was going to go for you next just for speaking up on my behalf."
Jase stared at Sam, his right-hand man in the business for four years and best friend for ten. He trusted Sam with his life, had trusted Sam with his life on many occasions during jobs. He'd never done Jase wrong. Even when he'd started making choices that didn't necessarily benefit the house, Sam had stuck by him for the most part. Until he didn't. Though, Jase understood his reasonings.
"What made you think of that?" Sam asked. Jase shrugged, shaking his head.
"You're probably the only one that knows how not okay I am." He sighed, running a hand through his hair. "It wasn't going to last forever. We all need to know when to call it a day."
Sam's palms were sticky with sweat at the thought of all the possible outcomes of the evening. He didn't want to have to choose between Jase, and his and Janine's future, which was the black and white of it. Jase pulled the tin box out from under the armchair, setting it on the coffee table.
"You've got your gun, haven't you?" he asked. Sam nodded, patting his waist where his Glock 29 was tucked. Jase unlocked the box, took out his weapon, and slotted in the magazine. He pulled the slider back and clicked the safety on before lifting his shirt and tucking it into his jeans.
"Where's the other one?" Sam asked.
"In my car," Jase replied, closing and locking the tin again, putting it back.
"Do you think it'll come to that?" Sam asked, jerking his chin at the outline of the gun.
"Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it."
The minutes ticked past, the tension was suffocating. Neither of them could recall any other situation that had aroused this much dread in their whole careers. They'd handled large amounts, money, girls, guns, and drugs, and not once had they been this disquieted.
At twenty-five past, there was a knock on the door. Jase stood up to answer, his grip tightening on the handle when Adam looked up and smiled at him.
"Surprised you let this go on for as long as it did, shame the damage has already been done," he jeered. Jase didn't blink, he'd seen this coming. He stepped to the side, inviting them in. Sam glared at Adam, not able to keep the same poker face as Jase. Not that Adam was fazed, he felt untouchable with Mitch by his side because Jase had already given in and Adam had chosen the winning team.
"Be quiet, Adam. I'm sure Jase feels humiliated enough without you rubbing it in," Mitch playfully chastised.
Jase followed them into the living room, taking his seat. Mitch sat down on the sofa and Adam pulled out a chair at the table, sniffing at Sam, curling his lip.
"I have to say," Mitch started, "I was rather surprised that a girl has been your downfall. Of everything I heard about the terrifying Jase Davies," he wiggled his fingers theatrically, "the last thing I expected from you was to fall in love with one of the house girls." He was trying to get a reaction, but Jase refused to give him any further satisfaction. "Then Harvey told me that girl was Madison and I wasn't surprised at all. If there's any girl that can run rings around someone like you, it's her. She always was a conniving, smart-mouthed little cow." Sam studied Jase, worried Mitch's taunting would tip him over the edge but Jase remained impassive. "My boys will love that about her for a while until they get bored and they've got all the use they can from her holes." Jase let him carry on as he lit another cigarette, not even flinching at the vulgarity. It hadn't even struck him as vulgar to hear girls being spoken about as fuckable objects until it was Madison as the subject.
"If you think you can do a better job at controlling her than I can then you'll have every opportunity to prove it," he said. Now they were there, and Mitch had only brought Adam, his nerves had settled.
"I'll do a better job than you. I don't swing that way so a pair of tits and that pretty little face won't be a distraction." Jase's brows twitched. He was almost amused by Mitch's self-assured demeanour. He couldn't know Madison that well if he thought it was her appearance that made things difficult.
Sam continued to watch Jase carefully. If Mitch continued teasing and Jase snapped, they could kiss their deal goodbye. But there was no fault in Jase's manner, no flash of anger in his eyes, not even a curled fist. He was almost too calm.
"Fair enough," Jase sighed, almost bored. His eyes fell on Sam. "Go get her, let's get this over and done with."
Sam stood up, making his way upstairs and unlocking Madison's door. He was expecting her to be crying, or to look distressed or even lost. She was none of those things, sitting on the corner of the bed in Jase's black hoodie, a backpack, and the white trainers and jeans she had on the night they took her. Her expression was unreadable, a blank canvas. Right to the end, Madison was giving nothing away about what was running through her head. She stopped in front of him in the doorway and Sam felt the weight of her presence for the first time. He saw how Jase saw himself in her. In the lack of emotion, in the pride and how she carried herself, as though she was untouchable even now.
"Tell Janine I said goodbye," she said before leading the way to the stairs.
Madison stood barely inside the living room, Sam returned to his seat by the table.
"Long time no see," Mitch smiled.
"I'd have preferred to have kept it that way," she replied, monotone. Mitch was unimpressed by the missing fear in her words. He had dreamed of a moment like this, when he finally got his hands on her, when he could get his own back on her bastard dad, and she had the gall to look disinterested rather than terrified. He got to his feet.
"Don't worry, we won't have to see much of each other."
"Silver lining," Madison replied sarcastically, she wouldn't break eye contact. Jase grunted an amused laugh. Mitch might have had a good idea of who Madison was back then, but he had no idea who she was now. She refused to cower and Mitch attempted to blindly push her buttons again. He wanted Jase to see her crumble, to flinch and whimper, beg and plead. He wanted the tears and the panic and the puffy eyes and dark circles to let him know she hadn't slept a wink since she found out he had won.
"I don't know why you've got a bag packed either," he continued. "It's not like you'll need a change of clothes where you're going, you won't be wearing them." A smirk gradually appeared on Madison's face. Jase took a long, slow drag on his cigarette, observing the exchange with narrowed eyes.
"You're a cardboard gangster, Mitch," she said. Her character was ice cold, there was no one on Earth that could trigger a man so fast with such ease and dismissal. Mitch clenched his fists but it didn't deter Madison, she was just getting started. "You bitched out of the meeting when Dylan got shot and even if you did have the minerals to kill me, you really think you can take on my dad-?" Jase gritted his teeth as Mitch slapped her across the face. Madison ran her tongue over the blood weeping from her lip, tasting the warm iron. The cut opened up as her smile widened. She wiped the red dribble from her chin. "Still can't control your temper I see. And you still slap like a girl."
Mitch laughed wickedly, giddy with adrenalin after making her bleed. He wasn't sure she'd even make it back to where he was going to keep her, he wasn't sure he could last the journey home without putting an abrupt stop to her existence.
"I can't wait for you to see what I have in store for you-" Madison rolled her eyes, cutting off his seething words.
"Oh fuck off, Mitch. All of you lot are the same, gay or not. You think you can just trade off girls like fucking Pokemon cards. Keep us locked up in houses because someone's fucking bought us? You think because you have guns and a little crew you can do what you like without consequences but there are always consequences." She looked at each of the men in turn, Jase last before closing her eyes and taking a breath. "Besides, you all made the same silly mistake." She clasped her hands behind her back. Jase stubbed his cigarette out, sitting forward in the armchair. He could see Sam in his peripherals, perplexed with his hand on his gun, ready.
"And please, seeing as you're so fucking sure of yourself, what is this mistake?" Mitch urged, letting his curiosity win.
Madison's vision tunnelled, the room closed in around her. She could hear the ticking of the clock, her own heartbeat thudding in her ears and on her neck. The smell of cigarettes and aftershave swallowed her whole, cold waves of adrenalin zapped and snapped through her body, stretching down to her toes and out to her fingers curled around the cold metal of Jase's glock tucked into her jeans.
"You all underestimated me." She pulled the gun and the men flew to their feet.
*
It takes more strength than one would imagine to pull a trigger. It takes conviction to end a life, yet it happens in seconds, and when it does, time stops.
Three gunshots echoed through the house.