“You motherfucker.”

“That’s not my name.”

“He’s dead?”

“Compliments of me. I also took Jordie Bennett,” Shaw said. “Not her corpse. Her. Which means that if you still want her killed, you gotta deal with me.”

Panella let loose a spate of profanities and threats which came through loud and clear despite the garbled voice. “You think you’re awfully smart, don’t you?”

“Well, I outsmarted Mickey. That wasn’t my gray matter left to shovel up.”

“I discouraged your participation.”

“Really? So it was Mickey’s idea to set me up to take the fall for her hit?”

Panella said nothing to that.

“I’m willing to overlook it,” Shaw said, “but because my feelings were hurt, I’m going to need a bit more compensation than Mickey settled for.”

“How do I know you even have Jordie?”

“Come on, Panella, let’s cut this crap. You knew who you were talking to when I answered this phone. You already knew Mickey was dead. By now the story of last night’s events will have been well covered by the media.”

“Not where I am.”

Shaw didn’t believe that, but he let it pass. “Call the Terrebonne Parish Sheriff’s Office. They’ll verify that Jordie was snatched. Homicide detectives will have gotten a description of me, and I’ve probably been identified as Shaw Kinnard.”

“Well, my contract wasn’t with Shaw Kinnard. So I’m under no obligation to honor it. If in fact you did take Jordie, deal with her any way you like. I don’t have to pay you a goddamn penny.”

“That occurred to me, too. But here are some possible consequences of that decision. One, I use her phone to notify the nearest FBI office that she’s alive. A little worse for wear, maybe, but very much alive.”

He paused, but Panella said nothing. Shaw had his attention.

“I leave the phone on so they can track the signal straight to her. By the time they get here, I’ll be long gone, but they’ll be glad to see her. Tickled to have her back in the fold. She was their clubhouse sweetheart for weeks, you know. Cooperative. Chatty. Who knows, maybe this traumatic experience will have jostled loose a memory about you and her brother that slipped her mind the first go-round of questioning.”

“I didn’t tell them anything!” she shouted.

Shaw clicked off the speaker and pressed the phone against his chest. “Shut up,” he hissed. “You fuck this up, I won’t be happy.”

“Like I care.”

“You should. I’m your only chance at life, darlin’.”

She tilted her chin up mutinously, but when she didn’t speak again, he put the phone to his ear. “There, you see? I have her. But her welcome is wearing thin, which makes option two damned tempting.”

“What’s option two?” Panella asked.

“I walk away from this whole friggin’ mess. You won’t know if she’s alive and in the bosom of the FBI, or buried where you’ll never find her.”

“If you walk away, you get nothing for your trouble.”

“True. But neither do you. And here’s why that would be consequential. First you lose sleep, wondering what happened with Jordie.”

“I don’t care that much.”

“Bullshit, you don’t. Because without his sister as a pawn, Josh will make good on his escape and retrieve the money. Because you ain’t got it.”

“You say.”

“I say because, if you did, none of this would matter to you. We wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

Panella didn’t respond.

“If Josh gets away,” Shaw continued, “he’ll collect the money and live to a ripe old age in a distant land, enjoying the grand lifestyle that you envisioned for yourself. If he’s recaptured, he’ll be locked behind bars forever with the key thrown away, and the money will molder till doomsday because he’ll never tell you where it is. Either way, you wind up with only your dick in your hand.”

He let all that sink in, then said, “Better choice, Panella. Agree to my current asking price. Jordie dies. Josh surfaces. You gain another opportunity to get your revenge on him, plus a shot at finding where he hid your money.”

The only sound coming through the phone now was heavy breathing amplified by the electrolarynx. He was thinking it over. Finally he said, “I warned Josh that if he ever screwed me over, I’d kill him, but not before killing his sister first. That rat needs reminding that I always make good on my promises. Jordie coming through this alive is not an option.”

Shaw’s gut clenched. It was difficult, but he held her gaze as he said, “Understood.”

“Okay then,” Panella said. “Get at it and call me when it’s done.”

“We haven’t come to terms yet.”

“Five hundred thousand.”

“Two million. Have a nice day.”

After Shaw clicked off, he continued looking at Jordie for a beat or two, then turned away from her and concentrated on removing the battery from Mickey’s phone. He put the phone in one front pocket of his jeans, the battery in the other.

Jordie moved around to stand facing him. “Two million dollars?”

“You think it’s too much or not enough?”

“He still wants you to kill me?”

He sidestepped her and walked around the car to the trunk and took out a bottle of water. He twisted off the top, poured half the bottle over his face, then drank the rest.

She knocked the empty plastic bottle out of his hand. “Answer me.”

He looked down at the bottle that had landed and rolled, coming to a stop against the toe of his right boot. Then he raised his gaze back to hers. He wanted to strangle her, and at that moment he would have happily done it for nothing.

He went to the backseat door of the car, which was still standing open. “Get in. Lie down.”

“Why?”

“Get in and lie down.”

“Or what?”

He stormed back to her, grabbed her hand, and dragged her toward the open door.

She tried to wrest her hand free. “You said you didn’t want to hurt me.”

“I won’t. Believe me, when I pop you, you won’t feel it.”

When they reached the door, she kicked it shut, which made him even more furious. They wrestled, although it was never any real contest. He easily backed her against the car door, her hands sandwiched between it and her butt. He held her there by pressing his body flush with hers.

“You had better hope Panella says no to my terms.”

“You’re not going to kill me or you would have already.”

“For two million dollars—”

“Not for any amount,” she retorted. “I don’t think you will.”

“You know I will. You’ve seen me in action. Mickey? Not my first. Not even my first this week.” Her eyes widened fractionally. “Oh, yeah, Jordie. Tuesday night, I left two dead in Mexico before beating it to New Orleans. So don’t delude yourself.”

She swallowed. Blue eyes that had been throwing daggers moments ago now filled with misgiving. He felt her literally going softer against him as her resistance ebbed.