Page 5 of Burn Bag (Owens Protective Services #31)

Oh yeah, and now I was burdened with the task of telling Eva that the father of her kids was dead. Fucking perfect.

“I can’t believe you pussied out on us,” Dash shouted as he approached the vehicle.

I stared at the sky in frustration as Thumper and Dash approached with everyone else on their heels. Fox was still munching on his snack behind me, as he had been for the last hour.

“Hey—” He flinched when he saw Fox in the back, no doubt grinning at him like a fool. “Fox, what the fuck are you doing here? ”

“Ouch, man. That hurts. It’s like no one wants me here. And I don’t see why. I brought all these tasty treats with me.”

I didn’t dare turn around. I didn’t need to count the numerous bags he brought. The onion flavor was wafting through the air and making me want to gag.

“We have a problem,” I said in a no-nonsense tone. I held out my hand and Dash took it, helping me out of the van. As Fox approached, I slammed the door in his face. “Fox killed Cash.”

“What?” Thumper snapped, his eyes shooting to the window of the van. “Why the fuck?—”

“You know why,” I argued. “Cash went after Knight, so Fox went after Cash.”

Thumper sighed, running his hand through his hair. “What the fuck are we supposed to do? Does Eva know?”

“I doubt it,” I sighed, already thinking of all the horrible things that would happen after this. “She’s going to kill him, you know.”

“Well, then he shouldn’t have been the dumb fucker who taught her how to use throwing knives,” Dash argued.

“Or…” Thumper chuckled humorlessly. “He shouldn’t have fucking killed her husband!”

“Right, well, I was getting to that,” Dash muttered.

Eli and Red sauntered up with grins on their faces. They had no fucking clue about the disaster they were walking into. But the moment they saw Fox in the van, their faces fell. I glanced over my shoulder, shaking my head as Fox made silly faces against the window.

“What the fuck is he doing here?” Eli yelled.

The door slid open and Fox frowned. “You know, it’s like no one is happy to see me. I have feelings, you know.”

“Keep your fucking mouth shut,” I snapped. “Fuck, you had to go and make everything all fucked up.”

“That’s my specialty,” he grinned. “I find it best to keep people on their toes.”

“Like Cash? Was he not on his toes enough for you?” I advanced, but Dash pulled me back, his hands wrapped around my arms to restrain me.

“What are you talking about?” Red asked. “What did he do?”

My jaw twitched in rage for every moment I looked at Fox. Despite the blowout I’d had with Cash, it shouldn’t have ended this way. He was a prick to all of us in the end, but there was still a chance for redemption. Knight was alive, and he could have tried to make things right.

“I unalived Cash,” Fox grinned, popping another Funyun in his mouth. “It was beautiful. When that bomb went off…” He sighed, shaking his head in amazement. “I mean, you know it’s not my preferred way of killing, but some things just have to play out a certain way.”

“I’m sorry, did you just say you killed Cash?” Red snapped. “Our boss? Your friend?”

“Well, friend is debatable after what he did to Knight.”

“You son of a bitch!” Red shouted, leaping at Fox. His hands wrapped around Fox’s neck, and like the psychotic fucker he was, he actually started laughing. “What the fuck were you thinking?”

Eli and Dash were holding him back as I stepped in front, struggling to keep Red from killing Fox.

“This is not the way to handle this!” I shouted, panting hard as I struggled to keep the behemoth of a man from murdering one of us.

“Tell him that!” Red shouted.

Fox chuckled, continuing to munch on his snack. Fuck, he was not helping himself here. When we finally got Red to settle down enough, and his cheek was twitching out of control, he jerked out of my grasp and fixed his shirt.

“Fuck, I can’t believe this shit,” he muttered. “We have to tell Eva.”

“Yes!” Fox laughed, bouncing up and down giddily. “Tell Eva. Man, this is gonna be so good.”

I spun on him, ready to tear off his head. “What the fuck is wrong with you? How can you be so happy about ripping your friend’s heart out?”

He jumped out of the van and started rubbing my shoulders. “Hey, it’s okay, man. This is the way it has to be.”

“It shouldn’t have been,” I snapped. “None of this should have fucking happened.”

“Well, that’s debatable, but in order for this to play out, I’m afraid we’re going to have to crush the little lady’s heart.”

I stilled at his words, slowly facing him again. “What do you mean in order for this to play out ?

Fox scoffed, grabbing a can of tuna from his pocket. With his knife, he started prying the lid open. “Well, we have to make it believable, and in order for that to happen, Eva needs to look thoroughly distressed.”

Not a single one of us moved as we all took in his words.

“What do you mean? Why do we have to make it believable?” Dash questioned.

Fox scoffed out a laugh, punching me in the shoulder. “Well, come on. It has to look like he’s really dead! I mean, to her, anyway.”

That rage inside me boiled over to a new height as I replayed his words over and over in my head.

Fox’s face morphed into confusion as he stepped toward all of us. “Wait, did you guys think I actually killed Cash?” He tossed his head back and howled in laughter. “Man, that’s what you guys are so pissed about? Fucking hilarious, man!”

I grabbed him by the shirt and yanked him toward me. “You’d better start talking right fucking now!”

He grabbed my hands and carefully pried them away with a chuckle. “No problemo, mi compadre. See, it’s really not that hard to figure out. At first, I was pissed as hell that Knight took a bullet from Cash. Who wouldn’t be? Am I right?”

When no one answered, he continued.

“Anyway, I stalked Cash to the ends of the earth, watching as he did some of the most unspeakable things, and that’s saying something from a guy like me.

So, anyway, I started getting this feeling that someone was watching me.

It was really fucking creepy. I started hiding in garbage cans and dressing like a homeless person just to avoid being spotted. Let me tell you, I really stank.”

“Fox,” I hissed in irritation. “Get to the point.”

“Right, so I never caught anyone watching me, but I knew they were there. Always watching me, always waiting for the moment to pounce. And then I’m pretty sure someone snuck some drugs into my food because I started hallucinating and acting crazy.”

That was a stretch. Fox hallucinating and acting crazy was just another Tuesday.

“What did you hallucinate?”

“Man, I could have sworn I saw Cash praying. And his old man was there, and he was crying. Ooh, and then some old bastard hugged them both. It was really fucking weird.”

“Someone hugged them? How?” I asked curiously.

He snorted in laughter. “Like, an actual fucking hug. But how insane is that, right? Who would hug the two of them?”

He had a point there.

“So, that’s about the time I started to think that maybe there was more to the story,” he said with crazy eyes. “That maybe, someone was drugging me to make me think I was seeing these things. Like, it was all an illusion, you know what I’m saying?”

The problem was, Fox was crazy on the best of days, so figuring out if any of this really happened was impossible. Not to mention that he was in one of his states over Knight nearly being killed. Maybe he accidentally drugged himself with magic mushrooms.

“Right,” Red said, “So, you saw some weird shit and then you decided to blow up Cash?”

“Ooh, that’s the good part,” Fox said excitedly. “So, there I was, lying in my garbage pile as the rain beat down on me. And this mouse came over and got in my face, and he started whispering information to me.”

I scrubbed a hand over my face, wondering where the fuck he was going with this. I was starting to think Fox had imagined the whole fucking thing in a state of mental distress.

“And what did the mouse say?” Dash asked .

“That’s the best part,” Fox grinned widely. “He said that Cash needed to be blown up to set the stage.”

“What stage?” Eli pressed.

Fox snorted. “Dude, it was a mouse. I don’t think he understood English.”

“So, you didn’t ask,” I muttered. “You just took the word of the mouse.”

“Well, when you put it like that, maybe I should have asked him a question or two, but he was really convincing, you know?”

“Why?” Red snapped. “Did his squeaks follow a pattern that sounded like the munching of Funyuns?”

“No, but how cool would that have been?”

“Fox,” I snapped.

“Yeah?”

“Get the fuck in the van.”

“Oh, cool. Are we leaving?” he asked as he wiggled back into the middle seat.

I slammed the door in his face and turned to the guys. “What do you think?”

Eli huffed out a laugh. “Seriously? I think Fox lost it this time. Well and truly lost it and thinks he talked to a mouse who gave him orders. That’s what I fucking think.”

“We need to dig into this and find out if Cash is alive,” Red said, glancing over my shoulder at Fox.

“I’m not sure any of our resources would help. They didn’t in the past.”

“Get Rae on it,” I ordered, though it wasn’t my place. “Fuck, if my father were alive?—”

“He might not be able to help either,” Eli assured me. “What’s done is done. Don’t beat yourself up over things you can’t change.”

I knew he was right, but fuck, so much shit had gone wrong. I felt like one more thing would push me over the edge.

“I’ll give Rae a call,” Dash grumbled. “Though I could find out on my own,” he added quickly. “It’s not that she’s better than me.”

“And Fox?” Eli asked. “What the fuck do we do about him? ”

We all turned and looked at Fox. He was sitting in his seat, grinning at us like an idiot.

“We keep him close,” I murmured. “Whatever the hell is going on, we need to keep an eye on him.”

“Mental breakdown?” Dash asked.

“Probably. Let’s just hope we can get him back before he tries to kill anyone else.”