Page 99 of Exposed

“The new lawyer can tell the cops. They’ll investigate it, they have to.”

Ray scoffed. “No they don’t. They’re cops. They have their boy. They’re not gonna look at anybody else. They think Simon did it. We set him up perfectly. It was a great plan and it worked.”

Mary felt a tingling as she listened. The men were talking about Simon and about lawyers. Suddenly she realized that she was a lawyer. Simon was a friend. She was Simon’s lawyer. She couldn’t figure out which man was talking. They were talking so fast she couldn’t follow. Or she just couldn’t follow because they were saying so much. She couldn’t process the information even though she understood the words. It was like a flood of words and back-and-forth that she couldn’t understand all at once.

“They figured it out. It didn’t work that great.”

“It was just a fluke that they figured it out. It was a fluke that Simon went to the lawyer and a fluke that bitch acted like she was working for us when she was working against us. You should’ve seen her at the meeting, full of herself, bossing everybody around. She loves it. I can’t stand bitches like that. Todd hated her too. She worked him over. I have half a mind to go in there and beat the shit out of her.”

“So why don’t you?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why don’t you go in? Why do you send me in?”

“You know the answer to that. Because she knows who I am.”

“So what’s the difference if she knows who you are?” Not-Ray sounded angry again. “We’re going to kill her anyway. That’s what you said. You said I’m going to kill her anyway. And she figured out who I am.”

“No she didn’t.”

“Yes she did. She knows my name.”

“How?”

“She took a guess.”

“She knows about me?”

Mary thought Ray said that. She was losing track of who was talking when. She tried to think of something to do to save herself. It hurt too much to move. She couldn’t even string a thought together. Her face felt wet and stickier than before. She was bleeding into the blindfold. The cloth stuck to her eyes as the blood dried. She blinked and blinked but more blood ran in. The thought nauseated her.

“I don’t know,” not-Ray said. “We didn’t talk about you. She knows it’s me.”

“Whatever. Why are you getting so paranoid lately?”

“I’m not paranoid.”

“Yes you are. You’re griping. You on your period?”

“It’s just that with Todd we had a plan. We had it planned out. This isn’t planned out. And now we get two new people. Women.”

“Stop with that. They’re lawyers.” Ray was getting testy, too.

“She’s a famous lawyer, isn’t she? She’s famous?”

“What are you talking about?”

“She’s famous.”

“She’s not that famous if you didn’t know who she was.”

Not-Ray fell silent, and Mary could hear some walking around. She remembered they were in a cabin. The floor must be made of wood. But the cabin seemed small. They were right outside her door. They weren’t worried about her hearing because they were going to kill her. She was going to die in some horrible way. She began to feel the emotion she hadn’t before. Stark, cold terror.

“Did she tell you she was famous?” Ray asked. “Were you talking to her?”

“No.”

“You were gone awhile. You were talking to her, weren’t you? What did she tell you? That she’s rich and famous? Did she offer you money?”