Out of Time

  He had to admit to himself: his wife was strong. Stronger than he’d ever realized. She could’ve handled knowing about Jo, and maybe one day he would tell her. Just not today. Chicky had been right to keep that journal from Grizz. It had probably saved Sarah Jo’s life.

  He thought more about his last meeting with Grizz, right before the execution. Tommy thought he’d have to convince Grizz he wasn’t the one who’d gone to Jan about taking down Grizz, Blue and the gang along with them. But to his surprise, he didn’t need to do any convincing at all.

  **********

  “I know it wasn’t you. But Grunt, I was pissed.” Tommy and Grizz stood in the alcove to the prison yard, the hot sun blazing beyond the covered overhang. It was three days before the execution.

  Grizz huffed out a breath, then kicked at the cement slab. “You have to remember what that fucking reporter had told me about the billy club. I talked to you, we worked it out, I didn’t like it, but what was I going to do? Have you killed and leave Kit alone? But then Blue waltzes in with pictures of his kids, says one is yours. Tells me Jan said it was you behind my arrest. It all came back how you manipulated me that night. Other nights, too. Admit it, Grunt. It looked bad for you. Real bad.”

  Tommy nodded. It did look bad.

  “But I know why you did what you did. You did it for her.”

  Surprised, Tommy stared at Grizz. “Always, Grizz. It’s always been about her. Look.” He exhaled sharply. “You’re going to the table soon. I have no reason to hide anything from you. I know you think I set you up. I know you think I fucked Jan.”

  Grizz put his hand up. “Stop right there. I don’t give a shit about Jan, and I know Blue doesn’t either. When she told us it was you who set it all up, that’s what pissed me off. But just for a second. Nobody double crosses me—”

  “I didn’t double cross—”

  “Shut the fuck up for a minute and let me finish. I know it wasn’t you. Okay? How many times do I have to say it? You were a kid when you pulled all that bullshit. I can’t blame you for being in love with Kit. I’m still in love with her myself. I’ve done a lot of things that would make another man cringe. The only thing I ever did that twisted my gut into pieces was telling her to marry you. To stop coming to see me. To make sure my daughter never knew me. I get it, kid. I get it all, and I understand it. I don’t like it, but I accept it. Because I love her.”

  “You can stop calling me kid,” Tommy said with a smirk. “I’m as big as you.”

  Grizz ignored that last comment. No one was as big as him. “I’ve had a lot of time to think in here, Grunt, and the more I thought, the more I wondered how Blue’s slutty wife could’ve pulled it off. I could’ve kicked myself in the ass for not thinking about it sooner. I was pretty certain I’d been right in my thinking the first time.”

  “Who? Who was it?”

  “That little prick, Matthew fucking Rockman. Rockman is responsible for bringing that shit storm into my life, and thanks to him, I’m going to the table in a couple of days. Can’t do anything about it now but trust Blue to handle it.”

  Tommy blinked. Matthew Rockman? He had a quick flash of the guy. The young attorney who suggested to Ginny that she use Carey Lewis’s firm for Grizz’s defense. That punk was the one who’d caused all the dominoes to fall?

  “So, we good now?” Grizz was saying to Tommy.

  “I’m good if you’re good,” Tommy answered, relief evident in his tone.

  “Wanna take a walk around the yard with me? I want to hear everything about my daughter and grandson. I want to know everything about them before I die.”

  Tommy hesitated. The yard? Was Grizz setting him up? Were there guys waiting in the yard to jump him?

  “Are you allowed to take visitors in the yard?”

  “I’ll be dead in a few days. They let me do what I want. C’mon.”

  Reluctantly he’d followed Grizz out to the yard. It was empty and had an oval track, much like the track Ginny used to jog on back at the motel.

  It was there that Grizz told him everything. Everything from the very beginning. Grizz started by explaining why he wanted to talk outside. Apparently, even with his clout, the prison still might have ears, and he had to be certain nobody would hear what he had to tell Tommy.

  Grizz told him not to be surprised when he was questioned about Jan’s upcoming murder. Tommy should’ve been surprised, but he wasn’t. This was Grizz.

  “When Blue was here last, I told him I would signal someone in the viewing room as to whether or not to take you down. I believe what you’ve told me today, so I’ll signal accordingly. It’ll all play out like I planned, but you need to know I have things in place that look like it might lead to you, but they won’t. They’ll only look like Rockman’s sloppy attempt to frame you. I’m only doing it so you can offer up some more information that will further implicate Rockman. Got it?”

  He then told him the real reason he’d been sitting on death row all this time. What he had been involved in since he was a kid. What they wanted from him. They had nothing to do with Grizz’s arrest. That was all Matthew Rockman, but they let it happen to see where it would go. To see if they could use it to their advantage. They didn’t have a name. In fact, they did, but Grizz wouldn’t offer it up to Tommy. He didn’t need to know it, but for the sake of this explanation he would refer to them as the NNG. The No Name Group.

  The FBI thought they were reporting to the White House when in fact, Grizz was certain based on names he’d learned many years ago, they were reporting to people even more powerful than the United States government. An organization more secret and connected than the CIA. Actually, the NNG was more powerful than any government. Privately elected within their own ranks, they came from all different walks of life—politicians, educators, CEOs, philanthropists. They were the ones calling the shots. They made sure the correct person was in the Oval Office. They controlled the world’s economy. They did it all.

  And yet a nobody biker from South Florida had something in his possession that scared them shitless.

  “What did you find that freaked them into letting you think you could bring down the people that ran the world? You know this sounds farfetched, don’t you, Grizz? I mean, come on—people who ‘run the world’?” Tommy made air quotes.

  “This is the part Kit can never know. This is the part that will offer you an explanation. It’s the least I can do for you, and you need to be able to handle what I’m telling you.”

  Tommy frowned, then nodded at him to continue.

  “I told you about my little sister. How I killed my parents and made my way to Fort Lauderdale. But that was just the beginning.”

  As they made their way around the prison yard track, Grizz proceeded to tell Tommy the rest of the story. The motel. Pop’s accidental death. What he’d found after Red and his guys showed up. He told Tommy everything.

  “A bag of counterfeit money with the plates to make more? Was that supposed to finance something?” Tommy’s eyes were wide.

  “Yes, but I didn’t find out the rest until I was older. I burned almost a million dollars that night in the pit. I thought I’d stumbled across plates to make counterfeit money. I hadn’t realized these had been real plates, real money. Real plates that were in the possession of the NNG. No wonder they were so fucking wealthy. They owned the fucking mint, Grunt.”

  Tommy exhaled sharply. This was far bigger than he ever expected. “How was Red involved?”

  “Red was undercover FBI. He was good friends with Candy’s father, Tom. That’s who she named you after. Tom was Secret Service, although his family never knew that. They always thought he sold insurance. Maybe he was undercover Secret Service, if there was such a thing back then. I really don’t know. Anyway, the Secret Service is responsible for sniffing out and dealing with counterfeiters. That’s probably what Tom thought he’d stumbled on. The NNG used their power to have Red, Tom’s friend, put on his trail to get that bag back. But it wasn’t the money t
hey were after. There was something in the bag I’m not even sure Tom knew about. But I sure did. I found it.”

  Tommy slowed to look up at Grizz, but Grizz tugged him along, mumbling under his breath, “Keep walking and don’t act surprised. This is supposed to be a friendly goodbye chat between father and son. We need to look like we’re clearing the air so I can die a happy death.”

  “Got it.” The sun was bright as they walked. Bright and hot. “So what’d you find?”

  “A big fat document, that’s what I found. Neatly typed, a logo and everything, very official looking. Names, dates, events. There were small explanations, notes under each one. It was basically an outline of major world events.”

  “Events? Like what?”

  “The Berlin Wall. The Cuban Missile Crisis. The Vietnam War. Names of men who would be president. Watergate. The gas crisis. AIDS—”

  ”What’s the big deal about that, Grizz? Everybody knows those things. You didn’t stumble on any big secrets. Pick up a fucking history book.”

  “You’re not as smart as I’ve always given you credit for, Grunt. You’re hearing me, but you’re not really listening.” In a very low voice laced with anger, Grizz continued. “I found this document in the fifties. The Berlin Wall wasn’t built until 1961. The Cuban Missile Crisis was in 1962. This letter said who would be president, who would assassinate him and who would assassinate the fucking assassinator. Said there’d be a president who would fall in a scandal called Watergate. That was in 1972. It said there would be a gas shortage. That they were working on a virus that would eliminate what they called ‘the undesirables.’”

  Tommy’s jaw dropped as what Grizz was telling him actually sunk in. “You’re telling me that you saw a map of our future? Like, a Nostradamus document or something?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying. And even though I was just a kid, I knew it was important. I just didn’t know how important. I don’t think Red even knew what I’d found. He died thinking it was a counterfeit operation. He was obsessed with that bag of money and his hunch was right that I’d found it. He convinced the FBI that I could be an asset. They didn’t even know the entire truth about what I’d found. They always thought they were reporting to some White House official, and maybe they were, but that official was reporting to a higher power.”

  “And you used this knowledge to keep them at bay? To let you get away with so much for so many years?”

  “I fucked with them big time. I let them think they talked me into working for them where they could keep an eye on me. I tossed them an occasional bone to let them think I was theirs and I’d—”

  Tommy cut him off. “Why didn’t they just threaten you, torture you, kill you?”

  “They tried. I almost didn’t survive their first and only attempt at torture. It was then that I let them know I had something in place for their shit to go public. And it would only happen in the event of my death. It was the truth. I had it all set up to be released if I died. Fuck, they even protected me for a while. They must’ve been shitting themselves when I’d piss off a drug cartel bad enough for them to want to kill me. I played them like that for years knowing I could get away with whatever I wanted and they wouldn’t let me die.” He clenched his jaw. “That’s when I overplayed my hand. Thinking that when I got arrested for Kit’s kidnapping and all that other shit they’d get me out. Especially if I got the death penalty. They risked exposure with my death.”

  Tommy nodded. Now some of it made sense. “But they didn’t,” Tommy finished quietly. “They didn’t come to your rescue.”

  “No, they played me back like I deserved. They told me to make sure Kit and the baby were out of my life. It would be too obvious if my woman was waiting for me. They were right. I know a lot of men who were taken out because their women refused to move on. They made it apparent they were waiting for their men.” Grizz gave a bitter laugh. “Of course, I told them that if they even so much as laid a hand on her head I’d expose them, and I would have. But it backfired on me. I did what they said. I told her to marry you and I never told her why. I could never offer her an explanation without putting her in danger.”

  Tommy didn’t know what to say.

  “They let me rot in prison after I did what they told me, thinking they’d get me out. Shit, Grunt, I expected to be out in a few years under the guise of a false execution. I didn’t think I’d be away long enough for Mimi to remember you as her father. I stupidly thought I was going to get out and give them back their shit and they’d relocate me and Kit and the baby and leave us alone.” Grizz shook his head. “It all went to hell, though.”

  “And it never occurred to you that I really loved her? That if your plan had worked you’d have been ripping her and Mimi away from me?” He understood Grizz, even had sympathy for him. But shit, it hurt.

  ”Honestly, Grunt? I was using you. I knew you loved her, but truthfully, I didn’t care.”

  The only sound was their feet on the prison yard track. After a few minutes, Grizz added, “I’m sure you never suspected it, but I’m certain Cindy was a plant.”

  “Cindy?”

  “I’m pretty sure her father was a wannabe. Trying to get in with them by showing them he could help out. When I guessed it I wasn’t worried about it because there was nothing Cindy would ever learn from you. You never knew anything.”

  “And now? Now that everything in those documents has come and gone, does it even matter anymore? Anybody could create a document to look like it was written in the fifties by some clandestine group with a secret name, and they could make it look like it was mapping out future world events. You said you even found pictures. These days, photos can be doctored. Anything can be done in hindsight.”

  “It didn’t stop at the seventies, Grunt,” Grizz said softly. “It didn’t stop at the eighties or even the nineties. That document mapped out future events for the next seventy-five to a hundred years. This world is being controlled by forces that have been around forever and they plan on staying around. Fuck, man, they’ve named kids who haven’t even been born yet.”

  It was dizzying. Tommy blinked. “How did they eventually figure out you had all this? You said they suspected it, but how did they confirm it?”

  “I showed my ass. I was in my early twenties and had always kept an eye on the property where my sister was buried. It’s where I hid the shit after I got a license and could drive there by myself. I would occasionally call and inquire about the property. When I found out it had been sold and was going to be developed, I had her remains secretly exhumed and gave her a proper burial. At that time, I decided to look over the documents again. I hadn’t read them in years. I noticed a company name that had been in the news. I decided to buy some stock and made a ton of money. They noticed, and it only confirmed to them that I had what they’d suspected all along. They knew I wasn’t lying or dicking around with them. It was stupid of me.”

  He told Tommy more details then. How more recently a new player, one with brass balls, had stepped in and decided he wasn’t going to let Grizz fuck with them anymore. Grizz had run out of time. They weren’t giving him any leverage. They wanted their shit back and they wanted it now. The NNG’s newly elected official made sure Grizz knew he could release what he had to the public and the NNG might falter temporarily, but not before they would let Grizz watch Ginny die a slow and painful death.

  Tommy tried to show no emotion, but the thought of Grizz putting Ginny in danger made him angry.

  “So it’s over for you, then? No more standoff?” Tommy tried to sound casual, but his throat burned. He swallowed thickly.

  “No more standoff.”

  “Too bad you just didn’t give it back when you were a kid. You know, before you actually understood what you had your hands on. But how would you have known what would happen?”

  “I wish I had, Grunt. Believe me. But let me warn you: If they think for a second that you or Kit know any of what I’ve told you, you’re dead meat.”
r />   “Then why are you telling me?” Tommy asked in disbelief.

  “Because I have to be sure they leave you both alone after I’m gone. They have to be certain you know nothing and you won’t be touched. I need to make sure you or Kit don’t say anything, not a single thing by accident that would even let them think you know any of this.”

  “But we didn’t know any of this! And I’m definitely not going to tell her. Besides, how will they be able to verify that we don’t know anything without interrogating us?”

  Grizz put his arm on Tommy’s shoulder. “They might even be watching us now. So you can in no way react to what I’m about to tell you. Understand? You just nod and laugh like I just said something funny.”

  Tommy did as he was told, and with a smile on his face, he asked, “How, Grizz? How can they know for certain Ginny and I don’t know any of this?”

  “Your house has been bugged for years.”

  Chapter Seventy

  2000

  Tommy couldn’t even begin to describe his anger after hearing Grizz’s last statement, but it all made sense now. The NNG could never be sure Grizz hadn’t shared his story all those years with his wife and son. He hadn’t, and the NNG should’ve known it. But Grizz was convinced Tommy needed to play out his part after the execution.

  Tommy was supposed to take Ginny home after Grizz’s death and come clean about some horrible things. He was willing to do that.

  “You have to give them something,” Grizz had told him. “You understand? Coming home like life is perfect will only keep them listening. They keep listening because you’re so fucking tightlipped. Nothing has ever come up about the gang, her life with me, nothing. It’s almost overkill, like you’re purposely hiding something.”

  “We’re not hiding anything.” Tommy’s voice was low. “We live a normal, average life. I’m an architect. She’s an accountant-slash-soccer-mom. Doesn’t that count for anything?”