Blast from the Past (A Mac Faraday Mystery) by Lauren Carr Read Free Book Online Page A

blue, it resembled a toy. No one doubted that it wasn’t.
    “Now you listen to me, Cruze. I’d wipe that cocky grin off your face if I were you, because it ain’t working. Neither are your big threats about coming after me, because I see them for the crock of horse poop that they are. You seem to have forgotten that I put your ass in jail for over ten years. This very morning, I killed two of your people. That’s right. I blew them away with my little pink handgun, which is now in evidence.” She growled when she said, “I really liked that gun, Cruze. All this blow hard bravado about how tough you are is a big fat waste of your hot air, because I know the truth. It’s you who’s afraid of me.” She cocked her head in his face and glanced down inside the car. “What’s that I smell?” She sniffed.  “Oh, I know that odor. It’s the smell of fear. I smell it. Gnarly smells it. All of us here smells it. You reek of fear, Cruze. I suggest you go home and change your underwear before your men smell it, too.”
    She shoved him back into the limousine. While all of the men stood in shock at the petite, little blonde’s display, she picked up Gnarly’s leash and headed back down Spencer Lane to home.
    In stunned silence, Cruze’s driver and body guard climbed into the limousine and drove off.
    Bogie said, “I don’t know about you, Mac, but Archie scares me sometimes.”
    “She just scared the living daylights out of me.”

    “Will you stop following me?”
    It was an order, not a question.
    As soon as Archie and her entourage got back to Spencer Manor, Mac launched into a recount of everything she had done wrong during their encounter with Tommy Cruze. She tried to ignore him and take her mind off her circumstance by unpacking her clothes and hanging them up in his closet.
    Bogie and Hector were both calling in more security to keep Spencer Manor safe.
    While Archie was uninterested in hearing what he had to say, Mac was following on her heels to make his point. He was so focused on Archie that he didn’t notice Gnarly up on the bed, where he was not allowed to be, watching them circle around the master suite during the debate.
    “I’ll stop following you when you stop walking away from me and listen,” Mac said.
    Carrying an armload of clothes, Archie went through the dressing room to the walk-in closet. “I am listening to you.” With one arm, she pushed all of his clothes aside to make room for her dresses. “You pulled your gun on him first, and that was okay,” she said. “I pulled my gun on him, and that was wrong.”
    “You didn’t just draw your gun on him, Archie, you called him out. You called him a chicken.”
    “I did not use the word chicken.” She turned to him. The corners of her lips curled. Her emerald eyes twinkled. “Did you see how scared he was?”
    “Any man is scared when a crazed woman sticks a blue gun in his face.” He grasped her by the shoulders.  “To tell you the truth, I’m more frightened by a woman pointing a gun at me than a man. Women tend to be more emotional. When you mix emotions and guns, bullets tend to fly.”
    She shook her head. “No, Mac. I’ve heard it before, but now I’ve seen it with my own eyes. Bullies are chickens. They cover up their cowardice with bravado like a child in a mask on Halloween. Their bullying covers up how scared they really are. Maybe they can even forget it themselves.” She shook her finger, her nail dipped in rose-colored polish. “I called him on it.”
    “Yes, you did.” Mac’s tone was somber. “And his men saw it. That’s why now he has to kill you. If he doesn’t, his men won’t respect him. If they don’t respect him, then he can’t rule the syndicate.”
    The cell phone vibrating in his pocket broke their stare down. The screen announced it was David. Mac put it on speaker phone. “Yeah, Dave?”
    “We found the leak,” he said.
    “And?” Mac asked.
    “She’s dead,” David reported. “She