Page 61 of I Will Ruin You

For Lucy, it was becoming a question of who to fear most. Digby, the hospital orderly who wanted more fentanyl and was ready to hurt Lucy if he didn’t get it? Billy, if he figured out she’d dipped into the shipment? The pair he was working for, whose idea of a good time was hooking battery clamps to a guy’s tits? The cops?

So far, Billy appeared to buy her denials that she’d had anything to do with it, but that could change. If and when he knew the truth, would he give her up to the people he worked for? If she stole any more from Billy, it upped the odds he’d catch her. Maybe he’d set up some cameras in the garage. It was a wonder he hadn’t done that from the get-go, if only to protect his precious automotive tools. And now, if Billy had even half a brain—and, to be honest, this was often in question—he’d have put a new lock on the cabinet where he kept the drugs, be more careful with the new key.

No way she was YouTubing her way into that carry-on bag again.

And even if she did dare to, Billy’s associates kept pretty close tabs—no pun intended—on the inventory. If he came up short again, what would they do to him? Lucy wasn’t sure just who these people fronted for, but it wasn’t the Girl Scouts. The flights were coming from south of the border, so it wasn’t hard to connect the dots. The cartels, baby. They controlled the drug trade down there, had their own labs making this stuff. So long as the money kept coming in, Billy didn’t ask questions. He really didn’t want to know.

If there was an easy way out of this, Lucy didn’t know what it was. Could she chip away at her list of potential threats? Cross one off, move on to the next? Digby, for example. Could she make an anonymous tip to the hospital admin? Say he was stealing pharmaceuticals, helping himself to patients’ personal belongings, fondling female patients while they slept? It was probably true, anyway.

She’d returned from a trip to the grocery store and was sitting at the kitchen table, staring into space as she nursed a beer, thinking about how she’d go about ratting out Digby, when she heard Billy’s van pull up beside the house. She got up, left the beer on the table, and went outside to meet him.

He’d reversed the vehicle up to the garage, gotten out, raised the rear hatch, and was swinging open the garage door when Lucy approached.

“Hey,” she said.

“Hey,” he replied.

He was unloading boxes and carrying them to the rear of the garage. He had brand-new power tools, all in their original packaging. Belt sanders, jigsaws, drills, reciprocating saws.

“You gotta be kidding me,” Lucy said. “I thought you were all tapped out. No money left.”

“Didn’t buy it,” he said, puffing as he made another trip.

“Don’t tell me. You know a guy.”

It would go with the other goods she’d seen in the locker, she thought. Laptops, DVD players, phones.

“I’ll pay them off one way or another,” he said, more to himself than to Lucy. “I got merchandise. Makes up for the shortfall.”

“Is this enough?” she asked. “And what makes you think they’re even going to want this? What are they supposed to do? Put it up on eBay?”

He ignored her. Once he had placed the last load in the garage, he came outside and lowered the door, took three deep breaths, and said, “I need a drink.”

She followed him into the house, where he went straight to the refrigerator and grabbed a beer. He took one long draw, set it on the counter, and then did something that made Lucy’s jaw drop.

He reached under his jacket and pulled out a gun. He set it on the kitchen table and stared at it for several seconds, panting.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Billy. The hell is this?”

“That’s a gun, Lucy. You should get out more.”

“Why do you have it?”

He took another drink. When he put the bottle down, let go of it, his hand was slightly trembling.

“Insurance,” he said. “Just... need to be ready.”

He couldn’t look her in the eye. He studied the gun on the table in front of him, turned it slowly with his index finger, the barrel briefly pointing at Lucy as it revolved.

“Is it loaded?” she asked.

“Wouldn’t be much good if it wasn’t.”

“Where’d you get it?”

He rolled his eyes. “Lucy, this is America.”

“What are they gonna think, they see you with a gun?”