grabs his chest. “My heart… it’s… it’s beautiful. Cassel, my dear man, I have underestimated you!”
Leland rushes forward and slides a finger under the rope around my left pec as his eyes—the only thing noticeable behind his ski mask—sparkle in delight.
“Teach me your art, master,” Leland says.
Cassel preens. For as much of a fuss as he makes about Leland, he sure loves it when Leland compliments him. He’s also not far whenever Leland needs him. I think he just enjoys complaining when Leland does something ridiculous so he looks more normal, yet secretly on the inside he’s waiting for Leland’s approval about everything.
“No, you’re not teaching him anything!” I beg. No… plead. The sex dungeon is enough. I really don’t need to be tortured any more. I can only imagine what Leland would do if he figured out how to tie this well.
“I’ll teach you all I know,” Cassel assures him and they high five. Literally fucking high five.
I sigh. “Please don’t tell me we’re going out like this. I mean, shouldn’t these be fake ties? You know, so I can still get away if I need to or something.”
“Nah, it needs to look super realistic.” Leland leans into me and snaps a selfie of the two of us. “I’m sending this to Henry. ‘Jackson’s all tied up and ready to go. His level of beauty grows every day. Don’t be too jealous; this stud is too much for you. XOXO. I love you like you’re my Daddy.’”
Cassel leans in to look, probably naively assuming that Leland wasn’t writing these things to Henry. “You do know when you capitalize the word Daddy, it’s… a Daddy Daddy, right? A person you want to fuck, right?”
“Oh, he knows,” I say. “Did you forget Leland lives to make everyone feel awkward or strange?”
“Huh. I never would have imagined,” Cassel says as he walks toward the car with me. We decide to leave Sarge behind and I tell Leland to make sure someone knows where in case something horrible happens.
“Already did,” Leland says as he helps me into the back seat before getting into the driver’s. “I told him that I have it set up with my lawyer that if I were to die and you… you…” He takes a deep breath like he can’t say it. “You had something… happen. I want my money to go to someone I love as a prize. We’re going to do it Battle Royale style since I want you guys to fight for it. We’ll have Ava in one corner, Henry in another—”
“Can I get in on this?” Cassel asks.
“Of course, of course. Cassel in another corner. Then I gave the lawyer a list of the weapons they’re allowed to put in the middle—”
“Hold the fuck on,” I say as I lean into the front seat, very concerned about this. “You’ve actually set this up?” It was dumb of me to ask. I’m sure he did. I’m sure in some weird part of Leland’s brain, he thinks this sounds like a good idea.
“Well… yeah. It’s fine. The lawyer was all ‘you can’t pit family members against each other with guns.’ And I was all ‘Fuck, you’re right, Ava would mow them all down with her attitude alone.’ So we agreed on paintball guns. Last person standing gets seventy percent, second place gets twenty, and third gets ten.”
Cassel pulls out his gun. “I’m really sorry. I love you guys, but as soon as you stop at this stop sign, there’s going to be a difficult choice to be made.”
Leland casually waves him off as if Cassel wasn’t suggesting his murder. “Nope, there’s a rule that my killer can’t participate. I thought maybe that’d keep Ava from offing me early.”
I’m just… mystified by the whole thing. “So… how long have you thought about this?”
“Too long,” Leland says. “Far too long.”
When we pull up to an old abandoned lot, they’re already there. Cassel had set up cameras of our spot out in an open area which he’d been watching since the man arrived. I don’t recognize him at all, so Cassel sent the image off to Tucker and Henry to see if they could get a match. The open area makes us susceptible to snipers, but Cassel has motion-activated cameras set up within an eleven-hundred-meter radius that can sense motion out even farther. Anyone shooting beyond that almost deserves to shoot us.
Cassel blindfolds me as we come onto the scene where the lone man stands.
I hear the car door open