Page 61 of All Out of Love

“Crates McGraw.”

It was a name Grayson had never heard before. “Who’s Crates McGraw?” he asked his brother.

“He’s a drug slinger. A nobody. Small time shit all the way.” Vinnie looked at Carlo. “Why would Crates McGraw hire you and Eddie to do a job? His ass ain’t got no big money to hire somebody like Eddie Hudgens.”

“I don’t know about all that, but that’s who hired me.”

“For how much?”

“Forty thousand.”

Vinnie frowned. “Forty grand to take out Grayson Carrington? That’s bullshit! The going rate on a two-man operation is going to be half a million easy.”

“I don’t know what he agreed to pay Eddie. But that’s what he paid me.”

Vinnie was getting flustered. “This shit ain’t adding up. Why would--”

But before he could finish his sentence, the entire front wall of the house, including the front door and the front window, all caved in as a big, gray, armored-looking Tesla Cybertruck barreled through at full speed. Grayson dived one way. Pauly grabbed Vinnie and they dived the other way. But the truck slammed into Carlo.

The two guards behind Carlo pulled out their weapons and started firing at the windshield, but like Carlo both of them were immediately crushed to death too.

Vinnie and Pauly had dived onto their backs, and had pulled their guns and were firing on that big truck as it slammed into the back wall and came a halt.

Grayson jumped onto the side of the truck and with the butt of his own gun busted out the side window. Then he grabbed the driver out of that truck as Vinnie and Pauly hurried around to assist him.

That was when they realized it was Crates McGraw himself, the supposed money man.

That was when they realized the gunshots of the two guards had penetrated the front windshield and Crates had been shot multiple times. They dragged him to the floor because he was injured. Gravely so. He was barely hanging on.

All three men knew, before Crates died, that they had to have the full story. But Vinnie also knew that it couldn’t begin and end with Crates. He didn’t have the reach to pull it off.

He and Grayson got on their knees. But Pauly ran outside to make sure there was no backup attacker lying in wait for another ambush.

Vinnie leaned down to Crates’ dying body. “Who hired you? And don’t tell me nobody because I know better than that. Was it Billy Joshua? The only way this makes sense is if Billy hired your ass. Was it Billy?”

“No.” His voice was weak and raspy, barely clear enough to be understood.

“Was it Billy Joshua’s son?” Grayson asked.

“No.”

“Then who was it gotdammit!” Vinnie’s patience was all but gone. He knew the signs. He knew Crates McGraw was on his way out of here.

But Crates looked at Grayson and actually smiled. “You clueless motherfucker,” he said with a grin.

Vinnie frowned. “What are you talking? What’s Gray clueless about?”

Crates didn’t respond and continued to grin. But Grayson’s main thought was Toya. He had to make sure this wasn’t about Toya. “What am I clueless about?”

“Those letters you were receiving.”

“The letters that claimed somebody else knew about what happened at the lake house?”

Crates nodded.

“They weren’t the truth?” Grayson asked him.

Crates grinned through his pain. “A pack of lies,” he said. “I sent them. Your old man paid me to send them to you. He said if you thought somebody else knew about what happened that night, then you would be too afraid to tell anybody about it. He thought it was funny.”