Out of Time (Nine Minutes #2) Read Online Free Page B

would still be a great story, even without the answer to the question she’d asked Ginny. A few more tweaks and then she’d be done, maybe go home and spend a real Sunday with her mom and sister for once. She was the only one in the tiny magazine office today, a small remodeled gas station located off the beaten path. The owners—Don and his wife, Irene, a natural redhead with a bouffant hairdo who always smelled like cotton candy—were rarely around, and Leslie ran the day-to-day operations. In a way it was a good job. But Leslie had grown tired of being in charge. She didn’t care about keeping up with advertisers, subscriptions, payments, any of it. All she wanted to do was write. That’s all she’d ever wanted.
    Less than an hour later, she was putting the finishing touches on her story when she heard the door open. Without looking up from her computer, she said, “Office is closed today. You can come back tomorrow morning. We open at nine.”
    She heard the door shut and didn’t realize the person had closed it from the inside until she heard the creak of the chair right in front of her desk. She turned to look and almost gasped.
    It was Keith Dillon. Gang name: Blue.
    Blue was one of the gang members who hadn’t gotten the immunity some of the others had. He was too high up in Grizz’s organization for that. Blue had gone to prison with Grizz and a few others. Got a lousy ten years and was out in two.
    Blue had visited Leslie a week or so after Grizz had attacked her in the prison interview room, right after Grizz gave her the phone interview. Right before the execution. She’d known Grizz did it out of anger and she’d had to swallow her pride after the beating, eat a little crow when she talked to him, but her instincts had been accurate. She knew she’d angered Grizz enough in that first meeting that he just might give her something.
    Boy, did he. When he told her during the call that Grunt—Tommy—was his son, Leslie had almost dropped the phone. He wouldn’t answer any other questions. She’d wanted to get more details, like whether Grunt knew and, if so, for how long. He wouldn’t give her anything else.
    The first encounter with Blue was when Leslie had just come out of the grocery store and was putting bags in the trunk of her car. The sun was hot and she felt a trickle of sweat make its way down the center of her chest. She had allowed her pain medication to wear off so she could drive herself to the market. The heat and renewed pain were making her woozy, but she was still feeling a little high, too. She knew the secret Grizz revealed was going to make her article. Make her career.
    She didn’t know where Blue had come from, didn’t see or hear him approach her car. He was just there, standing silently with his arms crossed. He didn’t ask her not to print the secret. He demanded it.
    “Grizz changed his mind.” Blue looked her up and down. “Don’t print whatever it was he told you during the phone interview.”
    Leslie just stared at him. She knew who he was, but he didn’t incite the same sense of fear that Grizz did. So instead she took her cart back to the return, left him standing behind her car. Like an afterthought, she called out over her shoulder, “You don’t even know what it is, do you?”
    He didn’t answer.
    She stashed the buggy and strode back toward him. “The big secret. You don’t know it, do you?” she asked a little too smugly.
    Blue waited for her to return. “Doesn’t matter. Don’t print it. This is just a courtesy call. You don’t want to be seeing me again.”
    He turned around and walked away.
    Now, two days after Grizz’s execution, Blue was back. He sat in the chair and looked at her. Didn’t say a word. She wouldn’t allow herself to be intimidated. A quick stab of terror at the memory of Grizz’s brutality jolted her, but she quickly replaced it with confidence. That bastard was dead. She was safe. She wouldn’t let Blue get the upper