“Yeah, Matt. It’s not a big deal,” Natalie opined.
But it was a big deal for Matt Lloyd, Morgan knew. In fact, it had been a big part of the reason that Lloyd had lost his seven-figure contract with the BBC—a homophobic tirade that had been captured on smartphone and leaked to the media. The LGBT community had been outraged, and demanded Lloyd’s head. They’d got it, and Morgan was certain that Lloyd would have spent tens of thousands on PR gurus and therapists to clean up his image, and his act. There would be no more public slip-ups from Matt Lloyd, no more loose tongues.
Of course, cocaine had a way of changing all of that.
“It’s a big deal to me,” Lloyd rumbled, the drug divesting him of any tact or inhibition. “Your rainbow-loving freak mates cost me my job.”
“I’m sorry?” Morgan asked, feigning ignorance.
“You and the rest of the queers. You pushed me out of my job.”
“He said some things about gays,” Natalie confessed. “They weren’t very nice.”
“True though,” the bigot smirked. “So why don’t you take your flowers and piss off.”
“Wow. I’m sorry I upset you. Really I am. I’ll go now.”
Lloyd was halfway back into his chair when Morgan delivered his mental right hook: “Natalie, would you like to dance?”
Lloyd was jumping to his feet in an instant. “You don’t ask my girl to dance!” he shouted, pulling Morgan back by the shoulder. Deliberately, Morgan dropped his glass, and heads turned to look at the commotion.
“What are you doing?” Morgan shouted, feigning helplessness.
“You do not dance with my girl!”
“Your girl?” Natalie shouted. “I’m no one’s girl.”
“Oh, really? Who bought you those clothes? You think you’re special? You’re no use except for getting your tits out. Those pics will be fish and chips wrapping by next week, and you’ll be forgotten!”
By now a small crowd was gathering as people recognized the turbulence in their midst.
“Don’t talk to her like that,” Morgan demanded.
“Or what, faggot?” Lloyd spat, using the most offensive American term he could think of.
Morgan said nothing publicly. Instead, he leaned close to Lloyd and spoke words into his ear that only they could hear.
It was the final straw for the bigot—he threw a punch.
It was an angry punch, sloppy, mistimed and misdirected. Morgan ducked it without even thinking, his own hands never leaving his sides. Lloyd swung a second haymaker. Morgan easily stepped out of its way.
The disgraced man never had a chance to throw a third. The two security men that Morgan had seen downstairs had been patiently watching the situation develop, hoping that it would fizzle out. Flare-ups between the stellar-sized egos at the establishment were not uncommon, and would be tolerated so long as they kept to chest-beating and insults. Once a punch was thrown, however, the security contingent would sweep in on the perpetrator within moments. During their phone call, Abbie Winchester had told Morgan as much. Now he watched as the two men expertly restrained Lloyd, one on each side of him, exerting enough pressure to hold him in place, but not to cause damage.
“I’ll have your face cut off!” Lloyd raged at Morgan as he thrashed to break free, his rage escalating higher as Natalie threw a drink in his face and the watching room cheered.
“I’m really sorry, sir,” one muscular security man apologized to Morgan as he and his partner turned Lloyd to the stairs and prepared to march him out.
“I’m sorry, too,” said Morgan, the security man’s face dropping as Morgan’s hand shot up under his jacket. Morgan stepped back and clear before the bouncer had a chance to decide if he should defend against the American or keep hold of the thrashing Lloyd.
Now it seemed the answer was clear: there was only one true threat in the room, and that was Jack Morgan.
Who had a gun in his hand.
Chapter 84
WITH THE SECURITY guy’s back turned to him, Morgan had liberated the pistol from his hidden shoulder holster with ease. In one smooth motion he had pulled the weapon clear with his right hand, using his left to cock back the pistol’s top slide, chambering a round. Within two seconds of Morgan beginning his theft, the pistol was ready for use and aimed.
“Don’t kill him!” the robbed security man begged, bravely trying to put himself between Morgan and Lloyd, who was now weak-kneed with terror. “It’s not worth it!” he urged.
“Your weapon on the floor,” Morgan told the man’s partner. “Do it!” he shouted, seeing in his peripheral vision a steady flow of revelers abandoning the scene, rushing with hushed panic for the exit. “Finger and thumb on the grip,” he ordered.
Slowly, very slowly, the second bouncer reached inside his jacket. With his finger and thumb gripping the handle, he pulled out a six-shooter revolver and placed it on the floor. Behind him, the room had all but emptied. Morgan flicked his eyes quickly to assess who remained, seeing Natalie shaking uncontrollably close by his side.
“Pick it up like he did,” Morgan instructed her. “Now!”
Natalie scuttled forward and picked up the gun.
“Put it in my jacket pocket,” he instructed. “Keep holding it exactly as you are, or I’ll blow his head apart.”
“Oh God,” the woman sobbed, black mascara running down her cheeks like a polluted river.
Morgan backed away as he felt the reassuring weight of the second pistol entering his pocket. “All of you on the floor. Facedown. Do it!”
They complied. Lloyd was the slowest to do so, almost paralyzed with terror. “I’m sorry,” he begged. “Please don’t kill me.”
“On your face!”
“I have a daughter!”
“On your face!”
Dribbling with dread, Lloyd joined the others on a floor awash with panic-spilled drinks.
“Interlock your fingers behind your heads,” Morgan ordered the four remaining people in the club, his voice suddenly seeming so loud, and bouncing around the room—the music had stopped, he realized. The last song put on by the DJ had played out, and now the lights and lasers flashed eerily in the silence.
“Your security tapes. Where are they? Tell me exactly where!”
But there was no reply, because the bouncers had heard the same thing that Morgan now did—footsteps on the staircase.
Before Morgan could move, gunshots filled the air.
He threw himself into a shoulder roll and scrambled for the bar as bullets chewed the furniture and decor in the room. He heard someone scream in pain as the shots flew wild, none coming within a foot of his refuge.
“Stop shooting!” Morgan shouted, his gut telling him who the firer would be.
Two more rounds smashed into the wall above him. Morgan scuttled behind the bar and peered around its far side—as he expected, the tattooed girl from downstairs stood at the head of the staircase, a semi-automatic pistol held in her hand. Of the security guards, Natalie and Lloyd there was no sign, only the flapping door of an open fire exit, and a trail of blood made dark beneath the disco lights.
Morgan drew his pistol up to aim. The girl’s shots had been wild, showing her lack of experience at firing a weapon, and he was exposing no more than his head and the top of his shoulders. At twenty yards, the chances of her hitting him were almost non-existent, while his own accuracy was a dead cert.
But Morgan couldn’t kill her.
“Drop it, goddammit!” he shouted.
The girl fired instead. Across the bar, ten feet away, a bottle of Gran Patrón tequila paid the price.
“I don’t want to shoot you!” Morgan shouted as the liquid and glass bounced around him. “But I will, if I have to!”