“Go back inside, Leith.” I hear her voice before I can make out where Chevelle’s squatting down between the pots. Thick, spirals of hair rustle in the wind. All I see is the top of my wife’s head.
“Chevelle, ye said as soon as I got home to—”
“Leith, get!”
I told myself to exhale in the car. In this precise second, I do so. I breathe feckin’ easy.
“Glad to see someone’s happy to see me,” I mutter, though her moment of genius has secured my safety. Chevelle will either beg me to come running when she’s crossbreeding various herbs or shoo me away if she’s too engrossed in something new like she is now. Like I once was about computers and coding.
“You know I love you, baby. I’ll make it up to you later. Bye!” A slender hand with manicured fingers pops up between green foliage, pointing to a baby monitor. “Check on your minion.”
Though our Mia is now a wee tot, she’s a very busy wean.
Over my shoulder, I call out, “When I get out of the shower, I expect me a frothy pint.” Make it five pints, enough kick to drink me under the bloody table.
With nothing but the sound of Chevelle’s snickering, I head back down the stairs, reproaching myself for the life we made for ourselves. The life I made for us. I step back into the house.
Chevelle has always been content in my arms. From what she’s shared about her parents in the past, they had some money. Sometimes, she gets skittish around too much money, though.
I lean against the door to Mia’s room. The entire area is filled with princess furniture. In the center of the bed, my lassie sleeps. Her deep chestnut hair has muted fiery red highlights. Her chubby arms are raised over a humongous head I often tease her about.
I lean down, kiss the big forehead her mom gave her, and murmur per the norm, “I’d die for ye, Mia.”
I stop from heading back to the garage where there’s blood and more DNA evidence in the trunk of my Audi.
“Dinna push it, Leith.” The deid lad will have to wait until later.
I head into my room for the shower. We live in a smart house with all the luxury we never needed. As an application and software developer, I can buy pretty much anything my family wants. My hen rarely asks for much. When Chevelle got pregnant, I got greedy, sought nothing but the best for our wee bairn.
It feels like hot rain spilling from the massive showerhead, but I’m numb to it.
“Incoming call from Leith MacKenzies’ cellphone. Confirm action?” the virtual assistant announces through a speaker along the shower walls.
“Who’s ringing?”
“Unknown.”
“Where is Mrs. MacKenzie?” I inquire.
“Mrs. MacKenzies’ status is on the rooftop of the MacKenzie home.”
“Answer. Volume low. Cut call if Mrs. MacKenzie enters the house.”
Gritting my teeth, I jab the button to turn off the water. With the steam continuing to bellow in the shower, I settle on the Venetian plaster bench.
A voice scrambler comes in loud and clear. “You got your hands bloody, Leith. I knew you had it in you.”
“You know shite about me,” I growl.
“When you took a position at Infinity Corp, I assumed it was to align your interests with mine for the sake of your family.”
The hot steam surely does not exceed my internal core. “Ye assumed I was operating on behalf of my clan. I’m a man apart from them. Dinna think that makes me weak or someone ye can threaten.”
“Threatening you wasn’t my intention, Mr. MacKenzie. Though I’m not a fan of assumptions, you’re right. I presumed you created an app for Infinity Corporation to have a bit of fun. All the power in the world—data—my friend, is at the tips of our fingers.”
Nae, I still feel the tips of my fingers pushing down the eyelids of the deid eejit from earlier. “I’m a good lad.”
The caller laughs at my hypocritical statement. “I understand. You keep your families separate. The big, powerful one from the tiny, intimate one you have there.”
“You dinna speak of them!” I snarl so hard spittle flies from my clenched lips. “As a matter of fact, I’m parting ties with ye.”
“You’re dissociating yourself with me? Tell me, Mr. Leith MacKenzie, what’s my name?”
My eyelids twitch, fingers clamp along the edge of the shower seat. The name behind the automated voice is beyond me.