Heartless Sinner (Empire of Sinners #5)

Chapter 2

Chapter Two

Scarlett

“Dad!” I break into a sprint, launching toward the kitchen. Once again not thinking about my safety.

All I can see is the brutish man pointing his gun at my father and his boot connecting with his stomach again and again and again.

I rush inside but a set of arms grabs me and hoists me into the air.

Whipping my head around, I come face to face with another man. This one has scars all over his face that look like someone went to town on him with a fish knife. One scar goes right over his left eye and runs down to his chin.

He grins back at me with a leery look in his eyes that makes my stomach churn. “I see what the boss means.” His voice sounds like gravel scraping against pavement.

“Let me go, asshole.” I try to break free of his grasp, but he whistles in my face, releasing a gust of bad breath infused with whatever the fuck he must have last eaten and old cigarette smoke.

“He said you were beautiful. He’s right. You’re also a feisty one, aren’t you? The boss didn’t mention that part.”

A shiver runs through me, twisting and twining my nerves. Who the hell is he talking about?

“Leave her out of this,” Dad croaks, coughing.

The man before him sends another two kicks to his midsection and I scream.

“Stop it! And get the hell out of here!” I sound more ballsy than I could ever feel in a situation like this and I pray these monsters can’t hear the wild, erratic stampede of my heart pounding in my chest.

“Not yet, pretty. The boss wants his money,” the man kicking Dad spits, speaking in a thick Russian accent.

The moment I hear the deep tenor, I think of Anton. He has an accent like that.

Could he be the boss they’re referring to? Anton had men like these. Guards, henchmen, lackeys. It’s all the same thing.

God, what if I’m right and he’s back from Russia?

“I told you I don’t have the money.” Dad’s weak voice grips me. I want to go to him, but this asshole has me so locked in place I can barely breathe.

Dad already has a bad leg and a bad back. There’s no telling what this beating will do to him.

This is about money. Some kind of debt that I wasn’t aware of.

Things have been bad for a long time, and we’ve scrimped and lived on the fringes of the breadline, but Dad never took out loans.

“How much money is owed?” I splutter, willing myself not to cry. The worst thing you could do around men like these is show weakness.

“Three hundred and fifty thousand dollars,” Russian guy replies, glancing at me. “Your father and brother have been in arrears for the last six months. They promised to pay ten grand by today. I’m sure you can guess that didn’t happen.”

Oh my God in Heaven. Dad and Johnny took out a loan.

And they owe three hundred and fifty thousand dollars?

What the actual fuck?

I look at Dad but he drops his head, clearly in shame. A sign the money was more for Johnny than for him.

Damn it. He’s always falling for Johnny’s wild ideas and dumb shit. But this is the worst.

What the hell did they need all that money for?

I can’t believe they had so much when I’ve been working my ass off at the diner. Now I’m the one who’s here dealing with this mess. Not Johnny.

“I have ten grand,” I speak up, my voice shaking with fear and hurt and a lethal dose of rage.

Russian guy looks at me, smiling now. “Now you’re speaking my language.”

Dad gazes at me with worried eyes. I never told him about my savings. I wanted to keep it secret to keep it safe.

“I can wire it to you.”

The man snaps his fingers, and bad breath guy releases me. I stumble as the air returns to my body and the blood starts flowing again, free from the stench of him and the restriction of his arms.

Russian guy steps forward, his gun pointed at me as he smiles. The sight of the gun makes me feel fragile, like I may shatter in the wind.

He retrieves a piece of paper from his pocket and hands it to me. I take it with trembling hands. It has bank account details scrawled in the center and the name of a company—Tate Ltd.

“Wire it now,” Russian guy orders, moving closer.

I get my phone and access my bank app, then he watches me like a hawk while I transfer everything I own to this unknown account.

The transaction processes and I recall with agony all that hard work I had to put in to save that money. Now it’s all gone. Everything is gone.

It’s not until the transaction flashes up as complete that Russian guy lowers his gun and steps out of my personal space.

“Pleasure doing business with you, beautiful.” He nods and his lips curl into a smirk. I want to tell him to fuck off and not to call me beautiful, but I hold my tongue. “By the way, Anton Chekov sends his regards.”

I was already numb and hollow inside, but hearing my greatest fears confirmed turns my blood to rocks in my veins.

I was right.

Anton.

He’s back.

And from the look of this messed-up situation, Dad and Johnny took a loan from him. Anton is the boss.

“Don’t you have any messages for him?” Russian guy smirks.

“No.” My barely-there voice sounds like a whisper hanging on to the edge of the wind.

He smiles wider. “Anton wants the rest of the money by Monday.”

I suck in a sharp breath, suddenly feeling like I may fall forward and keep going through the earth. “ What ?”

“You heard me, beautiful. Anton wants the balance by Monday. Three hundred and forty thousand dollars. Now that you have the account details, you know where to wire the money.”

“But I don’t… we don’t have that kind of money,” I stammer.

The man steps close again, towering over me. “That’s not my problem, sweetheart. Pay up by Monday, or we take everything. The house, the mechanic shop, and whatever your daddy’s got left.” He leans in, his gaze dropping to my breasts. “And if that doesn’t cover it or Anton’s not satisfied, well… let’s just say you better find that money. Or he will find other ways to deal with you. All of you.”

All of us. Including me.

My heart pounds as if someone added a dose of napalm to my blood.

Jesus. How the hell did this happen?

With a wicked smirk, Russian guy strides toward the door. Bad breath guy follows.

I watch them leave, listening as the front door opens and closes while I stay where I am, too afraid to move. Too afraid to face this new disaster.

Finally, I look at Dad and find him already watching me, his eyes filled with sadness and regret.

I want to scream, but as I stare back at him, I see the father who became both mother and father to me when I was nine and Mom left us. I see the father who worked his fingers to the bone to make sure we had everything. I see the father who would do anything for his kids, including welcoming back his daughter into his home after her seriously bad breakup with the same Russian mobster he now owes.

I was a mess. And thanks to Anton, I was addicted to prescription drugs and all kinds of shit. I nearly lost my life. Dad spent everything he had to get me into rehab and he didn’t stop taking care of me until I was better.

That’s the main reason we have so little money— me.

Silence stretches the threat the men left behind, leaving it lingering in the air like the scent of stale blood.

“Dad… you and Johnny borrowed money from Anton ?” I give him a thin, piercing stare, hardly able to believe the words that just came out of my mouth.

There are so many questions clashing around in my mind. Like how and why this happened.

What the hell did they need the money for?

When did they get it?

How did they even know where to find Anton? He met them a whopping total of two times during the span of our two-year relationship. And they never stayed in touch.

I watch Dad closely as he shuffles to sit and rest his back against the wall.

A stream of blood runs down his cheek, then another follows from his nose. His face is a mess. He is a mess.

Dad is fifty-two but looks like he’s doubled his age since this morning. Even the specks of gray hair on the sides of his black crop look like they’ve increased.

It’s strange seeing him like this—so battered, so helpless. My father is a big, burly guy who would have been able to take down those guys all on his own if this happened a few years ago. The fall he took did him in.

He jokes about it sometimes because he always thought racing his cars too fast would be the thing to take him down. But he fell off the roof while fixing it in the snow and almost broke his back.

“Dad, answer me.” I tighten my fists. “Anton, of all the people?”

Dad reaches for his cane, but his hand drops back to the ground. I walk over to him and crouch when he slumps back into the wall in defeat.

“Dad.”

“I’m so sorry, baby girl.” His Louisiana accent sounds stronger with his heartfelt words. “It wasn’t me. It was Johhny. He crossed the line. He said he borrowed the money from a friend. Then I found out the friend was Anton.”

“Damn Johnny.” How could he do this knowing what Anton put me through?

Why am I even bothering to ask myself that? This is Johnny all over.

“You shouldn’t have had to pay anything back.”

“They would have killed you.”

He bites the inside of his lip and doesn’t argue because he knows I’m right.

“What happened, Dad? What’s going on?”

“Your brother…” he mutters. “Johnny wanted the money to build our own racetrack. He said we could become business partners. But he lied to me about Anton. I was none the wiser because all the paperwork was done through a loan company. When I found out the company was Anton’s and confronted Johnny, he said he thought Anton would lend us the money because of you. He also lied about what was being spent. There is no racetrack.”

Shit. I’m sure Anton was banking on this mess and them not being able to pay back. He knew what my brother was like because I told him. And Anton is such a sicko I have no doubt he thought of using this situation to lure me back to him. “Is Anton back in Denver?”

“Not yet.” He coughs. “But he will be. Soon. The Feds are closing the investigation on him. They couldn’t find anything to take him down. He’s wrapping up business in Russia then he’ll be back here. That could happen tonight, tomorrow, next week, next month. I don’t know.”

The knots in my stomach stretch and tighten. “We have to find a way to fix this. Johnny has to fix?—”

“Johnny skipped town.”

My mouth falls open and the words dry up in my mind. “What do you mean, skipped town?”

“I’ve been looking for him for the last two days. He’s not answering his phone, his apartment is cleaned out, and none of his friends have seen him since last week.”

My mind struggles to process the reality of what he’s saying to me, and my words jumble like pieces of a puzzle that can’t be fit together. “Dad…”

“I really thought he was going to set the business up, but he lost all the money.”

“ All of it ?”

“Every last cent. He got in trouble. More trouble, and he gambled, then lost it all.” Dad coughs. “Anton can make good on his threat because I put up everything I own as collateral.”

“Dad, no.” My stomach plumets.

“Sorry, baby girl. I did. The house and the mechanic shop. Everything.”

“The shop is your livelihood.”

He brings a hand to his head. “I never thought this would happen.”

“Dad, it’s Johnny.”

“I know, but I hoped this would be different. It was my dream to buy a racetrack and train drivers. I never intended to end up fixing cars.”

Again, I feel sorry for him and guilty. Dad gave up competitive racing when Mom left.

My grandmother helped when she could before she died but she was sick. So there was no one else to look after us. When Johnny was old enough to babysit me, he was unreliable as hell. Like he is now.

Dad tried to get back into racing after I left for college, but then the accident happened. It was like his dream was never meant to take off.

“Johnny said he’d have the ten grand by today.” He presses his hand into his lap. “He fucking lied to me and left me to deal with the fallout. Now I have to find the balance.”

Johnny’s screw-ups are nothing new, but this is a whole new level of recklessness. And knowing Anton the way I do, he won’t be satisfied with taking the house and shop. If it were that simple, he would have done that already. He wouldn’t have sent his men here tonight.

“How, Dad? How are you going to get the balance?”

I didn’t think it was possible for him to look any more worried than he was, but he proves me wrong. “Don’t worry about it, sweetheart. You should get to bed. It’s late.”

“Dad, are you kidding me?” A tear tips over my lid, and I shake my head at him. “You can’t dismiss me like that. You don’t know Anton like I do. His men will come back. And next time, they won’t just take the house and shop and beat you. They’ll kill you.” Then they’ll take me, too. And I’ll die if I go back to Anton.

He grits his teeth and balls his hand into a tight fist. “Not if I can help it.”

“Tell me what you’re going to do, Dad. Tell me right now .”

“No.”

Damn it. He’s so stubborn. “You have to tell me. I deserve to know. Keeping it from me would be incredibly unfair. I’ve come home after midnight to find some guy holding you at gunpoint, kicking the shit out of you, then I had to hand over the ten thousand dollars I was saving to get my life together.”

Dad sighs and shakes his head. “I’m so ashamed of myself. You shouldn’t have had to pay that money. I know how hard you worked to save it.”

“Then tell me what you’re planning, Dad.”

He thinks for a moment then nods slowly. Another few seconds pass before his lips part and he sighs again in that habitual way when he’s gearing up to tell me bad news. The first clear memory I have of him doing so was when he told me Mom wasn’t coming back to us.

“Johnny got a job in New York.” His voice is low and careful, his eyes filled with trepidation. “It’s one of those underground jobs. I’m going to do it. I have to be there tomorrow.”

God, I already hate the sound of this. “What kind of job, Dad?”

“To steal a chip from a vault in a hotel room.”

“ Steal ?” I bolt to my feet. “You’re going to steal a chip in a vault.”

“The pay is four hundred thousand.”

This sounds like some crazy mad shit from a heist movie. “Dad, that is completely insane. That’s your answer? If this is real, anyone who’s willing to pay you that kind of money is dangerous. Not to mention whoever that chip belongs to.”

“I know.” Dad sighs wearily. “But I don’t know what else to do, and I don’t have any other choices. You know things are bad. They’ve been bad since my accident. I was barely managing before, but at least I had a steady income.”

“So, what are you going to do? You’re seriously going to steal this chip? You with your bad leg and bad back?” He can’t even move now.

“I have to try. I don’t want to be gunned down in my own home.”

The horrific image forces the bile in my stomach to rise into my throat and burn. “Dad… this is a nightmare.”

“I should never have listened to Johnny. I just never thought my own son would do this to me.” His hands tremble. “I’ve run out of options, Scarlett. We have until Monday. That’s four days. If I don’t do this job, there is no other solution.”

My heart squeezes and grief pulls me under as I stare at my father and take in the distress and defeat on his face.

Dad can’t do that job. That could get him killed, too.

My mind races, trying to find answers, but what I come up with is worse than ever.

“Who hired Johnny for the job?” I don’t even know why I’m asking. That part is irrelevant, and maybe it’s best I don’t know.

“It’s an unknown name for security purposes.”

Of course, it is . “Who does the chip belong to?”

“Micah Delarosa. An underboss in the Italian mafia.”

My eyes widen. This all just keeps getting worse and worse by the minute. “Italian mafia, Dad?”

“It’s an in-and-out job. I’ve been assured that no one will know I was ever there. I’ll leave for New York tomorrow morning, and I’ll be back here in two days. Once I have the chip, we get paid.”

“I’ll do it.” The words tumble out of my mouth, confirming I’ve gone crazy. Dad’s face twists with fury. “Scarlett, no. Absolutely not.”

I clench my fists. “Dad, you seriously think you can do it? Be in and out without anyone knowing you were ever there?”

“I will do it. I—” He tries to stand by pushing against the wall and instantly falls back to the ground, shouting in pain as he grabs his bad leg.

“Dad!” I back at his side, holding his arm.

“Fuck, that bastard hurt my bad leg.”

“How bad is it?”

“It feels… broken.”

We stare at each other for a long moment, a silent conversation playing through the space between us.

“I’ll go to New York. It’s an in-and-out job. Right?” I try to sound like it’ll be as easy as walking through the park.

“Scarlett.” Dad touches my face. “No.”

“I’ll be okay.”

“Scarlett...”

“I’m going, Dad. You know you can’t.”

He doesn’t argue. The decision is made.

I’m going.

So much for positive thinking and getting my life back on track.

At least I tried.