Chapter 13
CHAPTER 13
Nathan
After escaping our run-in with law enforcement, Deacon and I caught the first flight back to Las Vegas. A few days later, I was sitting in my office at the Fantaisiste headquarters, staring out the window as my thoughts turned over and over.
I’d spent the last few days trying to figure out how Agent Belden managed to follow me to New York, and I didn’t like what I’d found.
I was no amateur. I knew how to cover my tracks. The plane tickets had been booked under an alias, paid for from an account I couldn’t be connected to. Plus, based on the timeframe and how quickly she’d shown up, she must have followed me to New York and rallied the local officers before I’d even committed a crime.
The only way to explain it was if she knew exactly what I had planned to do.
For the first time in a long while, I’d been put in a tough spot. On my own, I could have beaten the murder charges. I hadn’t left any evidence behind for them to prove my crimes.
No security camera footage. No eyewitness willing to come forth. There hadn’t even been any bodies left behind. My people had immediately disposed of them.
I was in no real danger, except for Deacon. He’d never faced a murder charge or a police interrogation before. If I’d been smarter, I would have coached him on what to say in an interrogation as soon as we left Caprice’s office, but I’d been... distracted. That small mistake had nearly cost me and put him in danger.
I couldn’t risk leaving Deacon in police custody longer than necessary, so I’d swallowed my pride and made a call I didn’t think I would ever have to make.
I’d asked my brother for help.
He’d come through. Within half an hour of calling him, I’d been released from custody with all charges dropped. The leader of the Chechen Mafia—at least as far as the rest of the world knew—could pull a lot of strings.
Unfortunately, that meant I was going to owe my brother, and while he wasn’t our family’s actual leader, he was smart enough to capitalize on every opportunity.
Calling him would come back around to bite me, and it hadn’t even solved the problem of Agent Belden. Just delayed her for a while. The satisfaction I felt seeing the fury on her face when I once again walked away scot-free was satisfying, but not enough to override the sense of foreboding building in my heart.
Yet, I couldn’t bring myself to regret it. Deacon had done a wonderful job keeping the officers at bay until I was able to return for him. If I had any doubts about his ability to stand beside me, they had been put to rest.
The sound of Deacon’s laughter drifted in from the door to the main studio where he was working. His friend had just been discharged from the hospital, so he was in particularly high spirits. If I didn’t know better, it would be impossible to tell that he had killed a man just a few days ago. However, since then, I’d caught him staring off into space several times with a tangle of different thoughts turning in his eyes.
The first kill was always the hardest.
I didn’t remember much from the first time I’d taken a life. It had happened so long ago. Every life I took afterward had gotten a little easier. Now, I didn’t even think about it, but the first one, had caused me many sleepless nights until I’d come to terms with that new part of myself.
It must be even harder for Deacon. I’d been raised in this life from birth and knew what to expect. For Deacon, it had come out of nowhere. One day he was an ordinary citizen, and the next, he’s embroiled in a criminal life.
His laughter came again, and I smiled.
As long as he kept laughing, then everything would be fine.
My phone beeped with an alert. Giving it a brief glance to confirm what it said, I left my office behind and stepped into the studio.
Kiki sat in a chair by the window, still paler than normal, but looking much better. On the floor at her feet, Deacon had spread several bolts of cloth around her like a textile rainbow. Some bolts were still whole, while others had been cut into indecipherable shapes. None of it looked like clothing, but I trusted that Deacon knew what he was doing.
After watching him for a moment, I was pulled away by a new arrival.
D’Angelo Bianchi stepped into the studio followed by his two familiar bodyguards as well as two people I didn’t recognize. The bodyguards took their places by the door, while the two unfamiliar individuals stayed at D’Angelo’s side.
Based on body language, I could already tell one of the unknown individuals was D’Angelo’s partner. Small and slender, with cheerful eyes and artfully tousled hair. There was a burn scar on the side of his face, but his hair was styled in a way that kept it hidden, and his eyes were so bright that the scar seemed inconsequential by comparison.
The second individual was more of a mystery. Sporting a dark goth look, they were the textbook definition of androgynous, and could not be easily categorized male or female.
“D’Angelo,” I greeted him. “Glad you could come on such short notice.”
Under typical circumstances, two people greeting each other would generally shake hands, but we both knew better than that. D’Angelo always had at least a couple hidden weapons up his sleeve. I eyed his watch, which I knew had been fitted with a complex mechanism that shot poisoned needles. While I was on better terms with him than most other Mafia leaders, that didn’t mean I was willing to trust him with my life.
D’Angelo also didn’t even try to make physical contact with me. “I heard you lost one of your designers. So, I brought you some help. Oliver here is a great artist, and Ashes designs their own line of jewelry. I know neither of them is a fashion designer, but they can definitely help you out.”
A replacement for the designer who’d been killed was the excuse we were using to explain his sudden trip to Las Vegas. I’d expected it to only be a cover and hadn’t realized he was going to actually bring people with him.
“Did you say we’ve got a new designer?” Deacon called from the other side of the room.
Like a broken jack-in-the box that didn’t bother waiting for the turn of a handle to pop up, Deacon stepped right into the center of our conversation and started asking Oliver and Ashes about their work.
I watched D’Angelo’s eyes grow wide in surprise and prepared to intervene if necessary. However, when Oliver and Ashes both responded to Deacon’s enthusiasm with equal energy, D’Angelo relaxed, so I did as well. The fond look in D’Angelo’s eyes for Oliver couldn’t have been more obvious. For his sake, I hoped this was a sign of trust in me. If he went around being this blatant in front of everyone, ally and enemy alike, he was going to put both himself and his lover in danger.
That was a lesson I needed to remember as well. In many ways I’d already been too obvious with Deacon, but I couldn’t bring myself to regret it.
Leaving the artists to their work, I brought D’Angelo into my office.
“I assume that man, Oliver, is yours?” I said as I took my formal seat behind my desk.
D’Angelo just smirked as he helped himself to the contents of my liquor cabinet.
“And I assume that charming ball of energy is yours.”
“A new prospect, but a promising one. However, that’s not what we’re here to talk about.”
With glass in hand, D’Angelo sat himself on the other side of my desk, poised with one leg casually crossed over the other. Although I’d only known Deacon for a short time, his obsession over fashion and design had already rubbed off on me and I couldn’t help but notice the quality of D’Angelo’s suit.
At first glance, it seemed to be made from Italian silk, which would be apropos for the leader of an Italian Mafia family. However, after closer inspection, it turned out his suit was actually made from Russian silk. When I’d been researching what to give Deacon as a present, I’d considered Russian silk, as it was the most sought-after type of silk in the world. In the end, I’d decided it wasn’t impressive enough and chosen the Vicuna fabric instead.
This train of thought led me back to my original problem. The poisoned vicuna fabric that had killed one of my designers and nearly killed Kiki. I was still trying to figure out how it was poisoned in the first place, which was why I had contacted D’Angelo.
“What do you know about pyrenic?”
Taking a sip from his drink, D’Angelo placed the glass on a small table by his chair. “Cutting right to the chase, I see. You know, when you called me, that wasn’t the question I expected you to ask. Caprice has always been a pain in my ass, but she rarely uses poisons. Such options were always too... bloodless for her.”
It was as I feared. Caprice must be working with someone else. It would explain why she chose such an uncharacteristic form of attack, but if her accomplice was the one who helped her get access to the Vicuna fabric I’d bought, then that meant...
D’Angelo obviously followed my train of thought, for he gave my fears a voice.
“You think there’s a rat within your own organization.”
With a slow, regretful gesture, I nodded. “It would explain a few things, though it opens a lot more problems. That’s why I need to know about pyrenic.”
In the room beyond the door, I could just barely hear Deacon speaking with the other artists D’Angelo had brought. Their voices were so carefree. Although the two rooms were next to each other, we may as well have been in separate universes.
D’Angelo leaned back in his chair, thinking for a moment. “Pyrenic isn’t a common poison. Very fast acting, but also hard to handle. Even getting just a little on your skin can have disastrous effects. Plus, it’s not naturally occurring. It must be manufactured in a lab, and there’s only a few places in the world capable of producing it.”
The Bianchi family specialized in drugs. In the past, their business had mainly focused on recreational drugs, but in recent years, they had branched out into medical drugs.
That would, of course, also include poisons.
I gave him a pointed look, which he immediately picked up on.
“Yes, two of the labs that produce pyrenic belong to my family,” D’Angelo admitted. “But whoever tried to poison you didn’t get it from us.”
I hadn’t actually thought D’Angelo was involved in the poisoning attempt, but it was good to hear it from the man’s mouth.
“I need a list of all the labs capable of producing this poison.”
D’Angelo didn’t say anything as he took a long sip of his drink.
The cheeky bastard.
If I hadn’t already expected such a response, I would have been annoyed.
“In exchange, I’ll owe you another favor.”
With a smug grin, D’Angelo set his drink back down, now almost completely empty. “Seeing as how you were doing me a favor in the first place, it feels like we’ve come full circle.”
“If it reveals a traitor among my people, I’ll consider this whole thing worthwhile.”
“Actually,” D’Angelo sat up quickly, his eyes glinting with a sudden idea. “I’m going to capitalize on that favor right now. Oliver’s friend who came with us. Ashes. I need you to hire them fulltime.”
“Sure,” I instantly agreed. “But why. That seems like a strange request. Is there something unusual about them?”
“They’re not involved with any criminal business, although they are aware of things. The problem is that they live in a run-down little shack of a workshop that isn’t nearly safe enough for Oliver to spend time in. But I don’t want to separate him from his friend. If you hire Ashes for me, then I know Oliver’s friend is in a safe place and I won’t have to worry about him every time he wants to visit.”
I didn’t want to admit it, but for a moment, jealousy pricked at me like an acupuncturist’s needle, painful but also therapeutic.
D’Angelo obviously cared deeply for Oliver. So much so, he was willing to call in a favor just to secure his lover’s friend. I realized I wanted that kind of relationship with Deacon. The two of us had great sexual chemistry, and I definitely liked him. It even seemed like he would be a good fit with the less “clean” aspects of my life.
But would I be willing to sacrifice for him?
Or even sacrifice for his friend just because it would make him happy?
That, I couldn’t say for sure.
Once D’Angelo and I were in agreement, we went back to the studio where our little group of artists were working. They’d also been busy. Cloth was everywhere, and they were gathered around a table spread with dozens of drawings.
Neither D’Angelo nor I had the heart to interrupt their creative fervor, and just stood to the side watching them.
If there really was a traitor within my own organization, things were likely going to get worse before they got better. An insider could do a lot more damage than most enemies.
They might also know how important Deacon was becoming to me. I may as well have painted a target on his back.
I’d do what I could to keep him safe, but even I couldn’t be everywhere at once.
I needed to make sure Deacon knew how to defend himself.