Chapter Thirty-four – Can’t Hide Light
Chapter Thirty-four
Sadie
CAN’T HIDE LIGHT
Performed by Max McNown
The gun that pointed in my face had every ounce of breath leaving my body. Ugly memories rooted my feet to the ground as I stared at the woman and the weapon she pointed at me.
As my mouth went dry and my palms turned sweaty, I stared numbly at her dark-brown hair that had been colored a deep burgundy and cut into an extra-short pixie. Her tall, muscular frame was clad in a red tank, black leather pants, and low-heeled, knee-high boots.
I might have mistaken her for any of the shop owners on Main Street if I hadn’t seen the look in her eyes. Rage and hate burned in them. A willingness to pull that trigger and end my life along with the life of the teen in my charge.
Goosebumps broke out over my body. I’d seen that look before. I’d seen it at the same time I’d faced another loaded weapon.
My throat tried to close, and blood rushed through my ears.
A millisecond too late, I tried to shove the door closed, but Theresa easily blocked it with a booted foot.
My first instinct was to scream at Fallon to run, to get the hell out via the front door, but I bit my tongue, hoping Theresa hadn’t seen us come in together.
“Why are you here? What do you want?” I forced myself to ask, hoping I sounded sure and unmoved rather than panicked and afraid.
“To start with, we’ll take the diamonds. And then we’ll see what else we can do to you that will torture Rafe Asshole Marquess when he finds you and knows he’s the reason it happened.”
“Hey, Sadie, is that an actual jukebox…” Fallon’s voice drained away as she stepped into the hallway, and Theresa’s gun shifted in her direction.
“Don’t hurt her!” I cried out, leaping between them. “Please, there’s no need. I’ll give you the jewelry. We just have to wait for the bank to open,” I told her, my voice shaking with the effort to stay calm.
“Nice try,” a dark voice from behind Theresa said. Adam emerged from the sunlight outside into the darkened hallway. He had a baseball hat tucked over his hair that he’d bleached a hideous white, and he wore a fake mustache that was equally bad. “Too bad you already told me you kept them in the safe here at the bar.”
He shut and locked the door behind him.
Sweat trailed down my back, and my lungs forgot to breathe as my brain screamed at me to move. To do something. Anything. But just like that day with Chainsaw, my feet felt like lead weights.
“Grab my niece,” Adam told Theresa.
As she started past me, my body finally obeyed my mind’s desperate plea, and I stuck out a foot, trying to trip her. She righted herself, and Adam lunged at me, swinging his fist. It collided with my cheek, and stars burst behind my eyes. I went reeling toward the wall, barely sticking my hands out to keep myself from slamming headfirst into it.
Fallon’s flight instincts finally took over, and she turned to run, but Theresa was faster. She grabbed her by her braids and yanked Fallon backward, shoving the gun into her temple with a thud I could hear across the hall.
Adrenaline and fear mixed as dark memories tried to resurface and shut me down further.
I saw it all again. Chainsaw pointing his gun at me and then at Mila as an utter sense of uselessness sank into my veins, every molecule turning into solid rock until I could do nothing. I hadn’t been able to keep my niece safe.
I fought back those frantic, hopeless thoughts and forced air into my lungs. “Please stop. Don’t hurt her.”
Adam stepped up behind me, twisting my arm so painfully I had to bite my lip to stop from crying out in agony. What had Gia said I should do when a larger opponent had me like this? Why couldn’t I think of the answer? Why couldn’t I react?
Theresa’s eyes glinted as she watched the agony cross my face. She had Fallon in a clawlike grip, but it was Adam’s hard words that made the fear inside me swell to a whole new level.
“You screwed everything up, Sadie. You. I had everything under control until you sent that damn letter about the diamonds. Then, Spence started asking questions, hoping and digging into things he’d let rest his entire life. I was forced to speed up the movement of my money, and it raised his goddamn alarms. You started us on this downward spiral. And then you had to drag Rafe into it, whoring and stealing from us and the Puzos, just like your great-grandmother. But we can end all of it today. Right every damn sin. Every damn curse.”
Damn it, I had to do something. I had to move. I had to slap back before I lived through the same horror of what had happened three years ago with Mila. I’d be shot. Worse, Fallon might be shot.
Nausea rolled.
God… God… Think, Sadie, think.
As Adam shoved me toward the office, my gaze landed on the camera in the upper corner of the hall, and a brief, temporary sense of relief washed over me. The bar’s outside cameras were tied to the same systems as the ones at the ranch. Someone would have seen Theresa and her gun. They’d have seen her with a man and known it was Adam, even if he’d tried to disguise himself.
I just had to give us time for the cavalry to arrive. For my brothers to show up.
I sounded as breathless and scared as I felt, voice wavering as I told them, “I don’t have the jewelry here anymore. I moved it after I came back from California. You’ll have to wait until the bank opens.”
Adam’s voice was dark and ominous when he said, “Liar. We can add liar to your list of sins.”
I shook my head, and he hit me again, this time open-handed in a way that would leave the shape of his palm on my cheek and had me biting my tongue. My head spun. Spots drifted across my vision, and my stomach flipped once more. But I dug my nails into my palm, forcing myself not to pass out. I wouldn’t lose consciousness again. Not like last time.
“I’m not lying,” I insisted, the bitter taste of blood in my mouth.
“We’ll see soon enough, won’t we? Open the bar safe, and we’ll go from there.”
They hauled us both into the office. Fallon cried out as Theresa jerked her arm back farther behind her and forced her toward the desk. Every protective instinct in me screamed.
“Stop. You don’t need to hurt her,” I said shakily. “You can have the jewels. You just have to wait for the bank to open.”
Theresa just laughed, yanking harder on Fallon’s arm, and the fear turned to rage inside me. At Theresa. At Adam. At myself. I had to do something to stop this. To save Rafe’s daughter. I’d promised him. And I’d promised myself I’d never let someone I loved be hurt while I simply watched ever again.
Adam thrust me farther into the room with so much force I ended up on my hands and knees. My entire body quaked. When I tried to stand back up, he kicked me in the stomach, and I landed on my ass as pain ratcheted through me.
“Please, Uncle A-Adam. Don’t hurt her,” Fallon begged, and I whipped my head around to see she was crying. Slow, scared tears she fought but couldn’t be stemmed. More hatred welled at them for making her experience this and the nightmares it would leave behind, even if she got out of it somehow whole. “Why are you even doing this?”
He didn’t answer her. He was having a hard time even looking at her, and I thought I might be able to use that. Maybe he actually did care about her. How could anyone have watched her strength and resilience for years and not? I’d known her a little over a week and was stunned by her bravery and courage.
Theresa was the one who filled in Adam’s silence. “It’s simple revenge. It’s been a long time coming for the Hurly family, in my opinion. I, on the other hand… At least I attempted to avenge my brother after your dad turned him in to the feds. He’d be dead if that asshole Steele hadn’t intervened. But I have plenty of time to get him back too. After we take the jewels, after we deal with the two of you, I’ll make my way down the list, one by one.”
An uncontrollable fury built inside me as they talked. I absolutely would not let them hurt Fallon. Not another hair on her head. And I wouldn’t let them hurt Rafe again either. Or Jim Steele or any of the good people who’d held the man I loved up at his lowest moments.
“Look,” I said quietly, “you want the jewels? You can have them. I just want you to let Fallon go. Let her walk out this door right now, and I’ll call the bank manager and have him open early.”
Adam snorted. “And give her a chance to call Daddy and have him send one of his men to save the day? Not going to happen.”
The one thing Adam didn’t know, hadn’t planned on, was that the Hatley family would come running way before Fallon had a chance to call anyone.
As if he’d read my mind, Adam looked down at me with a smug grin. “And don’t think your gun-toting family is going to come either. Theresa turned off the cameras here at the bar as soon as we saw you arrive.”
“You were across the street.” It wasn’t a question. The fact I hadn’t trusted Fallon’s instincts or mine only caused the nausea to return. Goddamn, I’d let them come this close when I could have taken her and run. We could have gone to the sheriff’s station. To my brother and Gia. Anywhere but stay here, when our intuition had been warning us to bolt.
“After we have the diamonds, I’ll never stay in a shithole like that again,” Theresa said.
“If you hadn’t spent the money I’d saved offshore, we wouldn’t need the goddamn jewels,” Adam growled. “And if we decided we wanted them, we could have hired someone to retrieve them.”
“I had to protect my brother while he was in jail! And what kind of man sends someone else to get his revenge, anyway? I’ll get great pleasure out of drawing blood for every sin against my family,” she snarled. “More and more, I find myself thinking you aren’t anywhere near the man I thought you were. Maybe that was why you needed my help finishing off Spencer, and why you missed when you shot at Rafe.”
The derision in her voice had Adam’s spine stiffening.
“Fuck you!” Adam growled, kicking the chair in front of the desk and sending it flying against the wall. “I told you! We’re cursed! We’ve been cursed from the moment Great-grandpa Tommy hung himself instead of taking back what was his!”
Fallon’s gaze met mine. Her cheeks were still wet from tears, but her look turned steely and grim at hearing the careless way Theresa had talked about ending Spencer’s life. Anger flooded her face, replacing the fear.
I needed to hold on to the anger spinning through me as well. I needed it to fuel me. I needed it to shove aside the dread and regret and the terror blooming at the thought of never seeing my family again. Never seeing Rafe. He’d never forgive me for costing him the one thing in his life he held precious.
“The only way to end a curse that deep is to spill the blood of those who took what was yours,” Theresa said, pointing the gun at Fallon’s head again. “Let’s start here.”
My heart stopped, and it was with a harsh, croaked voice that I threw out, “You’re forgetting Fallon is a Hurly too.”
“And maybe she could have been saved. Maybe if her mother hadn’t spread her legs for both the Harrington brothers, she would have been worth something, but instead, she gave herself to the enemy. And this little piece of trash chose the wrong side when she went running to Daddy to tattle on Adam.”
“Shut the hell up, Theresa!” Adam growled.
“You don’t get to tell me what to do. I don’t put up with any of that macho, He-Man shit,” Theresa said, turning to me with a smirk. “That’s why your great-grandma took off, you know.”
It took me several seconds to realize Theresa had switched gears and was talking about Carolyn. “She didn’t want to marry the man her daddy had picked out for her. Didn’t want any part of the family business. So she hightailed it out of Hollywood, taking the jewelry she’d helped steal with her. She walked away from her inheritance because she was too afraid they’d drag her home by her hair and force her to marry the pig they had all but lined up at the altar, waiting for her. Her inheritance is why Lorenzo has been foaming at the mouth since you walked into Vegas, asking about her. He’s afraid you’ll take him to court and get her piece of the pie.”
I couldn’t help the shock that sprang from her revelation. I’d put myself and my family in the bull’s-eye because they didn’t understand we’d never want a piece of anything they had. They didn’t know what it meant to be part of a family that had more honor in our little pinkies than they did in their entire beings. “We’d never take it. We wouldn’t touch a cent of Puzo money.”
She laughed coldly. “Go right ahead and tell yourself that, sweetheart. But I bet you’d do just about anything to save the family ranch. This bar…” She waved her hand around the room and then landed the gun on Fallon’s temple once more. “I bet you’d do anything to save her.”
“Get your hands off her!” I shoved myself to my feet and stepped forward, but Adam caught me, twisting my wrist and making my eyes water.
“Open the safe,” he said, voice dark and threatening. “Give me the diamonds, and we’ll leave Fallon alone.”
“Don’t you dare speak for me,” Theresa spat out.
He glanced over to where Theresa had shoved Fallon into the chair behind the desk.
I scanned the office, cataloging the contents, wondering what the hell I could use as a weapon, wishing once again I had a goddamn gun. Instead, I had a pocket knife that was miles away in a desk drawer and knives in the kitchen that might as well be as far away as the ranch. My gaze landed on the screwdriver sitting on the desk that I’d used to fix the roller wheel on the desk chair.
“The diamonds can’t get my brother out of jail, but maybe I’ll take a piece of Rafe’s daughter for every year my brother was sentenced to serve.” Theresa cocked the gun that was pressed into Fallon’s temple, and my breath evaporated.
My gaze caught Fallon’s, and I shot a glance to the screwdriver sitting on the edge of the desk in front of her. She looked down and saw it before her gaze flew to Adam as he squeezed my wrist until I gasped with pain.
“Stop procrastinating, Sadie, and open the goddamn safe.” A part of me thought maybe he was rushing me in order to stop his partner from hurting Fallon.
I nodded just as a shuffle drew our attention back to the desk. Fallon had misunderstood me, and she’d gone for my phone sitting next to my bag. Theresa smacked her with the butt of the gun, and it sent the rolling chair into the wall. Fallon cried out, and my hands fisted.
The bile in my stomach ate up my esophagus, making my voice crack as I said, “I need the rolling alarm code as well as my fingerprint to open the safe. The number is in my text messages.”
Adam stalked over to my phone and came back to me, shoving it into my face to unlock it. He swiped through the messages, found the text with the passcode, and then pocketed it before drawing out a small gun. It took me several seconds to recognize it as the Liliput I’d had back at the ranch. More chills ran up my spine as I realized he had to have been there after I’d left it behind on Sunday.
Adam saw my gaze fixated on the weapon, and he laughed, dark and scathing. “Rafe doesn’t know his childhood home as well as I do. Everyone was scrambling, looking for us in the hills and down in Mexico, when we were right there inside the house the entire time.”
“You know about the secret passages!” Fallon blurted.
My mind blanked. God…he’d been at the ranch this whole time? There were secret passages there that Fallon had known about? He could have done anything to Rafe and Lauren! Jesus. Were they even okay? When was the last time Fallon had talked to them? I couldn’t pull the answer, and it made my legs wobble and my heart scream.
“You weren’t in Mexico,” I said, shaking my head.
“Easy enough to pay someone to take some cash out for you. Now quit stalling,” Adam said, pointing his gun at me. “Open the safe.”
I forced my feet to move, and I’d just opened the outer door of the cabinet where the safe was hidden when he closed the distance between us. He shoved the gun into my neck, pressed himself into me so I felt him everywhere, and whispered in my ear, “Don’t try to outsmart me, Sadie. Theresa was wrong about one thing. Hurlys know how to get vengeance. We just don’t splash it around like the Puzos. Tommy got a piece of it from Beatrice, Lauren got her hands on the ranch, and I’ll savor what I get from you. Theresa has been a tool, and her usefulness has drawn to a close. Give me the jewels, I’ll leave Fallon here unharmed, and you and I can take a ride.”
I fought the tremor of disgust that wound through me.
“What the fuck are you two whispering about?” Theresa demanded, whirling her gun away from Fallon and taking a step toward us.
From the corner of my eye, I saw Fallon’s hand snake the screwdriver from the desk while Theresa was turned away. The smart girl had used the phone as a distraction in order to give her time to get the tool. Now, I just had to be as smart and brave as she was—as my little, tiny niece had once been.
“Just a promise,” Adam told Theresa, catching my eye. “A promise of payback.”
I placed my finger on the safe’s scanner, and Adam leaned over me to type in the code. When we heard the lock disengage, he shoved me aside.
My heart pounded against my rib cage with a bruising viciousness as I slowly eased away from him, trying to get closer to Fallon and the desk.
“Stop moving!” Theresa groused, pointing the gun at me as she asked, “Are they there?”
He pulled out the velvet bag with the jewelry in it, smiling large and wide when he looked inside and saw the jewelry. He draped the string around his wrist as he shot me a look of hateful promise. “You know what happens to liars, Sadie? Extra punishment.”
He turned back to the safe and grabbed the deposit bag I’d shoved in there last night when I’d been too tired to drop it at the bank. With most people using a card nowadays, I didn’t have to make the run so often, but it had built up while I’d been gone, and the bag was full.
“Looks like Sadie has given us an extra present.” He flung the bag at Theresa. As she lifted a hand to catch it, the other one with the gun drifted downward, and Adam used the distraction to shoot her in the chest with the Liliput.
A deep mahogany spread across the vivid red of her tank. Shock stretched over her face, followed by rage. The money bag fell to the floor, the pistol in her hand lowered, and Fallon stabbed her arm with the screwdriver. Theresa screamed in fury, but the gun tumbled to the floor. I lunged for it, but a second shot from Adam’s weapon had me freezing before I could reach it.
“Don’t anyone move another muscle,” he said in a deadly calm.
Theresa put her hands to her chest, trying to staunch the blood. Her voice was sharp and brittle with pain and anger as she stumbled toward Adam. “You shitbag, two-timing—”
She fell to her knees, eyes blazing, as she took two last gasping breaths and then landed on the floor at my feet.