Victorious Vice (Bellamy Brothers #6)

9. Raven

9

RAVEN

“ W hat is it?” Jared asks.

I gulp and show him my phone.

He wrinkles his forehead. “This is your actual phone. Not the burner.”

I nod, swallowing—or attempting to swallow—the lump in my throat.

He strokes his chin. “So the text saying you were in danger came in on the burner. But this one…”

“Came to my phone.” My heart is racing as I say the words. “From someone who knows my number.”

“A cell phone number is easy enough to get,” he says. “Which means…”

“Whoever is communicating with me on the burner is…not an enemy?”

He frowns. “I’m not ready to say that, but it appears they’re trying to warn you.”

“Warn me?” I echo, my mind whirling. “About what exactly?”

“I don’t know. About Gallo, maybe.”

“Vinnie?” I shake my head. “He’s gone. He dumped me. He was very clear. He’s probably somewhere in South America by now.”

Jared takes a deep breath.

I wait for him to speak.

He doesn’t.

“This isn’t fair,” I gulp. “Do they know what they’re doing to me? I just survived cancer. I’m in the middle of doing some work of my heart to help others.” I feel emotion coming up my throat, but I do my best to swallow it down. My voice cracks a little as I continue. “Do they have any idea what a death threat will do to a person who’s already faced death once? I’m frightened, Jared.”

“I know. I know.” He lays his hands gently on my shoulders. “No harm will come to you as long as I’m here. I was hired to protect you.”

My heart hammers and a shiver runs down my spine. “Should we report this? To the police or someone?”

Jared looks at me gravely and shakes his head. “Not yet. We don’t know who we’re dealing with or what their game is. If we go to the police now, we could scare them off.”

I stare at the words on my phone’s screen. “But we can’t just ignore this.”

“No,” he agrees. “We definitely can’t ignore it. I’ll see if the number can be traced, but it probably can’t be. My guess is it’s coming from a burner phone.”

I groan. “Of course it is.”

“In the meantime, let’s get you home. Your place is secure.”

“Are you sure?”

He nods. “You’ve got the best system in place, but when we get back, I’ll call your brother and Phoenix. See if they want you to go somewhere else for the time being.”

I bite my lip. “Where else would I go?”

“There is a place. We’ll see if they think you should go there.”

A place? What is he talking about?

I close my eyes and rub at my forehead. “I can’t just disappear, Jared. I’m starting a nonprofit. I’ve got a gala to go to in a couple of weeks. I just can’t…” I clench my hands into fists. “Damn it! Damn all of them! How dare they? I won’t let this happen to me. I need to live my life. I can’t let them force me into hiding.”

“I understand. I really do. We don’t know yet who we’re dealing with. It could be related to Gallo and his family.”

“Why would it be? He and I aren’t together.” I choke back a sob.

Jared opens the car door for me and I slip inside. He moves into the driver seat and starts the engine. It’s a long drive home to Summer Creek.

I was so excited about the meeting with Emily. About getting a board together, about the new anonymous donation, about the gala.

Then one stupid text.

And my mood is shifted.

This kind of mood I never wanted to be in again.

So damn it, I won’t be.

I have to face it all.

Jared gets on the phone quickly as he drives. He’s talking to Leif. And after a while, it sounds like they’ve got Falcon on the line as well. All I hear is Jared’s yeses and nos. I could tell him to put it on speaker, but frankly I don’t want to deal with that.

I’ll let them make the decisions. They know more about security than I do.

But they’re not going to hole me up in some hideaway. They can’t. I won’t allow it.

The conversation seems to drone on forever. Again I try to read the book on my iPad. It doesn’t work.

It’s near seven p.m. by the time we get back to my house. Jared is probably starving. Normally I would be too.

“Don’t you want to eat?” Jared asks once we’re back in the house.

“I’m not hungry.”

He narrows his eyes. “You have to eat, Raven. You’re still?—”

“Recovering.” I cross my arms. “Yes, don’t I know it. I kicked cancer’s ass, and now someone wants to kick mine in return. What the hell do they think they’re doing?”

Even the raven can’t fly forever. Sooner or later, it comes home to die.

Then I gasp.

I’m home .

This is my home.

Maybe I should leave.

But no. I clench my fists again. They are not going to kick me out of my home. I don’t even know who “they” are.

“So are you going to tell me?” I ask Jared.

“About what?”

“Your talk with Leif. And my brother. It sounded like you got him on the line.”

“Yes, we did. Falcon wants you at the safe house.”

“A safe house?” I put my hands on my hips. “I’m not going.”

“Raven…”

“Look, I have a state-of-the-art system here, as you know. I have you here. I also have a trust fund, so if you want, hire five of your biggest, toughest friends. All armed. You can stay in my fucking living room.” I plunk myself down on the living room couch. “But I will not leave my home. I won’t stop working on the nonprofit.”

“You can still work on the nonprofit from the safe house.”

“Not hands-on. I can’t meet with people, and I can’t?—”

“Listen,” he says, interrupting me. “My job is to keep you safe. And until we know who sent this text and what exactly it means, you’ll be the safest locked away in a location that no one knows about.”

I cock my head. “What are you even talking about?”

“I’ll let your brother explain.”

“Fine. I’ll give him a call.”

“You don’t have to. He should be here any minute now.”

I sigh.

Just then, the doorbell rings.

I start to walk toward it but Jared gestures me to stop. “You don’t answer the door anymore, Raven.”

I look back at him, raising an eyebrow. “It’s my brother.”

“Yes, it is.” He quickly walks ahead of me, holding a hand to keep me in place. “But you need to get used to not answering the door. I’m here, and I’ll answer it.”

He walks to the door, opens it, and my brother walks in.

Falcon’s dark hair is mussed as usual, and he’s wearing jeans and a T-shirt.

I run into his arms. “Falcon, what’s going on?”

He strokes my peach-fuzz head. “We’re trying to figure it out, Ray.”

I look up at him, wiping a tear from my cheek. “It can’t have anything to do with Vinnie. He’s gone.”

“He is, but it’s no secret how he feels about you or how you feel about him.”

“So you think someone’s using me.”

“That’s my best guess. Someone is using you to get to him.”

I break from my brother’s embrace and walk a few steps away from him. “But he’s out of the country. They can’t lure me somewhere and then expect him to come rescue me. He’s not here.”

“They may not know that, Ray.”

“Oh for the love of God, Falcon.” I turn around and face my brother. “These are mobsters. They know everything.”

Falcon doesn’t respond.

No doubt because he knows I’m right.

“Listen,” he says. “When I went to prison, I had Hawk build a safe house. Savannah and I stayed there for a while after I rescued her from Miles McAllister. Vinnie’s been there too.”

“He has?”

“Yes. We brought him there when he first came back into this country.” He grabs my hand, squeezes it. “I know you love him, Raven. And I know he loves you too. I believe he’s a good man, but he had to make a choice. I believe his choice was a good one. If he’s going to bring down his family, his hands are going to get very dirty. Neither he nor I want you anywhere near that.”

“Yes, I know. You both think you can make my decisions for me.” I roll my eyes. “Poor little Raven with her bald head. Poor little Raven who needed her big brother’s bone marrow. Poor little Raven who can’t take care of herself.”

“Christ, Raven,” Falcon says. “You know that isn’t what we think.”

I poke him in the chest. “I’m not so sure about that anymore.”

He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “Let me see the text.”

“No.”

He opens his eyes and glares at me. “Let me see it, Ray.”

“Jared already told you what it says.”

“I know that. And he already gave me the number, and we’re working on tracing it. But I need to see it. I need to see the words.”

“Why?”

He clenches his hands into fists. “Because I’m already mad as a rabid dog, and I need to use my anger. Seeing that text might just give me the extra anger I need to see this motherfucker taken down.”

I walk up to him, run my hands up and down his arms. “Falcon, you’re happy now. You’re out of prison, and you’re with the woman you love. You’re going to be married. Don’t you want to live your life? Just live your life?”

“Of course I do.”

“So do I. Can’t we just?—”

“No, we can’t,” he says. “You’re my sister and I love you. I will protect you no matter what.”

I sigh, take my phone out of my purse, pull up the text, and hand it to Falcon.

His neck and cheeks turn red as he reads it.

Yes, there’s the anger. This is the Falcon who got through prison. The one who ruled his cell block.

He did what he had to do. He got more years tacked onto his sentence because he attacked a man with a shiv. He did it to save his own life, of course. But the shiv was contraband. He shouldn’t have had it in the first place.

He hands my phone back. “You can continue to use this phone, but not to talk about any of this. Use the burner for that.”

“I don’t even know who gave me the burner.”

He frowns. “That’s true. We’ll get you another one.”

“How many phones am I supposed to keep track of?”

He lets out a deep breath. “As many as it takes, Ray.”

I sigh, shove my phone back in my purse. “I suppose Jared already told you about this text.” I hand him the burner.

“He did.”

“So who is texting this burner, anyway? That guy who hijacked my Uber?”

“We’re still looking into that,” Falcon says. “But whoever is doing that doesn’t seem to mean you any harm.”

“They told me I was in danger, and then a couple hours later I got that horrible text.”

“Yeah.” Falcon rakes his fingers through his hair. “Leif, Jared, and I are going to figure this out, Raven.”

“I can help.”

“No. You stay safe. I’m going to get you to the safe house.”

I stomp my foot on the ground. “Damn it, Falcon. How can I get this nonprofit off the ground if I’m not around?”

“Savannah’s going to help. And Robin. I’ve already talked to both of them.”

I blink. “You dragged your fiancée and our sister into this?”

“They’re not the ones in danger. You are, Raven. And they don’t want any harm to come to you any more than I do.”

I let out an exasperated huff. “So that’s it then. I can’t stay in my own home, which, by the way, has the best security system in the world.”

“No, Raven. You can’t.”

“What if I refuse to go?”

“Then I’ll pick you up, toss you over my shoulder, and take you there myself.”

“Oh, yeah, Falcon Bellamy.” I cross my arms. “Big man. Likes to push women around.”

I regret the words as soon as I say them. My brother’s not like that. He’s never been like that. But he does take his big-brother responsibilities a little far sometimes. Not so much with Robin and me, but definitely with Hawk and Eagle.

“Fine,” I relent. “But I just met with an awesome attorney. She really understands my vision.”

“Savannah and Robin understand your vision. They’ll take care of all of this, get the gala ready.”

“You are not keeping me from the gala,” I say.

“I don’t want to,” he says.

“You’re not going to.” I grab Falcon’s hands. “I will go to your safe house. I will lie low. I will do what I can from there, and let Savannah and Robin do the legwork. But I will be at that gala, Falcon. I will be there. And you will be there. Our parents will be there. Robin and the rest of our family will be there. I want everyone there. I don’t care how much security we have to have. But I will be at that gala .”