Chapter 24
Graham wasn’t a fan of confined spaces. And the damn tunnel dug down beneath the Chicago River always seemed to close in on him when he set foot inside it.
Too much weight pressed against the walls. Not enough sky showed above his head.
A tomb.
The hairs on his neck rose, but he refused to shudder. Instead, he kept his stare hard and mean and locked on the woman tied to the metal chair.
He might not be a fan of confined spaces. But he absolutely hated interrogation.
The entire process was antithetical to anyone who valued their humanity.
It took all that was good and sacred inside a man and stomped on it, leaving him wondering if what he’d pulled out of his interrogee’s mouth was worth the pieces of himself he’d lost in the process.
He’d only done it once before. Back in Syria. Back when he’d been a wet-behind-the-ears baby SEAL. Cocksure and cavalier. Still convinced his trident pin made him ten feet tall and bombproof.
His prisoner had been some mid-level terrorist with info Graham’s unit needed yesterday. And Graham…well…he’d followed orders. Played the hard-ass just like he’d been trained to do.
He’d gotten the intel.
But he still sometimes saw that man’s eyes at night. That broken look. That hollowness that said that prisoner’s soul had fallen through the cracks in his flesh while Graham had used his fists on him and…whatever else it took.
The thought of having to do the same to this woman, this…Black Widow, or Vivian Drake, or whatever she wanted to call herself, made his stomach heave until he regretted that fourth cream Danish. And the three that had preceded it.
Eight hours in the Bat Cave had left the blonde’s hair limp and clinging to her face. There was a smudge of dirt on her jaw. And, despite the coolness of the cavern, sweat dotted her brow.
But her chin was up like a queen sitting on her throne. And he’d swear her nostrils flared like she was breathing in hellfire.
Not that he was surprised by her bravado.
Ozzie had used his hacker magic to conjure up the intel on her and her team. Which meant they now knew the woman wasn’t your average, everyday hired gun.
Vivian Drake, aka Black Widow, had spent ten years with the CIA working as a swallow, a female agent trained to seduce information out of foreign marks. But somewhere along the line, seducing had turned to killing. And she hadn’t stopped, even when the agency had ordered her to.
Which is when they’d given her the boot.
Now…she was Graham’s problem.
Boss’s problem too.
They needed to drag Bishop’s identity out of her. Unfortunately, she’d been through the same course on advanced interrogation techniques that they had. And that meant this would be more difficult than it might have been otherwise.
Unless they could find the right button to push. The right leverage to use.
“So,” Boss finally drawled after they’d exhausted their intimidation technique of looming and glowering. “How would you like us to proceed, Miss Drake?”
Graham saw it. A flicker. Just the barest tick of her lashes when Boss used her real name.
“Oh, yes.” Boss stepped closer, deep voice thick and edgy, like honey dripping over a sharpened blade. “We know all about you. Recruited straight out of college. Top marks at Camp Peary. Worked in Moscow, Kyiv, Damascus, and D.C.”
Graham saw her jaw tighten behind the duct tape. But that was the only indication she gave that Boss’s words hit a nerve.
“Struck out on your own after the spooks cut you loose,” Boss continued. “Been doing wet work for anyone willing to pay your fee for the last six years. And now, here you are, because Bishop promised you a paycheck.”
Bishop.
The code name that kept popping up when they least expected it.
The ghost in the machine.
Without warning, Boss ripped the duct tape off Black Widow’s mouth.
She didn’t scream. Didn’t so much as flinch, even though a bead of blood welled on her bottom lip where the tape had taken skin with it.
Graham’s gut revolted.
He knew what she was. A stone-cold killer who didn’t care about the line between right and wrong. Who saw no difference between murdering those who were guilty or innocent. But…still…
She spat out the soggy handkerchief Sam had shoved in her mouth the night before. Then, she licked the blood on her lip.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
Her eyes locked on Graham like she was challenging him to speak up.
“You boys want me to talk?” Her voice was hoarse from hours of suffering with the gag. “Then you better be prepared to make me bleed worse than this.”
Graham stepped forward. Showing her the steel in him. Hiding his disgust with the entire business.
“One way or another, we will hear everything ya have to say ’bout Bishop.” He kept his voice low and steady but ensured she could hear its honed edge. “How much ya bleed before that happens is entirely up to you.”
She smiled then, her teeth tinged pink in the low glow of the flashlight in Boss’s hand.
“Well, now,” she cooed. “A Southern boy with a violent streak. You’re just my type, sugar.”
Something twisted in the center of his chest. Revulsion, maybe. Or just the echo of his mama’s voice saying, “Don’t ya never raise a hand to a woman, Graham Coleburn.”
“Why did Bishop hire you? What was his endgame?” Boss’s tone was as flat as West Texas.
She shrugged like she wasn’t tied up and two bad minutes away from this interrogation moving on from the talking phase to the fear and pain phase.
“Who cares? I failed. Which means, when it comes to your merry little band of brothers, all’s well that ends well, right?”
Graham leaned his shoulder against the concrete wall like he had all the time in the world. Like he was ready to settle in and really draw this thing out.
“Like ya said.” He kept his voice casual, conversational. “You failed. So there’s no reason ya can’t just come out and tell us what it was you were hired to accomplish in the first place.”
Her mouth twisted, and he saw the cruelty and callousness behind her beauty. “What’s in it for me?”
“What do you want?” Boss asked.
She turned from Graham and leaned forward as far as her restraints would allow. Her face was only three inches from Boss’s big thigh as she grinned up at the man.
“I want you to tell me how you found us. You knew where we were long before I called to give you the location of the money drop.”
“You’re not as smart as you think you are.” Boss shrugged and took a casual step back. Graham didn’t blame him. He wouldn’t want to be that close to the viper, either. “And we’re a whole helluva lot better than Bishop led you to believe. Obviously.”
Graham saw it then. The subtle narrowing of her eyes. The quick flex of her jaw.
Bishop was their ticket to getting her to talk. She blamed him for her current predicament. And a woman like her wouldn’t take kindly to losing her team or her freedom.
“Let me guess.” Graham kept his easy-like tone. “He told ya this’d be a simple job. Grab one of the women, hold her hostage, demand ransom, and then…what? Kill all of us who showed up for the drop?”
“He didn’t care how many of you I killed,” she hissed. “He just wanted me to leave enough of a mess so the authorities would have to investigate, and the clues would lead them back here. I was the one who decided to end all of you after that brunette bitch stuck a glass shard in my guy’s throat.”
Gotcha.
One part of the mystery was solved. Bishop wanted to expose Black Knights Inc. to the world.
But why? Did he have a vendetta against the president? Was he simply tired of the Knights showing up at inopportune times to throw a wrench in his works?
Also…Sabrina slit the big guy’s throat?
Well, what’d’ya know, Graham thought. Our resident social media pro has more gumption than I gave her credit for. Good for her.
The blonde blinked when she realized all she’d revealed. He could see her wheels spinning, looking for ways to turn her confession to her advantage.
“So maybe I didn’t fail after all, huh?” She was back to projecting bravado. “That chopper you shoved me into was surely picked up on radar. The authorities are bound to find my men’s bodies. Will ballistics lead them here, I wonder?”
“Come on,” Boss snorted. “Our chopper’s got no tail numbers, no transponder. We flew completely dark.” He let that shoe hang in the air for a beat before dropping the second one. “And your men’s bodies? Two FBI agents have already disposed of them.”
Graham saw the shock that flashed through Black Widow’s eyes.
He latched onto it.
“Ah.” He pasted on a sympathetic expression. “Another of Bishop’s omissions, huh? He didn’t tell ya we have an in with the local feds? He really did send you into the seventh circle of hell without any warnin’, didn’t he? Your assignment was pretty much doomed from the get-go.”
Hunter and Britt had drawn the short straws when it came to doing the dirty work of corpse cleanup back at the bottling plant. Their partners, Grace and Julia, had run cover for them. So Boss had only fudged a little when he’d said two FBI agents had handled the problem.
All four of the Black Widow’s henchmen were now food for the fish at the bottom of Lake Michigan.
“Tell us who he is.” Boss’s tone shifted. It was almost…gentle now. “You don’t owe him anything. Hell, him holding back on you is what got your crew killed and what got you into this mess.” He waved a big hand around at the shadows undulating on the weeping walls.
She bared her teeth. “You don’t know who he is? You seem to know every other goddamned thing.”
Graham stepped in, exploring that chink in her armor. Looking for just the right leverage to split it wide open. “We can protect ya from him, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
She laughed, sharp and humorless. “I can protect myself.”
But he saw it then. The subtle eye-twitch. The tiniest hesitation.
She feared Bishop. And fear—real fear—was just the crowbar he needed.
“Then how’s about, once we find him, we make sure he can’t do to anyone else what he did to you and yours?”
That got her attention.
Her eyes fired like silver bullets. Cold. Fast. Straight into him. “What did you have in mind?”
He smirked. “Use your imagination.”
“I can imagine some very unpleasant things,” she assured him.
“Multiply that by ten and you’ll begin to scratch the surface of what we’re capable of.”
Boss leaned in. “Who is he? Can we use this to contact him?” Boss pulled from his pocket the cheap plastic flip phone they’d taken off her when they first apprehended her. “There are only two phone numbers on this thing. One is BKI’s. Is the other one his, Vivian?”
He’d used her given name on purpose to create a sense of intimacy, of shared intention.
Damned if it didn’t work. Her eyes softened. Just a hair. But it was enough.
There was no more bluster in her tone when she said, “If I tell you what I know, you have to promise to go after him. The only way he won’t come for me is if you get to him first.”
“We’ve been anxious to expose Bishop for what he is for years now,” Boss admitted. “Believe you me, our number one priority from here on out is to find the fucker and deal with him the only way traitors can be dealt with.”
The assassin hesitated a second longer, looking for the truth in Boss’s eyes. When she saw it, she opened her mouth and ponied up everything she knew. The first time Bishop had contacted her. All the things she’d gleaned during their conversations. The hints he’d inadvertently dropped.
The more she spoke, the higher Graham’s heart climbed into the column of his throat because…
It sounded like Lura Dougherty might be in grave danger.