Chapter 32
32
GAbrIEL
I didn’t intend to let Royal into my home, but I would have preferred to have kept him out of my office as well. Unfortunately, I needed one of my men, Carlos, and his equipment in order to triangulate the position of my unwilling bride.
And Royal, who never seemed to work very hard anywhere but the golf course and the gym, was stuck to me like glue. Which made me question if he was suspicious about my plans. Or at least, if his father were—I wasn’t sure Royal’s last two brain cells could cooperate long enough to muster suspicion.
I leaned back in my chair, looking at Dante’s cell phone, where I’d placed it back on the long polished desk, and then at Dante himself, who was strapped to a chair and looking rather the worse for wear. His left eye was swollen shut, and blood still trickled from the cut at the corner of his mouth.
“It was unwise to fight back,” I said without sympathy. Somewhere, Luca was wounded too. I couldn’t believe that he and Celia had eluded us somehow, despite the trail of blood they’d left across the pool’s concrete and the sand beyond.
How the hell was Luca up and moving, keeping clear of us when he was so badly hurt? I’d been expecting them to pop up at a hospital, and I was ready to nab them when they did. Who was helping Luca escape me?
I drummed my fingertips on the table, watching Dante. Royal had stepped out, but I had no doubt he would soon return, clearing his throat and sniffling habitually. If Celia’s father had been smart, he would have handed the cocaine wing of his business over to me and gotten that out of Royal’s hands. They had to be in the negative on profits by now the way he was going.
“Do you have anything to say for yourself, Dante?” I asked. “I’m still going to get Celia, and I’m still going to follow my plan.”
It had been our plan, once upon a time. But I swear to God, the second he saw her, Luca lost his damn mind.
And Dante’d never had much of a functioning brain.
Dante raised his head to glare at me like he was Captain America instead of a mafia man with a long list of sins. “She doesn’t deserve to be stuck with you.”
“I would tend to agree, though I’m pretty sure our reasoning would be different.” I smiled at him. “You didn’t keep her out of my clutches for long. All you got was Luca hurt, maybe seriously so. And who knows what could happen when we bring them down this time?”
“Don’t hurt her.”
“And how are you going to stop me?” My brows rose in amusement. “While you’re tied to the chair?”
“You don’t have to hurt her. She will help you.”
“I know I don’t have to.” I gave him a smile that I knew wouldn’t do anything to lift his spirits. “I just want to.”
Carlos came in. “We got a lead on their location, sir. Now that I’m locked into the signal, I should be able to follow them.”
“Good. Thank you, Carlos.”
He nodded and slid a piece of paper across the desk. “Last known location. They seem to have stopped, but when they start moving again, I’ll be able to track them.”
“Stopped? Interesting. Hopefully at a hospital before Luca bleeds out.” I took the piece of paper.
He moved away, understanding that he had been dismissed.
Unfortunately, he came face to face with Royal in the doorway.
Royal was wearing his usual demonic grin. “We got them?”
“Perhaps.”
They were only a few hours away, doubling back toward our city. It was interesting. I would have thought Luca would have spirited her far away. He wasn’t the type to risk losing his toys. Though he struggled to stay focused on the end game when the cost rose too high.
“Let’s go,” Royal said, resting his hands on the top of the doorway in a way he must have thought was cool. “I’ll get my men and?—”
“No more of your men,” I cut him off. “That was a fucking disaster. We attracted way too much attention, they had to drag a body out with us, and we lost the girl.”
“That wasn’t my fault,” Royal said.
I shrugged. “She’s going to be my wife. We’re going to do it my way.”
I had gotten the briefest glimpse of her with Luca from the marina’s camera footage. In it, he was obviously badly wounded, leaning on her. They had already made it to the boat, and she was chattering to the occupants of the vessel they ended up stealing.
I had talked to the couple later, pretending to be a police detective. With the police interfering with our work at the time, I thought we’d be able to catch up to them. But the boat had been dumped further down the shoreline. It raised so many questions about how they had gotten that done.
It made me curious.
Was she more competent than I realized?
“Put Dante in the car,” I told Breaker, my second-in-command.
“Why are you bringing him with you?” Royal demanded.
I gave him a cool smile and no answer.
I didn’t trust Royal not to kill Dante behind my back.
“If Celia is reluctant to cooperate, I have a feeling Dante will make it much easier.”
Royal seemed to feel that we were on the verge of victory. He was awfully fucking chatty in the car.
He was lucky I didn’t want a funeral to disrupt my wedding plans.
Murdering him would have to wait until afterward.