Caught in His Web (Hitmen of Ulysses #3)

Prologue

Wesley

I can’t believe how late I am. It’s as if the world has conspired against me today.

An alarm that didn’t go off, a missed bus, delays on the tube, a cab with a flat tyre …

If they had a place for me at this facility to park my motorcycle, this wouldn’t have happened.

Not that it matters much now—of all the days to be late, it had to be the last. I’ve probably missed sending the presentation. Harold is going to have my arse.

It’s odd that Brian isn’t at the desk to greet me. He must be on break—though, usually the security guards operate as a pair, and they never leave the front desk unmanned. But I’m too late to puzzle it out.

Nose glued to my phone, I punch the button for the second floor and swipe over to my email as I wait for the doors to close. Have they sent it yet? There’s been nothing new in my inbox all morning, which is odd. Surely they would have copied me on the email…

The lift dings, the doors part, and I step off. The carpet squelches underfoot, surprising me enough to make me look up from my phone.

“What the fuc—” The angry exclamation dies on my tongue.

Office buildings are often colored in tones that offend no one. The industrial carpet is a soft blue, the walls are off white, the office furniture is grey. Matilda, who’s worked in corporate offices all her life, described it once as “interior design to calm the inmates.”

The scene before me is anything but calm. Splashes of red on those previously pristine walls. Red seeping into the blue of the carpet, creating a dark purple stain that has spread all the way to the lift. A single red handprint in the middle of the grey wall separator for the two cubicles closest…

My heart leaps into my throat at the carnage, going wild when I see Matilda’s body draped over her desk, eyes open and unseeing.

So. Much. Blood.

An alarm blares from my computer, snapping me out of the waking nightmare.

I come to and realize that I’m frozen in place, holding the cloth I just fetched to wipe up the spilled energy drink on the carpet.

As I stare down at my shoe in the red puddle, I realize exactly what triggered that spell—even though the energy drink is an unnatural bright cherry red, the sound of it underfoot and the vaguely metallic smell…

I drop the cloth, stomp on it to absorb the puddle so the carpet won’t stain, and head over to my computer to check on the source of the noise.

The alarm is coming from the program linked to Eleanor’s panic button.

I know she and Mac—James Mackenzie, the sniper of our trio—are currently out to dinner at their favorite spot.

They’re alone, without backup. Mac can handle himself in most situations, but Eleanor isn’t like us.

She’s not an assassin; she’s a civilian.

And after what she’s just been through, the idea that she’s out there with him, panicking, twists a knot in my stomach.

I’ve been in those cameras at the restaurant before, and once you’ve hacked something, getting back in is easy.

As I pull up their feeds, I call up our group chat.

I can see the three dots, indicating that Dimitri—our Russian man on the ground and team lead in our merry band of assassins—is already in the chat, typing out his message.

But he’s got big, clumsy thumbs, and I’m faster.

3 Musketeers Chat

Eleanor’s panic button just went off

Dimitri

I saw it as well. Report in, James.

Just started the timer. If we don’t hear in 5, we’re mobilizing.

There are a few camera feeds, and I cycle through, searching for that familiar handsome face or long brown hair in the small crowd.

I find them at a table in the corner of the building, sitting stock straight and staring at the guest on the other side of the table.

I can’t see who he is—his back is to me—but the twin looks of fury on Mac and Eleanor’s faces give me a few guesses.

These cameras are shite. They don’t zoom and have no sound capability.

Luckily, Eleanor’s watch has a panic button and a bug—though Mac and Eleanor don’t know about the latter.

I figure most people wouldn’t like knowing they were wearing something I could turn into a surveillance device, but in my defense, I’ve never used it because the situation has never called for it. Until now.

“—and what happens when you want out of this partnership? You think he’s gonna just let you go?” the man is saying.

My hand curls into a fist. I know that voice.

Felix. What a fucking thorn in our side. As if being complicit in Nicole’s kidnapping wasn’t enough, now he’s cornering Mac and Eleanor.

“If you don’t know who the General is, you don’t know who to protect yourself against. How you gonna keep your lady safe? What’s your exit strategy, ese?”

That throws me for a loop. Is he talking about the General? Our General?

“Well, I’ll leave you folks to it. Enjoy your evening. And think about what I said.” Felix stands and adjusts his jacket. I expect him to turn and waltz out the front of the restaurant, but he circles the table and disappears into a hallway I know leads back to the kitchens.

A few seconds later, Mac responds to the group chat.

Mac

Felix showed at dinner. Everyone OK. Home in 15.

I look down at the black notebook open on my desk, containing the notes I’ve been carefully and meticulously keeping for a decade, and consider the name listed in the most recent round of hits.

Felix Cruz.

When I first got his name from the General and started digging, I believed he was just a local cleaner.

Someone who made himself useful to the local criminal element—disposing of bodies, cleaning crime scenes, providing alibis, that sort of thing—but it’s become clear he’s much more than that.

What are his aspirations? What are his motives?

Does he know he’s on the General’s list?

I haven’t taken the hit, so it’s only a matter of time before the General offers it to someone else. If Felix has somehow figured out that he’s become a target, does that mean he’ll want to go after the General?

Could that be a good thing for me? The enemy of my enemy and all that…

I hear Dimitri’s heavy boots in the hallway outside and slip my book back into its locked drawer, getting it closed just before a heavy pounding of knuckles precedes the scarred face in the doorway.

Big D—a fitting nickname for the 6’8” beast of a man—looks freshly showered and royally pissed off.

But between the permanent scowl, courtesy of the deep, old scar twisting across his face, and the fact that he’s the biggest, broadest bloke anyone’s ever seen…

well, he always looks at least a little pissed off.

“The car just pulled in,” he informs me in his thick accent, going to take his usual place leaning against one of the desks I have pushed against the wall.

He tends to favor the one with the half-completed electrical projects—my theory is that all the blinking lights from the single board computers on the adjacent desk freak him out.

The sound of the front door echoing in the foyer a moment later proves Dimitri right. Sound carries well across polished stone, so I usually keep my door closed because it funnels right into my office. But Dimitri didn’t close the door, so we can hear Mac and Eleanor pretty clearly.

“Darlin’, you okay?” Mac asks, a desperate edge to his voice that makes me uncomfortable to hear.

Her answer is quiet and tight. “I’m okay. I promise.” She sniffles. “I’m a little shaken up, but no one got hurt. I’m just… worried. So go talk to Wes and Dimitri and figure this out like you guys do best. I’ll be here when you’re done, and we’ll talk about it, just the two of us.”

“I’ll find you upstairs?”

“I’m way too stressed out to sleep. I’m going to… bake something.”

There’s a shuffling of feet, and when Mac speaks again, voice slightly muffled, I can picture him saying the words into her hair as he presses a kiss to the top of her head. “I’m so sorry, baby.”

“I know. I just…” She inhales shakily, the sound breaking in her throat. “Sometimes I wish you didn’t have to be.”

Suddenly, the moment feels much too private to be listening to. I glance over at Dimitri, sheepish, and he looks just as uncomfortable, eyes downcast and shifting from foot to foot.

“Eleanor—”

“I love you, James Mackenzie,” she says fiercely. “Always. Forever. We can get through anything. We’ll figure this out.”

“It is not right,” Dimitri murmurs over the sound of two sets of feet heading in opposite directions. “That she has become a target. For Felix to make her feel unsafe.”

“Agreed,” I reply. “And after everything that fucking just happened with Nicole as well.” Our team of three hardened killers has two very blatant soft spots now, and I happen to genuinely care for both of them.

Mac appears in the doorway in a rumpled suit, still smelling like aftershave. His dark hair is askew, likely from running a frustrated hand through its length. The expression on his face is hard and angry, and he barely gets the door shut before launching in.

“Felix found us. Or he’s been following me, maybe.

That smug motherfucker sat across the table and smirked at me because he knew there was nothing I could do with all those witnesses and with Eleanor…

” He crosses the room and collapses into the red wingback chair, pressing the heels of his hands against his eye sockets.

“I… she was with me and I couldn’t… I had to get her out of there. ”

Dimitri uncrosses his arms and leans forward with his usual stoic resolve. Big D has the most reason to want Felix dead of all of us, considering Felix’s recent role in kidnapping Nicole—so I’m a bit surprised when he simply commands, “Calm yourself and tell us what happened.”