Chapter 36
THIRTY-SIX
G RANT
“Fuck me,” I curse as Levi shows me the bombs that were rigged to blow in the belly of the Avarice’s bar. All in the champagne cases we ordered for the wedding. “They planned to kill all of us.”
“The ones at Seven Sins went off early.” Levi surveys the evidence.
“Didn’t realize they were taking the ‘All Stocktons Must Die’ so fucking seriously.” I run a hand through my hair, and I can feel it sticking up in every direction under my fingers.
None of us have slept. I haven’t even showered. I’m still covered in blood and ash from the bar.
Once I knew Dakota was safe in the hospital, out of danger with her head wound, and with Hazel and Ramsey at her side, I came straight here to help Levi. When the fire department put out the fire, they told him they suspected it was an explosion somewhere in the liquor storage room that had blown the place apart. It set off alarm bells for Levi when I mentioned the champagne I’d given Dakota, and he found this when he investigated. Luckily, he knew a guy who was EOD out of Ft. Carson—who owed us a favor and his silence. But now I’m staring at a dozen diffused bombs and wondering who could hate us so much they’d want to kill our family. We had enemies, sure, but I’d never imagined it was enough to turn a whole wedding bloody.
“Have you told Hudson yet?”
“No. I only told him about Seven Sins. Let him know the wedding is off. Fuck. What about all the guests?” I suddenly think about all the things Dakota will ask about when she has a moment to breathe again. The guests, the food, the staff—all of it will cause her to panic if I don’t make sure we take care of it first.
“Aspen has it under control. She helped Bristol and Marlowe work with Hazel’s brothers to let the guest list know the wedding is postponed. Then she worked with the hotel staff to make sure everyone would still get some dinner and cake delivered to their rooms.”
“I’d forgotten how nice it is to have our sister around.”
“Think we can get her to move back home now that Ethan’s gonna be out of the picture? She can take over this shit, and we can take a vacation.” Levi smirks.
I laugh, needing it after the day I’ve had. “Somehow, I doubt it. But fuck, after today…”
“We need to bring Hudson in on this. If this is all related to the relic and whoever wanted it…”
“He could be a target as much as us,” I acknowledge.
Levi presses his lips together and raises his brows .
I pull my phone out of my pocket only to see that I have several missed calls and texts from him.
H.K.:
Call me as soon as you see this. It’s urgent.
“Well fuck, he’s already been trying to get a hold of me,” I explain to Levi before I hit the call button.
“Where are you?” Hudson answers the phone with a question.
“Downstairs at the bar. Are you still here in the hotel?”
“Yes. I’m coming down. Meet me in the chess room?”
“See you there.”
“I can’t find the shell corporation that owns the bidder account. But I found the one that owns the house. It took my guy several layers deep, but he found one of the owners.”
“Someone we know?” I’m guessing by the disturbed look on Hudson’s face that it isn’t a good answer.
“This room—it’s compartmentalized from the rest of the place?” Hudson asks. I’ve never seen him strung this tight in the entirety of our business dealings.
“Yes.”
“Do you have your phone on you?” he asks quietly.
I nod. I usually don’t bring it into this room, but I needed to know if anything happened with Dakota. He shakes his head and then mimics me turning it off. I do as he asks, and Levi follows suit. We place them in a box on the far side of the room, and Hudson grabs a piece of paper and a pen from the bookshelf before walking us to the far corner. He scrawls across it quickly and then holds it out for us .
Abbott Schaefer
I stare at it blankly for a moment before I can even begin to process what I’m seeing—what it means. The Governor of Colorado owns the home where the relic came to rest after we sold it, which likely means he was the one who bought it. Which could mean he’s the one who sent us after it all those years ago, and the same one who burned down the Kellys’ ancestral home trying to cover up the theft of the second relic.
He also would have been the one who appointed the new sheriff—my uncle. The same one who ran the police department that was harassing Dakota. The same man who would have known exactly where and what to target in this building because I gave him all the details when I invited him.
“Fuckkkkk.” I roar the word, and Levi falls back against the wall in shock as he has the same realization. Hudson takes a lighter out of his pocket and sets the paper on fire, tossing it into the wastebasket as we all watch it turn to ash.
It feels like a metaphor for my entire life right now.
“I didn’t think he was that far gone,” he mutters under his breath.
“Nothing’s safe here if this is what we’re up against. Nothing and no one .” My mind immediately goes to Dakota, Hazel, and Ramsey at the hospital. “I have to get back to them. Make sure they’re safe and take them somewhere we’ve got more security.”
“The hotel’s not safe. Not after knowing this and the bombs. It could be anyone on staff who helped him.” Levi keeps his voice low.
“The bombs?” Hudson asks in a surprised whisper.
“They rigged the whole wedding—the reception room would have been full of bombs disguised as champagne bottles. They were going to kill everyone who attended,” I explain .
“Two birds, one stone.” Levi shifts his finger between the two of us, and Hudson’s face falls.
“Rowan’s with Charlotte now. But we should get everyone out of this hotel. There’s no telling what they’ll do now that they know the wedding’s been postponed. If they figure out that we’ve discovered them…” Hudson trails off.
“I agree. We need to get our family off the streets. But there’s one family member in particular I’d like to have in a room alone right now.” I grit out the words, surveying the floor of the bar. Full of people who are completely clueless to how close we all came to being dead.
“We’ll get him. But let’s get our family rounded up and safe first. The ranch?” Levi looks to me to confirm his suggestion.
“The ranch. Do we know what security we can trust?”
“The usual inner circle. We’ll get them on the ranch, and we’ll lock down all the gates. I have drones we can put up to help patrol who’s going on and off the property, and we updated all the cameras last year after the incident with the Flanagans.” Levi’s already putting a plan into action.
“Do it. I’ll go to the hospital if she’s not discharged yet and make sure we’re all on the same page. Can you get Aspen read in on things?” I ask, and Levi nods. Then I turn to Hudson. “You, Charlotte, and Rowan should come too. It’ll be safer there than here until we get to the bottom of the whole situation. We had our security team run an inspection on the whole building after we found the champagne situation, but there’s always the chance we could have missed something. I’d like to do another round first.”
“Always a chance that they’ll try to strike again while the iron’s hot, and we’re still disoriented.” Hudson gives me a worried look.
“Agreed. So you’ll come?”
“If you’ll have us. We can squeeze in wherever there’s room. I just want to get through the night to get the jet ready and send Charlotte back to Cincinnati. Rowan or I can stay with you to help work out a solution.”
“I’m sure Hazel can get you a couple rooms at the inn.”
I’m almost positive there isn’t a solution to a problem of this magnitude, but I was grateful as fuck he was willing to help pretend there was for a little while longer while I figure out how to keep my family safe.
“Hazel and Ramsey might want to head back to Cincinnati too. The Chaos start training camp soon, and it’s probably a hell of a lot safer than being here for them anyway.” Hudson makes a good point. I nod along with his assessment and make one of my own. I can’t bring myself to say it yet, but if Hazel and Ramsey go back, Dakota should go with them.