Chapter 52 Merciful
Merciful
Roman
It had been three whole days of no word from Isla, and I wasn't sure how I was still alive.
She disappeared. The last place her cell phone was turned on was in New York, around her apartment, and then nothing.
I had flown to New York with Kirill and spent forty-eight hours on a wild hunt that led to absolutely nothing.
Nothing.
None of mine or Kirill's contacts could place her. Her name didn't show up anywhere. No tickets were purchased under her name, she wasn’t on any flight database, no cameras picked her up in any airport or train station—nowhere. No one could locate that car.
It was like five years ago all over again. Vanished into thin air.
I sat on my couch in the middle of night three of no sleep, and looked over my reflection in the window. Was that me? I didn’t know the man who stared back at me.
I willed myself to get it the fuck together. Time was not on my side, and after I had exhausted every single path that could lead to her, I headed to see Claudio in the morning.
The door to his office swung open from one swift kick, but he wasn’t alone.
In front of him was an unknown man, about to be a dead one.
Without a second thought, I pressed the trigger.
The bullet flew right through the man’s temple, his body jerking violently to the side before slumping over like a bag of sand.
Claudio flinched behind his desk and froze, his shoddy little eyes on me. "You wanted those contracts so bad, you fucking decided to take my girl?" I took a seat where the man used to be, my voice low and calm, a stark contrast to my inner state.
In return, Claudio raised his hands in defeat, his eyes bulging out of his eye sockets. He stayed silent, unable to piece together a sentence, and looked from me to the bleeding, dead man on the floor.
Jesus fuck, he didn't know where she was either.
"Ro-Roman…I didn't…I didn't do nothing, man. I swear, I don't have your woman." Claudio gulped hard, visibly doing his best to remain calm and diffuse the situation.
God, I was going to lose my mind. No one had any fucking clue where she was.
Not Sergei, not Claudio, not The Triads, not the Albanians who I’d visited yesterday.
The only ones left were the Italians, but I knew it couldn’t have been them.
As strange as it was, we’d never crossed paths—not even once.
"Call Vincenzo," I ordered and jutted my chin out in the direction of the phone on his desk. He obeyed without question, dialing a number he apparently knew by heart.
A man picked up, and with fear in his voice, Claudio started from afar, speaking about random shit. I waited, listening to every word. Then, he casually mentioned Isla, and Vincenzo let out a low hmm.
"Claudio.” Vincenzo’s voice was strict and confident. “You know we don't do this. Leave this to the Russians and the Albanians. We don't kidnap for ransom. We don’t take to apply pressure."
"I know Vincenzo, but...” Claudio’s eyes darted to me as he picked his next words. “There are…extenuating circumstances. Do your research. Give me a name." Claudio pressed on, but there was silence on the other line.
A minute. Two. And then a long and annoyed sigh.
"I'll ask, but…I don't think I’ll be able to get you what you want."
The conversation ended, and I still sat there with my gun aimed at Claudio. I had no fucking clue what to do next. I was beyond defeated. Hollowed out and empty, ready to blow my fucking brains out just to escape the chaos, the guilt, and the lack of any information about her.
Claudio opened his mouth to say something I didn’t want to hear, but right at that moment, my phone buzzed in my pocket. It was a text.
From Isla.
I jumped to my feet as if electrocuted. My fingers fumbled over the screen, clumsy and shaking as I unlocked the stupid device and pulled up the conversation.
It was a video. Of her.
My legs shaking and my heart ready to burst through my chest, I pressed play, mentally preparing for the worst.
But the video was bright and quiet. She was sitting in a chair in a well-lit room, and she looked…calm. Gently, as if trying to find the words, she spoke.
Hi Roman,
My vision blurred just from the little tremble in her voice when she pronounced my name.
Um, I'm not sure where I am, but the person who took me…ugh…wants you to figure it out. They said that you…fucked up. That you didn't do your due diligence. And if you want me back, you're going to have to use your spy skills.
This was rehearsed; I picked up on that right away. Isla was trying to remember what she had to say next. Forced. My Angel was forced to say all these words.
I'm not hurt. They’ve been very…merciful…to me. She paused and looked straight into the camera. Merciful—she emphasized that word for some reason.
They said they don't want me. They don't want to hurt me. They want you to figure it out. They’re waiting. They’ll wait for as long as needed…and they will keep me until you put the pieces of the puzzle together.
The video cut there, and I looked up at Claudio, who had his eyebrows raised and listened along with me. "Shit, Roman. This ain't us. This ain't anyone here, man." He spoke as if defending and denying it all.
At the bottom of the video there were two letters: GP
My mind was overheating; I was sure it was about to melt out of me. I hadn’t slept, hadn’t eaten; the desperation was wringing everything out of me, but I just received a huge fucking win.
The text came from her phone. That meant that it had to be turned on, and now…now I would fucking find her. I was going to pinpoint her exact location and blow the motherfucker who took her right off this planet.
This was a mistake on his part. Either he was sloppy, or he didn’t know a live phone pings a tower with location data down to a few hundred meters. Whatever it was, the advantage was now mine.
Scenarios infiltrated my mind. I would bring a fucking army.
I would destroy him. I’d use mine and Kirill’s men to fucking annihilate him, rip him apart in front of my eyes, dismember him, squish him into a wet and bloody mess.
I would crush his fucking bones. I would turn him into ash.
Dust. There would be nothing left of him. Not even a whisper.
I refocused back on the video, my chest aching. My Angel didn’t look hurt. That was very important. Even if she was forced to say the words, she looked well rested, alert, and not drugged. That was important, I repeated to myself. That was important.
"You should send a video back." Claudio cut in, ripping me out of my spiral.
"What's GP?" My sight caught on the two letters again, my inner state dancing between dread and elation.
But what if he knew that he was revealing her location when he turned on the phone? What if that was the plan—to invoke this kind of reaction? To bait me? And was it a he? Or a them? And what were they planning to do to her…if I bulldozed my way in?
Claudio stretched out his hand, the disapproval written all over his aging face. “Pass it, let me see.” I plopped my phone into his meaty palm while he placed his glasses on the bridge of his nose. “You're going to have to get rid of this guy's body, by the way.”
I looked down at the dead man, wishing it was me and nothing in my life had ever happened. Claudio pressed play, and I heard her voice again, holding back tears for the hundredth time these past three days.
“G…P…” Claudio mused. "Fuck, it could be anything.
General practitioner? Good practice? Guinea pig?
Games played? General partnership? Double penetration?
Oh no, that's DP." He chuckled, smug with himself, but I almost fucking ripped his head off.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, bad joke!" He shook his head in defense and passed me the phone again. “Jesus.”
"What if GP is a place? A street? A country? A city? What starts with a G and a P?” I wondered out loud, sifting through every country, city, and location I knew that started with the letter G.
“Maybe it’s initials.” Claudio offered carefully.
Yes…his proposition seemed way more plausible. “They said you didn’t do your due diligence. Maybe it’s someone you missed? Someone around her or you…who was dangerous?" Fuck, Claudio was making perfect sense.
Claudio walked me to my car, but before he shut my door, he leaned in and spoke calmly. “If I find your girl, I want those contracts. Go home and sleep. Clear your fucking head before you make a mistake and lose her. I'll ask around about GP and call Vincenzo again."
But I didn’t drive home. I raced across the city to see the one fucking man who could help me find the location.
Sergei.
Lena answered the door and immediately tried to slam it shut, but I didn’t even blink—just shoved her out of the way and barged in. She protested, waving her arms in front of me and yapping like a rabid dog.
I stormed upstairs and busted through every door until I found him peacefully sleeping in a guest bedroom, bandaged and resting like he wasn’t the biggest piece of shit on the entire planet.
Neither he nor I could say anything; we just stared at each other. He was beaten up, bruised, and cut, but alive. And I fought with the last of my pride not to shoot him in his stupid, fucking face.
Lena followed me into his room, her voice shrill and fast, accusing me of whatever wrongdoings she thought I was involved in, but Sergei sternly cut her off. “Get out.” She stared at him for a second but then turned on her heels and walked out, not daring to argue.
I stood at the foot of his bed, nausea returning with full force.
His confession echoed in my ears, making my head spin.
He. He fucking betrayed me in a way that was unforgivable.
He stood beside me when we lowered her coffin into the ground and cried with me.
And he fucking killed her. He took my sister.