36. Chapter Thirty-Six
MATT
Manny Falco lived in an older section of town. He rented the second story of a boxy craftsman house, the kind built in the early 1900s from Sears mail-order catalog plans. The entrance to his unit was an outside staircase, which led up to a narrow, covered porch.
Matt sat in the black Range Rover with Kieran, across the street and down half a block. Behind the tinted windows, he had high-powered binocs trained on the house. Nothing was happening on the upper floor that he could see. The windows were fitted with blackout shades. No one had come in or out.
An older model SUV sat around the back of the property. The tires had mud in the tread, the same kind they’d encountered along the riverbank.
“She’s in there,” Matt said quietly. “I can feel it.”
Kieran smiled.
“What?”
“I thought so.”
“You thought what exactly?”
“You think I can’t sense when your mother is around? It’s like this hyperawareness. Nothing specific. We just know. Like some primal part of us recognizes our croie.”
Matt scowled at him. “It’s not like that.”
“Oh, right, I forgot. My bad.”
“Remind me again why breaking down his door and shooting him in the face is a bad idea?” Matt asked. He could be in and out before the guy knew what hit him. Bonus: he wouldn’t have to sit here and convince Kieran that Anna was nothing more to him than she was to any of them—a woman who needed their help.
Which was, of course, complete and utter bullshit.
Chuckles sounded over the comm sets.
“Damn, I like this kid,” someone—Matt thought it was Sean—said.
“Fits right in, doesn’t he?” said Jake.
“Told you,” said Kieran.
“He’s coming out,” Matt said suddenly, tossing the binoculars to the side.
“Hold tight until we have verification,” came Jake’s command.
Matt ignored him. In the span of few heartbeats, he was out of the vehicle and across the street, a shadow among shadows in his all-black tactical ensemble.
“Goddammit, kid,” Jake cursed.
“Give him a break. That’s his croie in there.”
“No shit? When did that happen?”
“What are you, blind?” Ian laughed.
“Okay, hold steady. Falco’s coming out with a black duffel over his shoulder.”
“How big is that duffel there, Jake?”
“Not big enough. Looks like Falco’s getting ready to bolt.”
“Matt, where are you, kid?”
“He’s climbing up the back of the house like a damn spider monkey,” Jake said with amusement. “Sean?”
“Behind the SUV. Don’t worry; he’s going nowhere.”
“Don’t kill him until we know Anna’s safe. Mick?”
“Standing by.”
Matt listened to them chatter back and forth like they were talking about what to have for dinner. Him? He’d gone completely cold. Totally focused. Anna was inside, and she was his only priority.
He slid open the bedroom window, slipped noiselessly inside. It was empty.
He moved to the door and into the main living space, looking around. He saw nothing at first, not until he rounded the couch and saw the figure writhing on the floor at the base of it.
“Anna!” he said, coming to his knees beside her.
She jerked and curled in on herself, trying to get as close to the couch as possible. Her back was to him, her hair a tangled mess, caked with … was that blood?
His stomach twisted, that cool, calm focus evaporating in an instant as he reached out and touched her shoulder. “Anna, it’s Matt. You’re okay. I’m here.” He spoke as he carefully rolled her onto her back so she could see it was him, then promptly recoiled.
The bottom half of her face was covered in duct tape. The left side was a mass of purple and black. The right, so swollen that it was nearly impossible to make out her features.
She moaned, and his heart broke, and the rest of him raged.
His uncles were talking back and forth on the comms. Matt heard none of it over the roaring in his ears. He removed the duct tape as gently as he could, then went to work on the zip ties around her wrists and ankles. The fucker had pulled them so tight that her extremities had turned a grayish-blue color.
Her one good eye focused on him. “Did you get him?” she whispered.
“Yeah, we got him. I’m going to get you out of here, okay?” he said, forcing a calm and confidence into his voice he didn’t feel.
“Okay.”
“Anything broken I need to know about?”
“Just my face. And I can’t feel my toes.”
The burn ratcheted up to nuclear levels. He wanted to lay waste to everything around him. To rip Falco apart limb by limb, then sew him back together so he could do it again.
“We’ll get you all sorted out; don’t worry.”
Lifting her into his arms, he curled her against his chest. “Ready transport,” he said into his microphone, “and have Mick on standby.”
An hour later, Matt was back at the hospital. This time, he was in Michael’s private office instead of a public waiting room. Apparently, his doctor uncle had special privileges and a lot of pull.
Anna was being checked out in a private room somewhere, while he waited and paced and thought of a hundred different ways to make Manny Falco hurt.
“Hey,” Kieran said, stepping into the office.
“Any news?”
“Mick’s got her in X-ray now.”
“Where’s Falco?”
“At an undisclosed location.”
“I want to talk to him.”
“Not a good idea.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Kieran sat down. “It means, you should let us handle it.”
“What am I supposed to do, just walk away? Pretend none of this happened?”
“Yes. That’s the plan, right? To walk away and not look back?”
The words felt like a slap in the face, mostly because they were true. It was then Matt realized that Kieran knew. But Matt refused to have this conversation right now.
“You can’t let him go. As long as he knows she’s alive, he’s a threat to her.”
Kieran nodded. “We’re aware.”
“I want a piece of him.”
“Why?”
Matt ground his molars together. Kieran knew damn well why. He wanted Matt to say it, but he couldn’t. Speaking those words would make them too real.
When the silence stretched between them, Kieran rose and patted him on the shoulder.
Then, he walked away, closing the door quietly behind him.