Chapter 31
31
Cassius
W e’re back in River’s office two hours later.
“Alexandra Mancini,” I say and drop the folder wide open on my brother’s desk. Its contents spill across for everyone to see. Copies of official documents our federal buddies were kind enough to give us. “Not Jones. Alexandra Angelica Mancini, sister of Vince Mancini. Their father was tried and convicted due to their activities with Perry-Sage. Their uncle, Jonas Mancini, is currently one of the family’s six dons.”
“Fucking hell,” River gasps, his eyes wide with horror. “How did we miss this?”
“They’ve got some competent folks working cyber for them, most likely after the Perry-Sage debacle,” Nathan says. “Upon taking a second look, some inconsistencies arose. We just didn’t pay attention to any of them because we didn’t know about the Mancinis or their interest in Portland, or Christa, for that matter.”
“Hell, when Alexandra approached us, we didn’t even know Christa was coming back to Portland, let alone that she had anything to do with them,” River says, then gives Nathan a worried look. “Where is the bitch now?”
“She slipped away shortly after we saw her earlier.”
“Of course,” I scoff, shaking my head. “I’ve already alerted security, and the FBI is aware. They’re gearing up for an investigation of their own.”
Nathan frowns. “It felt nasty to go into Spike’s computer like that, but I hope the Feds can use what we gave them.”
“Spike was working for them on other matters, but even they were surprised to hear he had a computer setup in his home. He wasn’t supposed to,” I reply.
“That’s good,” Nathan says. “It means Spike was smarter than everyone else. God, I hope he was smarter than everyone, and that the last message he sent actually means something.”
“The Feds are looking into that, too. They’ve got a crew of analysts combing through Spike’s computer as we speak. They’re prepping subpoenas and search warrants for the Portland-based Mancini operations. Hopefully, it will lead somewhere.” I sigh deeply. “What about Teagan? Is she safe?”
Nathan nods once. “Yeah, I dropped her off at home. Tony’s with her. I made sure their security system is working. They know to call, whatever happens. But I don’t think they’re a target. Not yet, anyway. I think Alexandra and Vince are cooking up something.”
“For us,” I conclude.
“They have Christa, too,” River says.
“They don’t know what we know, though,” I remind him. “They’re spoiled little shits who have other people do their dirty work for them.”
It still doesn’t bring us closer to a favorable conclusion. I don’t even know where to begin a search for Christa. Nathan was smart to make backup copies of everything he sent to the Feds from Spike’s computer.
“I flagged a couple of folders,” he says as he flips open his laptop and boots up. “Turns out, Spike did some illegal research on the Mancinis’ presence in Portland over the past couple of days. He connected them to about a dozen shell corporations that have been operating in the city for about a decade. Each of these have properties listed among their assets.”
“It makes sense that Vince and Alexandra would take Christa to one such property,” I agree. “It would have to be abandoned, though. They wouldn’t risk taking her someplace where there are lots of people around.”
River leans in to get a look at Nathan’s screen. “They’re goons with money. No matter how hard they try to act as businessmen, they still use violence and intimidation to bend people to their will. They must have a few spots where they take the least compliant ones to persuade them.”
“I’ve got three possible locations,” Nathan says, pulling them up for us to see. “A warehouse in Ardenwald, a farm in Willamette Heights, and an apartment building in Sellwood-Moreland. All three appear to be unoccupied as per the last IRS filing, anyway.”
River gets behind his computer and opens a map of the city on the screen, going over each neighborhood in minute detail while I check my phone for incoming updates. We know whom and what we’re dealing with, but we don’t know where to find them, nor do we have the time we would normally need to search for them.
We only get one shot, and it needs to be the right one.
Nathan’s brow furrows even deeper. He stops typing and looks up at me. “They had a lot of inside knowledge,” he says, his voice low but calm. “About Christa, about Spike. About our security systems. I don’t think Christa is the only one they bugged. Especially since Alexandra has been right under our fucking noses the last couple months.”
“Okay, so from what I’m seeing here, the warehouse might not be the best option, but—” River mutters until Nathan cuts him off.
“Hold on,” he says and rushes out of the office.
“What’s he doing?” River asks me.
The knots in my stomach feel tighter with each passing moment, but when Nathan returns with a device in his hand, I feel like it’s lead weights dropping instead. “Fuck,” I hear myself mutter.
We’ve been so preoccupied with finding Christa and so overwhelmed by these recent discoveries that we failed to take a few details into account—surveillance being one of them. River and I remain silent as Nathan turns the device on and uses it to sweep the office for bugs.
The light goes from green to red when he points the device toward the front-left corner of the desk. We exchange nervous glances as Nathan goes around and under River’s desk, then plucks out a small listening device. It’s the size and shape of a coin, but I see the tiny circuits on one side. Nausea threatens to disrupt my focus until I’m briskly reminded of who we’re up against.
River starts typing a message on his phone, then sends it to us.
Let it run , he writes. Let them think we haven’t found it yet .
I nod in agreement while Nathan puts the bug back where he found it.
“What was that about the warehouse?” I ask River out loud.
“It’s our best bet,” he says, stealing a glance at Nathan as he turns the screen around to show us a different location. We’re not headed to the warehouse. “We should start our search there.”
“We’ll take my car,” Nathan replies.
Five minutes later, we’re downstairs and practically flying out of the building. My blood boils as I go over the following steps.
“She bugged our fucking offices,” I hiss.
“We need our gear for what comes next,” Nathan says. “We need to stop by the mansion first.”
Our Escalades are parked outside, closest to the main entrance. The weather is turning from bad to nasty, though, the winds intensifying as a heavy storm gathers on the horizon with rolling, charcoal clouds. It will make everything harder, but we might find an advantage in the tactical cover of rain.
“They’re expecting us to take Nathan’s car,” River says.
“We’ll take yours then,” I shoot back.
I’m just about to get in the passenger seat, but I stop and freeze at the sight of a blinking red light reflecting onto the pavement. It’s coming from somewhere under the vehicle.
“Stop,” I say, my heart already racing. “Move back.”
“What?” Nathan sounds confused.
“Back! NOW!” I shout and drag River away with me.
Nathan catches up. We’re running toward the front steps when the explosion tears through the entire east corner of the parking lot. People scream. Glass breaks. The ground shakes and shudders as burning car parts fly everywhere.
We make it out of the blast radius, but the heat still brushes over us.
My cheeks burn as I crouch and look back.
As soon as one of the car door locks was deactivated, the charges were set to detonate. They missed us by a handful of seconds, no more.
“Motherfuckers,” Nathan groans, blood trickling from a deep scratch on his cheek from a chunk of debris, but he’s still in one piece and clearly pissed off. “They rigged all three of our cars.”
“Didn’t matter which one we were going to take,” I mutter. “We weren’t getting out of here alive.”
“Is everyone okay?” River shouts at the other Hawthorne staff and visitors in the blast radius’s immediate proximity. “Call 911. Now!”
“We can’t be here when the cops come,” Nathan warns.
In the meantime, tongues of black and orange flames lick at the darkening skies above. I see people running away from the parking lot. I don’t see anyone down, but the smoke thickens as it burns through the fuel and the plastic within the blaze’s reach. We should stick around and help people, but our security personnel are already rushing to secure the area.
And Nathan is right.
We can’t be here when the police arrive. We’ll have to give statements and no time to give them. The Mancinis just tried to execute us.
“We’re taking the fight to them,” I growl. “That’s the fucking last straw.”
The apartment building in Sellwood-Moreland is part of a half block of buildings left derelict for over two years. It sits on a quiet street where only stragglers and dope runners hang out, running their businesses on the corner, squatting in any of the empty apartments, and likely using one or more of the basements as stash houses.
There are no working security cameras in the area either.
“The fellas at that barbershop are about to close for the day,” Nathan says.
Across the street from the Mancinis’ apartment building, a barbershop is still taking customers, by the looks of it.
We’re in one of our backup cars, geared up and ready to go as nightfall stretches over the city with a curtain of cold drizzle. It will turn into a heavy rain soon enough, but for now, the flickering streetlights give us a good cover as we park between two abandoned sedans.
“That leaves the diner,” I say. “It looks empty from here.”
“Just a couple of patrons at the counter,” River replies as he peers through his tactical binoculars. “I think we’re good to breach soon.”
I gaze up at the building. There’s a light on. “Sixth floor. Check it out.”
“I see it,” Nathan says, following my gaze, then pulls up the info sheet on his phone. “The entire building is about to be condemned. No active tenancies or subleases at present. The gas mains were shut down six months ago.”
“The power is still on,” River mutters.
“Might be a generator,” Nathan says. “The power company contract was closed around the same time. There should be no electricity going into the building.”
“Then it’s the place to be,” I conclude. “Get ready to deploy. Three minutes. By now, word must’ve gotten back to the Mancinis that they didn’t kill us.”
Nathan checks his automatic rifle and gives me a cold look. “Oh, they know we’re coming. They just don’t know where and how.”
We get out of the car, carefully checking our surroundings. Under the cover of night, we head for the service entrance of the apartment building, keeping to the shadows and moving in single file.
One by one, we get past the small metal gate and slip between the walls. Once we’re in front of the door, we prepare for the first breach.
I signal to my brothers. Three, two, one.
I go in first, and they’re supposed to follow my lead. But I’m stopped in my tracks and forced to stare down the barrel of a sawed-off shotgun pointed right at my head. My pulse accelerates as I quickly register the unexpected.
They were waiting for us, after all.
“Nice of you to join us, gentlemen,” Vince Mancini says.
“Guess you assholes are smarter than you look,” River mutters from behind.
“Put the weapons down and you might get to spend an extra minute with your brother’s head before I blow it clean off.”
We’re surrounded.
Six men with semiautomatic pistols approach us from the sides and from the staircase. The smell of dampness and mold fills my nostrils and turns my stomach inside out as my mind starts to recalculate our odds of survival and rescue. They don’t look good.
But the fact that Vince isn’t eager to shoot us on sight tells me something.
“What are we doing, Vince?” I ask.
Nathan curses under his breath as Vince forces him and River to surrender their weapons. I thought we’d be one step ahead of them for once, but I guess they still had an ace up their sleeve.
“We’re going to have a reunion,” Vince replies.
Good. That buys us a few more minutes.