Thirty-Nine
THIRTY-NINE
Nat
I NEEDED A WEAPON, assuming Byron could successfully pick a fifty-year-old lock in the dark with shaking hands and no proper tools.
I couldn’t stop and think about any of this. I didn’t dare. This situation was a throwback to the days when I had to act on instinct and worry about the fallout later. Days when my adoptive father came home drunk, and I knew fists were going to be flying. When I knew it was either going to be me left with bruises, or my adoptive mother, and I couldn’t let it be her.
Act first; think never . That was the key.
So, a weapon. The half-rotted cardboard banker’s boxes were useless. The piss bucket was rusted so thin it barely had any heft to it. Plus, they’d smell me coming a mile away. I paced around the old office, trying to yank a metal bar free from the window for the umpteenth time, with exactly the same result as all my previous attempts.
Goddamn it, there was nothing in here . Nothing useful , anyway. I kicked the leg of the old metal desk in frustration.
We’d checked the unlocked drawers earlier, back when we’d had daylight. They were empty. There was nothing available to jimmy the locked ones, so we’d given up.
I kicked it again, letting out a wordless growl. The drawers rattled.
“Could you fucking not ?” Byron snapped. “I am actually trying to concentrate over here.”
“Sorry,” I mumbled. Then I froze. “ Oh .”
The drawers had rattled .
I grabbed a narrow one that wasn’t locked and pulled it out as far as it would go, then started wiggling it up and down. There was usually some kind of a notch in the metal rails that kept drawers from pulling all the way out accidentally. If I could just—
The rusty mechanism screeched, tiny wheels dipping into the safety notch and popping out on the other side. The drawer came free, heavier than I’d expected, based on its size. I turned it around in my hands, finding a two-handed grip on the back edge that wasn’t too sharp. Giving it an experimental swing, I pictured using the heavier weight of the front faceplate as a cudgel.
On the far side of the room, the lock clicked.
“Got it,” Byron said weakly. “Okay, we need to—”
But I was already across the room, reaching past him to twist the handle. The drawer dangled from my other hand.
“You stay here. You’re too weak,” I told him.
Don’t think. Just act.
“Nat...” Byron growled.
I charged into the hallway, peering around at gray shadows to get my bearings. Fortunately, the office was at the end of the hall, meaning there was only one direction they could have taken Luca. I jogged toward the main part of the building, trying to keep my footsteps light—the drawer cradled against my chest like a pointy metal baby.
Berlusconi had told the goons to take Luca to a different room. I stopped and pressed my ear to each door I passed, but everything was dead quiet. Double doors at the end of the hall opened onto the warehouse floor. As soon as I pushed through them, the echoing sounds of someone crying out in fear and rage reached me, sending adrenaline coursing through my veins.
Act, don’t think.
I ran toward the noise, only to trip against something blocky and metal that screeched as it skidded along the concrete floor. I cursed, staggering, and regained my balance just in time to see a door open somewhere ahead of me, light spilling out from inside. There were more rooms along the building’s outer wall, then.
“Hey! Who’s out there?” called one of the goons, raising his voice to be heard over Luca’s screaming.
He was backlit in the open doorway, a gun silhouetted in his raised hand. I charged forward—praying there were no more random items to stumble over—and lifted the drawer in both hands the way I’d practiced. With my full weight behind it, I hauled off and slammed it into the man’s head an instant before I crashed into him.
He dropped like a stone, my momentum sending me over the top of him and several steps into the room. Miraculously, I still had hold of the drawer, although my left hand’s grip was slick and wet now. The metal edge must have sliced open my palm.
“What the fuck !” shouted the second goon, even as Luca screamed “ Get off me !”
I blinked, dazzled by the sudden light after stumbling around in the dark for so long. When details became visible through the glare of portable lights, I found myself facing another angry man with a gun. Only this time, it was already pointed straight at my chest, and I didn’t have the momentum of a running start.
I froze, gripping the drawer in front of me like the world’s lamest non-bulletproof shield.
Luca scrambled off the old metal table where the second guy had apparently been holding him down. He backed away, looking around wildly, and I recognized the all-too-familiar expression of someone looking for a weapon when there were no good weapons to be found.
“Mother fucker ,” the goon cursed, looking past me to the crumpled body in the doorway. “The boss ain’t done with you yet, asshole—but I expect you can still sign a piece of paper after I blow off your fuckin ’ kneecaps!”
Luca had fetched up with his back pressed against the wall to my right.
“Don’t hurt him!” he gasped. His left hand was clamped over his right bicep, and I just had enough time to think, ‘ oh, god, we were too slow’ before the goon sneered and steadied his aim, lowering the barrel of the gun from my chest toward my lower legs.
“I’ll do more than hurt him, you omega piece of crap,” he threatened. “And when I’m done with him, I’m gonna tie you down and make you take it up the ass until you’re shitting ribbons.”
I had a panic-stricken instant to wonder if I could throw the drawer at the guy before he could get a shot off. In my moment of frozen indecision, a weak voice behind me wheezed, “Yeah, don’t think so. Nat, duck .”
Don’t think. Just act .
I dove for the floor, grunting as I landed on the unforgiving edge of the drawer. An explosion of sound deafened me, and when I craned around to look, the goon was halfway through the act of toppling over, as though someone had filmed him in slow motion. The gun fell from his limp hand, although I could barely hear the clatter as it hit concrete.
I whipped around in the other direction, gaping—the breath knocked out of me. Byron was sprawled half on top of the unmoving body of the first goon. A tiny curl of smoke drifted up from the barrel of the stolen gun clasped in his right hand.
He let it fall from his grip, eerily echoing his victim.
The rushing in my ears began to recede, replaced by the muffled sound of three people’s harsh, ragged breathing. I turned, looking for Luca.
The omega slid down the wall, still clutching his arm. His green eyes were as wide as dinner plates, flicking from me to Byron and back again.
“You... you came for me,” he said, the words sounding tinny and distorted through my messed-up hearing. “N-no one ever comes to help... but you came.”
“Did they inject you?” I asked urgently.
He shook his head, looking dazed.
“Your arm?” I pressed, gesturing at the bicep he was holding.
“I think I wrenched my shoulder when they were pinning me down,” he said, sounding worryingly distant and detached. “You’re both hurt. We need to get out of here. Blaze may still be in the building.”
“Love to,” Byron grated out. “Just one small problem.” He gestured at his leg, which was bleeding through the makeshift bandage again.
Somewhere outside, distant sirens sounded. It took me a moment to realize that if I could hear them through the all-pervasive ringing in my ears, they couldn’t be as distant as all that. In fact, they had to be pretty goddamn close.
“Are those sirens getting louder?” I asked.
The other two paused, listening.
“Yeah,” Byron said after a moment. “ Shit .”
He looked at the two unmoving bodies on the floor.
“Wipe your prints off the gun,” I said without thinking, only to stop and shake my head. “No. Wait. It’s not a crime to use force when someone’s threatening your life.”
The sirens were getting really close now.
Byron snorted, the gray cast of his face making him look like a particularly sickly Ghost of Christmas Past. “Yeah, I’m sure the cops’ll be completely understanding when they burst in on this shitshow.”
Luca let go of his injured arm and pushed himself to his feet, wavering for a moment before he locked his knees. “Stay here, both of you. I’ll go wait for them outside with my hands up and explain what happened.”
I managed to push myself upright as well. “With Berlusconi still unaccounted for? Like hell you will. I’ll go.”
Luca made a small noise in his throat and slid right back down the wall, as though his burst of strength had exhausted itself with that single act of bravery.
“Okay,” he whispered.
I wasn’t sure how much longer my adrenaline-fueled muscles were going to keep cooperating. Even so, I couldn’t just climb over Byron and the unconscious goon, leaving them behind in a tangle.
“Come on,” I said, taking Byron’s arm and helping him stagger upright. “Let’s get you lying down and elevate that leg again.”
The goon didn’t so much as twitch, and I had the horrible thought that I might’ve killed him outright.
Don’t think , I reminded myself firmly.
I got Byron settled on the floor with his heel propped up on the edge of the low metal table. “Stay here and try to look unthreatening. I think the cops are almost here.”
“I’ll get right on that,” Byron wheezed, staring up at the moldy ceiling tiles.
I patted his shoulder and gave Luca what I hoped was an encouraging smile. Then I hurried out of the room, trying very hard not to register the blood coating one side of the goon’s slack face as I sidled past him.
Outside might as well have been pitch black now that my eyes had adjusted to the portable lights inside the room. I blinked rapidly, trying to force them to make out shapes in the dark. There was a large rectangle in the far wall that seemed lighter than its surroundings. An open delivery door? I peered at it, and sure enough, I could make out faint strobing color beyond. Red and blue... police car emergency lights.
I headed in that direction, feeling my way.
I’d made it maybe twenty feet when a flashlight pierced the darkness. It came from a different corner of the warehouse floor—were the police already inside?
“Officer?” I called, raising my hands for good measure. “I need help—there are people injured!”
The flashlight beam landed on my face, blinding me.
“ You !” Berlusconi snarled. “How the hell did you call the cops here? Never mind—you’re my hostage. Stay right where you are, or I’ll shoot you in the fucking face !”
More lights illuminated the echoing space, crisscrossing crazily.
“Freeze!” shouted a deep voice. “Drop the gun!”
Berlusconi’s flashlight dipped away from my face, no longer dazzling me. As the afterimages cleared, I could make out a dozen dark shapes swarming the building, fanning out in all directions. Several beams merged on Berlusconi like spotlights in a stage performance.
My heart jolted. His gun was still pointing at my head. But as I watched, frozen, his gaze darted around the warehouse like a cornered prey animal. Unthinkingly, he turned, the pistol pointing vaguely in the direction of the swarming police.
“Drop the gun, drop the gun !” shouted another voice.
An instant later, the warehouse floor rang out with dozens of shots. Berlusconi jerked like a marionette in the hands of a drunken puppeteer, staggering backward.
I dove for the floor for the second time in less than ten minutes, covering my head with my hands. Blood from my cut palm stuck to my hair.
More yelling. “Man down! Requesting medical support!”
And then someone snapped, “Stay down! Identify yourself!” from very close by.
“I’m unarmed!” I said, my voice shaking. “My name is Nathaniel Bell! I was kidnapped with two other people from the Elderflower Inn restaurant in Soulard! We need help—one of them is badly injured!”
Rough hands lifted me to my feet. “Can you walk?”
I stumbled, leaning against a broad shoulder. “Y-yes. I’ll take you to them. Please hurry.”
“Forsythe, Jamison, Walker—with me!” barked my living crutch. “Fall in, we’ve got injured victims in the building. You... Mr. Bell. Lead the way.”