3. Searching…
three
Searching…
Mikey was skimming over another dead-end report when Miguel sauntered into the office with the morning’s coffee delivery. It had been a long night of tag with a few straggling Ink Blots for much of the family’s night shift, which meant Mikey had been on call later than he’d intended. The worst, though, was that all they had to show for it was two captured punks who probably didn’t know shit worth dragging out of them and hours’ worth of security footage he and Berto would have to scrub.
“Got your caffeine fix,” Miguel said, already setting the cup down. “Heard rumor last night was a blast for the street crews. Anything fun?”
“You really want to know?” Some days Mikey liked the guy, other days he wanted to throttle him. Usually it depended on how much sleep he’d had. This was not going to be Miguel’s best day.
Miguel shrugged in Mikey’s peripheral vision. “Prob’ly not.” But he didn’t make himself scarce like he usually did during these conversations, either. Instead, he blew out a breath and said, “You know how yesterday Richardson was just kinda … out of it?”
The question drew Mikey’s attention and he turned his eyes from his display. “I remember.”
Miguel glanced down at his own cup. “She’s definitely weirder today. I mean, she basically blew me off for the morning coffee run. She’s never done that.”
Mikey scowled and quickly called up the footage from her arrival that morning. He’d glanced over it earlier, but he’d only been looking for obvious things. She hadn’t raced into the parking lot, though she had walked briskly from her car to the building. She never once looked around or eased her grip of her purse. When he switched to the elevator view, he saw Brandi stood in the back corner with her arms around herself and her eyes closed. Was she tired? Upset about something?
He closed out of the footage and leaned back. “Let’s see if she pulls out of it by noon. Keep me updated if you notice anything concerning.”
“Yeah, sure,” Miguel said. This time he did turn and let himself out.
Mikey drummed his fingers on the desktop, gaze drifting toward the half-glass wall of his office, in the direction of Brandi Richardson’s desk. She really was a puzzle. It drove him crazy that he couldn’t figure her out with a simple keystroke.
He knew where she’d gone to college, he knew what she’d majored in and the GPA she’d maintained. He knew she’d attended an all-girls primary school, then been pulled into home school through her high school years. He knew her parents had divorced when she was six, and for reasons no logic could define, Wesley had been awarded full custody. As far as Mikey’s search had revealed, Brandi’s mother had run up to Canada and eventually moved clear to the west coast. He couldn’t even say for sure if Brandi had ever heard from her mother again. He knew Brandi had moved back to Newark after college and gone to work for her father, in a job that neither properly employed her technical skills nor paid her what she was worth. He knew she had moved into her current residence only the summer before, not even six months before Wesley had sold to Dante.
He knew all the technical information. None of it revealed what drove her.
There were no candid photos of her out on the town with her no-good father, or maybe with a date. He couldn’t find any indications that she’d inherited her father’s gambling habit, or even a recent online dating profile. She’d had one during her college years, and she of course had deleted all her information from the site when she’d left it after a sparse three months of use. All he’d found was a trace of a record that she’d been there.
Mikey dragged a hand through his hair and forced his attention back to the work that waited for him. Dwelling solved nothing. Inevitably, the information he needed would present itself. He just needed patience.
He lifted his coffee and paused again. It really was unusual for her to decline the free coffee delivery. Was she just not feeling well? He sipped at his drink and flicked a glance at his phone clock, her words from the day before replaying in his mind.
She’d said she only needed two hours to finish her active project. She’d already been at her desk for over forty minutes.
I’ll give her the morning. It was more than she’d asked for. If he didn’t have the project on his desk before she left for lunch—or if she tried to work through it again—he’d step in.
She wasn’t sure if she felt sick from having been punched in the ribs, if her stalker had hit some kind of nerve when he’d knocked her out, or if it was psychological. If she were a betting woman—which she was not—she’d put her money on the pit in her stomach being psychological. It wasn’t as if she’d never been hit in the torso before.
What she’d never had to deal with was a dangerous psycho breaking into her home in the dead of night, roughing her up and threatening worse, all to get a message to her goddamn useless father. Who wasn’t answering his phone. She’d tried him twice that morning already and it was pissing her off.
She didn’t finish her project until it was time for lunch. Miguel had already shut down for break and she waved off whatever probably friendly thing he said, desperate to finish proofing the code so she could save it and deliver it. She’d promised her boss she could have it done in under two hours, and she’d been working on it for four. The minor bug she’d encountered on her first go-through half an hour earlier wasn’t even the hold up. She just couldn’t focus.
But at ten after twelve she stood, drive in hand, and nearly walked straight into her boss.
Mikey caught her by the elbow as she stumbled back, keeping her from anything more embarrassing, like falling on her ass. “Trying to work through lunch again, Richardson?”
Brandi blew out a breath. “No, sir.” She raised the drive. “I was just finishing up. The file’s right here.”
He raised a brow and held out his palm, allowing her to drop it into his hand. “Two hours, huh?”
She ground her teeth. “I apologize. I’ve just had something on my mind this morning.” She lifted her purse from the back of her chair, which wasn’t even where she usually put it, she realized. “If I’m free to go, I really shouldn’t skip lunch two days in a row.” Not that it would hurt her figure. Her doctor kept lecturing her about losing weight, the pig. He didn’t seem to give a shit about her sense of self or the fact that she was comfortable in her skin. The numbers on the chart said she was overweight, so he wanted the pounds off.
Mikey shifted his weight, lowering his arm and closing his fist around the drive. “You’re still ahead of schedule. I’ll look it over this afternoon.” He paused, but didn’t move. “Is something the matter, Richardson?”
The name grated down her spine. “Only that you refuse to call me Brandi.” She didn’t let the words linger. “May I take my break now, Mr. De Salvo?”
She swore his lips twitched, but it happened so quickly she wasn’t sure she hadn’t hallucinated it. This time he stepped aside. “Give yourself an hour. Try to unwind.” He held up the drive. “A reward for coming in a full week ahead of schedule.” Then he turned and strode back to his office.
Brandi blew out a breath and went straight to the elevator. She didn’t have the energy to argue. If she had extra time, she could use it to actually eat and hopefully get some answers. But she wasn’t foolish enough to make that call until she was back in her car, the doors locked and her seatbelt buckled for peace of mind. She rolled the engine over and paired her phone to the car so she could multitask, then put the car in motion.
This time, by some miracle, her jackass father answered. “Three calls in one morning. The guilt must really be eating at you.”
“Shove it,” she snapped. She swung a little too sharply into traffic and aimed for the first place she could think of. “Who the hell do you owe money to?”
“I beg your pardon? You have a lot of nerve speaking to me this way after last night, young lady.”
“First, you don’t get to ‘young lady’ me anymore,” she said in her firmest tone. She switched lanes and her gaze snagged on a familiar, stomach-churning SUV in her rearview mirror. And she wasn’t hungry. She was only scared. She passed the turn she’d wanted and decided to go for the interstate. Maybe she could lose the bastard. “Second, if you would pay your goddamn debts—or, here’s a thought, control your spending like a grown-ass adult—then maybe I wouldn’t have woken up to a stranger standing over my bed at four o’clock in the morning.”
Wesley was silent for several seconds. Then, of all the responses she’d expected, he let out a heavy, disappointed sigh. “You really are on a tear, Brandi. Pull yourself together.” The line clicked.
Her jaw dropped. “Are you fucking kidding me?” She screamed the words into the empty car, tears of frustration and fury burning her eyes. No. No more crying. Her throat swelled and she swallowed hard, forcing the emotion down to the depths of her soul. She’d wasted enough tears on that man, and the messes he remorselessly dumped her in.
Her father wasn’t the only grown-ass adult in this situation. She would get herself out, somehow. And if he didn’t like her methods? Well, she’d given him the opportunity to do it his way.
The real question was, what method did she have available?
Brandi switched lanes and accelerated, hoping to get lost in lunchtime traffic. It was ultimately a losing strategy, because she wasn’t going to run away from her job. She liked her job most days. But if she could ditch the monster tailing her, even just for a moment, she might feel a little stronger.
Her plan was going great. She lost sight of her stalker’s SUV in less than ten minutes, and just to be safe, she took a few extra atypical turns. She knew the area; she wasn’t worried about getting lost.
She never considered being worried about suddenly becoming stranded.
On a less-than-desirable side road, in an attempt to circle back around to somewhere she’d prefer to be, Brandi heard an unfamiliar bursting sound and her car gave a violent jerk. She managed to get it under control, but was forced to pull to the side of the one-way street. Her heart hammered in her chest. She checked all her mirrors, again, but still saw nothing.
There was a building not far behind her, but it didn’t look occupied and she saw no movement. No other cars were visible. She couldn’t even see a bird.
Telling herself not to freak out, Brandi cut the engine, grabbed her phone, and stepped from the car. She saw the problem as soon as she shut the door. Her front driver’s side tire was shredded.
“Sonofabitch.” Brandi popped her trunk and moved around to the back of the car, hoping she misremembered her bad habit. She was fairly sure she hadn’t removed the spare, though figuring out how to get into the underneath panel was another thing. The larger issue was her tendency to take the tools out of her car and forget to put them back.
A subtle, but undeniable click from behind her made her go completely still.
“Go ahead an’ step back from the car,” an unfamiliar male voice said. She shouldn’t have been relieved that it wasn’t her stalker, but it wasn’t, and she was.
Brandi released a slow breath. “Okay.” She didn’t insist on saying more or try to turn around. She very literally stepped backward, slowly, until she was out of arm’s reach of her car.
Two figures moved past her, one up to the trunk and one toward the shredded tire. A third figure remained in her periphery. “You got anythin’ traceable in there?” The third was definitely the one who’d spoken originally.
Brandi made no attempt to look in his direction. Instead, she kept her head pointed down. She could see shoes and pant legs, enough to get a rough idea of body size, but not enough to confidently identify anyone. “There’s a built-in GPS.” She had left her tablet at the office, thank goodness.
“And?” her babysitter pushed while his companions set about replacing her shredded tire.
Brandi swallowed. “Some cash in my wallet. Everything else is plastic, credit not debit. My other electronics are at home. Not a problem.” Except for the phone in her pocket, but she’d much rather keep that, of course.
“Uh-huh.” The barrel of a gun pressed into her cheek and she squeezed her eyes shut. “You’re awfully cooperative.”
“Forget it,” another male snapped. “Too much trouble.”
The gunman scoffed and pulled his gun from her skin.
Torturous seconds passed and something heavy hit the ground next to her feet. “We’re done,” the same other male declared. “Get the keys.”
“Keys, bitch,” the original speaker demanded immediately.
Brandi pointed to the car without lifting her head. “Still in the ignition.” She’d left them there in case she’d needed to make a quick getaway—how that had made sense she now wasn’t sure—but she supposed it was working in her favor. Maybe.
The car door opened and the second speaker said, “I see ‘em. Let’s go.”
The gunman stepped in front of her, obscuring her limited view as the other two clambered into her car. “Close your eyes and count to fifty. You fuckin’ move from this spot, maybe my friends come by and blow your head off.” He pressed the gun to her forehead and whispered, “Boom, bitch.”
She shut her eyes again and whispered, “Okay.” She swallowed against a fresh set of nerves. “One … two…”
The gun left her skin and another door slammed. She almost didn’t hear a smaller, softer impact on the dirt seconds before the engine rolled over and her car peeled away. Dirt kicked up, almost directly in her face, choking her and leaving her coughing.
By the time Brandi cleared her throat and blinked her eyes open, the car and her assailants were gone. Her heart was pounding so wildly she thought she might faint. She looked around slowly, wondering who else might manage to crawl out of what hadn’t looked like much of a ditch but was clearly sufficient for hiding at least three adult males. All she saw was her purse, half the contents spilling at her feet. Slowly, she bent and scooped it up. Her wallet was there, but open. The cash and credit cards were missing, of course.
Brandi glanced to the side, where the remains of her shredded tire rested, and a once-familiar sense of helplessness built up in her chest. I’ve been carjacked. She couldn’t even believe it.
She should have just gone for food and dealt with the stupid fucking stalker. At least he’d never approached her during the day.
She sank to the dirt, well aware that she was too far from anything to walk there in a reasonable time frame. She would need to call someone and she’d sleep in this spot before she’d call her father. So she pulled out her phone and looked up a local cab company.
“I really appreciate you making time for me out of your busy schedule, Mikey,” Eleonora De Salvo said with her usual warm smile.
Mikey felt his expression soften as he looked over at his mother. “I always have time for family, Mom.” He indicated the tablet that was technically hers, though he was well aware she left it to her head of security to operate. “And this is literally what I do.”
Eleonora laughed quietly. “That big brain of yours never ceases to amaze me.” She clasped her hands together. “So do you think you can do what I want?”
“Of course.” She’d asked him to upgrade her home security, saying that with the incoming of more grandbabies to think of, she wanted to be sure her home was as safe as possible. Not that she needed an excuse. If it was within his power, Mikey would give her whatever she asked for. “I can get it done this weekend, if that’s good for you. Shouldn’t take more than a couple hours.”
Her eyes widened. “Really? It won’t need rewiring or anything?”
This time he chuckled. “No wires required.”
She waved a hand dismissively. “It might as well be magic at this point, I swear.”
He stood, and she stood as well. “I’ll do the technical part, don’t worry about it.” He let her pull him into a hug, promised he would be there for dinner on Friday like always, and made his way to the door. If he weren’t his own boss, he’d be late getting back to work. The butler nodded respectfully at him as he passed and Mikey jogged down the steps to his car. He almost didn’t register the buzzing of his phone in his pocket.
It was Brandi, of all people, and he was surprised enough to come to a full stop. He didn’t think she had ever called him without him having called her first. That concern he’d thought he’d felt earlier flickered again somewhere in his chest and he accepted the call. “Go ahead.”
She pulled in a breath and he knew two things immediately. She was not okay, and she was not at the office. “I’m sorry to bother you, sir,” she said, her voice shaky. “I know I’m late. I’ve been trying to get a cab, but no one will come out here or no one can promise to be here in less than a couple of hours and—”
“Where are you?” Mikey pulled open his door and ducked inside, quickly queuing up his GPS. He couldn’t immediately decipher the twisting sensation that struck him at the unfamiliar tone in her voice, or the recognition that she was calling him for help, so he put that reflection on hold. His fingers stilled as his brain registered the street name she gave him. Anger lashed through him. “What the hell are you doing out there?”
“I … went for a drive. I needed to clear my head. I was just trying to take a shortcut back and … I got carjacked.” There was obviously more to the story than that, but the punchline hit a little too hard to ignore.
Mikey programmed in the location, mostly as a precaution, and switched the phone to speaker so he could do something more useful with his hands. “Are you hurt?”
“They didn’t hurt me. Just took my car, and my credit cards. So … my pride, you know?” She made a sound like she was going for a laugh, but she failed miserably. She also didn’t actually deny an injury, which he thought was interesting.
“I’m on the wrong side of town,” he said. “I’ll send a team ahead. If they don’t give my name, I didn’t send them. Don’t waste your phone battery on more calls.”
“Thank you,” she whispered before he could disconnect. The watery sound of her words had his fingers tightening over the steering wheel.
It was hard to unclench even enough to dial the man he wanted, but it was necessary.
“’Sup?” Ryōma answered after the first ring.
Ordinarily, Mikey would have rolled his eyes at the greeting. Cristiano’s friend was a little too casual sometimes. But he was also dependable. “Are you free?”
“I am indeed.” Ryōma paused. “Are you angry? You sound angry. That’s unusual for you.”
“I get angry all the time. I just hide it better than my brothers.”
“So that’s a yes.”
“Grab at least two men and get over to Hogue Street. Brandi Richardson’s been carjacked and might have been less than honest about her well-being. I’m fifteen to twenty minutes away.”
“Protection detail, then. I can handle that.” Ryōma paused. “Richardson, isn’t that—”
“She’s one of my best employees and she’s called for help. She knows what that means.”
“Yes, sir.” Mikey wasn’t sure if there was really a grin in Ryōma’s voice or if he was so used to hearing the man’s voice that way that he defaulted to picturing it. Regardless, the response felt almost taunting. Mikey might have snarked at it, but Ryōma didn’t stay on the line long enough to let him.
Probably for the best.
Brandi was one of his best employees. That was actually the first time he’d put the sentiment into words. Statistically it was accurate. He wouldn’t have given her a top-floor desk if it weren’t. But acknowledging the fact under these circumstances felt … different. Everything felt fucking different the past few days and he couldn’t put his finger on why.
So he set that aside, too, and just drove. He’d told Ryōma he was fifteen to twenty minutes out, but that was only if he obeyed the speed limit.
Brandi felt so stupid. She’d called four different cab companies, the process for which had all on its own made her late for work, and she wanted to scream. She wasn’t sure why she resisted. The first company refused to send its cars to that area of the city. The man who’d answered had the gall to lecture her for being ‘dumb enough’ to go there in the first place, before promptly hanging up. The second company hadn’t ever answered the phone. The third had given a less severe version of the same answer the first had given, and the fourth had avoided outright refusal by saying it might take two or more hours. That she should call other companies and call back if no one was available sooner.
She was never spending another dime on cabs again.
And those rideshare companies? They didn’t have anyone available for her requested area, either. She was mad enough to want to delete her entire account, but she talked herself down off that ledge for the time being. Though calling her boss—a mafia man—for help instead probably hadn’t been a whole lot smarter.
At least he’d answered the phone, and not laughed or lectured her right off.
What was the world coming to when a third-generation mafia man had more humanity than a supposedly not-criminal businessman?
The sound of an approaching engine drew Brandi’s attention and she sniffled, realizing some of her tears had leaked free despite her best efforts. She turned, phone and purse clutched tightly in her grasp. The sight of the approaching SUV petrified her for several paralyzing seconds before she realized it was shiny, polished black and coming the wrong way up the one-way street. Definitely not her stalker.
The SUV spun in an impressively tight circle, parking almost perfectly parallel, just feet from her. Three of the four doors popped open and two men and one woman climbed out. None of them familiar, all of them wearing clichéd black.
Brandi pushed to her feet, not wanting to be sitting in the dirt for whatever happened next. She brushed off her jeans, shouldered her purse, and watched as one of the men took up a position at the head of the SUV while the female moved to stand at the rear, facing her. The other man, the driver, walked toward her.
He was tall, about six foot, and lean muscle with dark hair and distinctly Asian features. Tattoos danced down his bare forearms. His lips kicked up in a lopsided smile. “Brandi Richardson?”
Remembering Mikey’s words, she said, “Who’s asking?”
His smile widened. “Michele De Salvo sent us. I’m Ryōma.”
“Mr. De Salvo’s here,” the female said almost simultaneously.
Ryōma whistled, his gaze shifting from Brandi, toward the engine Brandi hadn’t registered hearing behind her. “Someone blew a few reds.” He sounded amused.
Brandi turned in place, watching as a car she recognized from the parking lot at work came to a stop almost in front of her. The tension inside of her began to settle. They may not perfectly understand each other, and her father’s behavior might make it impossible for her to ever fully fit in, but at least she knew she could call on someone if it truly became necessary.
The thought sliced the air from her lungs even as Mikey stepped from the car.
When was the last time she’d honestly felt as though she could rely on anyone beyond herself?
But the proof was there, directly in front of her. Scowling and staring down at her, as handsome as ever and completely out of place in the rough, abandoned neighborhood. He hadn’t just sent someone to get her. He’d come himself.
Brandi swallowed hard and found herself smiling. “Thank you, sir,” she said quietly.
Mikey cursed. “Come on, get in. Let’s get the hell out of here. You can talk while I drive.” He looked past her, not waiting for a response. “Follow us out.”
“Yes, sir.”
Mikey walked with her around the car, even opening the passenger door for her, and in the strange moment he spoke again, voice quieter. “Relax. You’re safe with me.”