Chapter 1
Chapter
One
Present Day
ANVIL
People call the main house in C’s compound ‘the castle’ because of the turrets. The mansion doesn’t look like it belongs in the neighborhood. Four decaying houses were leveled to put it here.
It belongs here because we do. Ever since we broke from Frank Palermo three years ago and started our own crue, we’ve lived on this patch.
The compound’s surrounded by a cement wall with razor wire at the top. It’s probably overkill, since anyone storming the gate better come with assault rifles and enough rounds to stage a coup in Moscow.
This is the devil’s stronghold, and I’m the devil’s right hand.
My cement-walled apartment’s off the back of the castle. As I walk down the grated metal stairs, my phone buzzes half a dozen times in my pocket. I shake my head. Fucking Trick.
I come around the house and find Trick standing on C’s front step, looking at his phone. He looks up as I head to one of the two C Crue Rovers.
“Your porterhouse is three minutes out. Aberdeen Street and counting,” he says.
Trick doesn’t give a fuck whether I eat the steak I ordered or not.
He’s on to something and wants to run it down.
The guy couldn’t give fuck all about most things, but he doesn’t like mysteries where our crue is concerned.
And I’ve been coming and going without explanation.
Usually my only business is crue business, so he and C are wondering what’s up.
“Toss it in the fridge. I’ll eat it later,” I say, my tone casual. I doubt he’s fooled. Trick’s a pretty boy, which makes a lot of thugs underestimate him. Long experience has shown that to be a deadly mistake.
“Who is she?” Trick asks, taking a stab.
I shake my head, not looking to let him go on a fishing expedition into my personal business.
“Has to be. Let me come and meet her. I’ll hang back,” he says.
I roll my eyes. He thinks I’m into some woman and that I’m afraid to bring her around in case she sees him and gets distracted.
It’s true that when Trick shows up, most women don’t notice much else for a while, but I don’t need his promise that he’ll watch himself if I’m serious about someone.
The person I’ve got serious plans for already knows him.
Also, my plans aren’t hearts and flowers. My plan is to satisfy a vendetta.
“‘Vil,” Trick says, pulling my attention from my plans. “What’s up?”
I open the Rover’s door and almost smirk.
Not knowing what I’m doing is driving him crazy.
I guess maybe I should’ve realized it would.
Trick’s a guy who likes to know things and his mind never stops.
He’s probably playing three games of chess and dissecting the stock market’s moves in his head right now.
“It’s not about that,” I say.
“So?”
“Are you my fucking wife?” I counter.
He cracks a smile.
I reach under the running board, yank off the GPS tracker, and toss it over the top of the truck. It hits the ground a few feet from him.
“Bad idea. Seriously,” I say with a scowl. None of us can afford to have our movements tracked. We had the GPS disabled in the Rovers. I’m surprised he’d put one on the truck even as a joke.
His smirk drops. “Wait then.” He comes over and takes another tracker from under the front seat.
I roll my eyes again. “Asshole.” He knows better. We keep watch over our vehicles and sweep them all the time to prevent tracking. The feds and Frank would both like to know where we’re at and what we’re doing.
“If you’re in something and need backup, I’ll come. No questions.”
“I know,” I say.
Trick and I are opposites in a lot of things, but we’re the same in a couple of ways that count. We’re at the top of a crue that was built on loyalty. We’ve got each other’s backs, down to the last drop of blood. Always.
“I’ve got things under control,” I say, knowing that might not be the case.
“All right,” Trick says. His phone pings. “Food’s here.”
He walks down to the gate.
I get in the truck and drive away, leaving the compound and the dinner I’ll never eat.
Ten minutes outside town, there’s an unmarked Dodge in a field where there are no closed circuit television cameras. I put the fake license plates on it last night and filled the tank from a gas can. Then I sped down the back roads to be sure it’s ready to make the run I’m planning.
The car’s ready. The restraints in the trunk are ready. And I’m ready.
I drive the Rover to it and make the switch of vehicles.
I’m coming for her.
RACHEL
I’m standing on the Langston Theater stage alone. It’s our community theater, but it’s also a newly restored historic theater that’s gilded to within an inch of its life.
I look down at the anonymous note that was left at the stage door for me on closing night of our limited run, original production.
My best friend Zoe and I wrote a dark fairy tale called A Midsummer Night’s Glare, and both performed in it.
Her role was as principle dancer. I stayed behind the curtain, playing lead violin in secret.
People from up and down the East Coast have come to town to see it. I’m proud of us.
But I didn’t get to perform in the final show because my father has cracked down, and I’m more of a prisoner than ever in his house. He’s suspicious of everyone. This might be the last time I manage to sneak out alone.
I look inside the envelope where there’s a train ticket to take me from Boston to Chicago.
I read the note again.
Leave Coynston before it’s too late. There’s a room for you at the Drake Hotel in Chicago.
I think the note is probably a test. Most likely, it’s one of my father’s tricks to see if I’ll take the bait.
He’s paranoid that I’ll take off before my wedding.
I narrow my eyes at the heavy bond paper.
The note could also be a little trap of Alberto Leone’s.
He’s my fiancé, and he also seems concerned I might disappear in the night.
I won’t. I can’t.
I wish I could. But my own Midsummer Nightmare doesn’t get a happy ending.
I slide the note into my violin case and take Lady Indigo out. I turn and face the rows of empty velvet-covered seats. Even in the low light, there’s a golden glow that I love.
I didn’t get to play on the night the show closed and I didn’t get to go to the cast party, so I want to play my own music onstage one last time.
This needs to be my final quiet rebellion because Frank’s angry.
I don’t care that he’s mad at me, but the brutal ways he’s cracked down on everyone who might’ve helped me makes me sick.
He’s also preventing me from seeing Zoe.
The war between C Crue and the Palermo syndicate is raging, fueled recently by Zoe’s defection to the C Crue camp and by our play production, which tells the story of how Frank tried to kill my mother on the day she left him.
I shake my head. My life’s been so messed up from as far back as I can remember.
I try to tell myself that being given to Alberto Leone is my way out. At least I won’t be under my father’s thumb anymore. Alberto can be a jerk, but I’ve mostly figured out how to appease him and how to control situations when I can’t.
I close my eyes and play my heart out, until I’m shaking from the thrill of it.
When I finish, I put my violin away. Maybe I can get Alberto to let me join an orchestra in New York. What if Zoe and I got to do off-Broadway together? It could happen. Not right away, but maybe one day.
I pick up my case and walk backstage. I shut off the stage lights and then move down the silent hall, flipping switches to darken the hall as I pass through it.
My stomach hurts. I realize I haven’t eaten since yesterday. Do I dare pick up food and text Zoe to meet me at her old place? She has one more month on her lease and the last I heard she still had furniture in the apartment.
The last I heard. There was a time when we texted all the time and talked at least once a day.
Now I haven’t spoken to her in three weeks.
Frank confiscated my phone and only allows me to use it to talk with Alberto.
I know I could use the burner I secretly bought, but it doesn’t seem worth it.
When I’m finally married and in New York, I’ll have my own phone back.
I’ll be able to talk and text with her when I feel like it.
I step outside, planning my route to the borrowed car I snuck away in. I’ll be glad to stop sneaking around. I’m sick of all of this.
When I turn I see a black sports car that shouldn’t be parked near the stage door. It has tinted windows. I glance around and a hulking figure emerges from a dark corner of the building.
My head jerks up, and I recognize Sasha Stroviak.
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
His big arm catches me around the waist. My feet leave the ground and I’m tipped sideways. My hands fumble to hold onto my violin case, but I drop it.
“No,” I shout.
He raises the unlatched top of the trunk and drops me into it. A piece of pre-cut duct tape is slapped over my mouth and my wrists are tethered behind me. A blanket billows and falls over me, plunging me into complete blackness. Then the trunk’s lid slams down.
I twist and try to yell from behind the tape, but the world is muffled.
A couple of moments later, the motor drowns out the sound of my feet kicking the sides of the trunk. I’m in a panic over my violin being left outside. I know I should be panicked for myself too, but I haven’t completely processed the danger yet.
Anvil Stroviak is kidnapping me.