Chapter 5
Chapter
Five
RACHEL
The gravel road is hard on my feet, and the woods are eerie. I wish I had a flashlight, but I couldn’t find one.
I don’t know how long I walk. Two hours? Maybe three.
I follow the narrow private roads off the property to paved ones. Finally I end up on a highway. I flag down the first car that passes. It’s a woman driving alone. Sometimes it’s helpful to be doll-sized.
She asks a lot of questions. I tell her I got drunk and lost. I don’t think she believes me, but I just smile and tell her I’m fine. And strangely, that’s the truth, despite the ordeal.
Deep down, I’ve been fascinated by Sasha since the first time I laid eyes on him.
My father brought him to my mother’s when he’d just joined the syndicate.
He was only eighteen, but there was something to him.
He kept to himself, never speaking to anyone except C for those first months.
He ate alone in the kitchen, came and left like a black shadow.
But gossip got back to me. C had befriended him because he’d stood up to a handful of gang members who’d tried to drag a girl into an alley.
He started out as a tall skinny kid who flung himself into fights that seemed unwinnable. By high school, his mom died and he moved in with C’s family and grew into a mountain of fearless fury.
“Harness that, and you have the weapon you need to take over a major city,” C had said to convince Frank to let him bring Sasha into the syndicate with him.
Because Sasha didn’t say much and had an accent, a lot of people seemed to think he was stupid.
But I’d noticed immediately that when my father spoke Russian to his associates, Sasha understood him.
I also noticed that Trick, who was brilliant at finance, and C, who knew more about criminal law than a lot of lawyers, never talked down to Sasha.
When C planned anything important it was in a huddle with Trick and Sasha, and all three weighed in.
My father’s guys were not allowed to talk to me, so trying to talk to Sasha directly was useless. I resorted to working out in the home gym at times that overlapped with his workouts and I dropped into the kitchen when I knew he’d be there eating.
There hadn’t been much of a point to it. He acknowledged me when I greeted him, but otherwise didn’t engage. Sometimes I’d think he was watching me, but whenever I tried to make eye contact, he looked away.
And Sasha, like the other two, hooked up with a lot of women, but reportedly paid little attention to them afterward.
His focus seemed to be on making money and making a name for himself in the syndicate.
Then they’d splintered off to form their own organization and for three years, I only caught glimpses of him, sometimes in odd places, like a campus bar I went to.
At the time, I assumed he was there for business or to meet a woman, but now, sitting in a strange car with bare feet and panties held together with shoestrings, I wonder whether the real reason for his being in that bar was that he was stalking me.
ANVIL
When I enter the castle, I expect Trick to come at me hard with questions; instead he’s kicked back on a couch smoking a blunt.
It’s Zoe who jumps up and meets me halfway across the foyer.
“Z, what did I say?” C calls out, walking out from the kitchen.
Zoe flings her wild curls over her shoulders, grabs me by the upper arms and leans close. Her flowery perfume wraps around me.
“Rachel—my Rachel—is missing!” she whispers frantically. “It’s all over that someone took her. Do you know anything?”
I nod.
C exchanges a look with me. His says ‘what the fuck?’
“What do you know?” Zoe demands, her voice shrill.
“Trick, you want a word?” I ask.
Trick looks over his shoulder, blows smoke and smirks. “Nah. I figured out what I needed to know. How about you, ‘Vil? You need anything?”
I shake my head.
“Let’s take a ride,” C says to me.
Trick stands. “I’m coming. Give me a second, C. I’m light.”
My eyes go to the chest holster where Trick’s got his Glock. His going for more guns must mean someone other than the three of them has an idea that I took Rachel. The property where I’m keeping her has no ties to C Crue. I wanted them clear of it.
I hold up a hand, not liking where this is headed. C and I step outside. Zoe tries to join us. He kisses her, then sends her back inside.
Trick steps out and closes the door behind us. “I’ll drive. I’ve got one.”
We have our business discussions away from our residences and vehicles. Usually in hotel rooms chosen at random, and when Trick says he’s got one, he means he has a place in mind that should be secure.
Against my better judgment I get in the Rover. As we drive, I glance more than once at the clock on the dash. I want to get back to her.
I don’t say a word about it, or anything else, as Trick drives.
His choice is a motel just out of town and near the expressway. When we’re in a room that he paid cash for, we sit around a small table, leaning in and our voices partially drowned out by the television we turn on.
“You took her yourself?” C asks. “Or you took her from a kidnapper?”
“All me.”
“Did you send ransom notes? Or did someone—?”
“Me,” I say.
They both give me a questioning look. We makes millions every month. The only money of Frank Palermo’s I plan to take is the money his operation makes. We’ll get that when the war ends and his syndicate no longer exists.
“The emails were a test,” I say.
“Did they pass?” Trick asks.
“No,” I say, thinking about the email exchange I had with Frank and Leone. The fiancé told me they weren’t going to negotiate separately, so I should copy them both on emails. That told me plenty.
Frank was ready to pay a two-million-dollar ransom until he heard something had happened that would leave her with a scar on her face.
My email blamed her for overreacting to something, saying the injury to her was her own fault.
After I sent that message, Frank said he needed to see a photograph before continuing negotiations.
I clench my jaw now, thinking about it.
“Frank’s known to us,” C says. “You don’t need to send fake emails as a kidnapper to figure him out. Did you do it thinking you could bait him? Lure him into coming somewhere alone to pick up Rachel? You should know Frank would never risk himself for anyone that way.”
“I know.”
“So then what? Did you do it to turn her? To show her they don’t really care about her? That they’re just using her?”
I could say that I found out she already knows that, but I don’t. The things she says to me are mine.
“He wouldn’t need to try to turn her to our side on his own,” Trick says. “He’d involve us to help frame that kind of plan.”
C glances at Trick, and then back at me.
“If you’ve been sneaking around with her, why keep it a secret from us?” C asks.
“C’mon, ‘Vil,” Trick says. “There’ve been rumors that she’s been coming to the theater. Some people know it’s to play violin. Others think it’s to see one of us. Since about two hours ago, Frank’s telling people there was a ransom demand, but he thinks it might be a hoax.”
“He doesn’t think it’s a hoax. He’s giving himself an out for not paying it,” I say, my rage at Frank growing by the second. If he was in the room, only one of us would leave it alive.
“He said he won’t pay a ransom?” C asks, surprised. “Even if he wouldn’t pay because she’s his daughter, he’s built her up on social media. There are influencer endorsement contracts that are worth real money. And he’s gonna benefit from the marriage connection to New York. Why wouldn’t he pay?”
“You told him she won’t be coming back the same,” Trick guesses. “No virgin bride for Leone?”
“I said her face was damaged. He said no more negotiations until he saw a picture of her.”
Trick’s eyes turn ice blue. If Frank were in the room, Trick would flip me for the chance to kill him.
“Did something happen?” C asks slowly. “Did she get hurt?”
“Of course not,” Trick says. “You think The Punisher here who protects kids and old store clerks did something to disfigure the girl who sponged his brow when he was practically a rotting corpse? Get real.”
C studies me. He knows I’m capable of things. I’ve punished plenty of girls in front of him, never in way that would cause real or lasting damage, but he knows I’m no angel. He leaves that for the moment though, and instead asks, “Why keep this play a secret?”
“It was my show. I didn’t want C Crue on the hook for it if it went sideways.”
“You can’t run a show on your own,” C says. “None of us can. Anything any of us does, C Crue does.”
I shake my head. “C Crue wouldn’t have run this play. From a crue point of view, it’s all downside, no upside.”
“Sounds like it. So then?”
I shrug.
“We’re in this, whether you wanted us in it or not,” C says impatiently. “No more secrets. Straight up. What’s the deal between you and Rachel?”
“No deal. I took her. Grabbed her and shoved her in my trunk. The whole nine,” I murmur.
C’s brows rise. “To get even with her? And to get at Frank?” C still can’t see it.
Trick narrows his eyes. “You had to be watching her? Planning this took time.”
I nod. “I stalked her.”
“The stalking, how long?” Trick asks in a low voice. He’s hooked a piece of it.
I can lie, but I know him. Now that he’s on it, he’ll keep fishing until he reels in the truth.
Do I care if they know now? I decide I don’t. My eyes lock with Trick’s.
“Always.”