Chapter 5 #4
Elodie wanted to be able to give him her number in return, but she didn’t have a cell phone.
Didn’t even have an email address. She’d found out the hard way how easy that stuff was to track.
Besides, she didn’t have anyone she wanted to stay in contact with.
No family. No friends. She was truly alone in the world.
“Thank you again for saving my life,” Scott said.
“Thank you for saving mine,” Elodie retorted.
“Be happy,” he told her as he took a step toward the exit.
“You stay safe out there,” Elodie returned.
“Always.”
Then he nodded at her and disappeared through the door.
Elodie stood in the middle of the crew dining area staring at the door for several moments. Her life had been so crazy in the last twenty-four hours, she wouldn’t have believed it was possible if she hadn’t lived through it.
“Rachel! Get a move on!” Manuel called out teasingly.
Closing her eyes for a second, Elodie patted her back pocket, making sure the paper was still there before turning and heading for the galley.
She had no idea what her next steps would be, but it was nice to have at least one option, even if that option would put Scott and his team in danger.
She didn’t think she’d accept his offer, but it was comforting to have all the same.
Putting thoughts of what she was going to do once the ship arrived at port out of her head, Elodie concentrated on doing what she did best…cooking.
Days later, Paul Columbus sat in his office in New York City and stewed. He owned the entire fiftieth floor of the apartment complex he lived in. The penthouse. He had more money than he could spend in two lifetimes. People both feared and respected him.
And yet he was deeply unsettled.
Being the head of one of the most powerful mob families in New York meant he had to constantly be on his toes. It wasn’t as easy to escape the scrutiny of the law as it had been in the old days. His grandfather used to pay off the cops, and that left him free to do pretty much whatever he wanted.
Paul’s father had to be more careful, but he’d still had some of the older detectives on his payroll.
After he’d died, Paul had done what he could to cultivate friends on the police force—even through coercion and blackmail—but he hadn’t been very successful.
That meant he had to run his empire with extreme caution.
He relied heavily on his people. And months ago, after a thorough search, he’d found who he’d thought was the perfect addition to his staff.
The damn woman had almost no one. No family.
Few friends. She also had no street smarts.
She was incredibly na?ve…the perfect choice to groom for his organization.
He’d treated her kindly, done his best to make her feel at home, to build her loyalty to the family, and he’d thought he’d succeeded. She’d seemed happy and content. Grateful.
Which was what he needed.
Without cops on his payroll, it was damn difficult to kill his enemies.
His grandfather had had it easy compared to him.
Paul had no idea how many men his grandfather had gotten rid of in his lifetime, but he hadn’t spent a single day behind bars for his actions, thanks to an army of law enforcement at his back.
Paul, conversely, had surrounded himself with loyal employees.
People who did anything and everything he requested, including lying their asses off to the authorities when necessary.
In return, they received generous salaries, nice places to live in the city, and became a part of his influential family.
But his private chef…
Paul had a lot of enemies. Shooting them was messy and noisy. And with all the cameras in the damn city, hit-and-runs would inevitably be captured on film.
But killing someone in the privacy of his home?
Without them fighting back? Without the mark even knowing what was happening until it was too late?
That was ideal. He could dump the bodies in the river and make it look like a drowning.
Stick a syringe in their arm and leave the stiff in a back alley somewhere.
There were countless creative ways he could get rid of bodies once they were poisoned.
And Paul thought he’d found the perfect person to assist in his plan.
He’d been wrong.
Dead wrong.
When he’d approached his chef, explained what he wanted her to do…she’d had the gall to say no! To him.
She was in his house, and under his protection. She should’ve said “yes, sir,” and done what he’d asked. That was the only acceptable response.
All she had to do was put some of the arsenic he’d secured into one of the bowls of soup she’d been planning on serving for dinner.
That was it. His mark had already been arrested a few times for selling drugs, so when his body was found, the cops would just assume he’d overdosed.
It was the perfect plan—except for the bitch shaking her head and gaping at him in shock when he’d told her what to do.
Paul hadn’t been able to make her pay for such disloyalty right then and there; he’d had dinner guests waiting. But he’d definitely gotten his point across that she was in deep shit.
After his guests left, he’d planned on making doubly sure his chef understood she wasn’t allowed to say no to him. Ever. That she’d do anything he told her to do from now on.
But she’d bolted. Hadn’t even taken most of her belongings with her. No, the only thing she’d taken was a small bag…and she’d dumped the damn bottle of arsenic he’d left in the kitchen, in the hopes she’d come to her senses.
Stupid bitch. She was too stupid to even take the bottle with her…the only evidence.
But she still had something on him. Still knew his plan. And there was no way Paul Columbus was going to chance being taken down by a thirty-something mousy fucking cook. A dumb one at that.
Paul stood and paced his office, mumbling under his breath. Occasionally he gripped his hair tightly, his gait twitching as he walked back and forth. Small tells his son would have noticed in a heartbeat.
Paul knew his eldest son, Jerry, thought his old man was crazy—but he wasn’t. He’d do anything to safeguard his family and his name. And the fact that there was a woman out there who knew what he’d planned for his dinner guest, and who could go to the cops with her suspicions, was eating at him.
No, Paul didn’t think he was crazy, but he was paranoid. If his employees weren’t with him, they were against him.
Twitching nervously, Paul growled in frustration. He’d been searching for the damn chef for months. He’d thought he’d located her a couple times, only to be disappointed.
He hadn’t said anything to his son, or his head capo…his uncle, who was in charge of some of their soldiers. No, this was his fuckup, and he needed to make it right.
And as long as Elodie Winters was out there breathing, there was a chance she’d talk. Blab her mouth about what he’d asked her to do. She had information that could potentially bring him down. And for that—and for having the nerve to tell him no—she had to fucking die.
But first, he had to find her.
They’d located her in Pennsylvania and Los Angeles, but hadn’t been able to kill her before she’d disappeared both times. She had no family he could threaten her with. No real friends whose fingers he could chop off and mail to Elodie…not that he’d know where to mail them anyway.
The woman was a ghost. A ghost with no friends and no connections. He’d thought that would made her the perfect employee, but he’d been wrong. And Paul Columbus hated being wrong.
A knock on his door brought Paul out of his head. “Enter!” he called out.
Andrew stepped inside the office and closed the door behind him.
Andrew was one of his capos, but he wasn’t related by blood.
He was lower in rank than Paul’s uncle, loyal as hell, and Paul trusted him implicitly.
He was the only one he’d trusted with his current problem, and Andrew had been working for months to find Elodie.
Andrew had a shit-eating grin on his face and looked way too fucking cheerful for Paul’s current mood.
“You better have something for me. If you don’t, you can turn right around and leave. I’m not in the mood today.”
“I’ve got something,” Andrew said immediately, striding over to the desk.
Paul rounded the desk and sat. Andrew placed a thumb drive on the desktop, then stood back, still smiling.
“Well? What the fuck is that?” Paul asked.
“It’s a video I think you’re gonna wanna see.”
“I only want to see it if it’s got that bitch on it,” Paul muttered. But he leaned forward and grabbed the drive as he spoke.
Andrew didn’t respond, and Paul’s heart began to beat faster.
Was this their first real lead since the bitch had disappeared into thin air? It was improbable that someone so stupid had been able to cover her tracks as well as she had.
He plugged in the thumb drive and waited impatiently for a window to open.
He clicked on the video file and watched as a newscast began to play.
It was in German, with subtitles. Playing behind the newscaster was a clip featuring a huge cargo ship with the name Asaka Express on the side.
Paul remembered hearing about how the dumbass captain had gotten himself and some of his crew killed.
He had no idea how in the world backwater pirates could ever take over such a large ship like the Asaka Express, but he hadn’t really cared enough to find out more about the incident.
“Look closely, boss,” Andrew said. “At the crew members getting off the ship.”
Paul leaned in and watched as men in overalls came off the ship one by one. Then there were a few officers wearing white uniforms. US Naval personnel were escorting them, and Paul knew they’d been called in to help pilot the ship into port safely.
The crew all assembled at the bottom of the gangplank and paused for a group picture. Paul was about to ask what the fuck Andrew had brought him, and why, when one of the crew members caught his eye. He was shorter than the others and standing slightly behind one of the officers.
Squinting, Paul leaned closer. That wasn’t a guy. It was a female.
As he watched, one of the officers turned and put his arm around her shoulders, hauling her to his side before the video cut out and the German newscaster was on screen again.
Rewinding the video, Paul paused it right at the end.
He looked up at Andrew. “It’s her.”
“I believe so, yes.”
“Where is she?”
Andrew’s smile dimmed. “I don’t know. But if she was on the Asaka Express, there should be records of where she went from there. I did find out the chef onboard was going by the name Rachel Walters.”
“That last name can’t be a coincidence,” Paul said.
“I agree,” Andrew told his boss.
“Good. And find out who that asshole is with his arm around her shoulders. If we can find him, we might be able get more info, maybe even finally have some leverage to use against her.”
“Already on it, boss,” Andrew said. Then he nodded and turned and headed for the door.
Paul had already refocused on the video.
He played it again. And again. Then he leaned back and sighed in relief as he stared at the slightly blurry screen shot he’d taken.
He couldn’t tell at first glance if it was the woman he was looking for, but the height was about right, and the hair color.
And the fact that she’d been working as a cook onboard the vessel.
He needed Elodie Winters dead. And no matter how long it took, it was gonna happen. No one in his family could know why she’d left. His eldest son wouldn’t be happy if he knew what he’d done, that he’d risked their entire organization by trying to involve the cook in family business.
Eventually, Jerry would take over the family, but not as long as Paul was alive and well.
He’d not take his place until Paul said he could.
And if his eager son found out about the loose end who could possibly put a large chink in the Columbus family armor, he’d use that to his advantage, try to kick Paul out.
He wasn’t having that. He was in charge, dammit, and as soon as he found and killed the bitch chef, he could relax and enjoy being the head honcho once more.
“You can run, but you can’t hide forever, Elodie,” Paul said. He leaned back in his chair and smiled for the first time in a very long while. “I’m gonna find you…and you’ll regret saying no to me,” he muttered.