22. Lily
CHAPTER 22
LILY
A shiver scuttles down my spine. They took Zeno God only knows where and?—
I clutch my midsection, bile rising in the back of my throat.
What are they going to do to him?
Vito lets out a low, growling bark as if he’s trying to tell me to move my ass and I race toward Zeno’s car and unlocking the door. I place Vito on the floor of the passenger side, and I dart around to the driver’s side, turning on the ignition. Just as the police cars round the corner, I peel out of the parking lot, headed for the strip.
Ten minutes later, I pull up in front of the Excelsior and stop the car in front of the valet stand. One of the valets comes up to me with a curious look. “Name, please?”
“I know what you’re thinking,” I say. “This is Zeno Villani’s car. I’m just dropping it off for him.”
The valet’s face relaxes and he gives me a quick nod. “I’ll make sure he gets the keys,” he says as I rush around the other side of the car and open the door for Vito. I scoop him into my arms and shove one of the glass entryway doors open, panting because my heart is beating with such intensity.
I hug Vito tight against me and surprisingly, he doesn’t try to move. He stays close, as if he knows we’re about to ward off something dangerous.
Dangerous…
I scout the lobby looking for that whore Rayleigh. My fingers itch to bitch slap her and then poke out her eyeballs. A deep breath expels from my lungs. It must be Zeno’s influence.
Maybe that’s a good thing. I need to channel his crazy right now.
My cell phone vibrates and I stop to lay Vito on the ground before grabbing it from my pocket. “Chloe?” I yelp when I see her name. “I just got here!”
“It’s Sergio. Take the elevator at the far corner of the lobby up to the twentieth floor. It’s the parking deck. We’ll be waiting.”
“But I’m in the lobby. Why don’t you just come and pick me up here?”
“Do as I said, Lily, and stop asking questions,” he grunts, hanging up the phone.
Click.
What a colossal dick! Parking deck? If they’re going to go after Zeno, why wouldn’t they just meet me down here? This seems like a huge waste of time when we don’t have much of it to lose.
Still, I have no choice but to follow the instructions since I can’t very well go after Zeno myself without a location.
Or a gun, let’s be realistic.
I pick Vito up and high-tail it across the lobby to the elevator bank leading to the parking deck. I step in once the doors open, tapping my foot as it creeps up to the twentieth floor. Vito shifts in my arms, getting restless. I take that as a good sign and use the time to give him a once-over. His pupils look good, he is alert, and he’s growling like he wants to tear something…or someone…apart.
All very positive signs.
Thank God.
The elevator finally comes to a stop at the top of the parking deck and the doors slide open. I step into the gray concrete enclosure, a piercing shriek shattering the silence. I rush into the garage. Vito squirms in my arms to the point where I lose my grip and he lands cleanly on his feet, running toward the sound, his barks echoing in the space.
“Vito!” I yell, chasing him. “Stop!” He still has the leash on him, but he’s moving so fast, he managed to tear away from me before I could grab the end of it. My feet pound on the pavement until I see exactly where the screams originated.
I didn’t think it was possible for my heart to really leap so high in my throat it’d get caught and almost asphyxiate me.
But that’s just about where we are right now, the second I see Sergio dangling Rayleigh by her ankles over the side of the parking garage.
Twenty stories in the air.
I yelp, jumping forward and grabbing the end of the leash before Vito can get any closer to the horror scene playing out in front of us.
Rayleigh’s skirt is around her neck right now as she struggles in Sergio’s tight grip, but I don’t think she’s at all worried about flashing anyone.
I’m pretty sure she’s more concerned with making sure she doesn’t sky dive, skull-first, into the concrete below.
Chloe runs up to me. “Oh my God, these guys are crazy, sadistic lunatics! How could you leave me with them?” she whisper-shouts.
“Hey, I heard that,” Sergio calls over.
“Good!” she yells back. “Just so we’re clear and all, you sicko!”
“Sergio!” I scream, pushing past Chloe. “Are you insane? Pull her back up here!”
He turns to me, his eyes blazing. “Are you telling me how to handle my business? Because last I heard, it was your fucking father who was responsible for this shit show! He’s the reason why Zeno was snatched, why Zeno killed Messina’s son! He’s a lying sonofabitch! And I don’t think you’re in any position to give orders, least of all to me!” he bellows.
“You cannot kill her!” I shriek, my eyes falling to Rayleigh’s panicked expression. Her face is purple because of the increased blood flow to her head.
“The fuck I can’t!” he shouts, shaking her. My eyes widen. He’s strong as an ox and Rayleigh is a hundred pounds soaking wet, but still. His fingers might cramp up. His arm might spasm.
Anything could happen and then…
Splat.
“Sergio,” I say, trying to keep my voice as calm as possible. “Please! This is barbaric!”
“Help me!” Rayleigh screams. “Somebody, please!”
“Nobody will hear you, sweetheart!” Sergio yells. “But if you’re ready to talk, I’ll pull you back up here! Otherwise…” He jumps forward and she dips lower, her window-shattering screeches damn close to making my ears bleed.
“Serge,” Bruno says, grabbing his arm. “Maybe we need to try something else. This isn’t working.”
“Fuck that!” he screams, shaking off Bruno’s hand. “This bitch betrayed my family! She’s the goddamn enemy and she will pay!” And just in that second, the one when I’m convinced he’s going to let her go, with a sudden jerk, he yanks her back into the garage. When her feet hit the cement floor, she collapses to her knees, gagging as what appears to be her breakfast spews everywhere.
Sweet Jesus.
We jump back and Sergio grabs the back of her head as her stomach finishes its violent revolt. He holds a gun to her temple, slamming her head into the mess on the floor. “Tell me what I need to know,” he hisses against her ear. “I spared you once, but it won’t happen twice, do you understand?”
Sobs quake her shoulders, her long hair hanging in wet strands around her face. “Fuck you!” she sputters as he moves the gun to the front of her forehead, pointed right between her eyes.
“Do you not know who you’re talking to?” Sergio seethes, kneeling down next to her. “And you do understand that I will do anything it takes to keep my family safe and protected from vile motherfuckers like you and the assholes you work for?”
More whimpering follows, but no words.
“What did you do after you drugged Bruno?” he shouts right into her face.
A shudder rumbles through me as I watch Rayleigh turn up the hysterics. I’m not sure what she did while I was gone to get Sergio’s engine roaring, or if it was just the knowledge that his cousin had been taken that sent him into an uproar.
But right now he’s vicious, vindictive, and out for blood.
And if this woman pushes any more of his buttons, he is going to kill her, right here, in front of all of us.
I can’t let that happen.
She’s our only lead, our only way to get back to Zeno.
I shake off Chloe’s trembling hand and walk toward Sergio. “Sergio,” I say in a low voice, my eyes focused on his irate ones. “What if she really doesn’t know anything?”
“She knows plenty,” he growls.
I push him aside so that we’re out of earshot. “We need to be smart about this. If she does know, making her panic like this won’t get the information we need.”
He cocks an eyebrow at me. “So what are you saying? You wanna give it a try?” he mutters.
I nod. “Yes, because you’re behaving like a psychopath, and it isn’t getting us anywhere. We don’t have time to waste.”
He shrugs, and I swear I can see a hint of a smirk lift his lips. He waves his gun toward where Rayleigh is still kneeling on the ground.
I walk over to her, squatting next to her, my voice soft against her ear. “Listen, we don’t want to hurt you, Rayleigh. Stop inciting him and just give us what we need. You know where Zeno is, so just tell us the location and then you walk away.” I pause. “Sergio is out of control and if you push him too far, I really don’t know what he’ll do next.” I am legit worried about how this story ends if Rayleigh does a swan dive off the side of this parking deck.
She turns her tear-filled eyes up at me, looking exactly like the pathetic damsel that I detest. “Really?” she asks, hope in her voice. “I can walk away?”
I nod, rubbing her back. “Absolutely. I’ll make sure of it. I promise. He’s crazy, but we have an understanding. I can control this.”
Her head bobs a bit. “O-okay,” she whispers. “But I’ll only tell you.”
“Sure,” I say in a soft voice, nodding at Bruno. I don’t quite get why she’s only telling me since I’m only going to relay the information anyway, but I play along because things got much calmer once I grabbed the reins, I’m pleased to say.
“Come closer,” she whimpers and I lean into her. “I drugged your pal Bruno and used his fingerprint to break into his computer so we could hack into the hotel’s security system.” And just before I have time to recoil at the admission, the fucking whore sinks her teeth into my earlobe, a razor-sharp pain exploding down the side of my neck.
“Jesus Christ!” I scream, leaping back and shoving her backward. She has the nerve to smile at me, blood oozing out of her mouth. “Sergio, she broke into the security system after drugging Bruno!”
“Sonofabitch,” he mutters, pulling out his phone and stabbing numbers into the screen.
“Eh. I didn’t even get a real bite,” Rayleigh says, spitting at my feet.
I leap up off of the ground, grab the gun Sergio is holding out, and shoot her in the thigh. She screams, clutching her wounded leg as she curses me. I yank her head backward, tilting her head up toward me.
“I bet you didn’t think I’d do that, huh?” I hiss through clenched teeth. “Well, let me tell you something, you skanky bitch. I will blow off both of your kneecaps next unless those lips start moving! Where is Zeno?”
“Fine!” she squeaks out as I press the gun into her wound. “He’s at an abandoned service station off of Route 66!”
“How the fuck are we supposed to find it? There must be a hundred of them!”
“This one is called Route 66 Fuel. But you’ll never save him. He’s one of the stars of the show. And if you show up to save him, mark my words, none of you will be leaving unless you’re in body bags,” she sneers, clutching her leg. “Now get me to a hospital, you lowlife assholes! I’m going to bleed out!”
Sergio walks over to us, giving me a victory sign. “Maybe. Maybe not. We’ll leave you here to find out the answer.” He nods toward Bruno. “You got the handcuffs?”
Bruno nods.
He looks at Rayleigh. “You know what’s coming next,” he says, grabbing my hand and pulling me away from her.
I grab the gun again and break away from Sergio, running back over to Rayleigh. I hover the tip of the gun over the bullet wound in her leg and her eyes widen with fear. “What show?” I ask.
“The show where your families watch their children get murdered, penance for the sin they committed when they ordered and carried out the hit on my cousin and brother.” Her voice drips with disdain despite the circumstance that she’s losing more and more blood by the second. “And once they get here, they’ll be greeted by the worst massacre they can imagine, one that will haunt their dreams and reality forever.” Her eyes narrow. “So hurry, Lily. You’d better get to Zeno and take your place in the show. Can’t have one of the stars go missing,” she grunts.
My mouth twists into a grimace, my lips quivering as the dots connect with rapid speed. This is all on me. If I’d have been smarter, more vigilant, more aware, I’d have seen those guys coming months ago. If I’d have been stronger and more prepared, they’d have never compromised me like they did.
I wouldn’t have needed luck to get away from them.
I would have used skill to turn the tables on them.
Anger and regret flood my veins, igniting the fires deep within me…fires that need the freedom to rage. It’s the only way I can even come close to fixing what’s been broken.
Rayleigh sneers at me. “What are you going to do, Lily? Who’s going to save you now, huh? Daddy and big brother Nico can’t stop what’s about to happen. You think you’re safe?” she scoffs. “The only thing you can be sure about is that you will never be safe again!”
“Ahh!” I shriek, pointing the gun at her other thigh and shooting her point-blank. Oh my God, what the hell am I turning into?
Sergio comes up behind me and takes the gun out of my hand. “Okay, princess, lemme have the gun.”
“Don’t call me that!” I yell pounding his chest with my palms. “That’s why this is happening, don’t you get it? It’s because of me! Because I was an easy target!”
He slips the gun into his waistband and pulls me away from where Rayleigh writhes around on the floor. “Listen, there’s nothing weak about you,” he says. “So whatever bullshit she just fed you is just that. You’re a fucking badass, Lily. You just shot that bitch twice without a second thought.”
“She deserved it,” I whisper, pressing my hands to my temples.
“Yep,” Sergio says. “She sure as hell did.”
Chloe takes a timid step toward me and I look at her through tear-filled eyes.
She shakes her head, her hands in the air. “I don’t even have words for this,” she says with an incredulous look on her face. “I mean, this whole thing…Jesus, I feel like I poured myself into bed last night and woke up in the movie Casino .”
“Yeah,” Sergio says with a mischievous glimmer in his eye. “And I think we’re getting close to the scene where we stick some bastard’s head in a vise and squeeze the shit out of it so his eyeballs pop out of his head.”
Chloe furrows her brow, looking from Sergio to Bruno to me and back again. “Who are you people?” she mutters.
Bruno comes running toward us dragging Rayleigh behind him after restraining her. He winks at Chloe. “We’re the people who never lose,” he says. “Welcome to the winning team, sweetheart.”
Sergio claps him on the back. “Damn right. I’ve got Mike on the security breach. He’ll figure out how to find the hole, plug it, and kick those assholes out of our system. Aldo is keeping a lookout on the casino floor just in case they send anyone else inside. Meanwhile, I want that bitch in the trunk.” He looks at me. “I believe it’s time for your big scene. You about ready to steal the show?”