Chapter 27
twenty-seven
A couple of days—that’s all it took to unravel the careful choreography of Xavier Cardell’s life.
Through tracking, I know exactly what time he leaves for his office with his driver. When he turns around and races home in his Maserati an hour later to fuck his wife. Then goes back to his building.
And then, his wife meets him for lunch. More fucking.
He quits in the early afternoon and meets with the NU board on Thursdays; otherwise, he’s on the golf course or going fishing on the lake with his wife. Or sometimes Levi Joseph.
For the Cardells, Sundays are important for his kids to eat dinner together as a family. My cousin, Pippi, has joined them, and they all get along. She’s inadvertently given me all those details.
It almost makes me miss my own family…
Only, the Cardell family dinners have fewer concealed weapons and less polite deception, it seems.
Yes, Xavier Cardell, CEO of Cardell Enterprises and NU Board member, seems to lead a very prescribed life…
But what if he’s faking it.
There’s something underneath that I can’t quite put to rest. A nagging sense that I’m being led into a honeypot. He’s too calculated. Too open. Surely, his life is in danger most of the time…
So where’re the guards? Hired guns. High walls surrounding their cabin’s island like we have back on Von Dovish estate? Hell, even my sisters have annoying bodyguards who follow them to class and back.
I can’t wait, though. This has been going on for long enough. Time has run out on this game the society is playing.
It’s time for me to act.
The midnight sky is inky black when I creep up to the balcony near his office sliding glass door. With an easy-to-pick lock.
Almost as if he expects me. As if he planned this.
Adrenaline spikes, bitter and metallic on my tongue. My pulse surges until I inhale the chill of autumn air, willing my heartbeat to calm. As soon as the latch flips, I slip inside as carefully as I can.
There’s no light in the room, other than a blue glow from a laptop charger in the corner. But I just need one moment for my eyes to adjust, then I can proceed to his bedroom…
This should get interesting.
A soft Persian rug covers my steps as I inch closer to the door leading into the hall. From my surveillance, it’s always open.
Not tonight. It’s shut tight.
So when I reach for the handle and the lamp behind me flicks on, I freeze.
“Take a seat, son. What’s on your mind?”
I stare at the white wood frame of the modern door for at least half a minute before turning to face the man I was sent to kill.
He’s leaning back in his desk chair, his white formal shirt unbuttoned casually, glass of some amber liquid held in his hand. And a pistol with a silencer laying on top of the blotter pointed right at me.
My hand grabs my face to make sure my mask is covering it, and it is, but…he looks at me as if he knows what I look like underneath it.
With as much bravado as I can muster, I take a breath and state: “I have a proposition for you. And a warning.” Hopefully, he doesn’t see my knees knocking together as his blue eyes behold me with something like mild interest.
He pulls a drink of whiskey between his teeth and licks his bottom lip slowly, savoring the flavor before granting me those piercing eyes again. Some part of me, twisted by fate or blood, aches for his approval.
His daughter inspires much the same feeling.
“I’ll take the warning first.”
“I’m here to kill you,” I admit evenly, voice just steady enough to cover my trembling core.
As if I’ve bored him, he waves a finger toward a club chair in front of him and doesn’t speak until I perch on the end.
“Very well,” he drawls, swirling his whiskey. “And what’s your proposition?”
I shrug and say, “That you give me something not to.”
Maybe he’s heard the lines too many times. And all my instincts about being led here on purpose were correct. He’s unbothered. Like ice. An untouchable creature.
But I know what will make him melt.
There’s a tiny tug at the corners of his mouth. If I got a second look, I’d say it was a smile. “Why do you think I won’t kill you?”
And here’s where the game begins… “Because I have something you desire.”
“What’s that?”
Uncomfortable being so close to the gun’s barrel, I stand and take a step behind the chair. But the pistol pointed casually at me feels like a test rather than a threat. He holds every advantage, but I still possess one hidden card—one dangerous truth he can’t afford to ignore.
“Before I answer that, we need to come to an understanding. A bargain.”
The man releases a chuckle. There’s no mirth behind it. “You’re asking me, the man’s house you broke into tonight, for trust to strike a deal.”
“Yes.”
He picks up a tablet and flicks a few screens across it that I cannot see. Not even looking at me, he declares, “Your father is Calum Von Dovish, correct?”
Every muscle in my body locks tight, dread pooling like molten lead in my chest. He knows exactly who I am—probably knows everything, even the secrets I hide beneath layers of darkness. “Yes.”
“Of West Tech Industries.” It’s not a question.
My gloved hands show me holding nothing. I didn’t bring a gun. “Then you know exactly who I am. So, are we ready to strike a deal?”
Xavier swishes the ice in his glass, the clinking almost driving me mad. His gaze bores into my mask, and I feel not just frustrated, but ashamed of wearing it.
Leaning forward slightly, his blue eyes glint with the first genuine spark of interest tonight. “Absolutely.”