Chapter 18
We spent a solid forty-five minutes searching through stacks of shipping containers. Connall recited the container number for the hundredth time.
“You don’t think it’s up there, do you?” Jonah jerked his head upward.
The shipping containers were stored five high in some areas.
I craned my neck and grimaced. How were we even supposed to get up there?
I could handle a forklift, but a crane? My heart rate hadn’t slowed since our brief clash with the police earlier.
What would’ve happened if Beck hadn’t disarmed them with ruthless efficiency?
“The paperwork was very clear about it being ground level because of the ‘delicate nature’ of the produce.”
“My feet hurt,” Ellington said. “I didn’t think it would take this long.”
“Let’s check down here.” Connall pointed left, closer to the bay.
The salt spray crested up over the rocks there, and as much as I enjoyed the fresh air, I wanted to make sure the people we were rescuing could breathe it too.
“We already checked down there.” Beck slipped out from the opposite end. “Jonah and I found it.”
“You did?” Connall’s eyebrows shot up. “I mean, great. Show us the way.”
My stomach bubbled with each step. The scent of damp metal followed us further into the stacks. Jonah rapped the front of a navy blue container, pointing at the jester spray-painted on the corner.
“Is this a coincidence or the height of arrogance?”
“Arrogance,” Beck and I answered together.
I ducked my head, cheeks hot as a satisfied smile spread over his lips. I felt the satisfaction across my skin.
“Don’t blush too hard, Lyra. I might get the wrong idea.”
“Your ego is making your brain as hard as a rock.”
Beck slid me another knowing look, and his hand dropped to my shoulder. He had been hard as stone last night while he got me off. I shrugged off his touch, and he put up his hands.
“Easy, I just want the tools.”
I shoved the bag at him. Our hands grazed, and his, thick with calluses, lingered.
My tongue tied as I took a step back and bumped into Ray.
The cramped stacks loomed over us, and I felt hemmed in by their height.
Beck knew how to rankle me. The worst part was that he’d made a home there, and it felt right whenever he got close.
“Let me take care of this.” Beck wrenched control, and his tone made my mouth go dry.
He left no room for argument, but Jonah squared up to him.
Ellington saw the two of them posturing and flicked his wrist in defeat.
I wondered if Ellington was thinking about the people trapped inside the container, or if they were just evidence he could use against his enemy.
Ellington was like Beck in a lot of ways, with more capacity for humor.
He used his laugh to cover the cold way he regarded people as tools.
“I’ll keep watch.” Connall leaned against the container opposite and stared down the oppressive corridor.
Night clung to the edges of the shipping yard in ragged shadows. The storm from earlier left a few ominous clouds that lowered the ceiling of peeking stars. We would be here for as long as it took, but things got complicated when the world woke up.
“Can we work together this once, please?” I slapped my hands on my hips.
Jonah tilted his head, mischief warmed his steely gaze. “I seem to recall working well as a team last night.”
“That’s right,” Ray crowed against my ear. “Especially when you—”
I slapped my hand over his mouth and shoved him against the container. Ellington swung his attention between the four of us, smothering a chuckle. Heat prickled up my neck. Ray’s tongue flickered against my palm, and I let him go with a curse.
“Don’t say another word.”
Beck dug through the bag and passed Jonah a tool as they both got to work on the container.
The problem was the vertical locking bars over the door.
Jonah and Beck crowded in to inspect it, muttering instructions to each other with surprising efficiency.
As they pressed in together to work on the lock, a pulse of heat throbbed between my legs.
Bad body, I scolded myself. This wasn’t the time to have impulsive thoughts of dragging them into the darkness to see how they’d unlock my rising lust. Heated breath coasted over my shoulder, and Ray’s fingers slid over my hips.
“They look good together, don’t they?”
I gulped. Jonah squatted, and his pants encased his muscular ass, making Ray groan. The noise shot through me, heating my veins. Beck dragged his hand across his face, turning his body with slow precision.
“Getting closer.” Beck listened as Jonah worked the lock. “A little more.”
“Pressure?”
“Right there, right there.”
Beck was a lone wolf, used to working on his own, and seeing him beside Jonah gave me a strange feeling in my chest. Ray’s fingers squeezed.
“What happens when we get it open?”
“Adelaide’s got transport organized for the people inside, and we have solid, irrefutable proof that The Unseen are doing a lot more than pulling strings.”
Irrefutable proof was the most important thing. The Unseen could scrub paperwork, but not an entire shipping container of people. I would be one step closer to getting revenge for my mum.
Ray notched his chin on my shoulder, and despite myself, I leaned back into his hold. The salty chill in the air wrapped around me like shackles, and the warm expanse of his back rescued me. That was the only reason.
“What happens after? When will you be happy with your revenge?”
“When it burns to the ground, of course.” Ellington answered for me, having sidled over to join our conversation.
There was a live-wire zeal in the way he held himself. I caught the tip of my tongue between my teeth. How did he manage the burn in his heart? He avoided speaking about Thornridge normally. Whatever she unlocked in Ellington’s heart burned like an out-of-control wildfire now.
“Why did you join The Unseen?” Ray asked Ellington.
“That’s a long story, one I’d rather tell over a whiskey. I attended Ashden Academy and was going to go into the family business, before The Unseen recruited me. They weren’t entirely wrong in their assertion about me. I wanted power until I met Thornridge. She was…” His face twisted.
“We both grew up doing what others expected of us, without having a choice. But the heart doesn’t care about generations of tradition. It wants what it wants.”
Ray hummed. “Too right.”
Of course Ray would know how Ellington felt, having given up his birthright to the Donato territory. I thought about my life, and all the decisions I’d made to end here. With damp metal in my nostrils and my heart crashing against too-tight ribs.
My heart keened like the whistle of ocean spray as it coated the shipping containers closest to it. My want was constant as my pulse, as heavy as my hurt, yet I wouldn’t change it.
Ray, Beck, and Jonah couldn’t be more different. But they’d captured my heart, and it still beat for them in its own, wounded song.
If they hadn’t betrayed me, I wouldn’t have discovered the truth about my mom. The Unseen would have blindsided me and killed Adelaide before I realized the truth. The shipping container groaned and Jonah tossed the tools aside with a clatter. He smashed a plate-sized hand down on Beck’s shoulder.
“Nice work.”
“Back at you… big guy.” Beck offered a rare, genuine smile.
We scrambled to the entrance, and I pulled my phone out to call Adelaide. Connall grabbed it from my hand and gave me a quelling look. He tucked it in his pocket.
“Enjoy your moment, Lyra. All your scheming helped you get here.”
I was going to question the strain in his tone, but Jonah and Beck heaved the door open. A wash of rusty scent slapped me in the face, and I blinked at the container. The creak of the door was the only sound.
“It’s empty.” Ellington leaned against the frame with a groan. “How is it empty?”
Ray flicked on his flashlight and shone the beam into the back. A streak of dark brown marred the wall. There was a plastic bag crumpled in the corner. I dug my nails into my palm as I tried to process the sight.
“Smells like sweat.” Jonah took a step inside, inspecting the interior. “Is that blood?”
I crouched on the ground as my heart hammered in my ears.
“Could you have got it wrong?” I asked Connall, who had his phone pressed against his ear.
He wandered a little distance away and held his finger up as Ellington trailed him.
“Did they empty it before today? Is there more than one? Answer me.” Ellington ground his fists into his forehead.
Beck snatched my hand as I ran it down the frame. “Careful. It’s sharp there.”
I nodded at him, incapable of words with the weight of my disappointment. Where were the people who had been brought here? A smaller, colder part of me lamented the lack of evidence.
“She’s safe? Perfect. I’ll take it from here.” Connall’s shoulders pulled back.
His phone fell as his hand went to the gun tucked into his waistband. My ears popped as he pulled the trigger, and Ellington jerked backward. The quick, callous action made me freeze. What was Connall doing?
“Are you fucking crazy?” Ray snapped as he, Beck, and Jonah formed a wall in front of me.
My ears rang, and the stars swirled as I stumbled to my feet. Betrayal tasted bitter in the back of my throat.
“That hurts a bit.” Ellington groaned. “I guess this is for your sister?”
Red seeped onto the ground and smeared as Ellington dragged himself back. His arms faltered as he coughed and red spittle covered his chin. Connall aimed the gun at all of us. I hadn’t taken the sharp edge in him seriously enough, stress and frustration, yes, but not this.
I rubbed my chest, and he closed his eyes when he saw it.
“You didn’t think I’d let him get away with hurting her, did you?”
“She was fine, geez, the drama.” Ellington coughed up more blood.
The damp ocean air smelled raw, and the shadows loomed over the containers. My head throbbed as Connall’s words jammed like a pick through my skull.
“You sold us out?” My throat burned, hot with acid, and a bitter laugh. “You know they’ll just turn on you, right?”
I stepped in front of Beck as his fingers drifted behind his back to his weapon. He could use me as a shield. Ray and Jonah already had their hands in the air, but Beck remained unnoticed. Connall wasn’t a field agent, and it showed at this moment. The gun trembled in his white-knuckled grip.
“I don’t care what happens to me, only that my sister is untouchable.”
“Bravo,” Ellington gurgled with praise.
Connall swung the gun toward him again. “Shut up. Just shut up.”
“What, can’t I be proud of you? You can go back to your sister and now you’re as ruthless as her husband. Maybe you can even take his place?”
Connall bristled, and an animalistic growl escaped his gritted teeth.
I wanted to scream at him. “All you’ve done is given her another noose. You think they’ll ever let her live free now that they have the perfect way to control you?”
Beck pressed his gun into my waiting hand. Connall whipped his head over my shoulder and waved his weapon. Given how he was acting, I was afraid he might set it off by accident.
“Get your hands up.”
Beck complied, watching my former friend with care. “What did you tell The Unseen?”
“I offered you on a plate, of course. First, I needed you to drop your guard, though, which is why I organized the raid earlier.”
My stomach twisted, and I forced rising bile back down. I knew something was wrong, but I’d been so eager to prove The Unseen were evil that I forgot the lengths they would go to silence anyone who stood against them.
“They’re going to kill you,” Connall spoke the words like a robot. “But I told them I wanted your life first.”
He blinked at Ellington, who slumped on the ground. All the color drained from his face, and the cracks in his lips were painted with blood.
“Finish it, Lyra. Promise you’ll destroy them, won’t you?”
His words embedded inside me like malicious code, and I burned as they sank into my bones.
Love him or hate him, Ellington had lived only for revenge, and I could respect his ruthlessness.
I’d fallen in love with colder, more dangerous men.
Three of them, to be exact. Ellington’s eyelids crashed closed, and blood dribbled from his slack jaw.
He’d wanted to burn The Unseen down. The heat that flared in my chest wanted to do the same. I wrapped my finger around the trigger and warmed the metal until it was mine.
“He deserved it.” Connal’s jaw ticked.
Maybe.
If I started judging others, I had to put myself in the same position, and I didn’t care to weigh myself morally. I wanted to live, and for the people I cared for to live many years with me.
“I thought you said we were good, you little prick.”
Connall’s eyes widened as I swung the gun from behind my back and squeezed the trigger.
Beck grabbed my arm, forcibly crashing me into Ray as Connall retaliated.
My ears burned as pain shot through my arm.
Connall gripped his shoulder with a glare.
His gun hung loose in his hand. I closed one eye and put him down the line of the gun barrel.
He could try again, but I’d kill him in a second. I was always a better shot than he was, and he knew it.
“Asshole,” Ray muttered under his breath.
“We were good. The five-minute start I wanted to give you is now three. Good luck, Lyra, for old time’s sake.”
I covered everyone, running backward as we ran in the opposite direction. Who was coming? More police or agents for The Unseen themselves? I swallowed needles and forced myself to ignore the roaring pain in my shoulder.
“Let’s split up,” Jonah said, grabbing Ray. “We’ll go this way.”
Beck and I stared, seeing the fire in each other. It might have burned someone else, but instead, it invigorated me. Beck grabbed my wrist, sending a jolt of pain down my injured arm, and pulled me the opposite way.
We were going to get out of this alive, even if I had to walk through fire itself.