Chapter 7 #5
I grin as I lean forward, matching his position.
“You have four guns pointed at my head right at this moment. They’re staying back and trying to hide the position the guns are in because you want to try to fool me into thinking that this is a safe place for me.
That this is an easygoing talk where I will willingly agree with whatever you throw at me.
Do you think I’ve gotten this far in life by following the whims of men like you? ”
His warm smile is starting to stiffen a bit. “I don’t mean to make it seem like we don’t trust you. They merely have weapons ready on the off chance you turned out to be… unmanageable.”
“Oh, I’m definitely unmanageable,” I say. “I’m just shocked you think I made it this far doing anything on the whims of others. I have no relationship to this woman or her son.”
Teo watches me closely while he thinks about the situation at hand. “That would be rather foolish of me, then, wouldn’t it? Tell me what you’d like in exchange for the death of my father.”
“The risk is significant. Raul is an influential man in the underworld. He’s raised multiple killers, many of whom I have to assume would be very displeased if I killed him.
And correct me if I’m wrong, but you have another brother who has quite a bit of pull in the family.
My life would be at risk if anyone found out it was me who did it. ”
“Then make sure no one does,” he says.
I smile at him. “If it was so easy to ‘make sure no one does,’ would you not have done it yourself? Killing your father without raising suspicion would be quite the task. Let the boy go. Give me three days to assess the situation and I will let you know my price.”
“No. I’m not letting the boy go.”
“Feel free to keep Sophia in his place,” I say.
“I think you’re misunderstanding the situation. This isn’t a choice. I’m offering to give you something in exchange for killing my father. That is your only choice.”
“There’s always more than one choice.”
I can tell he’s getting irritated with me, but that’s fine.
I’m simply giving the others time to find Cam.
My only purpose in this room is to distract Teo until the phone in my pocket vibrates two times.
Then I will make my escape, hopefully with a dash of car chase so I can whip out my newest ballad.
“Do you not understand this situation at all?” he asks.
I guess I don’t when I’m over here questioning whether the murder song or the car chase song will be more appropriate for this situation.
I wave those thoughts away and return to my “bad guy who definitely has this handled and isn’t just stalling” routine.
“Do you think this is my first day? I might be a retired hitman, but I know far more about how this world works than you do. Let’s start over.
I feel like we’ve gotten off on the wrong foot.
It’s a pleasure to meet you. I would like to introduce you to my baby, Calliope.
She’s sweet, isn’t she? She’s sleeping right now. ”
He glances down at the grenade launcher and scowls. How could anyone wear that look when looking at my precious Calliope?
“Very sweet,” he chokes out.
“And this is some random lady who tried poisoning me with her cookies,” I say as I wave toward Sophia, who’s been sitting quietly until now.
“I did not try poisoning you. They were good cookies!” she protests.
“And your hired men harassed my son, which is really… such a big no. I should deny ever dreaming of helping you for that alone.”
Teo bows his head, and I can’t tell whether he’s repenting or I’ve finally pissed him off. I soon get my answer when his head snaps up and he glowers at me. “You’re starting to waste my time.”
“I know what will fix this. Would you like to hear the story of me meeting the greatest man alive? Envision this… Dark night, hitman waiting, PI scuttling—”
And that’s when I hear gunfire. I slide forward, moving so quickly that no one in the room can react before I have Teo in my hands, gun to his head.
I don’t know who would be shooting outside of the room, but I really didn’t plan for my crew to get caught up in gunfire.
It makes me anxious, especially knowing that Jackson is out there.
“Teo, this really doesn’t look good for you.
Do you know what happens when you fuck with someone better than you?
You get to hear the full saga of The Fence. ”
“What the fuck are you going on about?” he asks.
“Tell your men to drop their weapons, then to get on the ground and spread their arms and legs like they’re making snow angels.”
He lets out some kind of growling noise of severe dissatisfaction. I mean, come on, did he really think this would be so simple? And when he’s done growling like a feral animal who just got his bone stolen, he nods at his men.
“Drop them.”
The moment they do, Sophia takes them. One man is hesitant to go down, so she slams the butt of his gun into the side of his face and then hooks his leg before dropping him to the ground.
“Snow angels, my friends. Bring back your inner child,” I call as I start toward the door with Teo urged along by my gun. “Sophia, guard my back with your body. I want the bullet to go through you before it reaches me.”
“You are such a gentleman,” she says.
“Thank you. Teo, how many people do you have in this place? I’m sure it’s packed full knowing I was going to be here tonight.”
“More than you can handle.”
“Possibly,” I say while I hurry him toward the door. “And where is the boy?”
“I will ruin your life. I will make your life so fucking miserable,” he threatens as we step out into the hallway and I hesitate.
There are two bodies in the hallway. One is a man whose throat appears to have been slit open.
The second is a tall man slumped over into a pool of his own blood.
I take my foot and slowly push his head up until I can see that he has suffered the same fate before being stabbed multiple times in the head.
An eerie feeling creeps through me. There’s no way Jackson or Henry would do this. And Tavish and Everly don’t strike me as the type of men to sneak into the hallway, slit the men’s throats and then not swing by to say hello.
“Get back in the room,” I order, pushing Sophia back.
“What?”
“My men didn’t do this,” I say.
“What the fuck do you mean your men didn’t do this?” she asks.
I shove Teo back into the room and have Sophia watch him as I quickly call Jackson using the fancy earpiece that Cassel had gifted us. It keeps my hands free for when I need to choke out a man and hold a gun at the same time.
Jackson responds almost immediately. “Was that gunfire from you?”
Well, that answers that question. “No. Vacate the building. There’s a third party here. They’ve killed two already.”
“We are closing in on the room that Cassel has identified as the one Cam is in,” Jackson says.
“Get out,” I tell him, having a horrible feeling about all of this. “Something’s wrong. Whoever this person is, they’re not someone to be fucked with. Jackson, please get out.”
“Okay. Be careful.”
“I will.” As soon as the call ends, I turn to Teo. “Do you have access to any surveillance feeds?”
“Not from here.”
“Do you know who this third party is? Were you not as sneaky as you thought, and your father sent someone to dispose of you before you disposed of him?”
Teo shakes his head. “No, he has no idea what I have planned. This is the first I’ve spoken of it out loud.”
“I don’t care about any of this bullshit with this selfish asshole. I need to get to my son,” Sophia says.
I can send Sophia to get Cam alone, let her take the risk, but I know my husband far too well.
There’s no damn way that he’s turned around, even though I’ve asked him to.
There’s no way he’d leave a child in here and go home.
If he’s that close, he’s going to go for the kid because he’s such a good person.
So I guess that’s my only option too.
“Sophia, we are heading out. In the hallway, we’re going to take a right and then another right once the hallway opens up. That should lead us to the others. We’ll grab Cam and then we’re leaving.”
“Thank you. Thank you so much,” she says, relief washing across her face.
She seems happy to deal with me for the first time since I met her.
We’ll have to fix that once we’re out of here.
I’d be more than happy for her to never wish to deal with me again.
She can merrily exit my life and leave me to go back to being Leland the PI.
I slip out, not planning on letting go of Teo until I have to.
“I’ll let you go,” he says. “Just let me free, and I’ll tell my men to stand down.”
“You really need to start doing standup if you think I’m going to trust a single word that comes out of your mouth. Hilarious. Sophia, did you hear how funny this man is?”
“I even cracked a smile,” she says. “Thought about chuckling, but it seemed a bit excessive.”
“Ha.”
“Ha,” she mimics.
Teo’s scowl deepens.
“Do you not like being used as a bullet shield?” I ask. “You didn’t seem to mind when you were trying to coerce me into being a bullet shield for you.”
He tries wriggling free, so I tighten the hold on his neck, squeezing it until I cut off his oxygen. Then he starts doing a fun little tap dance like he believes waving wildly and patting me on the arm like we’re ol’ pals will save his life… and this time it does.
He gasps for breath as I reach the door.
“Could you keep the wheezing and coughing down a bit? We’re trying to be discreet.”
The look he gives me is honestly impressive.
I grab the doorknob but find it locked. “Where’s the key?”
“F-Fuck if I know. W-We never lock these doors,” he wheezes out. “I’m going to make you regret existing.”
“Me? You harassed my child and then dragged me here and ordered me to do your dirty work and now you’re mad at me? You jest.”
“Fuck you.”
The door I’m wanting to get through is locked and pretty solid, so I doubt I’ll be able to break through it, but I still throw Teo’s body at it. He smashes into it and I nod approvingly. “Nice solid doors. Only nice thing about this place.”
“What the fuck was that for?” he asks.
“I was just testing the durability of the doors,” I assure him. “It wasn’t at all me venting my irritation from dealing with you.”
“I think I saw it wiggle a little, test it again,” Sophia urges.
“I think I might,” I say before I test him on another door.
This one also doesn’t open when his body smashes into it.
Deciding that ramming Teo against the doors is only pleasing me and isn’t actually fixing anything, I pass him off to Sophia.
“I have this strange feeling that whoever did this is trying to drive us to a certain location, which they’re doing by locking all doors they don’t want us to go through.
” I quickly contact Cassel and check my phone for the next best path.
The lock on the door looks like it’s resistant to lockpicking.
That probably doesn’t mean that it can’t be done, but I’m not quite sure my skills are high enough to do it.
I could waste time trying, but before going that far, I want to make sure I’m going the best way.
“Cassel, I think we’re in a bit of a pickle. ”
“I know. I’m doing my best. I’m trying to get into the system. They knew what they were doing when it came to security,” he says.
“I think there’s a third party here and they’re trying to drive us toward a certain area. I have to assume they’re here for Teo’s head, so I’m hoping I can simply roll Teo over to them and exit the estate with Cam intact. Maybe a quick high five and be on our way.”
“Don’t high-five strangers who may or may not want to kill you,” Cassel says, which explains why he’s never the life of the party.
“Low five?”
“No five.”
“So picky,” I say. I stare at the door that should lead us closer to Cam before looking back at the door they’re trying to direct us through.
“Sophia, how are your lockpicking skills?” I ask.
“I learned how to lockpick well before those kinds of locks were invented,” she says, eyeing the door with an electronic lock.
I take Teo back from her and move him toward the only door that appears to be unlocked. I pull it open and look over at the blood streaked across the floor. This time, there are no bodies to be found, which is likely a bigger problem than one would think.
If someone has time to murder this many people and then drag the bodies off… I’m not sure I want to deal with them. I feel like I’d rather take my people and get them to safety.
“Leland, you still there?” Cassel asks.
“Yes.”
“I’ve broken into their system… and it doesn’t look the best. Jackson and Henry have located the room Cam is in, but this third party… they’ve cut off Everly’s and Tavish’s exit. They’re herding them toward an open room.”
“Could Everly use Tavish’s body as a shield and get out of there?” I ask.
“I can’t connect to them. I think one of them is hurt since I see blood on them. Leland, you guys need to get out of there. The situation is too unstable. We’ve lost control of it.”
“The third party has Everly and Tavish?” I ask.
“Yes.”
“How far from me?”
“Other side of the estate.”
“How many of Teo’s people are still alive?”
Cassel is silent for a moment. “None of them.”