Chapter 34 Cassian
CASSIAN
Floodlights engulf the churchyard surrounding the house in bright light, but the rain coming down in sheets makes it hard to see, to hear.
Enzo.
It’s Enzo. Father and son. Both of them traitors.
There’s a dozen of us out here. Two men flank me as I stalk toward the gate at the far end of the house. The gates that were chained. Locked up tight. I can’t remember a time they were opened.
But they stand open now. No broken lock. Why would he need to break the lock? He had every key to every room. Because I trusted him. Because I fucking trusted him.
“Looks like tracks from two vehicles. I’m sending a car out,” one of my men says.
I nod, looking at the ground for signs of her.
Nothing though. I see nothing. If there ever was anything the rain is washing it all away.
I try her phone again. I don’t even know why I’m doing it.
“Here!” Someone calls from nearer the house.
Hope surges in me and I run, shoes sinking deep into the ground, mud squelching with each step. As I get close, I hear it. The phone.
“Allegra!” I hurry, almost falling in the slippery mud in my haste.
But when I turn the corner, that hope evaporates, gone as swiftly as it came.
I slow. It’s not Allegra he’s found. It’s one of my jackets.
It’s caked with mud and torn. I take it from him.
The sound of the phone ringing is coming from inside one of the pockets.
She must have put it on when she came out here.
It stops ringing as soon as I reach for it.
“Inside,” I say, knowing there isn’t anything more to find out here. We need to regroup. And I need to get more out of Angelo. Because she’s long gone and I don’t know where. I don’t have a clue.
Once I’m in the house, I go back down to the crypt. Jet has a bottle of water to Angelo’s bloody lips. The instant Jet sees me, sees the phone in my hand, his expression darkens.
“Were you working together to dethrone me? Is that what this is about? You fucking bastard, I trusted you!”
“No, Cassian. No. It’s not what you think,” my uncle pleads.
“Then what the hell is it?” I demand.
“I found out a few days ago. That’s all. A few days. Andre, my driver, I heard them talking.”
Andre. Andre who delivered the gun to Severin’s man to then deliver it to Gage. To distract me. To make me suspect Severin who already hates me.
“What did you hear?” I ask, half-hearing myself, no longer trusting myself. My instincts.
I trusted Enzo. I trusted Angelo.
He shakes his head. “Andre wanted more money, or he’d give him up. So, I confronted Enzo. Demanded he tell me what was going on. Cassian,” he pauses and just keeps shaking his head. “His head’s all turned around. He thinks... Ah fuck.” He closes his eyes. “No.”
“What does he think?” I demand, knowing I won’t like the answer. Knowing I will hate it. “Fucking say it.”
“Your brother’s disease. Your father’s. He thinks your blood is tainted. He thinks the family…”
Something inside my gut twists. I bite down on the pain. I can’t do this now. She needs me now.
“It’s not his place to think, is it?” I hiss. “Where did he take her? Where the hell did he take her?”
“It’s my fault. He thought I loved you more than I did him. I should have seen what was happening. I could have talked to him.”
“I need to know where the fuck she is. That’s all I care about right now, Uncle,” I say, feeling his blood betrayal anew. “You say you loved me.”
“Love,” he corrects. “I love you, Cassian, in spite of everything.”
“You say you love me. Then tell me. Because if Malek gets hold of her, he’ll hurt her very badly. You know that as well as I. So, if you love me or my brother or my father, I need you to tell me where he took her.”
“Don’t hurt him. Promise me. Promise me you won’t hurt Enzo.”
I bite my tongue, holding back. I want to kill Enzo. But right now, I need to find Allegra. I need to get her back.
“Give me your word, Cassian.”
I draw in a tight breath and nod once.
He slumps against the wall in relief. “I have spyware,” he says. “Tracking on all their devices.”
“What?” I am surprised by this.
“Your father and I always did that. In case. Shit, Cassian, I’m betraying my own son.”
“Your son betrayed the family.”
He sighs. He understands.
“Bring him upstairs.”
Jet unlocks the shackles that bind him, and we head up to my office. Angelo limps and leans heavily on Jet. Several soldiers follow them.
“Get everyone ready. Once I have a location, we move,” I tell the soldier who’s taken the lead now that Enzo isn’t here. Now that Enzo is the enemy.
“Your computer,” Angelo says as Jet deposits him on the sofa. He clutches his leg.
I carry my laptop over.
Angelo’s eyes go to the bottle of whiskey. I pour him one and watch him drink it like water. He closes his eyes, takes a deep breath in.
I grip a handful of hair and tug his head backward. “Show me where the fuck he is. Now.”
“Easy,” Jet says, hand on my forearm. “If he’s dead he can’t tell you anything.”
I step back and force my fists into my pockets. I pace and watch over my uncle’s shoulder as he hits a series of keys on my laptop. A site opens up. It’s one I’ve never been to, never heard of.
“Your father and I have been using this system for a long time,” he tells me as he enters password after password until finally, a window opens. He widens it so it fills the screen, a satellite map with blinking lights. A lot of them in various colors.
I lean closer. It’s Devil’s Peak. My house is where most of those lights are, although, when I zoom out, I see Seth’s location. See the lights of the men there. I count them. I left six men behind, but there are eight lights.
“Why eight?”
“Each SUV has one installed. Each cell phone.” He continues to type, and the map zooms out, the world turns.
“You moved Vivi.” He looks up at me. I did.
I moved them to a location Angelo did not know about because at some point in this nightmare of my life, I knew in my heart I couldn’t trust anyone.
So maybe it’s not my instincts that are off.
Maybe it’s my head. My heart. “You didn’t think I knew.
You didn’t trust me. I didn’t hurt her or Gage. I would never hurt them.”
“But Enzo would,” It’s a statement of fact and Angelo doesn’t deny it.
“How long? How long has he hated me?” I start, but stop. Shake my head. That doesn’t matter. Not right now. “Where’s Enzo?”
“He did it to punish me, Cassian. Not you.”
“I don’t care. I don’t give a fuck! Show me where the fuck he took her!”
Angelo punches keys and the world turns again. I see a single blinking light standing still. A single blinking light on a stretch of land I know. A place with more bones beneath its earth than even the cemetery that is my backyard.