CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
TY
W e’ve been casing the house for about three hours, perched inside one of their outbuildings. During that time, people have continued to trickle into what appears to be a party. Although the arrivals seem to have petered out in the last thirty minutes. I’m guessing this is a nightly meetup for them.
We believe we have approximately twenty-two fighting-age males, give or take one or two. Our thermal imaging scanner is accurate and indicates twenty-eight warm bodies, but we believe there’s also approximately six innocent females. Could be girlfriends, but that seems doubtful with the manner in which they’re being passed around. Either way, we’ll let them go with a friendly reminder to keep their mouths shut. In anticipation of their presence, we even parked a car at the intersection of two nearby streets, keys inside. It’s not pretty, but it was purchased with cash, so they can keep it. Hopefully, they’ll see this as their lucky day.
What I enjoy about surveillance is how free people are when they believe no one’s watching. Most are creatures of habit, shamelessly giving away all their secrets.
There’s a group of three who wander out every twenty minutes for a cigarette. Like fucking clockwork. They smoke near the outbuildings, bullshitting about everyone inside. Then, they traipse back into the house.
That’s our in.
We’ve got about two more minutes until go time. Gage already creeped into the front before this last smoke break. He’ll enter the premises from the main entrance while I set fire to an outbuilding—making it appear as though one of the losers who smokes was careless—and then I’ll climb onto the roof.
Even if no one notices the fire before the dipshits take their next break, we won’t have long before they return and discover it.
Once they pitch their snuffed-out cigarettes and meander back inside, I stack some dry kindling against the walls of the shed, flick a match and toss it among the used butts, and dash to the side of the house. It’s a standard two-story. Secluded. Not many trees or lush greenery. Fires aren’t a stretch out here. They’ll be prepared. But that’s okay; it’s the distraction we’re after, not the destruction.
My weapon—a KRISS Vector .45 ACP submachine gun with a red-dot sight and suppressor—is slung across my back as I scale the trellis they have against the house for their trumpet creeper vines. It’s a sturdy plant, not withering under my weight. Unlike its owners, it’s difficult to kill.
As I make my way to the second story—moving to the thumping din of music and rowdy conversation emanating from inside—I can’t help but think about Rena’s acrobatic skills. She’s always been both an open book and a mystery. I’m not sure how she accomplishes that duality. It’s one of the many reasons she has been my most beloved subject to study from afar. Readable and unpredictable at once. A special kind of magic. Impossible to ignore .
When I reach the window for a second-floor room that we noted was empty earlier, I quickly pop out the screen and jam the blade of my knife between the two windowpanes, wrenching it sideways to twist the lock so I can crack the window open. I’ll be entering through there in a little while.
It’s a quick task, and then I complete my ascent and skulk across the roof. I lie down on my stomach, snug against a slope that gives me a full-range view of the vast backyard while also adequately concealing me. I’ve got a couple of minutes until the blaze makes its bold statement, so I indulge in one more fleeting glance at my girl on the app. She’s been good, which I appreciate. Maybe this will all be smoother than I anticipated.
During all the years I pined for her, I thought for sure if I ever tasted her, ever quenched myself with her particular poison, it would do me in. Destroy me. Have me so on edge and crazed that I couldn’t see past the need to protect her, to mark her, to claim her. And while that rage for these motherfuckers is absolutely surging through my veins, one look at her angelic face—which is so clearly a ruse because she’s indisputably part demon—and I’m lulled into a serenity I’ve never known.
After tonight, I don’t ever want to be apart from her. I’d like to fucking leash her to me or superglue her to my hip. Wrap her in protective armor and sling her around me like a koala. Make sure there’s nowhere she can go that people don’t know she’s fucking mine. To treat her like the precious treasure she is or pay with their life for the joy they plundered.
Okay, so that’s not the sanest line of thinking, I suppose, but there’s a peace that accompanies it. A tranquility in knowing that while taking her is undoubtedly the worst thing I’ve ever done, protecting her, valuing her, helping her realize her dreams could be both my greatest purpose and one hell of an awakening from the nightmare I’ve been trapped in. I’ll spend the rest of my days becoming the man she deserves—or at least the man she needs.
And I haven’t gone off the deep end, burning the whole world so that only we exist. I’m pointing my wrath at a couple dozen who are clearly guilty. That’s something.
I close out the app and tuck the phone back inside my inner pocket, turning my concentration to the ambush at hand and lining up my sight. Smoke is seeping out of the crevices of the outbuilding. No doubt the dry yard clippings and shed tools are catching fire.
Another two minutes pass before I announce into my comm, “Stand by. We’ve got flames.”
Once the assholes start pouring out of the house, I’ll alert Gage, and he’ll cut the power. The Cabrinis—the Mafia family that Wells heads—control power companies, so Gage has a contact on standby to cut the electricity. At the push of a button, the house will be thrust into darkness. Since Gage is the enforcer for both the Cabrinis and the O’Reillys, our sources are as accustomed to hearing from him as Wells.
The blaze is burning bright now, flames licking up the sides, so it should draw attention at any minute.
With that thought, someone shouts, “Motherfucker. We got a fire!”
Patience is key here because timing is everything. I want as many to pile out as possible before I signal Gage and start ticking them off. But wait too long, and I’ll miss a valuable opportunity. Striking before anyone can alert those in the house that I’m here is the goal. The element of surprise surpasses how outnumbered we are.
There’s an old Bible story about this guy, Gideon, who defeated an army of 135,000 men with only 300. They struck in the middle of the night, when the enemy was sleeping, smashing jars, blowing trumpets, waving torches, and yelling. The camp erupted into a frenzied upheaval of disorder, and the enemy army began to kill their own men in the confusion.
That’s how we operate. Numbers rarely matter. Create enough turmoil, and they’ll do some of the work for you .
Smoke and fucking mirrors.
The silencer I’m using will also aid in the element of surprise. It’s so quiet; among the racket that’s about to transpire, no one will notice the shots. Not before they’ve got a bullet lodged inside them as well.
There’s a general ruckus of pandemonium filtering through the air now. Several men have run outside to check the inferno. Two are working to grab a hose. No innocents in sight.
In a low, clear voice, I issue my directive through the comm. “Eyes on eight tangos. No innocents. Hold your position until they’re down.”
They’re all facing the fire—their backs to me—consumed by the mayhem, so I start taking them out one by one. Quick, successive shots, beginning with those in the back, closest to me, and working my way toward those nearest the fire. It’s too fast for any of them to register what’s happening, and as I take aim on the last two, I report the kills.
“Six tangos down. Two tangos in my sight. Go.”
Before the word go has even fully left my mouth, the lights are out, and I’ve eliminated the last two men remaining in the backyard. There’s initially a myriad of shrieks and screams, and a few non-silenced shots are fired, meaning they aren’t ours. But the telltale sound of Gage’s flash-bangs—a stun grenade that detonates a deafening bang , along with a sudden flare of blinding light within the darkness—means that he’s got them shell-shocked and neutralized.
He barks several kills through the comm while I pick off the couple of squirters leaking into the backyard.
Between the ten I’ve neutralized and the eight Gage caught off guard inside, we have at least seventy-five percent eliminated. The few remaining survivors will be infiltrating all the nooks and crannies of the house now.
I move from my position and swing myself down to the window I cracked open. In case anyone is hiding out in there, I throw some flash-bangs through the slit, push it wide open, and slink inside with my night vision goggles on. My gun has an EOTECH holographic sight, which is night-vision enabled. The NVGs color everything in my field of vision green, and the sight paints a perfect round circle with a centered dot wherever I aim. Gage has the same.
He never goes anywhere without a shitload of handy tools to share, in case he needs backup. So, while I was prepared, he had the means to take us up a notch, essentially transforming our puny team of two into an unstoppable force. That’s the benefit of our SEALs background. We’re trained to clear a house in minutes. Like Gideon’s measly crew decimated a camp 450 times their size.
“Tango twenty down,” Gage chirps. “I’ve got six ladies. Two tangos unaccounted.”
“Copy that,” I answer, checking beneath the bed and inside the closet. Clear.
I move through three other bedrooms and two bathrooms on this level. Nothing. But a creak in the walls tells me someone is nearby. There’s a skinny door at the end of the hall that likely holds the air-conditioning unit. I haven’t cleared that yet. That’s a decent hiding spot because there’s no great angle to approach it that doesn’t afford him a shot on me.
If I was one hundred percent certain it wasn’t another girl, I’d simply shoot. But I won’t take a chance, so I bang on the open bedroom door to the right of it while simultaneously kicking the wall to the left of it—so he can’t discern where I am—and step into the open threshold of the bedroom, swinging open the air-conditioner closet door. He shoots immediately in the wrong direction, so I return it, and he tumbles out onto the floor.
“Tango twenty-one down.”
“Tango twenty-two down,” Gage volleys. “Performing a final walk-through of the lower level and backyard. I’ll douse the fire.”
“Level two all clear,” I say as I head downstairs to help with the ladies. They’re all piled on the couch, trembling in terror, so I quickly address them in a stern but soothing voice. “There’s a car for you at the corner. Keys in it. It’s yours to keep. Not one word. You were never here. Understood?”
One of them nods, rises, and drags the others up while keeping her eyes planted on me. “We understand,” she says, and they all scurry out of the house.
This was fairly painless. Although as I survey the carnage, it’s anything but. York is going to have quite a job on his hands. He’s not fond of situations that have more than a dozen bodies. Maybe calling it in to Terrance Vargas, our FBI contact, would be better. He’ll be pissed, but he’ll do it. He’s been our guy since we were first erased, but even if he wasn’t, we have enough shit on him from that black book—a ledger of corruption a dirty judge created that Celeste’s brother stole and left for her—to make him dance any tango, foxtrot, or rumba we choose.
Gage announces, “All clear,” and sends the signal to our power company contact.
The lights instantly pop back on for us to assess the mess, so we both flip up our goggles and glance around.
“Nine minutes,” he muses. “Not bad. We’ll get you back to your Little Moon in no time.”
The mere mention of her has my face lighting up involuntarily, but I force myself to focus. “York or Vargas?”
He chuckles as we stroll through the utter disarray in the main area at the front of the house. “Both are gonna be pissed.”
I’m about to respond when my vision snags on a guy slumped near the front bay window. Dead from a chest wound, but his face is intact. And one I recognize.
“What the fuck?” I hiss. “That’s Braxton, one of Balzano’s guys. He’s come to two of the meetings—never inside, but he accompanies him.” My heart rate ratchets higher as my mind races, trying to make sense of this.
“Yep. Why the fuck would he be here?” Gage growls, tromping over to the guy and searching through his pockets. He retrieves a wallet from his pants, and upon flipping it open, he proclaims, “Braxton. Fucking. Balzano,” which we already knew, but the corroboration still sizzles my veins.
“Goddammit,” I bellow as bile blasts up to burn my esophagus. “This is so fucking bad. Tell me these aren’t Balzano’s foot soldiers.”
Crunch.
“Maybe Braxton is just an unfortunate victim here. No one can hold us accountable for the guy being associated with rapists. How the hell would we have known to look for Balzano’s men here?”
That is flimsy fucking reasoning at best, but if Braxton is the only Balzano present, we could spin it.
Sifting through the information I have stored in my head regarding the two guys I killed, plus the one I swiped a wallet from at the club last night, and what we found in our checks, I mutter it aloud. “Enzo’s last name was Sanford. We ran our checks. There were no connected families with that name. Maxim’s last name was the same, and Sebastian’s was Forner. None for that name either. Everything we turned up—rap sheet, job history, relations—showed them to be some low-level gang.”
Gage collects another nine wallets, opening each and spouting off names. For the first six, it’s all good, but then he hits another.
Squeak.
“Anthony Balzano.” He drops it into the pile with a grunt before reading and discarding the next few. Then, he’s off to search for more while I examine the Balzano IDs more closely.
Braxton was in his late twenties. Anthony was only nineteen. My gut is already confirming my suspicion, but when Gage stomps inside with another ID in is hand, the house topples around me.
“He must have them for illicit dealings. The Balzano family used to be rough, but that first resort they opened soared to success, and Balzano’s father invested well.” He spouts the history we’re both familiar with, obviously attempting to sort through this like I am. “I’d say they didn’t completely abandon their old ways. That’s enough to defend us with KORT. They’ll be livid if they know he’s risking everything with this piddly shit. And we’ve already got him by the balls because of the Noires.”
That’s true, but as far as I know, we weren’t planning to turn the Noire information over yet. I wasn’t there for that part of the meeting, but Ivy and Wells both mentioned that Axel was against it, that he didn’t want that intel to see the light of day. None of that even fucking matters.
“It’s not about KORT,” I grit out. “A takedown of this magnitude will look intentional. He’ll narrow it down to a few possibilities. If he figures out that you and I have been out this way—any fucking mention from anyone—we’re screwed.”
Blood.
“Even if he does, he can’t fucking touch us,” he argues. “He won’t risk retaliating on KORT members for below-board shit. That would backfire.”
“That’s valid,” I concede, pacing among the bodies. My cool and calculated demeanor has morphed to a panicky, cold sweat. “But … I need to fucking think. He’ll dig around. Enzo and Sebastian were probably already reported missing, so he’ll look into that. And because he fucking owns this town, he’ll get his answers.” My head snaps up with the revelation that wallops me like a brick to my skull. “And he’ll be led to the club, to her. He’ll go after Rena. There’s no reason he can’t.”
One wrong choice.
“Yeah.” He blows an exaggerated sigh. “He sure as fuck will. We should just go kill him.”
It’s not shocking that Gage would leap to that. Enforcing is his domain, so any threat to us gets buried immediately when he’s involved. But no matter how unhinged I feel in this situation or how much I loathe Balzano and want to burn him alive for what he stole from my girl by robbing her of her mother, I have to maintain a level head, or we’ll be the ones who end up in the ground.
“That’s fucking war. We can’t kill a KORT chair. We’ll all be dead by next week.”
“I’ve got something that might hold.” He wags his finger in the air, tapping his light-bulb idea. “I got three guys in the truck bed.”
“What?” I gasp—because … what ? And also, of course he has three guys in his truck bed.
He arches his eyebrows in pride, which wrinkles his bronze forehead. “I got three fucking dead Morellis in my truck.”
“Morellis?” I parrot.
That does astound me. Morelli is the Mafia family Gage grew up with. Once upon a time, he was a high-rising foot soldier with aspirations of becoming more. Until they used him and killed everything he was, including every hope and dream he’d ever held.
He scrubs a hand over his mouth, but then starts for the door, urging me to follow. “I was out in Oregon to encourage the governor to get in line with KORT.”
“Indiana Jones,” I murmur, to which he chuckles.
“Yeah. Stupid hat. He’s a slippery sucker. Ended up tracking him down in Napa Valley, California. After all the footwork, that guy was a sniveling sissy who caved within two minutes of meeting me. No fucking fun. Anyway, Glines called me and was all cryptic about some development that he needed to pick my brain about. But didn’t want to say anything over the phone.”
Glines is an FBI agent we deal with. He straddles fences with the best of them. Dirty and underhanded when it serves him, but does a damn good job of sniffing out the guys who are a detriment on all accounts. We’ve worked with him a few times, and he deals a lot with KORT and The Order.
As we trek through a covered path that leads to where we’re parked, I spit out my first of many questions. “What did he want?”
“No fucking clue. Wells had told him I was in Oregon, so he was willing to meet me there. But when he mentioned he was in California, I told him I wasn’t far, and I’d come to him. We settled on a little pizza place in Grass Valley—eclectic fucking town—and I waited three goddamn hours. He never showed.”
“Weird,” I mutter as we hike up the last leg of our journey.
“So fucking weird,” he volleys.
“So, how did that lead you to the Morellis?”
“Well, I was out there, and that town is only about an hour from Lake Tahoe. I’d been there when I was a kid, so I thought, why the hell not? I drove on over, and when I walked into this little tavern, I immediately spotted these three motherfuckers.” He pauses there, right as we toe up to the bumper, and he pops the bed cover open to a forty-five-degree angle to show me the dead and desecrated corpses swaddled in plastic wrap, but then slams it shut again. “We’d better just drive over.”
That’s a much preferable idea over carrying those dead guys back. Physical exertion isn’t going to trump my anxiety this time. And there’s no risk of the truck being traced back to us if anyone should report that they noticed it. He either rented from a service that specializes in anonymity or paid cash. We never use names for anything.
I plop into the front seat as he drops in on the driver’s side. “Sounds like it was your lucky day. Until I called and dragged you into this god-awful mess.”
“I’m telling you, it is my lucky day. And yours too.” He glances in the rearview mirror before he accelerates, his face conveying emotion contrary to mine—where my expression is no doubt panic-stricken, his is elated. “This is kismet. I’ve been so wrapped up in Ivy, Felicity, and Celeste that I haven’t given revenge much thought anymore. Wells always promised we’d get to it after we were part of KORT and unstoppable. And you know, it’s best served cold and all that shit, so I was fine with waiting. I’d dreamed of all the ways I could destroy her and her fucking family, but then the girls …” He throws a hand toward me. “Well, you know. But when I saw those motherfuckers, it all came rushing back.”
I’d feel the same if Steve hadn’t robbed me of my right to slaughter him. No amount of time would have kept me from gutting him.
“I bet,” I agree, “especially being so far from the girls.”
They soften us.
“Right.” He pulls into the yard, between several other vehicles. “So, anyway, I was killing them slowly out in the woods when you called.”
“Sorry to interrupt,” I quip before I hop out of the truck.
“Are you kidding me? You just gifted me a fucking revenge plot, where I got to torture three assholes that I hate, and now, their deaths will lead to an all-out war. Balzano will fucking destroy that whole family for me.” He cackles into the night as he drops the tailgate, drags one of the bodies out, and slings it over his shoulder. “I’ll get them,” he adds. “You call it into Vargas.”
Before I make that call, I hit him with one more vital inquiry. “Time of death?”
“Ahh … I threw them in the truck when you called, but I liked the idea of them suffering, so I didn’t kill them until I was in the desert, about an hour away. They shit and pissed all over each other. Pathetic fuckers.” He pauses for a beat, the limp form dangling down his back. “Probably around eleven.”
Armed with that information, I whip out my burner phone and dial Vargas’s private line.
He answers with a clipped, “Yeah?” on the third ring.
“We’ve got twenty-five down at a house in Vegas. The only residence on Marigold Way.”
“Give me a minute, darlin’,” he mumbles before going quiet and eventually returning to me. “What the hell happened?”
He must have been hauling himself out of bed with his woman because he took long enough that Gage is already disappearing into the house with guy two .
I don’t bother explaining myself, opting to launch our cover from the start. “Appears to be some sort of Mafia shoot-out. Best we can tell, three of the guys were being held and tortured, but must’ve gotten loose and retaliated.”
He barks a dubious laugh. “Three against twenty-two. Fine. Any specifics?”
It’s a stretch, but my crew could do it. That’s basically our POW story.
“Yeah. No time of death should be performed.” I add that little tidbit because while less than twenty-four hours doesn’t pose a huge difference in appearance, it will certainly show on an autopsy.
“How much variance are we talking?” He asks that as Gage sprints back to the truck and hoists up corpse number three.
“Twelve hours,” I supply, mesmerized by watching the Big Guy in action.
“Okay. I got a guy in the coroner’s office there, so that’s an easy fix.” Vargas has guys everywhere. He’s as corrupt as they come, but he prioritizes women and families. That’s why he’s our guy. He hums before tacking on the factor that’s coming to my mind too. “They’ll be colder though. Any officer will pick up on that.”
As the concern leaves his mouth, flames start curling around the house.
“I think we’re gonna heat things up to take care of that,” I apprise him.
“Perfect,” he replies, pecking a keyboard to likely acquire satellite images. “The fire marshal and I go way back too. You can never know too many people in Sin City.”
“Great.” I release a small breath of relief, although this is far from over. “Just get the right people over here. There are some big names involved, and this isn’t the cleanest job.”
His unruffled air dissipates in an instant. “Gotta give me more than that. What kind of shitstorm am I trudging through?”
Yeah, this isn’t going to go over well .
My stomach wrenches as my heart clambers to my throat. “The majority were part of some street gang. But there were also a few Morellis and a couple of Balzanos.”
“Fucking hell,” he sneers, comprehending the full weight of that admission—the Morellis are mean motherfuckers who cooperate with no one, and Vargas is aware of Johnny Balzano’s position with KORT and how slimy he is. “What the hell did you get yourself into?”
I could tell him to fuck off and insist that he do it simply because I’m ordering him to, but that’s not my style. So, I provide the one detail that I know will have him bending over backward to cover for us. The truth. “I had to protect my girl.”
And as Gage bursts out of the blazing house, Vargas imparts the answer I need to hear. “Enough said. I’ll take care of it. Get the hell out of there.”
“Leaving now,” I assure him as Gage and I both jump into the truck.
The call ends, Gage peels away, and I snatch my primary phone to check on Rena. She’s sprawled out, sleeping peacefully, no idea that I just transformed her complicated world into an utter mindfuck of an existence.
Desperate exasperation shudders out of my lungs until they’re so empty that I feel them adhering to my spine. “I can’t fucking lose her. I fucked this all up. I should have stayed away or … fuck .”
“We’ll figure this out,” he insists, flying through the side streets to reach our house, a meager amount of distress mixed in with his leftover triumphant glee and a whole lot of compassion. “We will not fucking lose her, Tytan. Do. Not. Go there. She fits. She’s ours. We just have to be strategic.”
Gage, Wells, and Liam are the only ones who could truly relate to this terror. Celeste and Ivy have experienced loss, but the guys and I have spent much of our lives in Hell. So, Gage and I both sense eternal damnation coming for us. I could stomach that. I’ve been immersed inside and survived the scorching blaze for as long as I can remember. But it’s clearer than ever that I’ve sentenced Rena to join me in the hellfire and there’s no way to free her.
“My time is up,” I mumble, knowing there’s only one way around this. And that, too, is a ticket into the depths of Hades.
“Yep,” he replies, catching my meaning. “I’ll call this into the Murphy line, so the Chief can get ahead of it.”
He’s referring to Well’s emergency line. Like Murphy’s Law—whatever can go wrong will go wrong. This certainly applies.
“You get our girl.” He pats my back in a gesture of reassurance, but my weary bones and muscles are too numb to heed it.
If her brothers weren’t already going to want to kill me, they will after what I’m about to do.