Chapter 56 Amara
AMARA
“So, what’s it going to be, sweetheart?”
I’ve never wanted to run so bad in my life. Not even when my dad would come home stinking of booze and his own vomit. Somehow, this makes me sicker than that. Tristan makes me sicker.
Say what you will about my father, but he never killed anybody.
I take a deep breath. Fight against the nausea rolling through me in waves.
Despite myself, my eyes keep darting to the door.
“Waiting for Ransome to walk in?” Tristan barks out a laugh. “Don’t bother. He’s looking for me.”
“Then I should probably give him a call.”
“You could try.” His gun glints, catching the single ray of fading sunlight filtering in from the blinds. “But I don’t think you’d get very far.”
Regrettably, I agree.
“Or,” he whispers as he leans into me, “you could say you’re in. Jump over to the side that actually has the power to protect you and yours.”
I’m shivering hard. I don’t want to believe him. I don’t even want to consider it.
But Eliza—Gianni—Bella—
“How about this?” Tristan draws back. “I’ll give you until midnight. My number’s in your cell.”
I blink. “When—?”
“I have my ways. Now be a good girl and step back from the door.”
I hesitate. Just a moment too long, and then his eyes are hard again.
“Amara. Don’t make me repeat myself.”
Drained and helpless, I step away from the door.
Tristan smirks. “Good girl.” Then he holds a device to the handle.
The magnetic lock comes undone in seconds.
“I’ll expect your call.” He throws me one last look. “And if I don’t hear from you, you’ll most definitely hear from me.”
With that threat, he steps out.
I fall to my knees in the dark as the door clicks shut again.
It’s early when my phone buzzes. Once, twice, again and again.
I snap out of my dreams and jolt awake.
No, not dreams. A memory.
Last night’s memory.
In the end, I didn’t manage to tell Ransome. I fell asleep like an idiot and missed Tristan’s deadline.
Oh God. Tristan’s deadline.
I roll over and grab my phone off the nightstand, glancing at the clock as I do. It’s 5 A.M., and Gianni is calling.
Shit.
Not wanting to wake Ransome, I pad out into the living room before I answer the phone.
“G?” I try to sound casual, even though I’m terrified on the inside. “What’s up?”
“I need to talk to you,” he says, clearly more away than me.
“Now?” I frown. “Why? Is everything okay?”
“No.”
That word is a cold shower.
In the next five seconds, endless doomsday scenarios run through my mind.
Tristan, shooting up Eliza’s salon.
Tristan, talking Gianni into a race and making him run over someone.
Tristan, kidnapping Bella.
For some reason, that last one sticks with me most of all. I love all my siblings, but they’re adults. Bella, however? Very much not an adult.
“What happened?” Cold sweat breaks at the back of my neck. It’s a miracle I even remember how to speak. “Is it Bella?”
“What? No, it’s not Bella.”
Relief crashes over me.
It’s not Bella. Whatever else, it’s not my baby sister.
“Then what?”
“It’s…” Gianni stops. Hesitates.
It puts me even more on high alert. My brother is usually a pretty hard kid. A tough kid. But right now, he sounds nothing short of panicked.
“Please just come to the house,” he says eventually. “You’re in danger.”
“In danger how?”
“We don’t have time, Amara. Come to the house now.”
The house. For a second, I envision the rundown dump my siblings had been living in until recently. Old habits, I guess. I’ve been so busy, I haven’t even been to see the new house yet.
I slip into a pair of leggings and throw on a hoodie and some sneakers before I slip out the door. The sun is starting to kiss the horizon, though it is still very dark. But I don’t care.
I drive to my siblings’ new place. Gianni comes out of the side door of the garage, waving me over. I am practically running as I walk up to the house with him.
He shuts the door the second we’re inside.
“Jesus, G. You’re scaring me. What is going on that’s so—wait. Did you finish your car?”
“Yeah,” he says quickly. But he doesn’t have the look of pride I would expect. He’s jittery. Paranoid.
“Is it running?”
“Yeah. Tristan helped me—”
I stop. “Tristan? You’ve been hanging around with Tristan again?”
“Yes.” He runs his hands through his hair. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I’m sorry, sis. I thought he was a pretty cool guy, but—”
“A pretty cool guy?” I echo my brother’s words but louder. “Gianni, he’s a Chadovich! We talked about this!”
“I didn’t know what that meant!” he blurts. “I thought he ran in the same circle as your boss. Who was being kind of a prick that night, by the way. He was treating me like a child. All I wanted to do was talk cars. And Tristan loves cars.”
“Tristan loves racing. And cheating people, and hurting people, and…” I let out a long-suffering sigh. I’m practically on the verge of tears. “You cannot hang out around him, G. You have to stay away from him.”
“I know. I mean, I didn’t know. But I do now. And I’ve made mistakes.” Gianni’s voice is cracking too.
I freeze. “What kinds of mistakes?”
Gianni sits down and looks up at me through glassy eyes. “I think they’re all in on it, Amara. Tristan. Your boss. His friends.”
“In on what?” I ask, my heart slamming into my ribcage.
“I think they’re running. Or dealing. Fuck, I don’t know.
I think they might even be involved with the cartel.
Whatever it is, it’s deep and dark and bad.
It’s really bad. And I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you before.
” I bite my lips and try to decide my next move.
The less Gianni knows, the better. But at the same time, the less he knows, the more he is going to dig to find out, which is equally as dangerous.
I bend down in front of my little brother and take his face in my hands. “Gianni, listen to me. You need to let me take care of this, okay? Just stay away from Tristan and all the guys he runs with and lay low. Let me handle it.”
But Gianni pulls away, shoving up from the chair and shaking his head. “No. You don’t get it. You can’t take care of it because your boss is in on it. He’s part of the problem.” Gianni looks at me, tears brimming his now red eyes. “They tried to kill Ransome.”
“Who did?” I ask.
“Tristan and his guys. They shot at him and missed. And they’re not going to stop.
They want him gone because of whatever deal he’s a part of, and they’ll stop at nothing to get to him.
They’ll come after you and me and the girls.
Fuck, Amara. We are in deep here, really fucking deep. And it’s all my fault!”
“No.” I grab him by the shoulders. “It’s not your fault.”
“But it is,” he says. “I helped him.”
My heart stops. “What do you mean, you helped him?”
Gianni wipes his hand down over her face. “That car you drive? That fancy-ass work car? It belongs to your boss, which means your boss can use it.”
“He does,” I say. “But I don’t see how that—”
“I put a tracker in it, Amara.” Gianni’s expression twists in pain and regret. “That day you were at my house and I told you to pop the hood? There was nothing wrong with your engine. Tristan told me to put a tracker in it so he could keep an eye on the things Ransome is doing. The places he goes.”
Fuck.
My mind races as I think about that. Ransome has used my car. It’s more discreet than his own. Which means he may have used to go to the warehouse.
“Shit.” I run my hands over my head.
I don’t know what to do. Everything is racing so fast in the direction of disaster, and all I can think of is talking to Ransome.
I take a moment and turn back to my brother.
“Thank you for telling me. But you have to stay away from Tristan, do you understand?”
Gianni nods. Then, after a hesitant moment, he asks, “How bad is it?”
“How bad is what?” I ask in the most soothing voice I can force.
“Whatever these guys are into.”
I swallow, then shake my head. “It’s not good.”
“Fuck.”
I hug my brother and leave to go back to the penthouse. The sun is up and the world is rising with it, which means traffic, but I race around it.
None of this is Gianni’s fault. If anything, I blame myself. For getting involved with Ransome, for diving deeper out of thrill. And now? Now my siblings are in danger and it’s so, so much worse than I let on.
I get back to the penthouse and race up the stairs. I’ll be damned if I let anything happen to them. Ransome needs to know just what we are dealing with. He needs to know everything, no secrets or reservations.
Tristan wants to be pakhan. The only pakhan. And he’ll stop at nothing to get rid of Ransome.
Once I’m inside, I call out. “Ransome!”
No answer.
I rush to the bedroom. He’s not there.
I go to the bathroom. Nothing. Office, nothing. Ransome is nowhere in sight.
I try calling him. Once, twice, all shoved straight to voicemail.
“Goddamn it!” I throw my phone on the bed. Of all the times for this man to be stubborn and unavailable, this is the worst. He needs to know, and he needs to know now.
Otherwise, there’s no telling how much danger he’ll be in, too.