Chapter Six #2
A security officer dropped a knee beside the gunman and reached for the weapon. I left him there and forced my way through the crowd.
My receiver vibrated against my ribs.
It was Stella’s alert.
The live channel opened in my earpiece with a burst of crowd noise and her voice.
“I’m not going into that room.”
I changed direction immediately.
The tracker showed her moving east, away from the ballroom and into the restricted interior corridor.
Volkov’s voice came through next.
“We don’t have time for this.”
“Then let go of me.”
A crash exploded over the feed.
Stella shouted my name.
I ran faster.
Two Exchange employees stepped into the corridor ahead of me.
“Sir, you can’t—”
“Stella Moon is with Volkov.”
I went around them before either could answer.
Her voice came through again, sharper now.
“You killed Antonio.”
A beat passed with nothing but movement and breathing.
Then Volkov answered.
“Antonio should’ve listened to your reading.”
Now I knew it was Volkov.
I ran harder.
“You knew about the reading,” Stella said.
“Antonio told me after you left.”
“And then you killed him.”
“He’d become careless.”
A door shut somewhere over the audio.
I hit the end of the first corridor and followed the tracker left.
“Because you wanted his casino?” Stella asked.
“The casino was never the valuable part.”
“Then what was?”
“Antonio’s trafficking operation. The routes. The money. The people he thought belonged to him.”
My jaw locked.
“You wanted his operation.”
“I wanted control of what I’d spent years protecting for him.”
“And you murdered him for it.”
“Antonio believed everybody around him belonged to him. He was wrong about me.”
Another scrape sounded through the feed, followed by Stella’s breathing.
“And you put my card beside him.”
“You’d already given me the perfect story.”
“I gave Antonio a reading.”
“And he told me you warned him that betrayal would come from inside.”
“You corrupted the cameras.”
“I had access. That was the point.”
“You framed me.”
“I gave the police enough to frighten you. You were never supposed to spend your life in prison.”
I reached a second intersection.
The tracker held steady now.
A closed door stood twenty yards ahead.
Stella’s voice came through my earpiece.
“You were going to make the case disappear.”
“I could’ve.”
“So I’d owe you.”
“So you’d understand who could protect you.”
“I already had someone.”
“DiNero complicated things.”
“You mean he stopped your men from drugging me.”
“You refused help you should’ve accepted.”
“So you sent them.”
“I needed you somewhere we could talk without your bodyguard deciding everything for you.”
Stella laughed once.
“You still don’t understand. I was deciding. That’s why I said no.”
Something heavy scraped across the floor.
Volkov’s voice lost some of its polish.
“You should’ve accepted what I offered.”
“You wanted me grateful.”
“You should be.”
“For what?”
“For keeping you out of prison. For seeing what you were when Antonio treated you like entertainment.”
“I was there because he paid me.”
“You were wasted on him.”
“I wasn’t his.”
“You could’ve been mine.”
Glass shattered over the live feed.
I reached the door and grabbed the handle.
Inside, Volkov swore.
Stella’s breathing turned rough.
“You can barely stand,” he said.
“I’m still standing.”
I pulled the door open.
Stella was coming straight at it.
A heavy chair lay on its side behind her. Broken glass glittered across the carpet near the table. She braced one hand briefly against the tabletop, but she was upright.
Volkov stood several feet behind her with a short knife in his hand.
He saw me and lunged.
I caught his wrist before the blade reached Stella and drove my forearm into his elbow. The knife turned away from her.
I hit Volkov across the jaw.
He staggered and came back with the blade.
I stepped between him and Stella.
Volkov slashed.
The knife caught my sleeve without reaching skin.
I went for his wrist again.
A chair slammed into the side of Volkov’s knees.
Stella had shoved it past me.
Volkov buckled.
I took him down.
He twisted beneath me and grabbed for the knife where it had fallen.
His fingers closed around the handle.
I trapped his wrist before he could drive it into my side.
We fought over the angle.
Then he tore loose and came up toward Stella.
I drew my weapon.
“Stop.”
Volkov kept going.
I fired.
The first round hit him in the chest.
He stopped, looked down, and still took another step toward Stella.
I fired again.
Volkov fell.
The knife landed beside him.
I kept my weapon trained on him until I was certain he wasn’t getting back up.
Then I holstered it and crossed to Stella.
“Are you hurt?”
“He didn’t cut me.”
“Did he hit you?”
“No, he didn’t.”
She pressed her fingers to her temple.
Her face had gone pale, and sweat shone lightly near her hairline.
“The warning changed,” she said.
“You saw something?”
“His badge. The door. The secure room.”
“You triggered the alert.”
“Exactly like we planned.”
I wanted to put both hands on her and check every inch for damage. I stopped myself.
“Can I touch you?”
“Yes.”
I slid one arm around her waist.
Stella leaned into me, and I took enough of her weight to steady her without closing her in.
Exchange security arrived first, followed quickly by police.
I called Locke while officers secured the room.
He answered immediately.
“Tell me you have it.”
“I have all of it,” he said. “The recording is preserved.”
“Get it to Dempsey through counsel.”
“It’s already moving.”
I ended the call and stayed beside Stella while statements began.
The live recording gave police a confession in Volkov’s own voice.
They locked down his office, phones, and the Exchange security systems. The capture gear and pool-issued communications unit from the apartment attack were already part of the case, and his admission about Bellacorte’s trafficking operation gave investigators another criminal enterprise to pursue without Stella or me.
Dempsey found us near the edge of the ballroom after the first round of statements.
He looked at Stella, then at me.
“We’re going to need both of you again.”
“I assumed we would.”
He faced Stella.
“But based on the recording and what happened here tonight, you’re no longer our focus in Bellacorte’s homicide.”
Stella released a long breath.
“Thank you.”
“It isn’t a favor.”
“I know.”
One corner of Dempsey’s mouth twitched.
“We’re locking down Volkov’s office and devices now. What he said about trafficking is going to the appropriate units tonight.”
Stella nodded.
Dempsey looked between us once more.
“We’ll be in touch.”
He left.
The Halloween party had ended somewhere between the first gunshot and the police sirens.
Smoke still drifted from abandoned drinks on nearby tables. A severed-finger cookie lay broken on the carpet.
Stella followed my gaze.
“Still want one?”
I looked at her.
She smiled.
I almost laughed.
“No.”
“That’s disappointing.”
“I’m taking you home.”
Her eyebrows rose.
“The safe house?”
I looked at the ballroom, the police, the shattered glass, and the place where Volkov had nearly taken her away from me.
“For tonight.”
“That sounded like there was another answer.”
“There is.”
Stella waited.
I took her hand.
“I don’t want the safe house to be the only place we know how to be together.”
Her fingers closed around mine.
“Good.”
“I wanted to pull you out the second that security report came in.”
“I know.”
“I wanted to put you behind a locked door and keep you there until somebody else solved this.”
“I know that too.”
“But you told me the warning. We made the plan. You triggered the alert when it changed.”
“And you came.”
“I trusted you.”
Stella looked up at me.
The white streak had fallen across her forehead. Her red lipstick had faded, and there was a tiny smear of raspberry near the corner of her mouth that had somehow survived everything.
I brushed it away with my thumb.
“I told you I would.”
“I know.”
I leaned down and kissed her briefly. The room still had police in it.
Stella smiled against my mouth.
“You know your terrifying fruit punch is probably still sitting somewhere.”
“I hope somebody threw it away.”
“That’s wasteful.”
“It was purple.”
“It was festive.”
“It was terrible.”
She laughed.
I kept her hand in mine as we headed for the doors.
Stella slowed beside me.
“Geo.”
I turned.
“When you said you wanted us after the assignment, you meant it?”
“I meant every word.”
Her fingers tightened around mine. “Good. Because surviving tonight didn’t change my mind either.”
“About me?”
“About us.”
I pulled her against me and kissed her.
Stella wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed me back, warm and alive and still mine because she wanted to be.
When we finally broke apart, she smiled up at me.
“Take me home.”