Chapter 26
Damien
“What the fuck do you mean, she’s missing?”
“I mean… I mean…”
“Speak, woman!”
“I… I…”
I’ve never been so close to shaking the fucking life out of a woman before. I stand before Lucy, breathing hard, as she quakes against the wall, her face white.
“Didn’t you give her my note?” I thunder.
“Y-y-yes...” she breathes, averting her eyes from my dangerously flashing ones.
“And she didn’t believe me? She didn’t believe me!” This time, I’m not asking for an answer. Of course she didn’t believe me. I can hardly believe it myself. That I could have hurt my poor sweet Seraphina in this way. She was looking to me for protection, and I failed her. I failed her.
I want to die.
But there’s one thing I can’t believe at all. She can’t have escaped. It’s not possible.
I push past Lucy, bang open the door, and search the apartment, turning it topsy-turvy in the process. Under the couch, between the cushions, in the shower, under the bed. Even in the fridge.
It’s ridiculous, I know. There’s no way she could be hiding in any of the places I look in, but it’s even more absurd to think she could have evaporated in thin air.
The door was locked, and only Lucy and I had the remote controls.
Even imagining that someone managed to get access to the floor some other way, there are only five keys to the apartment.
Lucy takes a key from one of us Devils each time she goes and returns it immediately afterward.
The only time that wasn’t the case was during the Feds’ investigation, when she was living on this floor.
But things have returned to normal. My key lies heavy in my pocket, and I trust the others enough. Even Vale. Especially Vale, as far as this situation is concerned. What possible reason could he have to help her escape?
Kill her, yes. But escape?
And it’s clear she has escaped. She packed a bag.
Anyway, he wouldn’t have killed her in secret like this. She’s his leverage. The minute she disappeared, so did his leverage.
No, it’s impossible. Impossible.
I lean against the wall, letting my head fall into my hands. Behind me, I hear the others, probably alerted by Lucy, coming to see for themselves if it’s true. If my pet really has escaped.
She has.
I groan, images of my sweet girl flitting through my mind. I have only myself to blame. I’ve been a monster. I’ve hurt her. She didn’t understand. How could she possibly? If I were to do it all over again…
Well, one thing’s for sure, I wouldn’t bid her in a fucking game of poker. Or take a belt to her when she cursed me out.
She had every right to do it. I never had the slightest intention of losing her, but she didn’t know that. She didn’t know Logan would never touch her.
I was her abductor. She was my captive. Did she even want me to touch her? The kiss, the touching… maybe she didn’t want it at all. Maybe it was intolerable to her.
That thought nearly breaks me. I close my eyes, tuning out Vale as he speaks.
“I guess she was guilty after all. She’s probably with Angel as we speak.”
“Never,” says Everest hotly. “She was merely caught up in the situation. Of course she would escape, given the opportunity. She was in captivity.”
“Let’s wait till we have all the facts,” suggests Logan.
“How long?” sniggers Vale. “Until she hands the nanochip over to Angel, who doctor it to remove all mention of them, and then give it straight to the Feds? That’s how long you want us to wait?”
“Bullshit,” says Everest.
“If what you say is true, it means your crime is far worse than the girl’s,” points out Logan, loyal as ever. “You were pushing us to work with Angel. You defended them after. Now you’re telling us they’re not to be trusted.”
Another pause, then Vale speaks again, on the defensive.
“They were to be trusted. We all break under pressure. Before, the Feds weren’t on us. Now they are, and someone has to take the fall. Whoever has the nanochip will fuck the other one over. That’s natural. It’s all about opportunity.”
“We wouldn’t fuck them over,” says Logan quietly. “We have a code of honor.”
I groan again, pressing my fingers over the bridge of my nose. The migraine is back, and it’s overwhelming. I know they’re talking about important things, but I can’t bring myself to care. All I can think about is my girl. Nothing else matters.
Vale snorts as he glances at me. “Look at that sniveling bastard. Is this really the leader you want? He’s practically crying over her. He’s the one responsible for all of this. If he weren’t stupidly in love with her, he would have let us kill her. And all of this would have been…”
His words are interrupted by a loud crack. I open my eyes and see Vale staggering backward, a fist on his jaw.
Good old Logan. I can always count on him.
“Once more,” says Everest quietly, “we don’t know that she’s with Angel. And I, for one, hope she isn’t. Because I’m sure she’s innocent. And if she’s in their hands, she’s fucked.”
That thought allows me to push through the migraine. We need to stop talking. We need to act.
“Alright, boys,” I say, disregarding Vale, who’s lying on the floor, groaning.
Talk about a sniveling bastard. “Let’s bring her home.
Everest, I want you to get a group of trustworthy guys together.
Try to trace her. If she escaped alone, she probably didn’t do a very good job of covering her tracks.
Logan, see if you have any contacts, or can activate any, in the Angel network.
Let’s try to figure out if they have her, because by the time they reach out to tell us, it’ll probably be too late.
” I swallow, trying to push away that uncomfortable thought.
“You can also broach the subject to Vincent,” I add.
“We’re still not entirely sure we can trust him, but he probably has valuable information.
Maybe it’s best to keep him under surveillance.
He could prove a valuable asset. Vale… Vale, you go over the security footage,” I order, dismissing my furious rival with a wave of my hand, before turning to the bulky, silent Igor.
“Sharpen your torture tools, and get ready for war. As for me, I’m going to look into this fucking key situation.
And the minute I find the person who lent her one, he’s dead. Keys, boys.”
They all fumble through their pockets, then hand me their keys. With mine, there are five. They’re all there.
If my migraine weren’t so vicious, I’d probably be able to figure it out. It was stupid, anyway, to believe that one of the keys would be missing. That would be far too easy. A big neon sign flashing, pointing to the guilty party. We’re not idiots. We can cover our tracks better than that.
I give myself a shake. There’s no way any of us would be guilty, anyway. As Logan says, we have an honor system.
But there are other possibilities. Other people who have had access in the past. Lucy. No, I trust her. Everest’s coach. He saw her once, and once is enough.
The first thing to do is bring him in.
“Call him,” I order Everest.
“Huh?”
“That coach of yours.” I rub the bridge of my nose again, wincing in pain.
Everest looks crestfallen. “You think he helped her? I’ve known him for so long.”
“Get him over here,” I grimace.
I see him hesitate for a second, but he seems to realize it’s the most likely possibility. He goes out of the room to give a call, and I hear him barking out the order to our guys in a very non-Everest fashion.
He returns, his face ashen. “I’ve known him for a long time,” he mumbles again.
“You’re going to need to find another coach to keep you red carpet ready,” scoffs Vale.
“No red carpets in the near future anyway, by the looks of that Fed investigation,” comments Logan drily.
I turn toward Igor. “Get all your shit ready in the basement room next door.”
He disappears at once, and Everest, watching him retreat, seems to have sudden qualms about having ordered his coach brought here. He’s far too soft, but having him with us, to tone us down a little, is what makes us Devil.
There’s no toning me down today, though.
I close my eyes as I think of what awaits his idiot coach, and the pain behind my eyes ebbs just a bit. It’s funny how everyone believes the cell is the worst thing that can happen to them. The cell is nothing. It’s what’s next door that will fuck you up.
A larger, nondescript room, with shackles hidden in discreet places and a small metal briefcase waiting by the door. In that briefcase are all of Igor’s treasures. The tools aren’t there to punish. They’re there to disfigure. To kill.
That room isn’t known, because no one has ever left it alive. And dead people don’t talk.
Ten minutes later, the surveillance camera shows a Devil car pulling up into our private garage, and I watch a few of our guys push a man out. He’s absolutely terrified. I don’t even know his name, and he’s going to die.
“Any updates on the cameras?” I ask, turning toward Vale, who’s moodily watching hours of sped-up security footage.
“Nothing,” he grunts. “Though they’ve been down on the entire fourth floor since the Feds executed the search warrant. Nothing suspicious in the staircases or elevator, though.”
I grit my teeth. I wish, now, that we’d turned the cameras back on, Feds be damned.
“Whoever helped her likely knew,” says Logan pensively. “They knew the cameras were down. They must have had access to the remote control for the door.”
“She might’ve known about the cameras being off, at least,” I comment. “The blinking red light might not have tricked her. She’s used to the cameras. Maybe she figured it out.”
Because I didn’t go visit her. She probably taunted me and I didn’t respond. I didn’t go see her, and she realized at the very least that I wasn’t watching. If only I’d gone to see her...
“Whoever it is also must have the codes to the entire building,” adds Logan. “And there are a lot.”
I run a hand through my hair, trying to think straight. “That means whoever helped her had inside information. A lot of inside information.”
It all feels more impossible than ever. I’m starting to doubt that the coach had anything to do with it, after all.
Everest seems to share my doubts.
“Can we wait a bit?” he pleads. “There’s a very real possibility he wasn’t involved.”
“No cell service down there,” I mutter. “If you want to stop it, you’d better start running.”
He jumps up and is out of the door in a second.
I sigh, wondering, as I sometimes do, how Everest ever got involved with us. Ever since I beat up a couple of his bullies in third grade, he’s been trailing me like a shadow. I still remember the day he swore loyalty to me in the school yard during recess. Since then, he’s been one of us.
But he’s far too gentle, far too kind for this world.
I lean my head back, frustration overwhelming me.
I guess it’s back to square one.
Suddenly, my phone buzzes. The entire room goes quiet, and Logan and Vale turn toward me in confusion.
No one ever calls or texts me. No one has my number, apart from Devil, and all of us are in this building.
I feel like I’m reaching for the phone in slow-motion.
It takes me a moment to register that I have a message, and another moment to register its meaning.
She came willingly.
The phone buzzes again. A second message.
She had the nanochip all along.
Then a third one. This time, with an image attached.
My girl, naked, bound and gagged, a vacant expression in her eyes.
Don’t worry. We’ll give your little traitor what she deserves. We’ll take turns fucking her before we kill her.
Gabriel.