Chapter 28 #2
"If I give you this access," I say, "it covers drugs only. I won't provide intelligence that protects anyone involved in violence against people. Rapists. Murderers. Anyone moving human cargo." I keep my voice flat. "That's not negotiable."
Luther looks at me for a moment, calculating behind his blue, beady eyes. I watch him the way I watch everything — completely still, waiting for the thing underneath it to expose itself.
He doesn't flinch.
"That works for me," he answers.
But I’m not sure I believe him.
I have to get moving and get two steps ahead of this motherfucker before he and Marcus decide to seal the alliance with something other than Delilah.
Before the women are moved.
Before they find my girl.
Luther stares at me as flatly as I do him, and I can’t make a call on what’s true and what’s not, apart from the fact that he’s kept me a secret.
He could be agreeing to drugs only now and change it all later. Or maybe he doesn’t know about the trafficking. Maybe Luther genuinely doesn't know what his future father-in-law does to women from Chile.
I have to operate on him without knowing.
Marcus goes down first — clean, fast, the case built tight enough that it holds.
With Luther uninvolved, he becomes a separate problem, one I can take my time with, find the right angle on, and make it cost him something to use me.
It could be survivable. Delilah could move on. Enjoy her youth, freedom and sweet little dog somewhere peaceful.
Luther picks up his glass again. "I think we understand each other."
I rap my knuckles on the table and start to stand, but he stops me.
“Just one more thing.” He smiles smugly. "How’s Delilah?"
It takes everything in my power not to show him that his words mean anything to me when they mean everything.
This scum, this son of a bitch who thinks he has a claim on her, knows where she is? Instantly, my hackles are up. I want to tear into his throat and rip out his voice box, just so he can never say her name again.
“It was the biggest coincidence of my life.” He furrows his eyebrows, and his gaze takes on a vicious nature. “My man went to that party looking for you, to deliver this meeting invitation in person, and he got a two-for-one.”
Delilah was right. Luther’s man was at the party, but he wasn’t there for Delilah. He was there for me. That's why the rider didn't take her. He didn’t have orders. He wasn't expecting her.
And I didn't get Luther’s message because we left together.
I’m ready to launch myself over this table. End him right here, right now. I’ve never been filled with so much rage in my life as I am hearing him utter her name.
He contemplates me, tapping his lips pensively with his index finger. "I'm usually good at solving puzzles, but this one is tricky. How did Delilah Cross end up with you?"
He doesn't know she's seen the file.
I don’t answer him.
He searches my features for something. I give him nothing and he knows better than to ask. I’ve shut him down.
He sips his whisky again. "I'm going to need her back, Rio."
I keep my tone flat. “What’s she to you?”
I don’t want him to say it. To have him claim her as his fiancée might send me over my limit. My molars are nearly ground to dust as it is.
He puffs out a small laugh. "Don't make me come and take her."
Take her. As if she's a thing that was left somewhere by mistake. He fucking disgusts me and this threat is one too far.
I lean forward slightly, close enough that he can see the whites of my eyes.
"Let's be clear about something. The men I have at Monarch Hills aren't prospects with something to prove.
They're professionals who've done things in places you've never heard of for reasons you wouldn't want to know.
If you come to my home—" I pause. "You won't leave it the same way you arrived. "
His expression grows colder.
"You're right," he says harshly. "But I don't need to come to Monarch Hills. I only need to make one phone call. I don't need to storm your gates to get the girl.” He lifts an eyebrow. “I just need to dial."
Delilah can’t be another advantage he has over me. He doesn’t know what she is to me. And I should try to keep it that way.
"You'll get her back to me." He stops just short of letting his anger show. "Get her back to Sacramento tomorrow night. I have arrangements to finalize, and she's part of those arrangements." He picks up his glass. "Tomorrow, Rio. That's generous. I could have said tonight."
He downs the rest of the amber liquid in one gulp.
"And bring her back in one piece." He says it the way you'd say don't scratch the car. Casual. Proprietary. "Don't break her." He smiles, sick and psychopathic. "I plan on doing that myself."
Every muscle in my body wants to fly across this table. Rage moves through me so fast and so completely that for one second, there is nothing else — no strategy, no calculation, no controlled exterior. Just the absolute certainty that I will not let this man anywhere near her.
But I don't move.
I don't blink.
I don't give him a single thing.
Because the second he sees it — the second he understands what she is to me — he controls it all.
I hold it all back behind my eyes, behind my jaw, behind years of learning how to be still when everything in me is the opposite.
I stand now and shrug on my jacket. My voice comes out level. "She's a free woman, Luther. But I'll let her know you're waiting on your knees for her." I straighten my jacket. "With an offer like that, I'm sure she'll come running."
His nostrils flare. "Oh, she'll be the one on her knees, Rio. Penance for the stunt she's pulled."
I want him dead.
"Tomorrow." He stands too, and tugs his jacket straight.
He moves through the bar toward the door. The two guys he brought, who were posted near the exit all this time, follow him out.
The door closes behind him.
I don't move for a moment.
Every path from here leads somewhere I don't want to go.
Every hope I had before he set the clock drains out of me. But I can’t lose my mind. I can’t quite just because this got harder.
We need to move faster than ever. We need a warrant to arrest Marcus, because if one thing will stop Luther from needing Delilah, it’s Iron Covenant falling apart.
I don’t know if we can do it. Warrants aren’t signed on the back of hacking.
The only thing I know for certain is that Delilah isn't going back to him.
I zip my jacket and walk out into the Sacramento morning with Anton on my left and Gabriel on my right.
I take out my phone and call Enzo.
He picks up on the first ring. "How'd it go?"
"Depends," I say. "How far have you gotten today?"
"Pretty far, actually. We're running surveillance on a few Ring doorbells that cover Cheryl Hartman's place right now."
"Financial records?" I ask.
"You know how those are," Enzo says. "Slippery."
I get in the car. Anton pulls out into K Street traffic.
"We have less time than I thought," I say.
"I'd better go then."
The line goes dead.
I look out the window at Sacramento sliding past. At the ordinary streets of a city that has no idea what runs underneath it.
Tomorrow.
We have less than twenty-four hours to take Marcus Cross into custody.
I already know it isn't enough time.
I also already know it doesn't matter.
Delilah isn't going back to Luther. Not tomorrow. Not ever.
Whatever it costs me to make that true — I'll pay it.