Chapter 20
Twenty
“What are you doing?” Grant hissed as his brother knocked Harmony Gibbs out. The woman dropped to the ground, deadweight.
“We need to question her,” Kiernan said, reaching for the woman, his hands under her arms to lift her. He stopped, grabbing something from the ground.
“We need her dead. We don’t need to question her.” Grant glared at his brother. “What the hell are you doing?”
“She dropped the keys. I was going to toss them into the car.”
“Why?”
Kiernan nodded to the open door of the SUV. “There’s a carseat. Those people who went in a few minutes ago had a baby.”
“So?”
“We’re not going to harm them,” Kiernan said. He tossed the keys into the vehicle and closed the door, then grabbed Harmony Gibbs. Kiernan dragged the woman to the SUV a row over.
Grant watched his brother put the woman in the backseat and close the door, sighing. Kiernan was always the gentle one. The one who couldn’t handle the ugliness of their childhood. He would cry when they had no food, then felt bad when they stole from people so they could eat.
Grant never understood caring about people who would just as easily allow them to die from either starvation or the cold that seeped into their home. No one ever cared about them. They only had each other.
Which was the only reason Kiernan was still alive. If he wasn’t blood, Grant would have cut ties with him. Permanently.
Grant got in behind the steering wheel, pulling out of the lot and heading away from the city. If they were going to question the woman before they killed her, she needed to be somewhere no one would hear her scream.
“Why the fuck did you take her?” Grant asked Kiernan when they were leaving the city and heading toward the abandoned farm property no one ever went to. Grant had been hunting on the property for years, and had disposed of a body or two there when he had to get rid of someone.
“I thought that was the plan,” Kiernan said. “I thought we were going to question her and find out what she knows.”
“You were at the same meeting I was. He isn’t interested in making a deal unless he knows the risk is handled.”
“And that meant killing her?”
Grant slid his brother a look. “I don’t know what the fuck else it would mean. Do you really think we can question her and then let her walk away? That she’ll pinky swear not to tell anyone who we are?”
Kiernan grumbled and sank in his seat. “I don’t know.”
Grant snickered and shook his head. “You’re still so naive, little brother.”
“Fuck you. Maybe I just don’t like the idea of killing people.”
“You didn’t seem to have any issues with it when we got those diamonds.”
“They were going to kill us. It was different.”
“And she’s so innocent?”
“All she did was call the cops. She didn’t come after us.”
“Same thing. If she hadn’t called the cops, we would have been able to move the diamonds that day, and we would have gotten more for the secrets that were ‘leaked’ during the break-in. We would already be on a private island with our hundreds of millions.”
Kiernan exhaled a rough breath.
“What is wrong with you?”
“Nothing. She just seemed like she was nice. It’s not her fault we were delayed getting there and the coffee shop was open.”
“And that’s why Paul didn’t survive the beating he took.
If he had been on time, everything would have gone according to plan.
He took the fall because he caused the problem,” Grant snapped.
Never mind that Grant had every intention of killing Paul that day.
Why the fuck was his brother on all this again?
They’d already talked about it. Countless times.
“I know,” Kiernan said. “Maybe I don’t trust the buyer.”
“You’d be an idiot if you did. He’s going to fuck us over if he has a chance.” Grant pulled off the road onto the dirt path that led to the barn in the middle of the trees.
“Then why are we working with him? We’re the ones taking all this risk. Killing people, putting ourselves out there, and he’s going to walk away with all the diamonds.”
Grant snorted. “That’s what we told him.”
“What does that mean?”
Grant parked the SUV in front of the barn and turned to look at his little brother. “It means I’m not selling that fucker anything. We’re going to get the money, then kill him, and leave with the diamonds and the cash.”
“What?” Kiernan barked.
Grant got out of the SUV and walked to the barn door. “Get her from the backseat.”
“What are you talking about? What do you mean you’re going to kill the buyer?”
“Just what I said. I’ve already set up a meeting with him for later today. I’m going to show him pictures of our dead tattle-tale to get the money, then I’m going to put a bullet in him and walk away with the money and the diamonds. Just in case we ever need to sell them again.”
“But that’s…”
“Wrong?” Grant snorted. “Climb down off your high horse and meet me in the gutter, little brother. We’re not the good guys.” Grant shoved the barn door open. “Go get the fucking girl, since you had to bring her here.”
Kiernan walked to the SUV, opening the back door.
Grant watched as Kiernan dragged the bitch who ruined everything from the backseat. Her feet hit the ground, but she didn’t move. He smiled. His brother hit her harder than he thought. Maybe there was hope for Kiernan yet.
Damien was talking to Austin when Lacey rushed into the bullpen with wide eyes. Her gaze landed on Damien, and he knew something was very, very wrong.
“What happened?” Austin asked before Damien could.
“Harmony… She went to get the diaper bag and never came back,” Lacey explained.
“What?” Rhett barked. “How long ago?”
Lacey shook her head. “I… I don’t know. Berkeley and I were talking, and Samuel needed a diaper change. I said I needed to go get the bag from the car, but Harmony offered. We were right there. She said it was fine. I showed her where the car was—”
Damien’s gut sank. He felt paralyzed, frozen in place. Activity swirled around him, voices asking questions, but he couldn’t add to it.
“Where’s Berkeley?” Jude asked.
“She’s still up front. When we realized, she called Marcus. She told me to come tell you guys,” Lacey said.
“Stay here,” Austin said.
“Where are you going?”
“To check the car.” Austin nodded at Damien, but Damien couldn’t function. Austin looked past him, and Walker went with Austin.
“They’ll check it out,” Jude said, his voice right next to Damien.
“She’s gone,” Damien whispered.
“We don’t know that yet. Maybe she had trouble getting the diaper bag. Maybe she saw a friend. Maybe—”
“We were wrong about Grant Pickens, and he took her. Him and whoever the fuck he’s related to. Pull up the footage,” Damien snapped.
“Already on it,” Rhett said. “She walked out seventeen minutes ago. There are the lights on Austin’s SUV. Door opens.”
Damien stared at Rhett’s screen. Harmony was blocked by the door. The SUV was parked in the back spot of the row with another vehicle in front of it and others on all sides. They couldn’t see her or anything else.
“Someone else is there,” Eve Barnes whispered. “You can see the shadows.”
Rhett shot her a glare. She returned it.
“She’s right,” Jude said, pointing to the space next to the SUV. “There’s someone else there.”
“What the fuck is going on?” Montgomery asked.
“Harmony’s gone,” Lacey said. “She went to get my diaper bag and never came back.”
“Berkeley?” Montgomery whispered.
“She’s fine, boss. She called Marcus,” Jude provided.
Montgomery cleared his throat. “Okay. Good. Where’s Austin?”
Austin reappeared. “Here, boss. Harmony’s gone. No sign of her. Lacey’s keys were tossed in the backseat with the diaper bag. Whoever took Harmony left the keys.”
“Why the fuck would they do that?” Jude asked.
“No clue, but let’s see if we can pull a print off them,” Montgomery said. “Someone needs to stay with Berkeley.”
“Walker’s up there,” Austin said.
Montgomery nodded, pausing his progress toward the front. “Okay, good.” Montgomery ran a hand over his face. “What the hell happened?”
“We were just watching the video footage from the front door,” Rhett said. “We saw her go out, then open the door, but we haven’t been able to see anything else.”
“It looks like there’s someone else out there,” Eve said.
“Whoever threw the keys into the SUV. Did we see him?” Montgomery asked.
Rhett hit play on the video again, and they all crowded around his computer.
Damien stared as the door to the SUV slammed closed. A man bent and grabbed something. He walked backward…
Dragging Harmony to an SUV.
“Fuck,” Montgomery yelled. “Why the fuck was she out there by herself? We were supposed to be watching her. Who fucked up?”
“I did. She was bored sitting here and went to talk to Berkeley. She ordered food for everyone, and I didn’t think there was a reason to worry about her being up front.
Berkeley is up there all the time by herself.
I should have told her to stay back here where it was safe,” Damien said, beating himself up for letting the woman he loved get kidnapped.
“You think?” Montgomery snapped.
“Boss,” Austin said.
The two of them had a conversation with their eyes, and Montgomery sighed, hands going to his hips. “I didn’t know it was like that, Damien.”
“Excuse me?” Damien asked.
“I know she’s not officially a client, but we have accepted responsibility for her safety. I didn’t realize she was more than that to you.”
Damien sighed. “I love her. I told her that over the weekend. She said the same. I can’t fucking lose her.”
“You’re not going to,” Austin said.
“Yeah, we’ll find her. We won’t stop until we do,” Jude said.
“Except we have no fucking clue where she is. We’ve already looked into Grant Pickens. We didn’t find anything that made us think that that fucker was the one behind all this.”
“Wait, Grant Pickens? The billionaire?” Austin asked.
Damien nodded.
“I thought he was the one she saved,” Austin said.