Chapter 9 #2
Yet it was all snatched away from me. It was gone in a flash, and then I was being hauled off to prison while everybody else carried on with their lives.
As I select Ronan’s office at Callahan House, I lean back in the creaky chair and think about how that’s supposed to be me.
Everything he has is supposed to be mine.
A hot flame of bitterness rushes me ’til I realize what I’m actually seeing.
My baby brother is pacing behind his desk like a caged lion, jaw clenched and shoulders tense. Simone sits in one of the leather chairs across from him, face drawn and eyes red rimmed like she’s been crying.
…again.
The woman’s been almost as much of a mess as Chantal has been; the two of them are obviously very close.
More than best friends, they’re basically sisters.
The bitterness vanishes for a beat of satisfaction. This weapons dealer’s princess is the reason my boy is dead. She’s one of the biggest reasons my original plot for revenge failed.
If Dren and Eddie had killed her when they had the chance; if she hadn’t interrupted when Eddie was about to take out Ronan…
It feels good watching her cry. Watching Ronan’s failure play out live like the latest TV drama.
“It’s been days, Ronan,” she murmurs miserably. “We still have nothing. No real leads or idea who could be—”
“We’re working on it,” Ronan interrupts, his tone gruff but not unkind. He stops pacing long enough to squeeze her shoulder. “Kill’s got men shaking down every contact we have. Something’s gonna break soon.”
She shakes her head. “But what if it doesn’t?”
“Hey, it will,” he says, cupping her chin and looking her in the eye. “We’ve just gotta be patient. We’ll gain ground any moment.”
As if summoned by his name, Killian appears in the doorway of the office. The boneman’s face is grim, his beard grizzlier than usual and knuckles as bruised as ever. On vibe alone it doesn’t bode well for whatever news he’s about to deliver.
I grin to myself.
“LaMalfa’s not talking,” he reports. “The rich bastard’s insisting he doesn’t know anything. Says the girl went missing at the resort and he’s got no fucking clue who’s behind it. Claims he didn’t even see a thing; he was out of the room on business when it happened.”
Ronan’s expression darkens. “Sounds like we’re asking too nicely. He knows something. Force it out of him by any means possible.”
“Gimme an hour alone with him,” he says, cracking his bruised knuckles. “I’ll have him tapping out in the first five minutes.”
I mute the audio as my grin morphs into a scowl.
If Killian’s about to hem LaMalfa up, then that could present a real problem for me.
LaMalfa’s a pussy—there’s no way he’d be able to handle Killian wrinkling his suit let alone actually roughing him up. If the clan pushes hard enough, LaMalfa’s sure to crack. He’ll sing like a fucking canary and blow up my spot.
Which means I’m going to need to throw them a bone.
A false lead to send them on a wild goose chase while I figure out how to handle the LaMalfa situation more permanently.
“Thinking hard or hardly thinking?”
Marco’s voice pulls me out of my strategizing. He’s sprawled in the chair by Grandpa Finn’s bookcase, one ankle crossed over his knee, the position so casual you’d think he owns the place.
The former Cosa Nostra capo has made himself comfortable in my operation, which I tolerate because he’s useful.
For now.
“LaMalfa’s becoming a liability,” I say, gesturing at the screen. “My brother’s about to start pulling fingernails. We need to redirect their attention before our Wall Street pal decides to confess his sins.”
“So we feed them some bullshit,” Marco says with a shrug. “Send them sniffing after the Russians or what’s left of the Albanians. Anybody but us.”
“That’s the idea.” I turn to Akio, who’s set up his own workstation in the corner of the office, multiple monitors glowing with code and data streams. “What’s the status on the Callahan accounts?”
Akio doesn’t look up from his keyboard, fingers a blur as they fly across the keys.
“I’m in their primary business accounts.
Cayman holdings too. Give me another forty-eight hours and I can start moving money around—small amounts at first. Enough to create confusion without triggering any fraud alerts. ”
“You mean make it look like internal theft, right?”
“Child’s play,” he answers. He pauses long enough to shake hair back from his eye. “Though I have to say, their security is embarrassingly outdated. My grandma could hack these systems, and she’s eighty-nine.”
Marco snorts. “Wasn’t your granny Yakuza affiliated? She probably could hack them from the retirement home.”
“She was an accountant,” Akio replies flatly. “But yes. She would find this insulting.”
“Speaking of money,” Marco says, leaning forward with a glint in his eye. “I’ve been in touch with the Raguzins about the girl. They’re very interested. Fedorov wants to handle the negotiations personally.”
“We’re not there yet,” I say. “She’s still useful as leverage.”
“Sure, sure. But when we are ready...” Marco rubs his fingers together in the universal gesture for cash. “We should talk numbers. The Bratva pays premium for girls like her—educated, curvy, exotic. We could be looking at seven figures easy. Maybe more if we play it right.”
A knock at the door interrupts us. Robby pokes his head through the gap like a groundhog checking for its shadow. The dirty cop’s got a talent for appearing exactly where he’s not supposed to be, exactly when he’s not supposed to be there.
“You talking about selling the girl again?” he says. “Just passing by and heard—”
“You’re always just passing by,” Marco snipes.
Robby ignores him, his attention fixed on me.
“I had important news to deliver too. Sorcha’s stressed.
That girl of yours is refusing to eat again.
Won’t touch anything on the trays and barely drinks the water.
At this rate she’s gonna keel over from low blood sugar before you can use her for anything.
Seems she’s still upset about dinner the other night. ”
I pull up Chantal’s camera feed, minimizing Ronan’s office to focus on her room instead. She’s curled up on the bed in the beige jumpsuit we’ve given her, elbow propped on her thighs, staring at the faded wallpaper.
The tray of food Sorcha left sits untouched at the foot of the bed.
She looks... broken. Completely demoralized after recent events.
Good. That was the point of the other night’s dinner theater.
But Robby’s right; she’s no good to me dead. A psychological experiment is only useful if the subject survives long enough to exhibit interesting behavior.
“Tell Sorcha to let her out of her room tomorrow,” I say, my eyes still fixed on the screen. “She can roam the west wing, nowhere else. Make sure she ends up in the old parlor. The one with the artwork. She could have lunch in there.”
Robby cocks a brow. “You sure that’s a good idea? Giving her more freedom?”
“It’s not freedom. It’s all part of the game.
” I lean back in the chair, watching as she brushes another tear from her cheek and shudders out a sad, pitiful sigh.
“I want to see what our bratty little captive does when she thinks she’s being given privileges.
Whether she tries to run again or the other night taught her a lesson about the consequences when she acts out. ”
The part I leave out is the other reason why I’ve made the decision I have.
My curiosity if there’s anything left of that fire she had when she was first kidnapped. The brat who screamed at us in the villa in the Maldives and even the other night when she stabbed Dermott with a fork.
It would be a shame if I’d completely snuffed it out already.
Where’s the fun in breaking something that’s already broken?
Come early afternoon the next day, I find myself checking the surveillance feed like I’m tuning into my favorite TV show.
It’s purely tactical.
I need to observe how Chantal responds to this new test I’m giving her. See whether a taste of freedom makes her bold or if the dinner from the other night has cowed her into submission.
That’s what I tell myself anyway.
Sorcha lets her out of the room around noon, and I watch as Chantal takes her first tentative steps into the west wing hallway. She moves like a fawn learning to walk, padding awkwardly down the hall like she’s unsure how to work her legs. She fidgets, clearly expecting a trap at every turn.
Smart girl. There is a trap. She just doesn’t know what it looks like yet.
She explores slowly, peeking into rooms and retreating quickly, as if afraid that lingering too long in any one place’ll trigger some kind of alarm. Her fingers trail along the faded wallpaper and the frames of portraits that adorn the walls.
None of which she stops to examine. She’s not interested in the Callahan family history.
Fair enough. Neither am I most days.
Eventually she makes her way to the parlor at the end of the hall, drawn by the afternoon light pouring in through the tall windows and the artwork on display.
Much of it valuable collectibles Grandpa Finn bought for Grandma Darcy decades ago.
Sorcha appears shortly after with a tray—turkey and cheese sandwich, carrots and mixed greens, and a cool glass of water—and sets it on the small table by the settee.
“Your lunch, miss.” She bows and then quickly scampers out of the room.
Chantal eyes the food with obvious suspicion, probably wondering what horrors I’ve hidden inside the sandwich.
Cockroach? Maggots? Another dead mouse or rodent of some kind?
But hunger wins out over paranoia, and she plops down on the settee and takes a cautious bite.
Then another. And another.
No dead mice today, my brat of a captive. I’m not that predictable.
She finishes about half the sandwich before her attention wanders to the artwork on the walls. Though she’d noticed it when she first wandered inside, it’s the floral piece across the room that draws her over.
The Georgia O’Keeffe.