Chapter 39 Bastian
BASTIAN
THE FOLLOWING NIGHT
double-cross cut /?d?b?l kr?s k?t/: noun
They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
That’s false. Because I-94 from Skokie to the heart of Chicago is paved with cracking asphalt and roadkill.
Zeke takes the wheel while I ride shotgun, watching the highway unspool before us like a gray ribbon leading straight into the ninth and lowest circle of Dante’s Inferno.
The familiar skyline emerges through the windshield in increments.
First, the Sears Tower. Then the Hancock.
Then the bristling spear of glass and steel that I used to call home.
They all look like glittering middle fingers raised against the darkening sky. I still don’t know who they’re telling to go fuck themselves. Me? Harold? Aleksei? Fate? Reason?
Jury’s still out.
My burner phone sits in the cupholder. Harold sent coordinates to a parking garage in the West Loop. Neutral ground, supposedly safe. A lot hinges on the word “supposedly.” But what choice do I have?
Zeke fills the silence with nervous chatter. “Yas made me promise to text her every fifteen minutes,” he says, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. “She’s convinced we’re walking into a trap.”
“Smart woman.”
“Yeah, well, she’s also convinced I’m going to propose within the year, so her judgment might be compromised.”
I grunt something noncommittal, but I’m barely listening. My mind keeps drifting back to Eliana in my bed. The promise I extracted from her to repeat her dreams to me face-to-face.
I have to survive this. I have too much to lose now.
“Turn here.”
Zeke follows my instructions and there it is. The parking garage looms ahead like the hollowed-out, concrete ribcage of some long-dead beast. He pulls into a spot near the entrance ramp and kills the engine. “So what’s the play?”
“You stay with the car.”
His head snaps toward me. “Excuse me?”
I point at him, then tap the center console. “You. Car. Stay. Need me to write it down for you?”
“Like hell I’m letting you walk in there alone, asshole!” Zeke looks panicked, eyes huge and round. “This is exactly the kind of stupid solo mission that gets tough guys like you killed. Horror movie bullshit. The guy who goes off alone always ends up as a cautionary tale.”
“If this goes sideways, someone needs to get back to the safe house and warn them.” I don’t look at him.
Keep my gaze straight out the windshield, at the pocket of shadow marking the mouth of the garage.
“Someone needs to protect the others. And I don’t want Yasmin haunting me if I get you killed. She’d be a vengeful ghost, that one.”
Zeke’s jaw works as he chews this over. Finally, he slumps back in his seat.
“Ten minutes,” he says through gritted teeth.
“After that, I’m coming in whether you like it or not.
And if you get yourself killed before then, it’s not Yasmin you have to worry about.
I will personally drag your ass back from the afterlife just to beat it again. ”
I nod, check the gun tucked into my waistband, and step out of the car into the night.
I slide down the sidewalk on quiet feet. The garage looms up, huge like an open gullet. I step in and it swallows me whole. My footsteps echo off the oil-stained concrete. Each one returns to me like a reminder that Zeke was probably right.
Stupid man.
Reckless fool.
Walking right into the slaughter like the hard-headed idiot you are.
I climb stairs toward the third level. That’s where Harold is supposed to be waiting with a briefcase full of evidence. A briefcase that could buy my family a future, if I play my cards right.
It’s mostly dark up here. Only one light at the far end of the floor works. Most of the cars look like they’ve been parked in place for a while. All of them are black-glassed, impossible to see inside.
They could be hiding anything. They probably fucking are.
When I get halfway across the floor, equidistant from the stairwells on either side, Harold steps out from behind a concrete pillar. He’s clutching a black leather briefcase to his chest. Even in the dim light, I can see the sweat beading on his forehead.
“Harold,” I intone.
“Bastian.”
I close the distance between us. Harold shrinks back until his shoulder blades hit the pillar behind him. “Is that it?” I nod at the briefcase.
“Everything.” He swallows hard enough that I can hear the click in his throat. “Enough to bury him ten times over.”
I reach for the briefcase, but Harold pulls it back.
“Not so fast.” There’s something in his voice I don’t like.
Something that makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
“I need guarantees first. Real ones. You promised me witness protection, a new identity, enough money to disappear properly—”
“We’ve been over this, Harold. I thought it wasn’t the kind of conversation you’d forget.”
He licks his lips. “You don’t understand, Bastian. The things Aleksei has done... the people he has in his pocket...” Harold’s eyes dart toward the shadows behind me. “I need something real. Needed, rather.”
An eerie chill settles in my gut. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that I had to pick a side. And unfortunately… it wasn’t yours.”
My face blanches white as a bone. “Harold, what the fuck are you—”
“Hello, Semyon.”
I spin toward the sound, hand flying to my waistband, but I’m already too late.
Men emerge from behind parked cars like roaches scattering from light, except these roaches are moving toward the threat instead of away from it.
Four, five, six, twelve of them, all armed and wearing the blank expressions of soldiers who’ve done this a thousand times before and will do it a thousand times again.
Their faces hold nothing, neither malice nor mercy. They might as well be carved from rock.
Aleksei himself steps out of the shadows last. “Did you really think I wouldn’t find out?
” He lights a cigarette and the scent of menthol mingles with the engine oil and sweat in the air.
“That I wouldn’t know the moment you crawled out of whatever hole you’ve been hiding in?
” He jerks his chin towards his men. “Bring my brother. It’s time for us to have a chat. ”
That’s when they descend on me.