Power Play: A Romance Collection

by Lauren Landish

  I can feel the anticipation of the guy behind me as he nearly grinds against me, but I don’t move away this time. I’m too scared to rock the boat because I can feel the precarious balance we’re at right now.

  A balance that could be lost with as little as an unexpected movement, a whisper, or a heavy breath.

  Finally, Francisco spits again and lifts his chin to the guards. They release us immediately, although they shove us both away roughly, and I can feel my heartbeat in my arm where he was squeezing so tightly.

  I can hear the roar of my blood rushing through my head, a message repeating with every heartbeat.

  Not dead.

  Not dead.

  It feels like a prayer of thanks and a reaffirmation of life all at once.

  “Welcome to the jungle,” Francisco says and then laughs.

  It’s a bit maniacal, but he certainly thinks we’re the crazy ones. He might be right.

  An uncomfortable tension reigns between us, especially when Nathan looks at me like he’d hoped to never see me again. Still, he slips his knife into a sheath and then glares at Caleb.

  “Caleb? A word,” he says. “Over there.”

  They step away, but I’m unwilling to be left alone with the guards and Francisco, so I step closer too. I’m trying to give them a modicum of privacy for the conversation to come because I’m betting it’s going to be a doozy, but I can still hear every word.

  “What the fuck are you doing here? And why’d you bring her?” Nathan hisses.

  Caleb flashes that white-toothed grin, like all we did was crash a house party or something. “She wanted to come. Seemed like a good time, and I figured you could use the help.” Caleb looks over to the guard, who’s picking up his gun. “Think I can go get my AK now?”

  “You know you’re not getting that back,” Nathan scolds. “And I left her to keep her safe and you damn well know it. But you brought her here, of all places? I know you wanted to watch the shitshow from the front row, but this is cruel even for you.”

  I pause at that. Caleb hasn’t been onboard with Nathan and me from the beginning. I know I pressured him into bringing me, but could he have been playing me right back?

  Is this his attempt to get me killed, or even just to make Nathan see what a risk I am so he’ll back away from me permanently?

  But then I think about Caleb helping me through my moment of panic and his words that maybe he liked me just a tiny bit. Even that small give seems important from him, an unlikely kindness. He’s not the type to give false praise, I don’t think. So while he’s not happy about Nathan and me, I do believe he brought me to be nice, not cruel.

  “Thought you’d want to see your girl. Fuck knows, she wanted to see you. And since she was willing to tell her sister to fuck off and run down here by herself, I figured the safest play was to stick by her side. So here we are.”

  Caleb glances at me, his eyes unreadable once again, and I question myself again at his motives.

  “How did you even get here?” he asks Caleb, but before he can answer, Nathan turns to me.

  “Didn’t you have a play to perform in?”

  I growl, stomping over to him and getting right in his face before Caleb can speak. “It was one hell of a helicopter ride, and fuck the play. My guess is they got the original actress back, but I don’t know for sure, and I sure as fuck don’t care right now. I ditched Cleopatra, ditched my sister, and ditched it all so I could be here. So Caleb could be here. For you.”

  A bird screams, but it’s the only sound that interrupts the sudden silence, and Nathan’s eyes burn into mine. Risking it all, my voice cracking, I force the words out. “I love you. And I want to help you.”

  He doesn’t say it back, and the crevice created in my heart when he left widens, gaping deep and dark and pain-filled.

  But I force the tears back, unwilling to break here in the jungle surrounded by dangerous men.

  Something about it makes me think of the nickname he calls me . . . kitty. Not Kitty, but kitty. I’m a lost kitten trapped by junkyard dogs in a world bigger and scarier than I’d ever dreamed.

  Still, I’m latching onto the biggest, scariest dog I see and not letting go. I’m gonna ride this out and see where it all ends.

  Caleb’s voice is full of sarcasm. “I love you too, Nate-y Wate-y.”

  “Fine, let’s fucking bury Dad then,” Nathan says with a sneer.

  Still, before he steps back, he puts his hand over mine, and I feel . . . something.

  It’s torture, not knowing exactly what it means.

  But I’ll take it.

  Chapter 37

  Nathan

  The three flashlight beams play on the walls, but despite the extra light, I feel the situation pressing in on me more, more stifling than even the cave walls. I’m searching around aimlessly and occasionally speaking loud enough to make it seem like we’re holding some sort of strange funeral for a man I didn’t care enough about to hate.

  Okay, maybe that’s not entirely true because I do feel something about my father and his death. Whether good or bad, ill or beneficial, he had an impact on my life that’s brought me thousands of miles from home, with three armed men outside.

  I’m just not sure what label to smack on the outside of the jar of those emotions.

  “Damn it, Dad. Why?” I cry out, my body in the gap between the inner and outer caverns. The dramatics are for Francisco, who I’m sure is paying a lot more attention this time. Considering he was holding onto Caleb’s AK-47, he’s certainly being cautious.

  From the entrance to the inner cavern, Caleb whispers, “Too much, dumbass. You sound like a pussy. Tone it down a notch. Or ten.”

  I grin but fake a sniffle like I’m crying while keeping an eye out to see if Francisco is thinking of interrupting us. He did solemnly offer his condolences as we entered the cave, so I’m guessing he feels like he’s done enough, but I’m taking no chances.

  Meanwhile, Emma and Caleb are poring over the papers they brought, re-familiarizing themselves with the information I have memorized. Emma is comparing what she sees on the walls to what’s on the map using a magnifying app on her phone, looking at every inch, and then she gasps. She covers her mouth, but I can see by her wide eyes that she’s figured something out.

  I look to where she’s pointing at the wall. There’s a small picture, almost a hieroglyphic, though this isn’t the right civilization for that. I didn’t see it before because it’s so faint, it’s more like a watermark on the wall. Now that she’s pointed it out, it’s as plain as day.

  I cross the inner cavern, but Caleb is to her first, grabbing her shoulders and turning her to face him. “What? What does it say?”

  Her eyes flick past him to me, and I push him out of the way. Thank God he moves willingly or I would have to beat the shit out of him for touching her. I’m still going to beat the shit out of him for bringing her here, but that can wait till we get home still alive.

  “It’s a sunstar design, unusual for this area, but . . .”

  She goes on, quietly rambling something or other that’s way above my head about the civilization of the area and the development of their written language. I learned the details of the treasure, not the history of the local indigenous tribes. But she obviously did the homework I asked of her.

  “Sum it up,” I demand. “What’s that mean?”

  She sighs, realizing that no one has understood or even listened to her. “It’s basically like ‘the light within’ or ‘light bursting through’, so I think it means—” She looks around the cave, and I do the same even though her words are basically gibberish to me.

  She shines her light around, looking for something, but I don’t see anything other than the same brown rocks we’ve been looking at.

  “What do you see?” I whisper, trying to figure out what Emma’s looking for. Caleb’s moved back to the door, and we’re both shocked when she bends down and crawls through a gap I hadn’t seen before, an almost impossibly ti
ght squeeze.

  “What are you doing? Don’t go back there!”

  My words are harshly whispered so as not to alert the guys outside, but I want to scream them. She’s going deeper into the cave where we can’t see, where Caleb and I can’t reach. There’s no way my body’s fitting through that gap, and Caleb’s a little taller than me, so he’s no help either.

  If something goes wrong, we can’t get to her.

  She pauses, and I can hear the excitement and the fear in her voice as she says, “It’s okay. I’m going to get this diamond for you.”

  She shuffles on, her flashlight beam disappearing while Caleb looks at me worriedly. I know what he’s thinking. It’s the same thing I am. What the fuck do we do if she’s stuck in there?

  I watch, shocked, as the crystals we were focusing on start to light up again . . . this time from the other side. I can almost imagine it’s my eyes playing tricks on me.

  “What the hell?” Caleb whispers, then chuckles. “Of course. You don’t leave your valuables in your fucking entryway.”

  He’s being his usual joking self about a scary situation, but then the crystals darken again like Emma’s moved to a different area of the cave where we can’t even see her light. Even that small sign of her is gone. And the reality of her disappearance hits me like a ton of bricks. I don’t want her to be gone.

  I want her by my side.

  Always.

  Forever.

  Shit.

  I tried to do the right thing, to get her away from the madness that is my life even though it hurt me. I knew I was becoming the thing I hated most . . . my dad.

  But Emma deserves more than this, and I tried to give it to her.

  Freedom, the one thing she deserves most of all. Which is why I pushed her away.

  But like a puppy that doesn’t know any better, she came back for more.

  No, not a puppy.

  Like a kitten. A kitty.

  A kitty that lets you pet her on her terms, approaches you when she wants, but will scratch the shit out of you if you fuck up. And the definition of fucking up is strictly written on her say-so.

  She’s let me play at being in charge of us, at her following orders when it suited the situation, but look at us now. She’s the one making the big steps, and I’m freaking out that I’m going to lose her.

  She chased me down to fucking cartel territory in Brazil to help me. And I’m on her hook so damn bad.

  I knew it, but I didn’t know it deep down to my core like I do right this instant.

  I turn back to Caleb.

  I know he can see the realizations blooming like fireworks in my dark eyes, and he sighs.

  “You really want to walk this path, man?”

  Not helpful. I’m looking for assurance.

  Assurance that I didn’t just kill her by bringing her here and letting her go traipsing off alone into an uncharted cave, looking for a diamond.

  A diamond I just want to destroy.

  “Caleb,” I whisper, and his face softens. We’ve fought, but now that I’ve made my decision, he’s going to back me one hundred percent.

  Caleb holds up a reassuring hand. “Give her a minute. She’s stubborn.”

  I understand, but still, I’m worried. How deep does the next cavern go?

  Why didn’t it show up on the geological reports?

  What if . . .

  My eyes scan the deep darkness, and then I see the white light bouncing through the crystals, coming back toward me, and hear the quiet echo of her running footsteps. My heart stops as a slightly dirty but unmarked arm sticks out of the crack.

  “I need something to dig with, something sharp.”

  Caleb and I both offer her our knives from our sheaths, and I take some small joy that my knife is bigger, more serrated than his.

  We set them down, and I can see her face, so beautiful in the dark crack. She looks at them and then takes them both with a smirk, like she could read my thoughts.

  “What did you find?”

  She doesn’t answer, just winks and disappears into the darkness again.

  Caleb and I look to each other, and he grins. “It’s not the size of the blade but how you use it.”

  It’s a bad joke, but it helps with my worries as from behind the crystal wall, I can hear scraping noises and a few grunts.

  “Give her a minute,” Caleb repeats, and it sounds like he’s reminding us both.

  He’s a good guy, would never infringe on something I have going with a woman, but I can sense that he feels some responsibility for bringing Emma here.

  And he knows she’s mine . . . and he’ll defend her to his last breath because of that.

  “Thanks,” I whisper, one word encompassing so many things. For being my brother, for always having my back, for bringing Emma, for coming himself. All of it, none of it. It doesn’t matter.

  Caleb simply nods, and two agonizingly long minutes later, Emma is back, a grimace on her face.

  “Did you find it? Holy shit, did you find it?”

  “I did. But uhm, it’s not what I expected.” The look on her face is one of confusion mixed with awe.

  “Let me see.”

  She reaches into her pocket, where she pulls out . . . her sock?

  She unwraps the balled-up sock, and I see it. The gem’s beautiful, a hue of iridescence that I’ve never seen before, and it’s somehow carved. The pattern is almost chilling, a figure twisting and entwining itself in a way that’s almost an affront to the sane mind.

  “I can see why you don’t like it,” Caleb whispers. “Ugly fucking thing.”

  “Fucking finally,” I growl as I reach out, taking it from her. I turn it over in my hands, looking at it, through it, studying it. It feels heavier than it should, like the density of the stone is higher than that of a typical diamond.

  Caleb holds up a hand, not to take the gem but to ask, “Where we gonna hide it?”

  I look at Emma, who shakes her head as I scan her body. “Not there, you’re not! I ain’t that helpful.”

  Caleb rolls his eyes and interrupts. “I don’t care if you smuggle it out of here San Quentin style or shoved up your twat. Though Nathan . . . don’t go sticking your dick in there again or you’re risking some serious cave cooties.”

  He grins like that’s high-brow humor, and I can’t help it, I chuckle.

  I push him, and he stumbles but finds his footing. Emma giggles the smallest little laugh, like she finds our brotherly battles entertaining. While we’re goofing off, she solves the problem, shaking the urn with dad’s ‘ashes’. “Looks like it’ll fit in here. No need for questionable smuggling.”

  We stage the ground to look like we’ve had some type of ceremony for dear old Dad, and we even sprinkle the ash throughout the cave to cement our cover story. Then we slip the gem in the urn. It fits like we planned it that way, but it’s truly just the best of luck. A tiny voice whispers that maybe Dad had a little something to do with that good fortune, but I dismiss it.

  “Looks good, yeah?” I ask.

  With a nod, we leave the cave to the dusky night air of the jungle.

  I fully expect Francisco to have double-crossed us and be waiting with guns drawn to take the diamond from us.

  But instead, he’s sitting on his rock by the campfire, drawing shapes in a patch of dirt with a stick. The guards are several feet away, snoring lightly on the grass, feeling secure that the fire will keep away any predators.

  “You do your padre right?” he asks. Like most men in this region and this line of work, he’s willing to let the difficulties from before slide, it seems.

  I swallow thickly and hope it looks like I’m choking on grief. “Yeah. We’re good. Thanks.”

  He nods. “Get some sleep. We’ll leave early, with sunrise.”

  We do as he says, Caleb going to secure his gear while I slip the urn into my pack before using it as a pillow, lying down next to Emma.

  There are so many things I want to say to her, but I d
on’t want them overheard, especially by Nikolai’s guys.

  So I pull her to me, spooning her and keeping a protective arm wrapped tightly around her waist, whispering, “I’m sorry.”

  She seems to understand the need to keep any gestures small right now, because she nods and snuggles back into me. “Me too.”

  With a small, satisfied smile, one my mind says is almost kittenish, she drifts off easily. I’m sure she’s exhausted, because I am too. But I can’t sleep.

  Caleb sits down beside me, leaning back on a rock where he can see Francisco and the two guards. “I’ve got watch. I’m good.”

  Francisco shakes his head, smiling a little. “I guard. They later.” He tosses a thumb in the direction of Tweedle-Big and Tweedle-Bigger. “That’s what money is for.”

  Caleb and I know better. Those guards are to watch for danger in the jungle, to make sure no one and nothing sneaks up on us while we’re vulnerable.

  Caleb is watching for danger right here in our little group. He’s watching out for me, for Emma.

  I do think he’s starting to like her. Maybe. He admires her guts, at least. So even if he doesn’t trust her yet, he’ll watch out for her because I care for her.

  That’s what brothers do.

  I check my watch and do some quick mental calculations. “Three hours. You catch rack before daybreak.”

  He nods, already in stealth mode. Still and quiet, he sinks into the shadows.

  He’s watching, and he’s not going to let anyone hurt his family.

  That knowledge lets me close my eyes, glad he’s on my team.

  Chapter 38

  Emma

  The sun is barely peeking over the horizon when Nathan shakes me awake. “Time to go.”

  I stretch, my body arguing at the abuse from sleeping on the hard ground overnight. It’s been too long since I’ve been in the field, and even then, it was a lot more ‘civilized’ than this. If this is what Nathan’s idea of roughing it is, maybe I’ll stick to excavating at a Holiday Inn.

  With a toilet and a long, hot shower. Ah, plumbing . . . I miss you.