by Nana Malone
As I spoke, East’s jaw just kept ticking. “Fucking hell, abusing assholes.”
“We are in agreement. But that brings me to my question. The girls they bring to initiates, where do they come from?”
East rolled back in his chair. “Fuck. I don’t want to think about that.”
“We have to think about it. Have we been culpable all these years? Those girls looked like they wanted to be there. But are they trained to do that? Are they told they can go back to their families if they make us happy? Where are they coming from?”
“Jesus fucking Christ. You’re right. We should have just walked away from the lot of them. Washed our hands of this whole thing and been free.”
“Yeah well, we don’t get to walk away now. So that’s the question I had for you. I was hoping you at least had the name of your girl, because I don’t remember mine. Any brain cell in existence that day is long gone.”
“Yeah, I’ll look mine up. Ask some questions.”
“Thanks.”
“Then what the fuck are we going to do?”
“The same thing we were always going to do. Burn it to the ground.”
“Yeah, but mate, to do that, we need to be in-charge. And to take charge, we need to steal the jewel. We’re still no closer. So what’s the priority, this or that?”
I rubbed a hand on my jaw. “They’re both priorities.”
“You clearly don’t understand how to prioritize. Are we doing this shit, getting justice for these women, or am I chasing down how the fuck to get into the Van Linsted estate, in and out, mind you, and not getting caught. Oh, and let’s add not getting shot at to the list.”
“East, you let Lucas worry about getting us in and out and you worry about this for now. I’m well aware of how to prioritize, but it’s not a competition. Right now, we need to work on both of them.”
“All right, in that case, give me time to work. I’ll skip tonight’s meeting. You can catch me up.”
“Yeah mate, cheers.”
I knew that if anyone could find out where the women from the initiation nights came from, it would be East. I just hoped to Christ the truth wasn’t as bad as I feared.
12
Ben
We all crowded around Roone’s massive oak dining table. Roone stared at Lucas. “Walk me through it again.”
“Look, what I’m telling you, man, is that we can’t go through the back entrance. There are no guards there, but you’ve got the lasers to contend with. They usually go across the entire border of the rear gardens, which means that we can’t even get there. We’ll have to come in from the side. But the side is a whole clusterfuck of worries and possibilities. There are multiple entrances, employee gates, guards in untold numbers. We can’t see inside.”
Bridge stepped up and moved the little soldier icon that was meant to be him. “Well, I could ask for a meeting with Bram at the house. I’d have to find some excuse, but I could possibly shut off the lasers in the back.”
I didn’t like that particular idea. “No, I don’t like it. My guess is the Van Linsteds are already wary of you, especially after the fake jewel was taken. Not necessarily just of you, but wary of anyone. Marcus is cagey. There’s no way he’s letting Bram have any kind of meetings on the estate, not after the other night. Not under the cover of darkness, anyway, and that’s what we need to get in. We can’t break in there in broad daylight.”
Sebastian rubbed his jaw. “Okay, say we could at least get the lay of the land on the security, what has to happen next, Lucas?”
Lucas chuckled. “Okay, let’s just say by some miracle we make it inside, past the guard tower, past the security on rotation, and we make it to the door of the vault. This door right here, thanks to Bridge for those images by the way… You see that lock? That’s a Mclagan lock. You know how they talk about all the craziest algorithms to protect security and data, and the kind of machines you need to be able to crack that security. You have whole server farms in foreign countries with dedicated hackers trying to bring down these types of locks. That’s the type of lock that’s on their vault.” He glanced around. “Where is my fucking tech support?”
“East is working on something for me.”
Lucas lifted a brow. “Something that’s more important than this?”
“Something that’s more time sensitive.”
Lucas rolled his eyes. “Look, that Mclagan is uncrackable, so we will need to have the code before even attempting this madness.”
Sebastian ran his hands through his hair. “Okay, let’s say we put Ariel and Lucas, and I guess… What’s Olivia’s friend’s name again?”
“Telly,” I supplied.
“Right, and Telly. Maybe they can crack this lock, which means that you only need to take care of let’s say a couple of guards. Let’s pretend there’s four. So if you have two of us with you, and we’re able to manage two guards on our own, that’s a three-man team, then you’re inside.”
“I need to be one of those men.”
Sebastian looked like he wanted to argue with me. Roone definitely wanted to argue with me. “Ben, leave it. Lucas is obviously the master thief, the man with the hands. I have the military training. If we use tranquilizers, we should be able to take out any additional security. Seb, you’re going to have to sit this one out.”
Sebastian laughed. “Oh, the hell I am. You’ve got me planning a heist you don’t intend to let me be a part of?”
“You’re the bloody king. You can’t take part.”
Sebastian chuckled. “Watch me.”
I put up my hands. “Okay, listen, if you two can stop arguing for a minute, we still have to get our boy in that safe.”
Lucas tapped the map. “Okay, things get a little easier here. It’s a wide-open hallway right through down to the elevators, which are our only way in, or so we’re told. But if we bypass the open hallway, there is a servant’s hall beyond it with stairs down to the lower levels, which includes the vault.”
My brows lifted. “How do you know there are stairs back there?”
Bridge grinned. “Because I shagged a maid there once.”
I blinked at my best mate. “What?”
“I was at a training exercise, and she was well fit and reminded me of a girl from home.”
“My God, if you’d gotten busted…” My voice trailed.
“Yeah, but the keyword there is ‘if.’ And I didn’t. But I do happen to know that an employee walkway is there. The Van Linsteds don’t want their help to be seen more often than they need to be, so Marcus had these hallways built into the house. And lucky for us, they have an access point downstairs, so we do not have to take the elevator.”
Lucas crossed out that path option on his notepad. “Okay, then we take the stairs.”
Roone shook his head. “Well, it’s not that easy. You have stairs, but down here,” he circled the position with a pen, “you have more guards.”
Lucas cursed again. “Christ. There’s another security tower right there.”
I glowered at my cousin. “So let me guess, you plan to have more dart guns or whatever, even though they’ll clearly be waiting for you? No, that doesn’t work. You need more men on the team.”
Roone chuffed. “That’s all we need.”
Lucas frowned at him. “Man, while I appreciate you trying to look out for me, this is not the way to do it.”
Roone shook his head. “What is wrong with you? Why do you all have a death wish? With minimal team, there’s minimal chance of getting caught. Minimal team means minimal mistakes. Lucas, you have to go. I will go, obviously, otherwise I wouldn’t be allowing it. Seb, you definitely can’t go for obvious reasons.”
The king snorted and rolled his shoulders. “Not fucking obvious to me.”
Lucas shook his head. “Can we focus on the part where we have to crack the mother of all locks and get into the vault? And then as a matter of question, what else is inside the vault? Do we take it all so that they don’t know we were the
re after the jewel specifically?”
“Well, it will help if they don’t know that’s exactly what we’re after.”
I leaned over. “All right, so let’s just say we did take everything, or at least some extra things to cover the trail. Lucas, do you have a fence?”
He laughed then. It was the first moment of levity I’d seen in the group since the meeting began. “Do I have a fence?”
Sebastian rolled his eyes. “Oh my God, please no. You’re just giving him an opening to talk about all his exploits.”
“As much as I’d love to hear about them, this is for practical purposes.”
Lucas pouted. “Yes, I have a fence. He’ll take his cut and leave us with the rest. Lucas shook his head. “But guys, this is our main problem right here.”
Bridge leaned over and frowned. “Is that a safe in the vault?”
Lucas nodded. “Per the schematics that we have, yeah.”
Bridge nodded. “The safe inside the vault is a Fletcher. I’ve been in that office with Bram.”
Sebastian frowned. “Are you sure?”
Bridge nodded. “Certain. Because the damn thing was fucking yellow, of all things. Bram even bragged about the damn thing being uncrackable.”
Lucas’s eyes went wide. “A Fletcher safe? You’re kidding?”
Lucas whistled low under his breath and I couldn’t stand the tension. I needed to know. “What does that mean?”
He met each of our gazes. “What that means is that we’re not getting that jewel. At the very least, we’re not getting it from the Van Linsted Estate.”
13
Ben
“Jax, I’ll need the final portfolios on the plans for the Australia project, and then I’ll need Kennedy and yourself to—“
I looked up from my conference call when I saw East’s shadow looming in my doorway. “Got a sec?”
“Hey, Kennedy, Jax, you have your marching orders. Jax, how about we catch up for drinks tomorrow night? How long are you in town?”
Jax’s Aussie accent was smooth. “I opted not to go back to Sydney just yet. Kennedy was scheduled to come in two weeks, so I’ll just wait and leave with her.”
“All right, that works well. I’ll have Alyssa call you to set up a time for drinks this week.”
“Sounds good.”
It was a bit odd having one of my newest business partners about to marry one of my executives. But the change in dynamics hadn’t altered Kennedy’s ability to work. If anything, she was more productive. The woman was a machine. Though she was still cross with me for stealing Livy away from her.
As if there was any way I was going to let Livy languish in an admin role. And if Kennedy was being honest with herself, she’d have to admit that the old job was the last place Livy belonged. She was too skilled on the operations end.
I gave East a lift of my chin as I hung up. “What’s up?”
“I found one of the girls.” He closed the door behind himself. “Her name is Britney Jenner.”
I leaned back in my chair, letting it bounce slightly. “Britney Jenner. Is she anyone you know?”
He shook his head and then handed me a slip of card stock with her name, address, and phone number on it. “I reached out to her.”
“You did? What did she say?”
His lip curled into a smirk. “She asked me on a date.”
I grinned. “Of course, she did.” In some ways, East was completely unaware of his charm. In other ways, he shamelessly exploited it. He had the good looks that made women want to throw their knickers at him, but there was also something about his geeky tech side that made them assume he was the ultimate nerd, which he was in many ways. That made them also want to take care of him, which was bizarre.
Women asked him out all the time. And he was a man, so he took full advantage. “When is the date?”
“No date. I turned her down. It would be awkward meeting up with the girl you were supposed to shag one time, but you were too messed up over your friend’s death to get it up. She wants a do over if you can imagine that.”
“Of course. I mean, clearly it was a fluke if the great East Hale couldn’t get it up.”
He narrowed his gaze at me. “It was one time. Hell, you couldn’t even talk to your girl.”
He had a point there. “Yeah, you’re right. Hell, I’d be hard pressed to tell you what she even looked like now. I’m drawing a complete blank. I can’t even pull up a mental picture of her.”
“Anyway, there you go. What are you going to do?”
“Grab Livy and go see her as soon as possible.”
My mate rubbed his jaw. “Yeah, tell me how she looks now and if she’s well fit or not. Maybe I should take her up on that date.”
“You’re a pig.”
He shrugged. “I’ve been told that before. I understand Lucas gave you bad news?”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Yeah. He’s trying to find us another solution, but right now it’s not looking good.”
“You got another plan?”
I shook my head. “Nope, I’m hoping something comes through. I think the four of us need to sit down and chat later this week because time is ticking and we’re coming up snake eyes.”
“All right.” He pushed to his feet and headed toward the door. “I told her you’d call today. She seemed excited and happy to hear from you. My two cents say she was just a young college student who thought she’d have some fun for the night and probably make some extra cash. I don’t sense anything untoward there. But you’ll find out.”
“I’m on it.”
When he left, I finished up another quick call before going to check on Livy down in her office.
Once again, I found her with Fucking Kevin. It was all I could do not to rip the door open, but instead, I exercised some restraint. I smiled at her assistant. “Maria, can you please let Livy know that when she’s done, I’d like to speak to her.”
Maria’s dark brows lifted. “Yes, sir. I’m sure we can interrupt her now.”
I shook my head. “No. She’s really busy with Kevin.”
Maria blinked in surprise. Apparently, I wasn’t known for my restraint. “I’ll have her contact you as soon as she’s done.”
It took all of my patience and my willpower to not barge into the office. Instead, I turned around and marched back to mine. Livy joined me not even ten minutes later. “You wanted to see me?”
I held out the card stock. “How is Fucking Kevin?”
Her eyes danced. “Fucking Kevin is great. Now what do you have?”
We didn’t have time for me to be a jealous prick. I handed over the card with the address and telephone number. “We have a hit. One of the girls from my initiation night.”
Her eyes went wide. “Oh my God, you should have come in and told me.”
“What, and get accused of not respecting your space? And oh yeah, scare off Fucking Kevin some more?”
The corners of her lips twitched, and she fought to hold back her smile. “To be fair, last time you came too close to challenging him to a fight to the death and then clubbing me over the head and carrying me off to your cave. You were a bit of a dick.”
“I’m never a dick.”
“Oh yes, you are.”
I shook my head. “I think you’re mistaken. You’re mistaking having a big dick for being a dick. Although, I can understand it’s confusing.”
She rolled her eyes. “Oh my God, you’re impossible.” She toyed with the card, her fingers tracing over the pointy edges. “God, do you think she’ll really talk to me?”
“You mean us. Don’t be mad, but there’s no way you’re going alone.”
Livy crossed her arms. “You’re coming with?”
“Yeah, in case you don’t remember, we’re a team. Team Ben and Liv.”
She laughed. “It lacks the finesse of Team Winston Isles.”
“Okay, fine. Team London Lords.”
“Yeah, but that’s you and the others.”
&nb
sp; “Look, I’ll come up with an apt name, mark my words. In the meantime, get your coat. We’re going to see her.”
“I’ll be right back.” She turned midstride and gave me a beaming smile. “Oh, and Ben?”
“Yeah, kitten?”
“Thank you.”
I watched her march out, and I couldn’t explain it, but I just knew. Even if she didn’t know it yet, Liv was going to be mine forever.
14
Liv
Ben held on tight to the hand rest of the Spyder as I swung into the parking lot and parked inside. “You know I’m just going to drive even faster.”
Ben’s eyes went wide. His grip was so tight on the handle his knuckles were white and his breathing was coming out in short shallow pants. “Do you drive like that all the time?”
“Well, it’s not often I’m able to drive at all. Thank you for the opportunity to drive this baby again. I had a blast.”
He swallowed and nodded slowly. “Right. When was the last time you drove?”
“Um, a few weeks ago, when I took the Maserati to meet Sadie.”
His brows lifted. “Where was Erik?”
“Oh my God, relax. I had a little caravan. Scott was in front, and Erik was behind. It was a real sandwich.” I waggled my brows at him suggestively.
He rolled his eyes. “They let you drive?”
“Well, I wanted to drive a Maserati.”
His eyes softened. “You like to drive fast, huh?”
I grinned at him. “Well, if we had time, I would give you a fast drive in the car right now.”
His gaze narrowed to slits and he licked his bottom lip. “Oh, we could work something out. We should park somewhere more obscure though.”
“What, you don’t want all these Londoners to see me giving you a blowjob?”
His groan was low and growly. “Woman, you are trying to kill me.”
“I’ll give you a fast ride later. Right now, let’s go. I want to meet Britney.”
“Right, Britney. That’s why we’re here.”