She spotted Mercy, first, because he was the tallest person back here, and she headed that way.
“Oh, Raven!” a designer she knew called out to her.
Several more heads turned, and more greetings were shouted.
Becca Donahue actually tried to wave her over.
Raven lifted a hand and kept moving, refusing to make eye contact.
When she reached the guys, she was pleased to see that Evan and Reese were both dressed and ready. A headset-wearing staff member was hurling fast instructions at them. Raven could hear the low murmur of the crowd beyond the curtains, as the show started to fill up. It would be starting soon.
Ian turned to her, and he had color in his cheeks, eyes a little tight at the corners. But he put on a massive, toothy smile and greeted her with his fake French accent.
“Raven! Belle femme!” They clasped hands and did cheek kisses.
Raven slipped the ID card into his palm, smooth as glass.
When she drew back, she said, “I trust everything’s going smoothly?”
He winked. “Oui, mademoiselle.” Low, in his own voice, smile still in place, “If I don’t strangle this fucking Yank.”
Raven flicked a look over his shoulder at Evan, who was frowning down at his very tight pants. She shrugged. “At least he’s kind of hot.”
Ian rolled his eyes. “You clearly have terrible taste in men. Alright.” The last he said with the accent again, pulling back from her. “You’re a delight, as always. I’ll see you for cocktails later.”
“Of course, darling.” She blew him a big, obnoxious kiss, and started walking again.
One more piece of the puzzle, she thought, and suppressed a shiver.
~*~
“We’re at the stairwell,” Fox said into the mouthpiece clipped inside his sleeve.
In his ear, Ryan, voice strained, said, “Hold on, just a…got it. I’ve got all the security feeds pulled up. Just another…and the drive…” He heard a man’s voice, Shallie offering guidance. “Alright. I’ve got the loop set up, you should be good to go.”
“Awesome.” Fox nodded to the others and slipped into the stairwell. A camera peered down at them from the corner. He waved at it. “Anything?”
“No, the loop’s working.”
“Alright. We’ll check back in later.”
The door eased shut with a click, and they were sealed into the cool concrete stairwell, alone for the moment.
They dropped their ladders, and cases, ditched their visors, and stripped out of their coveralls. Underneath were compression shirts, flak vests, tac pants, and combats. Holsters everywhere. Long guns and extra ammo were in the equipment boxes, and Abe opened them up and started fitting magazines into the AKs.
Fox pulled a tin of grease paint from his pocket and scooped up big gob that he started smearing across his face, quick and messy.
“Charlie.”
Fox was in the zone, now. Heartbeat steady and slow, breathing regular, adrenaline quietly banked so that he could run all night like this, unfeeling and efficient. His first name, in Devin’s voice, brought him up short. He lifted his head, hand dropping to wipe the excess paint off on his pants leg, and found Devin right in front of him, less than an arm’s length away, gaze intense.
“What?”
Devin hesitated.
“Dad, what?”
He smiled, then. Sudden, almost violent; it looked like he surprised himself, even. Voice rough: “Charlie, I just want you to know. Whatever happens. You’re my favorite.”
The stairwell, the others checking magazines and earpieces – everything faded away, and his world narrowed down to the sound of his own accelerating heartbeat in his ears, and his dad’s face across from his. For one dizzy moment, he felt eight again, on one of those painful visits at home, wondering why he wanted so desperately to please this man when he should have hated him.
Fox blinked, shook his head, and the weird vertigo vanished, the moment and the task at hand rushing back. His pulse stayed kicked up, though, noticeable where before it had been low and steady. “What the fuck? You can’t have favorites. Parents can’t have a favorite kid.”
Devin chuckled. “We can, and I do. And it’s you. Just wanted you to know that. In case–”
“We need to move,” Morgan said.
Fox looked away from Devin’s smile, his dancing blue eyes, same as his own. “Yeah,” he said, and pretended his voice wasn’t strained.
~*~
When Raven was gone, Mercy made a slow stroll over toward the backside of the stage, in the area that hummed with staff losing their minds at the last minute. He could hear the crowd gathering on the other side of the curtain, and the models were beginning to be queued up.
“You need to keep this area clear,” a woman with a headset snapped at him.
“Right, right, sorry.”
But he’d spotted his quarry: a black equipment case, set off to the side. It could have contained any number of things, but this one had a small red sticker on the side, and this was a case Fox’s group had dropped on their way past.
Mercy snatched it up and headed back to his post.
~*~
Phillip watched the numbers tick upward on the elevator and thought that he was getting too old for this.
He was pretty sure that was a movie line. Or at least part of one.
But he was tired. And he hated that here he was, riding up to meet the assholes who’d tried to kill his dad – hell, who’d made his dad – and who were holding his little sister captive, and stronger than the anger, the worry, the fear, the determination…was exhaustion.
He hadn’t founded the London chapter of the Dogs, but he’d built it up from the modest, mostly-legal entity it was to begin with. It had been an outlaw club from birth, yes, but back then, in the aftermath of WWII, the founders had wanted more than anything to make a statement. To shrug off the colors of a country that no longer had a place for them, and drape themselves in the colors of their choosing. There had been presidents before him, and would be presidents after, but Phillip Calloway was the one who’d decided to make a profit off outlawry.
But it had been a long time. And a lot of work. And a lot of dark, violent decisions that had kept him awake at night. He’d done some awful things – and some things that had felt awful, like sending his daughter to America…only to learn that she wasn’t safe there either. He’d raised his siblings, more or less, some more than others. Had tried to provide them with a haven, and with a shoulder to lean on, to cry on. And here he was, still, after all this time, with his family in danger, and the world falling down around him, and a plan held together with gum and hope and he…
He was tired.
In the chrome-walled elevator, Miles and Tommy flanked him, and Nicky and Shep flanked them, all of them touching and overlapping in the small space. Phil had told his younger brothers to stay behind – to stay safe – but they’d cheerfully told him to go fuck himself, and that they were coming along. They’d identified themselves to the security team downstairs, as instructed, and been waved into an elevator. The lack of an escort worried Phil; he figured someone would open fire on them the moment the doors opened.
But Cass was alive. And there was a reason for that.
So, when the car finally arrived with a shudder and a polite ding, Phillip didn’t duck down and prepare to shield himself. He would face this, whatever it was, head-on.
The doors slid open, and a knot of men in black suits awaited them.
Phil found he was surprised they weren’t in tac gear. But he supposed this was part of the charade.
He spoke first. “I’m Phillip Calloway. Where’s my sister?”
The lead man, the kind of big-shouldered, unremarkable muscle that no one could ever describe to the police, motioned them forward. “We need to pat you down.”
“Fine.”
They stepped forward, arms out to the side, and submitted to a patting-down that was really more of a groping, heavy
hands slapping at them, and grabbing between their legs, under their arms, searching for weapons.
“Hey,” Tommy protested, and Phillip shot him a quelling look. Not now. They couldn’t do this now. They had to rely on their brothers – blood and club – to pick up the necessary slack.
They were led down a nondescript hallway, through two turns, past offices and cubicles, and into another elevator. A big service elevator, with room for all of them. The thug in charge pressed the P for the penthouse level.
“Fancy,” Tommy said.
One of the thugs turned his head a fraction and glared. Or maybe that was just his face.
When they reached the top level, the doors opened to a vast space that, while along the lines of what Phillip had expected, given the rest of the building, still managed to have him murmuring an internal Jesus. Windows on all sides, dark hardwoods, white and gray rugs. A freestanding fireplace, and little clusters of minimalist furniture. The entire thing was open concept down to the floating kitchen, and the big bed on a raised dais way, way off to the side. At a long, black wood dining table, with a modern, angular chandelier hanging over it, a stooped, elderly man sat, waiting, two more security goons flanking him. Beyond the windows, Phil saw a rooftop terrace, a garden formed of raised beds, a lighted pebble path wending through it.
Extravagant.
“Welcome,” the old man called, and Phillip was nudged out of the elevator and toward the table.
He sent up a silent prayer that Fox and the others would all do their parts, and did as he was told.
Thirty-Four
Albie…was in a considerable amount of pain. He liked to think of himself as someone who was tough, who could pop a few aspirin and go on with life, not wallow in self-pity and let physical hurts drag him down. But the last time he’d hurt this badly, he’d been a teenager and just laid his bike down across the asphalt. His head throbbed, and his eyes ached, and it hurt to swallow. On every inhale and exhale, his broken ribs crackled, a fiery, stabbing pain that took his breath.
It hurt to exist. And that in and of itself muddled his thoughts and made it hard to concentrate. But he couldn’t deal with the fog of drugs right now. Not if he was going to pull this off.
He played cards while the others left. Forced himself to say “go fish,” and take new cards, and pretend like he gave a damn as he listened to the rattle, and thump, and creak, and last shouted instructions before his family and his club brothers all left Baskerville Hall and headed out to Pseudonym for the big showdown. Phil had at least been kind enough to come see him before, to outline the plan to him. Then he’d patted him on the knee, smiled, and told Axelle to keep an eye on him.
Axelle was being a sweetheart, yes, but he was ready to leap out of his own skin.
Instead, he sat upright against his mountain of pillows, and with a great amount of wincing and cursing, rotated around and swung his legs down over the side of the bed. Axelle had gone to fetch him some tea and a fresh ice pack, and he meant to make the most of her absence.
Getting upright involved gritting his teeth, sweating, and pushing up inch by inch, his knees threatening to buckle the whole way. It was the pain, and the concussion, and his general exhaustion. And it was pathetic. The ice had helped with the swelling on his eye, but he still couldn’t open it properly, which meant he was half-blind.
He was standing with one hand on the bedside table, the other grasping at empty air, working up the nerve to walk across the room to the duffel of his things someone had left on the dresser when the door opened and Axelle froze in the act of coming in.
They locked gazes.
Half a gaze, in his case.
She blew out a breath. “Are you kidding me?” she asked, tone flat.
“I have to go.”
She threw the ice pack at him. A soft, underhanded toss, but still he fumbled it. It smacked down onto the floor with a sound that was accusing.
“You can’t even catch that,” she said, matter-of-fact. “What would you do there? Fall down? Get captured? Be a liability?”
He gritted his teeth. “They’re my family, and this is the most dangerous thing they’ve ever done.”
“Yeah. You getting blown up is evidence of that.” So quiet, and calm, and reasonable. Like a parent laying down the law with a child too tired to know what he was saying.
Albie ducked his head and walked forward. His legs worked, though they were weak, and he couldn’t stop shaking. But the movement sent fresh bolts of pain through his torso, and the room tilted, dizziness taking hold. He got to the dresser, and unzipped the bag, movements clumsy, sweat sprouting up at his hairline, on the back of his neck, between his shoulder blades.
“Albie,” Axelle said, coming to stand beside him, emotion edging into her voice. “I know you want to help, but we’ve talked about this. Phillip talked to you about this. You can’t go. You need to lie back down, and–”
“I can’t,” he growled. “I can’t – I have to help. I have to do something. I…”
He expected her to interrupt with another reasonable argument, but instead he ran out of steam, and then it was silent save the sound of his own rough, open-mouthed breathing.
When he turned his head, and finally looked at her, her face was laced with pain. And resignation, also. “If you go,” she said, voice heavy, “you know there’s a very good chance you’ll get killed, right?”
He studied her as best he could, given his swimming, pounding head. She looked lovely, as ever. And sad. After a moment, she nodded. “Alright, fine. Wait here.”
Where would he go?
She left again, and he traded his soft sweats for jeans, black shirt, and body armor. It took a long time, fumbling with his cast-covered arm, and he thought she was staying away on purpose – either because she was giving up on him, or to spare him the indignity of grunting and cursing his way through the process in front of her.
But then she came back, and said, “Ugh, I was gonna help you.” She set down what she was carrying – a bottle of whiskey – and came to help him straighten and fasten his flak vest, tightening the Velcro up where he’d fumbled it, asking quietly if it felt alright, and if it was hurting his ribs. It was, but it held him all together, too, an extra layer of bracing.
Axelle unscrewed the cap on the whiskey and handed it over. “If you won’t take the prescription meds, at least have a few slugs of that. I’ll be back.” And she left again.
He sipped the whiskey, and the heat of it was an immediate relief. It dulled some of the sharp edges of the pain, and thanks to a lifetime of alcohol tolerance, didn’t make his thoughts too fuzzy.
His arsenal had been confiscated at the hospital and no doubt was taking up space in a police evidence locker right now. But there were other guns – he would never be out of guns – and he armed himself. He had to leave his ankle holster empty, because there was no way he felt like crouching down at the moment.
When Axelle returned, she wore a black leather jacket zipped up to her throat, her hair tied back in a tight bun, a satchel slung over her shoulder.
“You’re leaving?” he asked, and felt himself frown.
“No, you dumbass. I’m going with you.”
“It’s too–”
“If you say ‘dangerous,’ I’ll smack you right in your bad eye. Shut up and come on.”
~*~
The pub was officially closed for the night downstairs. After the disaster of last night, with Clive’s escape, and Fox’s showy means of stopping him, Baskerville had made the news. Albie hadn’t dealt with it personally – what with being unconscious in the hospital – but he’d heard that the police had been by. Of course, without evidence of any sort, and only panicked hearsay from civilians – and Clive neatly hidden away – there was nothing for the cops to do but give them stern looks and take off. But there were no customers downstairs, and so it was easy to find Simon Cavendish.
He sat with Eden’s mother, of all people, a bottle of wine between them on the table,
their glasses half-full. Simon had ditched his tie, and his shirt was rumpled and open at the throat, his pomaded hair mussed from several finger-combings.
He glanced up with a start when Albie walked into the room, Axelle hovering at his elbow, hands up and ready to make a grab for him if he toppled.
Vivian Adkins twisted around in her chair and made a dignified noise of disgust. “Oh, for heaven’s sakes. What in the world is he doing out of bed?” She’d spoken to Axelle, and not to him.
Axelle sighed. “He’s a stubborn idiot.”
“I’m not going to sit on my ass and let the rest of my family get cut down by these people,” he said. “I’m fine.”
Vivian gave him a withering up-and-down visual sweep. She arched a brow. “Stubborn, or stupid? There’s nothing for you to do. Sit down before you fall down.”
Albie turned to Simon. “Why did you help spring me out of the hospital? You don’t even know me.”
Simon sighed, too, and sipped at his wine. “You make it sound like you’d rather have stayed handcuffed to a bed.”
“Why?” Albie pressed.
He shifted in his seat, and the way he rolled his eyes seemed chagrined. “Because Eden was right. She tried to warn me, before, about Pseudonym and its people. That they were using me, and would kill me the moment I was no longer of use.”
Albie lifted his brows – brow; only the one would move.
“They tried to. Got one of my men, nearly succeeded with me. I reached out to an old colleague from my MI5 days. Apparently, he’s one of your Emerald boys. He explained it to me, and I offered to help.”
“Why?”
Vivian tsked. “Haven’t you ever heard that expression about gift horses?”
Prodigal Son (Lean Dogs Legacy Book 3) Page 30