by Nicole York
Zak came through them in a hurry.
“What the hell?” Cole breathed.
Zak was sweaty and out of breath, like he’d just run a mile or up five flights of stairs. His hair was slicked back, his beard untamed, and his eyes wild as he sought out Marcus. The roar of the club music and the flashing lights became muted all around him as Cole watched the man approach.
Something was very wrong.
Marcus caught hold of Zak’s shoulder when he approached and looked him over. “Where the hell have you been, man? We’ve been looking all over the fucking club for you. Did something happen?”
Zak struggled to find his voice for a moment.
Cole glanced up and locked eyes with Vance, who looked about as worried as Cole felt.
His stomach rolled with unease, and subconsciously, he put out a hand and guided Cameron back a step so he could step in front of her. Her fingers curled in the back of his jacket.
“Speak, man,” Marcus barked.
Zak’s eyes finally focused on his boss. “They’ve found me.”
Marcus arched an eyebrow. “Who are they?”
“Fuckers,” Zak spat venomously. “I thought they couldn’t find me here. I thought—” He broke off and shook his head. “I made a mistake.”
Cole stepped forward. There was no time to pussyfoot around this. “Do we need to shut the club down?”
Marcus glanced at Cole.
Zak didn’t seem to notice he was there.
Cole grabbed Zak by the shoulder and turned him to face him. “Look at me!” Cole yelled. “Are we safe here or do we need to get everyone out of the club? Answer me, Zak.”
Zak’s Adam’s apple slid up and down his throat as he tried to find his voice. Finally, he spoke. “Shut it down. Shut it down now.”
31
Cameron
She felt the mood in the club shift as those words fell from Zak’s mouth. He looked like a man who’d been running from the devil himself. He was drenched in sweat, pale in the face, and out of sorts. Whenever someone spoke to him, he had a hard time focusing on them, and for a moment, she wondered if he was high.
Zak told Cole and Marcus to shut the club down, and chaos erupted all around her.
One minute, she’d been standing there kissing the man she loved, and the next, everyone snapped into action. Cole barked orders at servers and dancers and demanded they get everyone out of the club immediately. Vance, the burly security guard who’d hung back during the exchange between her and her father, rushed to the third floor to empty out the private rooms and start clearing one level after another.
Dean, the bartender, put up all the liquor and climbed up onto the bar. He cupped his hands to his mouth and bellowed that the club was closed and everyone had to get the fuck out.
Now.
It took thirty seconds before the DJ stopped playing music. The club felt like a strange place when the music was off and the lights came on.
People left Kadia in droves. Cole pulled Cameron aside and behind the bar to make sure they weren’t trampled as Marcus walked to the back wall to start clearing out the stragglers. Keesha yelled orders at servers and dancers and sent two of them to the dressing room to get the rest of the girls.
“What’s happening?” Cameron asked shakily.
Cole brushed her hair back from her face. “Listen to me, Cameron. I need you to get out of here. In a minute, Keesha is going to leave. I want you to get in the car with her. She’ll take you back to Marcus’s place. You’ll be safe there. And as soon as things are under control here, I’ll come get you.”
“What?” she breathed. This hardly seemed like the right time for him to send her away. “I don’t want to leave you here. Are you in trouble?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know?”
“I don’t know what this is all about, baby. But I’m going to find out. I can’t have you here while I do that. You’re a distraction. You could be used against me.”
His words didn’t make sense to her.
How could she be used against him? She wasn’t a pawn or a piece on a playing board. She was Cameron White. If anything, couldn’t she be of help in a situation like this?
“Let me help,” she said.
“You don’t understand, Cameron. This isn’t safe for you. There might be—”
“Tell me what I can do,” she said desperately. “I can’t leave you here. Please, Cole. You’re scaring me.”
Cole’s jaw flexed. A burst of people rushed past the bar with Marcus hot on their heels. In a matter of three minutes, the entire club had emptied. Cameron hung on to Cole’s jacket as he looked her in the eyes.
“I know you’re scared,” he said evenly. “But I need you to do what I’m asking. You remember what we talked about over dinner? How I’m part of the Castaletta Syndicate?”
She nodded and her hands started to shake.
“This is mob business,” he said. “Not Kadia business. There’s a difference. And I need you to be as far from here as possible in case shit hits the fan.”
“Please,” she begged. “Please don’t make me go.”
“What kind of a man would I be if I let you stay?”
Cameron swallowed hard.
He’d be the man her father thought he was.
She forced herself to take three steady breaths and she met his gaze. “Are you in danger?”
Cole cupped her cheek. “I’m always in danger.”
He took her by the wrist and started walking her to the front doors of the club. At first, she resisted, but she soon realized she was being foolish, and fighting against Cole wasn’t going to do either of them any good. She needed to get out of there in order for him to do his job. And he needed to do his job in order to keep people safe.
Even if said people were criminals.
She walked alongside him, and Keesha caught up with her.
“I’ve got her, Cole,” Keesha said, taking Cameron’s other hand. Keesha gave her a smile that was supposed to be reassuring, but Cameron could see the fear in the other woman’s eyes. “You’re with me, Cameron. I have a safe place we can go and lay low while we wait to hear back from our men.”
Cole nodded his gratitude to Keesha. “Thank you. Cameron, you’ll be safe with Keesha. I promise. As soon as we have a handle on this, I’ll find you. Okay?”
She nodded and tried to stop her bottom lip from shaking as more tears threatened to escape. “Okay.”
“Good girl,” he said, leaning in to kiss her forehead. “Now go.”
Keesha pulled Cameron away.
Cole vanished inside the club. The doors swung closed behind him.
Cameron’s gut felt hollow as Keesha pulled her to the edge of the curb and thrust her free hand in the air to hail a taxi cab. It only took a few minutes, and before Cameron could process what was happening, Keesha was ushering her into the back seat while she yelled at other girls waiting on the corner to get in.
Brittney and Ashley, the two girls Cameron had talked to in the dressing room just fifteen or so minutes before, slid into the back seat.
It felt like that had been hours ago.
Keesha jumped into the passenger seat and told the driver the address. As they pulled away from the club, Keesha twisted around in her seat and watched it disappear. Cameron recognized the lines of worry and fear in the other woman’s face. She reached over the seat and put a hand on Keesha’s shoulder, realizing she wasn’t the only person in the car who needed comfort.
Keesha closed her hand over Cameron’s, faced forward, and put her seatbelt on.
Brittney and Ashley held hands for the entire drive, and when the cab dropped them off and they all climbed out of the car, they found themselves in front of a modern five-story apartment building.
“Come on,” Keesha said after paying the driver. “Let’s go inside and make some tea.”
Cameron followed the others inside. As they rode the elevator and walked down the hall
to Marcus’s apartment, she marveled at how well Keesha kept her act together, even though Cameron was sure she was just as afraid as she was. There was no way it was easy for her to turn her back on her man when the club was in such a state of chaos. The feeling of impending doom had been suffocating.
What was going down at Kadia right then? Was there going to be a fight? Were bad men hunting down Zak?
Would Cole get out of there in one piece?
Cameron covered her mouth with one hand as her stomach heaved with nausea.
Keesha shouldered open the apartment door and let the women inside. She locked the handle, deadbolt, and two chains behind them, and they moved deeper into the dimly lit apartment. Keesha flicked on some lights and told the girls to get comfortable on the living-room sofa. While they did, she put a kettle on the stove and started boiling water for tea.
Finally, all four of them sat in the living room together.
“Are they going to be okay?” Cameron whispered.
Keesha nodded. “They always are. They’ve had worse than this. Trust me. They’ll have each other’s backs. They’ll get through this. We just have to wait.”
Cameron licked her lips. Her mouth was so incredibly dry. “For how long?”
“However long it takes.”
She looked around at all three women. “How often does this happen?”
Nobody spoke.
Cameron didn’t know if that was a good or a bad sign. If things like this happened all the time, it might have been easier for her to wrap her mind around it. That meant these men dealt with this kind of thing regularly. They’d have an action plan.
If it didn’t happen all the time?
Well, that probably meant this was something serious indeed.
“No, it doesn’t,” Keesha finally admitted. “But Zak might be making a bigger deal out of it than what it is.”
“He looked scared,” Cameron whispered.
Keesha swallowed and looked at her hands. “Yes. Yes, he did.”
“Have you ever seen him like that?”
Keesha shook her head. Ashley and Brittney didn’t say a word.
That wasn’t helping to ease the anxiety clawing at the inside of Cameron’s chest. “Oh God. Oh God. Oh God. I think I’m going to be sick.”
Keesha pointed down the hall off the living room to an open door. “The bathroom is right there. Don’t stress yourself out. Marcus can handle things like this. He’s been in much worse situations. Trust me.”
“Worse than this?” Cameron breathed. “How?”
“I don’t think the answer would make you feel better,” Keesha said.
“Oh.”
The kettle started to whistle.
With a sigh, Keesha got to her feet and went into the kitchen. She began pulling mugs down from cabinets and dropping tea bags in them.
Ashley put a hand on Cameron’s knee. “It’ll be all right, doll. Cole is a badass. He’ll do whatever it takes to get back to you. I’m sure of it.”
There was no doubt in Cameron’s mind about that. What scared her was what it might take. What fight was on the horizon for him? What if it was a fight he couldn’t win? What if tonight was the last time she would ever see him?
Her stomach heaved.
“Shit,” she groaned before launching off the sofa and racing down the hall to the bathroom. She barely made it to her knees in front of the toilet before she was sick. She gripped the sides of the toilet in misery, waiting for another bout of vomiting, but it didn’t come. She sat back on her heels, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and tilted her head back to stare at the bathroom ceiling.
Was Cole bleeding out on the floor of the club? Had shots already been fired? Was she getting way too ahead of herself thinking guns and flying bullets would be involved?
She had a bad feeling crawling around inside her chest.
Keesha stepped around the doorframe and held out a cup of piping-hot chamomile tea. “It’ll calm the nerves. Drink.”
Cameron took the mug and sipped on it. “Thank you.”
Keesha sighed and sat cross-legged on the fluffy gray bathmat in front of the sink. “When Marcus and I got back together a few months ago, I went through something like this, too. It was scary. The scariest thing that’s ever happened to me actually. And it was so much worse than this, babe.”
Cameron sniffled. “Really?”
“Yes. Cole was there. He and Marcus got each other out of a sticky situation. They saved me, too. They know what needs to be done. They both know how to make the hard decisions. Cole finally has something to fight for. He’s going to do what it takes to get back to you. I promise.”
“Is it—is it always going to be like this?” Cameron whispered.
Keesha hesitated before she nodded. “Yes.”
Cameron appreciated the honesty, but it wasn’t the answer she was looking for. She pulled her knees up to her chest to rest the mug on them. “Fuck.”
Keesha sighed. “Yeah. Fuck is right. But can I tell you something?”
“Sure.”
“It’s kind of nice to have someone around to worry with.”
Cameron tried to smile and failed. Both women sat in silence on the bathroom floor.
And they waited.
32
Cole
Cole moved down the line of bathroom stalls and pushed all the doors open to make sure nobody was lingering. He’d already cleared out the women’s washroom and found nobody inside.
Now in the men’s room, he was cursing his bad luck.
Of course, shit was hitting the fan right when he and Cameron told each other they loved each other.
How else could it possibly have gone?
“God damn fucking Zak,” Cole hissed as he blasted open the last stall.
He was surprised when a young man yelped and leapt back, stumbling into the toilet and promptly landing on the seat. He blinked up at Cole, a line of cocaine somehow still intact on the back of his hand.
Cole gripped the top of the door and stared down at the kid. “On your feet. The club is closed.”
The young man couldn’t have been more than twenty-two. He had a head of curly brown hair and big brown eyes.
“I said on your feet,” Cole said sharply.
The kid lifted his hand to his nose and snorted the white powder.
Cole hung his head. “This fucking night.”
He reached forward, grabbed the kid by the front of his shirt, and hauled him up.
The kid squirmed but didn’t have any strength in him. It was easy for Cole to maneuver him out of the bathroom and down the hall. They passed the bar, upon which Dean currently sat with the bar rag over his right shoulder. He watched Cole and the kid pass with amusement playing on his face while Vance bellowed down that the second and third floors were clear.
Marcus confirmed that the dressing rooms, storage rooms, and kitchens were also empty.
All the while, Zak paced back and forth in front of the bar.
Back and forth.
Back and forth.
Cole watched Zak over his shoulder as he led the kid to the front doors. He kicked the doors open and hurled the kid outside.
“Don’t bring that shit back in here,” Cole warned. “Do you understand?”
The kid nodded, scrambled to his feet, and ran off down the sidewalk. Cole pulled the door closed after him and locked everything up. When he returned to the bar, Vance and Marcus were there. Zak was still pacing and Dean watched him.
“Fuck, man,” Vance said, crossing his arms over his chest. “I haven’t had stress-sweat for a long time but my balls are fucking dripping. What the hell is going on here?”
Dean and Cole shared a worried glance.
Marcus had tired of Zak’s pacing. He grabbed hold of the Russian’s shoulder, spun him around, and smacked him on the cheek.
Hard.
The slap echoed throughout the empty club.
Marcus gathered a fistful of the front of Zak’s shir
t. “Look at me. You’d better tell us what the hell is going on or I swear I’ll knock your teeth out. I’ve had about enough of this shit.”
“I’m sorry, boss,” Zak managed to say. “I think our time working together has come to an end. Not everyone is lucky enough to escape the demons of their past. Sometimes, the demons… they come looking.”
Marcus growled and released Zak’s shirt to throw him back a step. “Enough of your riddles. Who’s coming for you?”
“It’s a fight you want no part of, boss,” Zak said.
Cole looked from Zak to Marcus and wondered if Marcus was going to beat the hell out of his righthand man. It sure looked like he wanted to.
A loud bang erupted from behind them. Instinctively, Cole ducked, expecting gunfire, but none came. Instead, the front doors of the club blew open, creaked on their hinges, and promptly fell inward to land heavily on the club floors.
Outside, standing under the neon light of Kadia’s sign, were five men dressed in black.
They were heavily armed.
Cole was glad for the pistol tucked in the back of his jeans as he stared at the men. Nobody moved for several long, agonizing seconds. Zak’s demons stepped over the fallen door and entered the club. They were cast in darkness for a brief moment as they passed the ID counter. Within moments, they were fully illuminated by the house lights which banished the shadows and exposed their true faces.
All of them were covered in tattoos.
Tattoos that, to Cole, looked incredibly similar to the ones on Zak’s chest and arms. The men were large, broad shouldered, and intimidating.
They stopped about twenty feet away, and one of them, the largest of the bunch, took one more step forward. His dark eyes scanned over Cole and the others as Dean slid off the bar and landed lightly on his feet beside Vance.
The large man’s attention fell on Zak. Cole couldn’t be sure, but it looked like the stranger might have been smiling faintly. “It’s been a long time, old friend,” the man said. His Russian accent was thicker than Zak’s and his voice was deep and gravelly.