“Oh? Only now? Because this has been such an easy situation so far,” Cassandra said, shivering as her mind played images of her missing the bottom rung and plummeting down countless floors.
“I haven’t killed you yet, have I? Trust me, Cass.”
Cassandra started to tell him not to call her by that nickname, and then decided that it wasn’t the moment for an argument. She was on the last landing before the roof; she might as well get it over with.
“Okay,” she said, exhaling in a gusty sigh. “How are we doing this?”
“You’re going to turn around, get close to the edge, and reach as far as you can. I’m going to boost you up and hold you there until you can get a good grip on the ladder.”
She glanced at Jack doubtfully.
“If you can’t manage it I’ll get you back down onto the landing and we’ll figure something out,” Jack told her firmly. “But this way is easiest.”
Shaking her head, Cassandra turned her back on him. She stepped cautiously towards the edge of the landing, right below the bottom of the ladder, with only a tiny margin of error preventing a long drop to the ground. She gathered up her courage and half-crouched, pushing up on the balls of her feet in a quick jump.
Cassandra’s heart skipped and stuttered in her chest as her feet lost contact with the metal landing. Before she could scream, Jack’s strong hands grabbed at her hip and thigh, holding her in the air. Cassandra forced herself to take a slow, steady breath, and reached up for the third rung on the ladder with both hands. Jack gave her another push, and Cassandra’s foot tapped the bottom rung of the ladder. She pulled her other leg up, reaching for the next rung as she maneuvered into the right position to continue climbing.
Clambering over the edge, Cassandra sank down to the gritty, sandy concrete of the roof, panting slightly. A nagging thought—What about Jack?—entered her mind, but in the very next moment she saw his head pop up above the ledge, saw him pull himself up and over, tumbling to the dirty surface next to her.
“Okay, so we’re up here,” Cassandra said, brushing her hands off on her pants. “How do we get next door?”
“We jump,” Jack said. He grinned as Cassandra stared at him, open mouthed.
“All this just to jump between two buildings and risk smashing ourselves to pieces?”
“I told you, they never think about the roof,” Jack said, lifting himself up onto his feet.
Cassandra looked across the gap between the buildings, her heart starting to beat faster in her chest.
Jack half-smiled, his brilliant eyes glittering with amusement. He reached out and touched her shoulder. The contact sent a little jolt of electric heat through Cassandra’s body that she tried and failed to suppress. She looked out over the edge, thinking she should have known that they would have to jump. Somehow, in the stress and fear of climbing the fire escape, she hadn’t considered it.
“It’s not that far,” Jack added.
“It’s far enough,” Cassandra countered, crossing her arms over her chest as a chill worked its way through her spine.
“I’ll go first,” Jack told her. “Watch how I do it. When you follow, I’ll catch you.”
Cassandra still felt the tingle at her shoulder where Jack had touched her a moment before. She took a deep breath, and finally nodded her acceptance.
Jack stepped away from her, moving back several feet from the edge. He frowned, then took a few more steps backward. Cassandra saw his chest rise and fall with a few deep breaths.
A moment later, Jack took off, running towards the edge of the roof. In seconds, he reached the edge and launched himself forward, arms outstretched. Cassandra’s throat tightened with fear as she watched him travel through the air; everything seeming to slow down. In the next instant, Jack was on the other side of the gap, tumbling a little as he landed.
He stood and brushed himself off, and Cassandra swallowed hard.
Don’t look down. You’ll choke if you do.
Cassandra walked to the spot that Jack had taken off from. Her palms were slick with sweat, her stomach in knots, and her heart pounding in her chest. She saw Jack waiting for her, watching her intently. Cassandra inhaled slowly, closing her eyes as she attempted to suppress the nervous panic welling up inside of her, images of plunging down toward the ground playing through her head.
It’s maybe four, five feet. You can jump that far.
Cassandra took another breath and forced herself forward, starting at a jog and speeding up to a run. She kept her gaze straight ahead, keeping track of the edge of the roof in the bottom of her field of vision.
Reaching the edge, she pushed off, propelling herself forward and biting back the yelp of fear that rose up in her throat. Glancing down for a fraction of an instant, she saw the ground far below her. The next moment, she was nearing the opposite roof and Jack’s hands closed on her waist, his arms coiling tightly around her, swinging her the rest of the way onto the stable concrete. Her heart thundered in her chest, her blood roaring in her ears, as she took shaky breaths to try and clear the adrenaline out of her system.
“Holy shit,” she said finally, realizing she had made it over safely.
“See? You were made for this,” Jack said, giving her a quick smile.
“No. No I wasn’t,” Cassandra said, clenching and unclenching her hands to try and get the feeling back into them. “What happens now?”
“Now we break into the penthouse suite.”
Jack let go of her, and started towards a staircase that led from the roof to the top floor balcony. Cassandra took a moment to gather the tattered remnants of her nerves and followed him onto the stairs, hurrying down behind him.
Jack’s heavy shoes thudded onto the balcony and Cassandra reached the dubious ground a few moments after him, watching as the fugitive looked around for a way in.
“Door’s locked,” he murmured, and Cassandra wasn’t sure whether he was talking to her or to himself.
He stepped to the side and tried the window a few feet away, blocking it with his body so that she couldn’t quite see what he was doing. A moment later, the window opened with a squeal of protest, and Cassandra winced, looking around in the sudden fear that someone must have seen them, that they must have someone on their tail. She looked around, but there was no one on the roof opposite, no one coming down the stairs behind them.
“Here we are,” Jack said. “You go first, I’ll boost you through.”
Cassandra pressed her lips together. “I’ve gone from being a kidnap victim to an accomplice in less than twenty-four hours,” she said, shaking her head. She approached the window, seeing the sill was just below her underarms. “Let me try on my own first.”
I can’t avoid being involved in this debacle, but I can at least try and do it on my own terms.
Cassandra could still feel the parts of her body where Jack had caught her, where his arms had wrapped around her. She planted her hands on the windowsill and pushed herself up. She propelled herself head-first through the window, and brought her knees up to push herself the rest of the way through as she took in the room ahead of her: it looked like some kind of dining room, she thought—though there was no table to prove it.
She started when she felt a pair of strong, rough hands on her ass, pushing her up and over the obstacle. Part of her mind rebelled, thinking she should be shrieking at Jack to take his hands off of her. But the warm, firm grip on her buttocks sent a shock of heat through her body, making Cassandra think back to her dream earlier that same day. She tumbled forward onto the floor with a yelp and immediately clapped her hand over her mouth, looking around and listening to make sure no one had heard her.
As she struggled to her feet, hoping there wasn’t some resident hurrying into the room to investigate, Jack launched himself through the open window, landing lightly on his feet a few feet away from her.
“Show-off,” Cassandra muttered lowly. Jack smirked back at her.
Cassandra would have expected the pen
thouse suite of the huge, grand building to be lushly furnished, with thick rugs and heavy furniture—at the very least she would expect the place to be clean and neat. Instead, as she followed Jack out of the dining room area, through the kitchen, and into the living room, Cassandra took in dingy walls, threadbare rugs on stained wooden floors, no artwork, and almost no furniture.
A faint smell of mold greeted her as they opened the door to what seemed to be the main living area. Off in one corner, a stained mattress had been propped against the wall; next to it Cassandra could see a small baggie with some white powder in it.
“So this is the drug baron’s hideout?” Cassandra looked at Jack in disbelief as she looked around the barren, filthy apartment.
It amazed her that someone could possibly live in such a place without having the kind of money it took to maintain it; the apartment’s interior looked like something she’d see in the seedier parts of the Bronx, where she’d keep her keys in her hand to make a weapon out of them if need be.
“Last time I heard,” Jack said with a slight shrug, but Cassandra could see the disbelief in his eyes as well. Jack shook his head, and Cassandra could tell that he was just as shocked at the state of the expensive apartment as she had been.
Cassandra opened her mouth, intending to ask Jack what the apartment had been like before—by the fact that he knew how to get in, she guessed he must have been to visit the first time he’d had to track down Lenny. But just when she would have asked, she heard a scratching sound near the door, along with the clink and clatter of metal keys.
Cassandra looked at Jack, eyes widening. She heard the lock turning over and froze; there was nowhere to hide in the echoing, unfurnished apartment. As the door started to open, Cassandra was shocked to see Jack immediately move in front of her, positioning himself between her and the door, taking an unmistakably defensive posture.
He’s defending me?
Cassandra’s mind reeled.
Chapter Fifteen
Jack
Tension rippled through every muscle in Jack’s body as the door to Lenny’s apartment opened. For a moment, he considered the possibility that he’d been fed false information about his one-time bounty; that Lenny might have skipped town, and someone else had moved into the apartment. After all, after the debacle with his drug arrest and the way things had gone down with Laura, it would have been smart for a man like Lenny to find a new place to live, even if it meant starting over.
The sight of the man who shuffled through the door, looking at his feet and wiping them on the doormat as he came in didn’t help Jack’s anxiety. There was no way that the man in front of him could possibly be the well-dressed, fit but heavy drug lord; he was emaciated, his skin covered in sores, pale and sickly-looking, wearing clothes that looked more thrift store than the designer showroom.
When the man looked up and staggered back against the closing door, Jack was momentarily convinced that he would have to diffuse the situation with a stranger—and somehow hope that the man hadn’t heard about the notorious fugitive who was now standing in his living room. When the figure at the door met his gaze, however, Jack saw the small brown eyes staring back into his, and he knew: it was Lenny. He was certain of it.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Lenny stared at Jack, and Jack felt his heart starting to slow down in his chest.
Lenny’s eyes lit up with recognition. Jack sensed Cassandra shifting to the side, out from behind him, and the drug baron glanced at her briefly before looking back at Jack.
“You. I should’ve known. I heard about you on the news, Hardy.”
Jack’s arm shot out instinctively, pushing Cassandra back as Lenny reached into a pocket of his jacket and took out a knife.
“I don’t know who this bitch is, but I’ve been waiting to run into you.”
Jack fell into a fighting stance, hands ready and body slightly hunkered down. Lenny stared at him intently, hand tightening and relaxing on the hilt of his knife. He let out a guttural-sounding growl and rushed towards Jack, brandishing the knife in his shaking, unsteady hand.
He’s in bad shape, Jack thought, evaluating his opponent as he rushed forward. He remembered the man he had squared off against in a tiny little suburb outside of Newark, back when he’d hunted Lenny down the first time. The drug baron had been quick back then—and he had owned a much sharper-looking knife.
In the corner of his vision, Jack saw Cassandra stumble back. He moved forward, meeting Lenny’s rush towards him. He dodged the swipe and the stab that the decrepit drug dealer made at him, ducking and sidestepping. Years of training and experience came to the fore of Jack’s mind, and he shifted into automatic. He brought the edge of his hand down on Lenny’s knife arm, just above his wrist.
The dealer shouted, dropping the knife. Jack took advantage of the distraction to grab his arm and twist it around, stepping behind the other man and pinning the wrist to the small of his back.
In moments, Jack had him subdued. Lenny twisted and struggled, but with his arms pinned behind him, there was nowhere for him to go.
Jack glanced at Cassandra; her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were wide, but she looked as though she was physically okay. Jack frog-marched the man to the only piece of furniture he could find in the sprawling penthouse apartment: the dirty, tumbled-around mattress. He threw Lenny down, face-first, and held him there until the man stopped struggling underneath him. Cassandra followed in their wake; Jack thought to himself that while she didn’t exactly look comfortable with what she was witnessing, at least she wasn’t screaming.
Jack held Lenny’s wrists against the small of his back with one hand and grabbed at the hair at the back of his skull with the other, lifting the other man’s head off of the mattress.
Lenny shrieked and gasped for breath.
“Fine—fine! What do you want? What do you want from me? You can take it.”
“Information,” Jack said, pushing Lenny’s arms up at the wrist, increasing the pressure on the man’s elbows and shoulders.
“Whatever you want! Whatever you want. I swear.”
“Tell me, Lenny old pal, what have you been up to since I hauled your ass back to jail?” Jack’s grip tightened on the man’s hair as he remembered the time he’d spent in prison for the past three months. “What does your piece of shit life look like these days?”
“I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you. Just…just let up on me a little. I can’t think like this.”
Jack held his grip for a moment longer before relenting just a fraction, glancing at Cassandra.
“Start talking, you rat,” Jack said, his knee pressing into Lenny’s thighs.
“So obviously you caught up to me after they arrested me. You know what that shit was for? Selling dope to some UC bastard. Not even a lot—a gram or two, max. They got a warrant to search my trap based on that bullshit—hauled my car in and found two kilos.”
“What kind of an asshole keeps two kilos on hand when he knows the torch is on him?”
“I had a business to take care of, man!” Lenny yelped when Jack twisted his arm once more. “God—fuck, you been lifting the weights hard, haven’t you bro?”
“Harder than you, that’s for damn sure. What happened after I took you in, Lenny? That’s what I want to know. Tell me, and maybe you get out of this.”
“It was Laura who took me into custody. And after all I done for her, she flips on me like a goddamn light switch. Acts like she’s never even seen me before, pretending like she needs to look at the file to learn my damn name. That’s when I worked out that she must have been the one who set me up. Folks kept slapping her on the back, saying well done for taking down one of the biggest dealers in the city. Think she got a medal out of it, that bitch.”
“That why you killed her, Lenny? Come on, talk to me you piece of shit.”
His grip tightened on the man’s arm, his nails beginning to dig into the loose flesh. He could feel the anger building up ins
ide of him; it was too easy to imagine Lenny dying by his hands, to imagine watching the light leave the man’s eyes.
Jack took a shaking breath and told himself to cool down. He needed to know what had happened, and Lenny wouldn’t be able to tell him anything if he was unconscious.
“Tell me, you asshole. Tell me what you did.”
Chapter Sixteen
Cassandra stood watching the two men in mute shock. I shouldn’t be this surprised. Jack would have done…he was ready to do worse to Riley, back at that storage unit, if he’d had to. She shuddered at the images her mind conjured up.
“I’m telling you man, wasn’t me who killed Laura,” Lenny said, turning his head and spitting over the edge of the mattress.
Cassandra frowned, reviewing what she knew about Laura Granger and the information that had come out since her death—information that Cassandra had been instrumental in discovering and forwarding to the police as part of their investigation.
Laura Granger’s public face had been squeaky-clean, but her private life had been worse than filthy. The NYPD officer and decorated Army vet had been the pride of her community. She had mentored troubled youth, even helping several of them make their way into the ranks of the police, and was given some kind of honor by her high school. Charming, sprightly, and tough, she had won a spot in the hearts of everyone who followed her career.
But even as she had lectured high school students about the importance of staying away from drugs, Laura had been pilfering the evidence bins, stealing confiscated product of all kinds—meth, crack, pot, coke, whatever happened to be available—and distributing it to dealers around the city. Laura had been careful; that was why she hadn’t gotten caught, and why her double life hadn’t come to light until after her murder, when Cassandra had started investigating.
“I moved product for that bitch and when she took me in, she acted like she never even heard my name before,” Lenny said, bitterness overtaking his fear at what Jack might do to him. “I got myself some lawyers, hired the three best criminal defense attorneys in the state of New York. They cost me my savings, but hell, it was worth it.”
Steal The CEO's Daughter - A Carny Bad Boy Romance Page 19