Showdown

by Cindy Dees

  “Well?” Claude asked.

  “It’s perfect,” the guy said reluctantly. “And it’s pretty cool too. It’s one of them old clubs people went to way back when booze was illegal.”

  “Did you tell my manager to clean it up and lay in food and drinks for the meeting?” Sebastian asked.

  “Yeah. Just like you said to. He said it would be up and running by ten o’clock tonight,” the thug replied.

  Claude looked undecided for a moment, then picked up his cell phone. “The meeting place is set and checked out. Whenever Mr. Elliott and the others are ready, we can hold the interview.” He listened for a minute, then replied, “Yes, sir. We’ll see you at midnight.”

  As Claude pocketed his phone, he said direly to Sebastian, “I hope you know what you’re doing. Once you’ve seen their faces, if you don’t get in, you’ll be eliminated.”

  Sebastian nodded calmly. “I would expect no less.” He looked over at Zane. “Do you trust me?”

  “With my life.”

  “That’s actually what’s on the line tonight. But I swear, I will take care of you.”

  “Ditto, my dude. We’re in this together, no matter what happens, right?”

  “No matter what,” Sebastian answered firmly. He leaned forward and Zane met him halfway. They sealed the promise with a kiss. It was nothing special, just a brief meeting of lips and exchanged breath. But even that small contact was enough to send Zane’s pulse racing. Sebastian’s pupils dilated hard as well, and he smiled ruefully at Zane.

  “Soon,” Zane murmured.

  Funny, but Zane was okay with however this turned out. Good or bad, dead or alive, he and Sebastian would be together to the end.

  Chapter Twenty

  SEBASTIAN WAS stunned by how cool Zane was under pressure. He was frankly humbled by Zane’s absolute trust in him to save both of them from this mess.

  Now he just had to pray that Pere had gotten the message from Zane’s friend and brought a small army to rescue them. The subcutaneous tracker in his hip hadn’t done anything weird to indicate that it had been activated, but he had to believe that, once Wild Cards had gotten the distress call, it had been located.

  As soon as Pere saw where Sebastian had gone for the meeting, he would know what Sebastian wanted him to do. After all, no self-respecting speakeasy was without a few hidden escape routes for its more important customers to slip away from the inevitable police raids that happened from time to time. His was no exception.

  Sebastian spent the next hour working through possible scenarios in his head of how Etienne and Pere’s men would enter the club. Who they would see first. Who would shoot first. The best spots in the club to avoid being hit by stray bullets. He envisioned a half-dozen possible seating scenarios of where he and Zane would be put for this meeting and where they would have to dive for cover from each one. If he were Erebus’s security team, how would he react to a sudden influx of armed attackers? How would he get his guys out?

  His analysis was exhaustive, bordering on a bit obsessive, but Zane’s life would depend on him reacting correctly to split-second changes in the situation. And he’d be damned if a single hair on Zane’s head would get hurt tonight.

  He looked over at Zane yet again. He never got tired of looking at him. Not only was he physically attractive, but his heart was just as beautiful, and once he’d gotten to know Zane, it shone in his eyes and on his face, clear as day.

  “Okay, you two. Time to go. The boss wants you in place well before the big dogs get there.”

  Sebastian smiled. No indeed, it wouldn’t do to keep the Erebus big dogs waiting. God, he hoped every last one of them was there tonight. Apparently Pere’s inside man at Erebus’s Greek headquarters had given them a complete list of names of the top operatives in the consortium. The key now was to get as many of them together at once as possible, arrest them all, and take down Erebus for good. Though it couldn’t hurt getting more hard evidence on them for a prosecution here in the States, as well. Like catching them with a currency printing plate. On the assumption that Pere and company would be taking video of the meeting for future criminal prosecutions, he made a mental note to mention the currency plate aloud.

  He was put into the back seat of an SUV, and Zane was shoved in beside him.

  Indignant, he snapped, “That’s my future husband you’re pushing around. When I’m accepted into Erebus, I’m going to remember the faces of anyone who roughed him up.”

  “Future… what?” Zane gasped.

  He stared at Zane, uncomprehending for a moment while he spooled back what he’d just said. Oh. Oh! Holy hell. “Umm, sorry. I probably shouldn’t have just blurted that out like that.”

  “No,” Zane said in obvious shock. “It’s fine. We’re under a little duress here. I get it.”

  “But I meant—”

  “Save it back there,” the driver said. “Claude said not to let you two talk to each other on the ride over.”

  Right. Because they were going to cook up some dastardly escape plan in the back of an SUV. At gunpoint. With no phones or other resources. Sesbastian probably ought to be flattered that Claude was so afraid of his capabilities. Little did the bastard know that it was Zane who’d gotten the word out and called in help. Ha!

  The car pulled up in the alley behind his pizza parlor. Zane was helped out of the car a great deal more politely, and he stepped out as well. He didn’t bother looking up at the rooflines for snipers. In the first place, there was no reason to tip off their guards to look up there, and in the second place, Pere’s guys were way too good to be spotted so easily. But Sebastian had no doubt they were up there already. The manager said the joint would be ready at 10:00 p.m. Pere’s guys had probably been up there a couple of hours before that, and it was closing in on midnight now.

  “Where to?” Claude demanded from beside the SUV in front of theirs.

  “Into the office. Your men should already have the staircase open,” Sebastian replied.

  They piled inside the kitchen and then into the tiny office in single file. He went down the familiar stairs into the speakeasy, which bustled with life. A bartender he didn’t recognize stood behind the bar in an old-fashioned shirt with garters holding up his sleeves. He prayed the man was one of Pere’s guys.

  An ensemble of jazz musicians was playing in the orchestra pit. No way of telling if they were Wild Cards men or just a band. A pair of bouncers stood by the door—definitely Wild Cards operatives. In fact, Sebastian knew one of them from a visit to Wild Cards HQ last year.

  Praise the Lord and pass the potatoes. Zane’s message had gotten to the Wild Cards, and they were here in force. Suddenly he felt a whole lot better about his and Zane’s chances of making it out of here alive tonight.

  A waiter came out of the kitchen and laid a tray of canapés on a buffet table. No telling how many Wild Cards guys were in the kitchen acting like cooks and waiters. A woman came out from backstage, wearing a flapper dress, long beads, and an authentic 1920s hair bob. She, too, was a face he remembered from his last visit to the Wild Cards offices in London. Weren’t the Erebus people going to be shocked when she pulled out a weapon and started firing at them? She started to sing, and damned if she didn’t sound just like a performer straight out of the Roaring Twenties.

  Even Claude seemed impressed by the joint as he gestured for Sebastian and Zane to be seated at a long table that had been set up in the center of the dance floor. Okay. This wasn’t too bad a spot. A little open for Sebastian’s taste, but a quick tumble and roll would bring him and Zane up against the bandstand, close to a secret trap door they could crawl through to get behind the heavy oak structure of the dais.

  It took a few minutes of waiting, but finally Claude moved over to nibble at the buffet, and no guards were watching them. He was startled when Zane leaned in close to whisper, “I have something to tell you.”

  “Not now.”

  “It’s important.”

  “What?” Sebastian said
from behind unmoving lips.

  “I had a set of fake plates made. The one I brought back is fake. It’s made of magician’s metal. It gets soft when it’s warmed up and will break if they try to use it to print money.”

  Sebastian stared at him in blank shock. The audacity of it. The sheer lunacy. “My God, that’s brilliant.” He ought to be furious with Zane for keeping it from him all this time, but right now he could only summon gratitude. No matter what happened tonight, Zane’s trickery would stop Erebus from counterfeiting millions or billions of dollars. Now he could only pray the Wild Cards and whatever law enforcement types they’d brought along would stop the entire Erebus Consortium tonight, once and for all.

  Zane leaned back, smiling a little.

  Sebastian’s mind raced. How did that change the equation? They could let Claude and the briefcase escape if necessary. That made his job a great deal easier. All he had to worry about now was keeping Zane safe. “No matter what I say here, don’t forget how I feel about you. Promise me you’ll trust that.”

  Zane smiled at him. “Sebastian, no matter what happens tonight, I’ve had the extraordinary honor of loving you. If I don’t live one more day, I’ve had that. And it’s enough for me. I’m at peace, no matter what happens.”

  Sebastian was, in a word, staggered. No one, no one, had ever felt that way about him before. Not his father, who’d left him, not his mother, who’d chosen oblivion in a bottle over him, nobody.

  He wanted nothing more than to gather Zane in his arms and tell him all the amazing ways Zane made him feel, but he spied Claude turning away from the buffet table and heading back in their direction. He murmured without moving his lips, “When it goes bad, topple your chair over backward, roll over to the band pit, and crawl behind it.”

  “Will you come too?” Zane muttered.

  “Of course,” he lied. “I’ll be right behind you.”

  Claude plunked a plate of food down on the table beside him, and Sebastian was grateful for once that he could say no more.

  They didn’t have long to wait for Erebus members to start showing up. The first man arrived about ten minutes before midnight. Probably a newbie to the consortium, trying to make a good impression. A second man arrived a few minutes later, and then two more came in together. Wow. They might bag a whole bunch of the top Erebus people at this rate.

  All in all, a dozen men arrived, all prosperous-looking and middle-aged or older. Finally one last man arrived. Sebastian recognized George Elliott. Pere had mentioned that he was one of the Erebus big dogs when they’d talked a few weeks ago. Elliott was a bit of a celebrity in his own right, simply because he was so damned rich. Allegedly, he was one of the wealthiest men in the world.

  The pomposity in the room was tangible as the consortium members took their places around the table and a ring of security guards loomed around them. Which was fine with him. The goal was to arrest these criminals, not slaughter them.

  “So, Mr. Gigoni. Mr. Vanderpohl tells us you think you have what it takes to contribute to our business enterprises. Why is that?”

  “Because I’m better at what you do than you are,” he replied.

  Elliott smiled blandly, not rising to the bait. “And what is it you think we do?”

  “It’s obvious what you do. You’ve corporatized crime.”

  “And why do you think you’ve got something to offer us?”

  Sebastian leaned back. “I assume you’ve done your homework on me in the past twenty-four hours. You know where I come from and where I’ve gotten to.” He paused for effect. “Well, you know about my legitimate assets, at any rate.”

  Zane shot him a startled look. Which was fine with him. Secrecy was key to these men. Evidence that he hadn’t told even his boyfriend of his supposed illegal activities would weigh in his favor.

  Not that this was an actual job interview, of course. This was a game designed to get these men to admit to their criminal activities.

  “You have other assets?” Elliott asked casually. Too casually. He was interested.

  “Of course I do. I’m not a major slumlord for nothing,” he joked. Put these men at ease. Make their security guards relax. “My off-book assets span several continents. As you have no doubt discovered, I spent a number of years in the British Special Forces and was stationed in a number of… interesting locations. While there, I took the opportunity to form any number of relationships with various local warlords and people of influence. I would venture to say my contacts are even more far-reaching than yours in certain places.”

  “Indeed?”

  “How extensive are your operations in Southeast Asia, for example? My impression is that you don’t have much reach into that area yet.”

  “I beg to differ,” one of the other men piped up a shade irritably.

  “Really?” Sebastian challenged. “Then why haven’t I heard of you? I know you’ve heard of me.” He named one of the most powerful crime rings in all of Asia. Of course, he had nothing to do with that outfit, but these jerks wouldn’t know that.

  There was an audible inhalation around the table.

  Rapidly he fired off the names of crime rings in Africa, South America, and Eastern Europe. They were all groups his British military unit had gone after at one time or another. It was a calculated risk to name the gangs and hope that Erebus wasn’t already in bed with any of them, but he couldn’t expect Erebus to cough up information if he didn’t do the same.

  He stared around the table, making eye contact with each Erebus man in turn. “How much more reach, influence, and profit will you have when I merge my organization with yours, gentlemen? You have me at a disadvantage in answering that because I’m not aware of the full scope of your outfit, of course. But surely there will be synergies aplenty to exploit.”

  As he’d hoped, one of the men suggested how smuggling could be made more efficient if they could find a better source of South Pacific shipping to mesh with their opium operation. Another suggested that trafficking through South America would be cheaper than trying to bring in stock—as in human slaves—from Asia. Before long an animated conversation was in progress, with Sebastian making suggestions enthusiastically. Lord, this stuff was prosecutor’s gold. They were confessing to crimes spanning the globe as they considered how to integrate all the crime syndicates he’d named into their corporate structure.

  When they finally wound down, Sebastian asked casually, “By the way, I’m curious as to why you used Zane Stryker as the mule to move your currency plates. He obviously wasn’t a random choice because the suit in the suitcase fit him perfectly. Was it a ploy to reach me?”

  One of the men answered, “I confess, we were not aware of your relationship with Mr. Stryker. Had we known, we would have found another mule. Our apologies for encroaching on your… turf.”

  He nodded graciously. They didn’t need to know he and Zane hadn’t met before the suitcase switch.

  The man continued with his explanation. “We’ve had a few… setbacks… recently, and we were concerned that one of our own people might be spotted coming into the country. Hence, we decided to employ the services of a courier completely unattached to our organization. It was a risk, but we chose somebody with a checkered enough past that if he were caught, the authorities would believe he was a smuggler and take him down for carrying the plates without digging too much deeper than him. Plus, we needed someone recognizable enough for our people to watch him from a safe distance. And you have to admit, Mr. Stryker stands out in a crowd.”

  Sebastian spared a fond glance for Zane. “He does, at that.”

  “It was easy enough to slip one of our people into a photo shoot and take a suit that had been tailored for him. We judged him to be someone who would take the money we offered and not go to the police. He’s known to live a, shall we say, high-profile life. Of course, we had no idea he had access to your considerable financial resources. It does help explain his extravagant lifestyle.”

  Sebastian nodded as
if these idiots had pegged the whole situation exactly correctly.

  The man concluded with, “We mistakenly judged him to be desperate enough for cash that he would ultimately cooperate with us and not go to the authorities.”

  Another man leaned forward. “Given that you met Mr. Stryker directly at the luggage storage area and knew without having seen the contents of the suitcase to take evasive measures with the luggage and your boyfriend….”

  Whoa. They’d had surveillance on him and Zane even at JFK that first day, had they? Yikes.

  The man was still speaking, “…begs the question of how you found out about the plates arriving in the States, Mr. Gigoni.”

  He shrugged. “You didn’t honestly think I would approach you like this to do business without doing my homework on Erebus, did you? Of course I have people inside your organization. I got a tip that the plates were coming to New York.” He added, “I do have to wonder, though, if you have all the other necessary resources in place to print money.”

  The man waved a casual hand. “We’ve spent several years accessing paper, ink, even a fellow who worked at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing to run the operation. I assure you, we’ve taken care of all the details. The plates are the last piece in the puzzle.”

  Elliott raised a hand from the other end of the table. “Enough. We’ll need the names of those moles you’ve placed inside Erebus. Indeed, we’ll need proof of everything you’ve told us. Full access to your financial records. Names. Contact procedures. Everything.”

  Time to spring the trap. C’mon, Pere. Don’t fail me now. Sebastian leaned back in his chair. “Why would I hand all of this over to you without any guarantees from you?”

  “You’ll just have to trust us, Mr. Gigoni. After all, we have you at a disadvantage.”