by JA Huss
Rook lifts herself up cautiously, waiting for the command to sit back down, but when it doesn’t come, she stands all the way up and coos into Kate’s ear. “You’re OK, baby. We’re gonna get out of here now, OK? Go see your mommy and daddy.” She removes her blindfold and looks around. I duck back into the closet as her eyes swipe past the room. Then she runs over to Amber and removes her blindfold.
Amber sighs with relief. “Untie me. We need to get the hell out of here before he comes back.”
Rook sets baby Kate down on the bare floor and goes to work on her bonds. When she’s done untying her, they both stand and Rook takes the baby again. “We need to get outside,” Rook says. “We can make a run for Shrike Bikes.”
They both run to the stairs and pull open the door, listening for footfalls or voices. They must not hear anything, because they both disappear inside.
I follow them. I get up, tiptoeing as silently as I can in my Chucks, and get my gun out. I check the chamber to make sure I’m ready, and then I pull the door open and follow them down the stairs. They go slowly, Rook desperate to keep Kate from crying, her pleas and Kate’s complaints dead giveaways to anyone who comes in here looking for us. I’m still two flights above them when I hear a small squeak from the door directly below me.
I freeze.
The door closes quietly. Kate is loud now, and Rook cannot contain her crying, so the man below me takes advantage and leaps down the stairs, once, then again. Rook is screaming, Amber is screaming, Kate is screaming… and I’m already standing in front of Tony Fenici, pointing my gun at him before I even have a moment to think about it.
I aim for his chest and fire. The bullet hits the wall and shatters the plaster.
He turns at me and I duck back. A bullet whizzes up the stairwell and hits the ceiling. Heavy footsteps thunder down the stairs and Kate’s cries diminish as Rook and Amber exit through the door to the garage. Tony follows them, jumping over the railing to save himself some time, and I’m right on his tail.
Fuck Bobby Mansi, I’m on Team Rook right now.
Tony slams the door open and exits and three seconds later I follow, my gun ready.
Tony grabs Rook and she loses her grip on the baby. I watch in horror as he takes possession of the hysterical child just as a car pulls into the garage. A door swings open and Ashleigh is out and running towards us.
“No!” I scream.
Tony whirls around, and Rook grabs Kate, just as Bobby takes a shot at me. I duck back inside the stairwell as the cinderblock crumbles off to the side of my head.
What the fuck was that? Am I on his team or not? And how did he miss me? He shoots that gun like he was born holding it.
“Ashleigh!” Bobby yells. “Stop right now!”
But Ashleigh doesn’t stop. She’s running full-on towards a fleeing Rook who has her child.
Until Tony turns to face her. And then her feet stop. Her face contorts in confusion. Her mouth opens. Her eyes widen. Her hands come up to her mouth as she tries to process what she’s seeing.
And then she drops to her knees and her world comes apart.
Chapter Thirty-Four
SPENCER
We get over to the Mason Street condo just as a black car pulls into the garage. When they move through the gates, Ronin, Ford and I jump out and leave Carson in the truck. We book it to the gate before it closes and enter the garage just as Ashleigh falls to the ground. At first it looks like she’s hurt, and I look around wildly, trying to figure out where the threat is.
“Ronin,” Ford says in a low voice. “Kate’s on the far side of the garage with Rook. Get them. I need to speak to Ashleigh.”
“Tony, Tony, Tony…” Ashleigh’s small voice keeps repeating.
And this is when I figure it out. Ford knew. Ford knew Tony was alive and he never told Ashleigh.
Ronin takes off just as Ford enters the garage. I follow him in and even though I’m pissed he kept this secret from us, it hurts my heart to hear Ashleigh say the name of her dead lover in front of him.
Ford’s shoulders slump as he takes in the scene. And I can only imagine this is his worst nightmare. Like Ronin watching Rook take the stand and admit her part in that human trafficking ring.
Or me, after all the sacrifices I’ve made to keep Ronnie safe… to find her hurt because of my past.
Watching Ashleigh come to terms with this new reality is Ford’s version of hell. He just stands there, waiting to see how it will play out.
There’s movement on the far side of the garage—not Rook and Kate, they’ve disappeared inside the stairwell. Someone else. Another woman.
“Ashleigh,” the blonde calls out. “Stay away. Please, Ashleigh! Stay away from him!”
“Ashleigh,” Tony says in a tone one uses for children who are acting irrationally. “Come here, baby. It’s me, Ashleigh. It’s me. I’m here.” And then he opens his arms. “Please,” he begs. “We have to go.”
I walk the wall. No one is paying any attention to me. All eyes are on the girl who holds all the cards. “You’re dead,” Ash manages. Her breathing is suddenly erratic, like she’s overwhelmed with what’s happening. She clambers to her feet, swaying back and forth a little, and Ford takes a few steps forward. “You’re dead!” she repeats, louder and a little more forcefully this time. Like she needs to talk herself into it.
“No, Li Li,” the very much alive Tony replies. “No, baby. I’m not dead. It was fake. It was fake. I had to make it look real, I had to make everyone believe. It was the only way to get out of my contract.”
“What?” Her hands go to her head and she grabs fistfuls of hair, like this makes no sense to her.
Tony moves forward. But Ashleigh retreats several steps, stumbling until she backs herself against a cement pillar.
“You’re dead!” she says again, only this time she’s on the verge of hysterics. “I’m seeing things. Ford!” she yells.
“I’m here, Ashleigh,” Ford says, and then all eyes are on him, like a target.
Tony takes a shot at Ford, but it misses. A warning shot. But I duck behind a pillar, just in case. My gun is ready, but for some reason, I’m so very, very calm.
“Stay where you are, Aston, or the next one goes through your head.” He extends his hand towards Ashleigh again. “Come on, baby. Just take my hand, Ash, and we’ll get out of here and go home.”
“Home?” Ash says, like she’s confused. “You’re dead,” Ashleigh says one more time. “I saw your grave. I went to Texas. I drove in a blizzard. I went to LA. I took a very long trip to go see your grave.”
“Empty,” he says. “It was an empty grave, I made sure you knew that. I made sure there was nothing in that grave so you’d know. I told you. I told you, Li Li. I’d never leave you. And in your heart, you knew I was alive, right? You felt me, you knew I was alive. You knew it was empty. I’d never leave you, Ashleigh. Never.”
Ashleigh starts to cry and Tony moves forward again. I’m not sure if I should stop him or not. When I look over at Ford I can feel his pain just by watching the expression on his face. She might walk away from him right now. He might lose everything.
She lets Tony approach this time and then he’s got her wrapped in his arms. “We’re leaving now,” he says in her ear.
“Ash,” the blonde woman I now recognize as Ashleigh’s sister calls out. “He’s a bad man, Ashleigh. He’s a bad, bad man. Please, listen to me. He’s a paid assassin, Ashleigh. He was never in the US military. OK? He was never a Navy SEAL. He’s a soldier all right, but not the kind who protects people. He’s a killer. I’ve been trying to tell you for years. Remember when I dated James? Tony’s brother? He’s bad too, but at least he knows better than to drag a woman into his world. Please listen to me, Ashleigh. Please do not let him take you, because you will sell yourself into this organization if you go. You’ll sell Kate into this organization. Is that what you want?”
Tony stares at Ashleigh’s sister like she’s the devil, and every second she s
peaks, I expect him to shoot. But in a weird way, he almost looks relieved. He looks down at Ashleigh, his eyes begging her to accept these things as true and still want what he has to offer.
Ashleigh starts to cry uncontrollably. “Why?” she asks, looking up at the first man she gave her heart to. “Why did you do this to me? How? How could you do this to me?”
Tony’s face hardens with her words. “I did this for us, Ashleigh. So we can be together! If I hadn’t died, then I’d still be a slave to the organization. And I’d never be able to have you and Kate.” He grabs her face and holds it steady, forcing her to look him in the eyes. “I did this for us! For our family. Say it back to me, baby. Tell me you understand. Tell me you know I did this for us!”
Ashleigh shakes her head. “I thought you were dead.”
“I’m not dead, Li Li. I’m not dead. We’re together now. Everything’s OK now.”
He grabs her hand and tries to lead her away, but she plants her feet firmly on the ground and resists. She pulls her hand free. “I almost killed myself.”
“Ashleigh—”
“I almost killed myself! I was almost locked away in a psychiatric hospital, that’s how depressed I was after hearing you were dead. I was going to fall asleep in a parked car during a blizzard. I wanted to die.” She backs away again and then her eyes search wildly until she finds Ford. He’s out in the open still, in full view of everyone. Just standing there, like he’s got a great big bullseye on his chest. “Ford saved me,” she finally says.
“I’d do it again, Ashleigh,” Ford says. “I’d never walk away from you, Kitten. Ever. Not for any reason. Never. We’ll do it together or we won’t do it.”
She turns back to Tony. “I’m married,” she admits in a calm voice. “I’m married to my soul mate. I’m happy. I’m happy I’m alive and I’m happy with my life. I can’t walk away from Ford. I’m not walking away from Ford. I’m not coming back to you.”
Tony reaches out, a pained look on his face. And then in one swift move, he’s got Ashleigh by the throat. He pulls her next to his body and a shot rings out.
Veronica, of all fucking people, is shooting at Tony. She hits him in the back three times, but he’s got armor on. The shots jerk his body, but he stays standing. Ford rushes towards Ashleigh, and I cover him, shooting at Tony’s feet. Ford grabs Ashleigh’s arm and swings her out of the way. Tony points his gun at Ford’s head, and then Ronnie shoots again, and a distracted Tony pops off several shots in that general vicinity.
I’m aiming, but Tony makes one more mad grab for Ash and she’s back in his clutches. The gun goes to her head. “I’ll kill her, Aston! Stay the fuck back, or I’ll kill her!”
Ford drops the gun I gave him back at the garage, his hands in the air. “You don’t really want to hurt her, Tony. If you love her, you’ll let her go.”
For a second I think Ford’s soothing voice will work, but then Ashleigh’s sister is running towards her screaming. “No, you bast—”
Tony fires several times and the woman takes a shot to the chest. She drops to the ground and then Bobby Mansi comes out of nowhere, his gun pointed at Tony.
“I’ll kill her, Tet,” Tony says, pushing his gun into Ashleigh’s temple as she sobs, calling out to Ford. “I’ll fucking kill—”
One, two, three, four shots ring out and Tony’s head explodes, four times over.
Ashleigh wiggles free and makes a run for Ford. Bobby Mansi stands over the fallen Tony, emptying round after round after round into the dead man’s chest. When he’s out of bullets he drops the gun on the ground, looks over at me, and then says as calmly as you can, “Better call an ambulance.”
“I think he’s dead, man,” I say back.
“Not for him, Shrike. For her.” He points to a body near the stairwell and my whole world begins to spin.
Because my Ronnie is laid out on the ground in a pool of blood.
Chapter Thirty-Five
SPENCER
Chaos.
That’s my world right now.
“Ronnie?” You’d think I’d be screaming it, but it’s a whisper. “Ronnie, baby?” I’m kneeling down next to her and my only thought is how pissed she’d be if she knew so much blood was covering her body.
“It’s a flesh wound, Spencer,” Ford says as he shakes me.
No. Oceans of blood do not pour out of a flesh wound. My hand goes to her arm where the blood is pulsing out in a river.
“She must’ve been shooting at him when it hit her. The cartridge nicked the brachial artery in her upper arm.” Ford pushes me out of the way and then grabs a belt being offered by Carson and loops it around her arm, up near her shoulder. He pulls it tight and Veronica lets out a moan.
“Ronnie?” But that’s all I get from her because at that moment—the moment when I realize this might be the last thing I ever hear from her mouth—my world goes silent.
I watch. I’m an observer as Carson talks on his phone. He’s hysterical. Rook and Ronin are trying to calm a screaming Kate. Ashleigh’s kneeling down over her sister, her tiny hands pushing against Amber’s lifeless chest as the blood seeps out and puddles up on the ground.
She’s dead.
Ashleigh and I come to this realization at the same time, and then she’s up on her feet, looking around wildly. Bobby Mansi walks forward calmly, she falls into his chest and they embrace. He hugs her hard, his hand wrapped around her head as Ashleigh sobs for her dead sister.
Sirens sound off in the distance.
I watch them like this until the embrace is broken by Bobby. He holds Ashleigh out at arm’s length and begins to talk. Her tear-filled eyes are locked with his as he takes her face in both his hands. His lips move as he talks, and Ashleigh’s head bobs up and down in agreement.
They both look over at Tony’s body, then to us. To Ford, who is still working on Veronica like he’s some kind of military field medic. He’s barking orders to Carson and then Ford presses a phone in my hand and I take it automatically. When I look down I realize it’s filming.
It’s Ronnie’s phone. Disconnected from service, but the camera still functions.
I look back to Ash, but she’s alone now.
Bobby Mansi is standing over Tony’s body. He drops another weapon on the ground that looks identical to the first, and walks calmly to the elevator, where he inserts a key and the doors open. He steps in and turns.
I catch his eye just as the doors close and he shoots me his finger.
But it doesn’t come with a wink.
Flashing red and blue lights take over from there. Carson is running towards the cops, yelling for them to bring an ambulance.
There are half a dozen cops surrounding me, yelling for me to drop my gun. I look down at it and my hands let go automatically. It clangs to the concrete and then the next thing I know Ronnie and I are on our way to the hospital. I sit in the ambulance, silent, stoic, as the medics work on my Bombshell.
They are shining a light in her eyes, lifting up her eyelids, calling her name.
She’s not responding.
I watch the lips of the medic at her head. Lost a lot of blood, they say.
The ambulance stops and I’m pushed out the doors. I can only watch as they maneuver the stretcher out of the back and wheel her into the ER. I try to follow but the cops are there again, they have me by the shoulders. And normally I’d fight back or protest or something. But I feel like I’m in another world right now.
“Ronnie,” I say softly as she disappears behind the ER doors.
I’m ushered to a police car in the parking lot, cuffed and put in the back. And none of this matters. The only thing that matters is Veronica.
I sit here for how long? I have no idea.
It feels like hours before I spot Ronin outside the car. Ford is here, too. Our team of lawyers. Scott comes over to my car and opens the door. “Come on, Spence,” he says softly.
“Don’t talk to me like that, Scott.” I finally find my voice. “Don’t talk to m
e like I need your sympathy.”
He helps me out of the car, uncuffs me, and then slips Ronnie’s phone into my palm and closes my hand around it. “We never saw this,” he says.
Ronin jogs over from the huddle of lawyers and grabs my shoulder. “She’s OK, Spencer. She’s in surgery. They have to repair that vessel. But she’s doing OK.”
I nod, still numb. Doing OK and OK are not the same thing.
All these years of trying to protect her mean exactly shit to me right now.
What a waste of life. What a fucking waste of life.
“Come on,” Ford says. “We can wait inside.” We all follow him and end up in a small waiting room on the second floor.
We sit in silence and it’s only then that I realize Ford and I both are covered in blood. Ronnie’s blood.
It’s past midnight before a doctor comes into the waiting room. “Who’s a family member here?” he asks.
“I am,” I say. “She’s my fiancée.”
“Mr.—”
“Shrike. Spencer Shrike.” I can barely meet his eyes. I’m terrified of what they’ll tell me.
“She’s stable, Mr. Shrike. She came in with a tear to the brachial artery—”
I stop listening and sit back down, my head in my hands, wanting so badly to cry with relief. I replay those words over and over in my head. She’s stable. It keeps me from falling apart. It becomes my mantra. The only thought I’m capable of.
Ford takes over, asking questions using words I’ve never heard before. When the doctor leaves, he sits down next to me and puts a hand on my shoulder. “She’s OK, Spence.”
I can’t look at him. I’m so fucking messed up, I can’t look at anyone.
“There’s no nerve damage that they can see so far, the repair went better than expected, and she’s being moved to a room right now. You can go see her in a few minutes.”
Ronin sits on the other side of me and puts his hand on my shoulder too. “The trial is off,” he says.
“What?” I look up at him.