by Nina Park
He sounded so sweet and sincere that Alina couldn't make herself even a little bit nervous. She didn't know what was going to happen next, but she knew that it felt good to be in Vincent's lap with his arms around her.
"Okay," she said. "I guess we're going to try this out.
Chapter Eight
When the call finally came, it wasn't from Nick. Of course, Vincent didn't know that when he picked up the phone. It would make sense for Nick to have picked up a new burner, and Vincent didn't think about it beyond that.
"Hey," he said, by way of greeting. When it was a soft, feminine voice that greeted him instead of Nick's stark basso, Vincent almost dropped the phone.
"Vincent," he heard. "Thank God. Is she with you?"
"Who is this?" He cursed as soon as he asked the question; simply saying that much confirmed that she'd reached the person she was looking for – whoever she was.
"Dez," the woman said. "Desdemona. Frank's – well, whatever we are. Please, tell me you have her and that she's safe."
"I don't know you." Vincent kept his voice as careful and level as he could. "I don't know who you're talking about, and I'm definitely not having a conversation with you." He was a bad liar, but he also had no way to tell if it really was Dez on the line. Plus, Nick had been so clear that he shouldn't talk to the woman at all.
But then, she was here, and Nick wasn't.
Didn't matter. He went to disconnect the call, but her voice snapped out, "Wait." The sheer vehemence in her tone froze him in a way that the same sharpness wouldn't have from Nick or any other man he knew.
He decided to wait. He could give her a ten-count to tell him what the hell was going on and let him make a decision about what was going to happen next.
"He's dead," she said, her voice shaking just a little. "Frank's dead. Nick's playing you. He's waiting until the furor dies down, and then he'll come for the girl."
Vincent shook his head. "Alina's nothing in this. Why the hell would someone come for her?"
Distantly, he was aware that he was giving away a lot – both to himself and to the woman on the phone – by letting his priorities be focused this way. He should care more that the boss was dead, but frankly, it seemed the most distance and irrelevant part of what he was being told. Alina was in danger, she was the last job he'd been given. By proxy, perhaps, but still.
And then he froze in place. Because Frank hadn't given him the job. Frank had just been shot, and there had been blood everywhere, and Nick had grabbed him while the other capos did what they needed to do. Nick, who was the most likely heir in the Costas, given that Frank hadn't had boys. Nick had said, "Get her. Keep her safe." And Vincent had run.
Maybe he'd felt more affection for that gawky kid he remembered then he was willing to admit. But that wasn't the thought right now. It had never occurred to him to question Nick's loyalty. It had never occurred to him that Nick might have suggested something that wasn't in the best interest of the family. Because he was – he was family.
And truly, how much did Vincent know about Dez? She'd appeared out of nowhere, she'd caught Frank's attention, and she'd become an advisor and confidant more quickly than anyone was comfortable with. Where was the proof that she was any kind of good for Frank? How did anyone know that she was anything she said she was? She could be with – with any number of organizations, gaining information that could be used to take the Costas down.
He didn't know who to trust, and that meant he wasn't going to trust anyone but himself. He could tell himself that Alina was just a package to protect, but he knew better than that. He knew the warmth that stirred in him when he thought of the baby she was carrying, and when he thought about how much he wanted to be part of what came next for her. For them.
"Dez," he said. "I ain't talking to you. I take my orders from the Costas, and that's not you. Don't contact me again."
He hung up on the phone before he could think better of it. Maybe he was making the wrong call, but it was the only one he knew how to make.
Alina was in the living room, stretched out with a marathon of Netflix shows by Shonda Rhimes in front of her. Even as stressed as he was, he couldn't avoid enjoying her body, just a little. Her pretty, soft belly had started to swell. When she was standing, it wasn't obvious but stretched out like this, he could see the small rounding. Her boobs were bigger, swollen and sensitive. It drove her crazy now when he dragged his teeth over her nipples, sending her cunt clutching at him. Gorgeous.
"We need to go," he said, hating the words. "We need to get out of here. Is there any property you have that's not attached to your father?"
"What's happened?" Alina sat up straight, her eyes wide. She snapped the TV off with the remote and stared.
Vincent cursed at the same time he felt a swell of pride for his girl. Too many of the wives and girlfriends he knew from the edges of the Costas would just whimper and simper and race off to do what they were told. Alina needed to know what was happening. She wasn't passive; she was an active participant in whatever came next.
"I don't know," he replied. "But we were contacted by someone who shouldn't know where we are, and we have to get out of here. I need you to answer my question."
Alina didn't panic, just got quiet for a long moment, then nodded. "There's a cabin, in the northeast of Vermont. There's fucking nothing up there but trees and this cabin, I swear. It was my grandmother's; my mother owned it and never passed it to my father because of some weird thing in the will, and it passed to me when she died. If someone dug into me, they could probably find it, but otherwise..."
Vincent considered it carefully. If it wasn't that, what other options did they have?
"Okay. Grab your things. We don't have to rush, but we do need to go. I'll go down and arrange for us to check-out. Pack my stuff too."
Alina nodded sharply and stood. As he headed for the door, he saw her pause to stand still, then nod. She strode to the bedroom as he headed to the elevator that would take him to the front desk.
As he walked, Vincent planned. They'd need new phones ASAP. Burners again, bought in cash. Numbers no one would be able to trace, perfectly clean. It was going to be a couple days to get to the cabin Alina had mentioned, but he had an idea for a pit stop along the way. And then – shit, he had no idea. He'd never been the planner before; he was the one following along and doing the work. He was damn good at that.
While he waited for the elevator, it occurred to him to pull out the phone he'd been using and hit Google. Using Frank's name as the search keyword gave him a bunch of press releases about the Costa family's charity work; using his name + death turned up a couple of pieces on times he'd been implicated in one thing or another. Nothing had ever stuck, of course, but the articles written about it were still out there.
If Frank Costa had been shot and killed, wouldn't that have made the news? An obituary, at least. If Frank had been killed on the spot, it would have been possible for his body to be disposed of, allowing things to move forward with a minimum of fuss. But Vincent had been there as Frank was loaded into the ambulance. He'd heard that Frank was heading into surgery before Nick sent him on his way.
Vincent didn't know who to trust, and he hated that. His life worked well because of one simple thing: he figured out who he trusted, and then he did what he was told. It was simple.
There was one crazy moment, as the elevator doors dinged open, where he considered putting Alina in the car and heading back into the city. He would find out what was happening, what would keep her safe. He couldn't believe that someone would hurt her. She was a pregnant woman; even the Costas had their limits.
But no. Frank had his limits. If someone else was in charge now – who knew what they had in place.
As ridiculous as it sounded, Vincent was pretty sure that he was going to need to figure out what the hell was going on. He had a few contacts that were his own, that he trusted. He could make some calls, talk to some people. So maybe heading all the way into the woods wouldn'
t be the best idea. The kinds of people he needed to talk to weren't going to give him information over the phone. They'd want in-person meetings, the sort where people were checked for wires and then nodded through doors that were locked behind them.
But he needed Alina to be safe. He couldn't possibly focus on what he needed to do if he was worrying about her. And if he was entirely honest, it wasn't just about the baby. She'd grown on him. Knowing that this was a thing they were going to do, they'd stopped just fucking and started spending time together. He kept them pretty cooped up in the hotel, so they'd spent a lot of time cuddling and watching TV. Alina had started cooking for him, and he'd found himself to be a fair hand with a roasted vegetable or two. They'd been... really domestic.
Vincent had grown up in the life. It had never occurred to him to want anything else. And from things Alina had said – he wasn't sure she would ever be willing to settle for a mob man. She didn't want someone like her father; she'd made that gently clear.
So what did she expect from him? That he would reform just for her? Could he, if he wanted to? Would the Costas ever let him out? When you were a made man, you were made for life. But if Frank – if Frank were alive, and he managed to get the man's approval for him to build a life with Alina – maybe that would be enough.
He sighed and tried to force his brain to focus on what was in front of him. He had to get Alina somewhere safe so he could figure out what was going on and what he needed to do. That was the only thing that mattered right now.
The elevator let out into the lobby, and he walked quickly towards the front desk. So fast, in fact, that he almost missed the three men who walked into the lobby from the front entrance. There wasn't anything about them that should have caught his eye. In fact, they were so nondescript that they were notable for that alone. Because men who your eyes glazed over should have been meandering in, their eyes up and looking around, or down and unfocused. Men who walked into a room like they needed to find all the potential points of assault before they could relax into a stance of merely "actively waiting for danger" were not Joe Anybody, no matter how boringly they dressed.
He ran through his options faster than he could have actually described to someone else. Engage? No, there were three of them at least, and he didn't have a single weapon on him. Run? No, that'll be far too obvious. Continue on this course? A mistake – since they were moving in the direction of the registration desk as well, and if they were here looking for him, that would be a disaster in the making.
Only after that did his brain cough up the name of Jack Quincey, a hired killer, and one of the men who had just walked through the door. He had a hell of a reputation in the city; he was expensive, but you got what you paid for. Quince didn't leave jobs undone, and Vincent had always respected the man's professional ethics. It was said that he never hit a target unless he was being paid – which meant that if you hired him to kill a man, his wife and kids were going to be okay. The story went that half a decade ago, Jack Quincey had made a mistake, and a little girl got killed, and since then he hadn't made another mistake.
It was entirely possible that Jack Quincey and two goons weren't here to find him and Alina and wipe them out. All sorts of things were possible. But Vincent hadn't kept his clients alive over the years by assuming that the least likely scenario wasn't one that would play out. He had to assume they were there for him. For Alina. And he had to act accordingly.
By adjusting the trajectory of his walk and adding a little stutter step to it, he looked like any other tourist confused on where they should go for the day. He walked to the activity board the hotel maintained near the entrance to the club restaurant. He studied it for a moment, tapped "Trip to the Marimack Mansion" like he gave a shit what that meant, and then turned back the way he'd come. He didn't let his steps quicken or his appearance to become more rigid as he approached the elevator. He couldn't give a single sign. It wasn't until the elevator dinged and he got back inside, swiping his card for the penthouse floor, that he allowed himself to look at the front desk.
If the three men had seen him, he didn't think they had marked him, and that might be the best luck he was going to have today.
He had to get Alina out.
It seemed to take years for the elevator to get to the top floor, and his toes tapped hard during every single moment. When the elevator was on its way to the penthouse, it didn't stop at any of the other floors; that was some kind of blessing at least. Vincent forced himself to steady his breathing, to let himself settle into the space where he was prepared to act in whatever way was necessary to protect his client. He tried to let all meaning flow away from Alina; she was just a job right now. If he was emotional, there was no chance of him protecting her like he needed to. He needed to be cold, and just hope she didn't hate him for it when this was over.
Let her be alive, and he could explain things to her. He couldn't explain shit to her when she was dead. Let her be just a moving target right now, something they were trying to hit, and he was trying to protect. With that, he could maybe, possibly, make it out of this with everyone alive.
When the elevator door dinged open, he was already in motion. "Alina!"
She was a woman who had learned early on how to listen to the snap in his voice. Her head popped out of the bedroom door in just a moment. "What's happening?"
"Act now, talk later. Got it?"
It was the kind of statement anyone who had ever had a bodyguard understood. She wasn't going to ask questions or demand explanations or do anything other than trust that he was going to get her through whatever was happening. She didn't need to know what was happening right now; that was his responsibility, not hers. She gave a curt nod and waited for instructions.
"Get whatever you've packed. You have a minute to add anything else you need. And then we're on the move." He didn't add a "Got it?" and he didn't wait for her acknowledgment. He saw her turn and run back to the bed, drawers opening and hangers clanging as she threw stuff into the one duffle bag they'd acquired. He heard footsteps in the bathroom and the clatter of toiletries falling into the bag as well.
He went through the apartment looking for anything that might be a clue to what they'd been doing here, how long they'd been here, or where they might go next. He ripped several sheets off each notepad, even though he couldn't remember when they'd used any of them. He double-checked that the pregnancy test had gotten thrown out when housekeeping went through. He cleaned out hairbrushes and made sure there weren't scraps of paper in any of the trash cans. And then Alina was standing in the living room, the duffle bag over her shoulder.
A rush of soft, heated feelings ran through him as she stood there. She was pale and nervous, her hands shaking hard, but there wasn't more than that. She was terrified, he thought, but she was ready to listen and do what she was told. She wasn't going to choke up on him. That was, in and of itself, pretty goddamn valuable.
"This way," he said.
She followed him as he went to the elevator again. This time, instead of riding it to the lobby, he picked a floor about halfway down the busy hotel and punched that button. When the doors opened, he stepped out into the hallway, saw the men he was avoiding down the hall, and turned his head fast to make sure they didn't see him.
Getting back into the elevator would be suspicious, at this point, and he didn't need any more suspicion. He took Alina's hand and pulled her close, taking the bag and slinging it over his own shoulder. It cramped his draw for the weapon he now had holstered against his side, but then the goal was always to not need to draw your weapon in front of the client anyway. If you were doing your job right, it wouldn't be necessary.
Every so often, Frank or Nick had decided to hire him out, let him get some more training in his skills from those around him. He was good at his job, but they wanted him to be the best. He would always appreciate the hell out of that.
Prior to today, most of his work had been in the "stand here and look intimidating" vein, with only a handf
ul of situations where he'd needed to draw down a weapon and two where he'd had to fire. One kill. Most of the time, he'd been able to use his hands to deal with whatever was in front of him. More than once he'd been able to talk a situation down to nothing.
But he knew the theory of how to get a client out of a potentially active situation, and he drew on every one of those skills now.
He'd planned to hit the fire stairs closest to the elevator, but pushing open those doors now would draw a lot of attention. There was a set on the other side of the building as well, so he put his arm around Alina and laughed just a little. She reacted just right, leaning into him without obstructing his reach if needed, and grinning up at him.
They turned a corner – like most hotels, this one was organized in a ring – and then sped up just a little bit. And then Vincent heard the sound he'd dreaded on every assignment he'd ever had. Someone shouting "Hey!"
"Go," he said to Alina, pushing her out in front of him.
She didn't hesitate, just went straight for the entrance to the fire stairs and pushing through the door. He followed her, both of them rushing down the stairs as fast as they could without falling.