Sophie and Ryan were on their way. Shannon and Brent, too, and their grandparents as well. But Elle lived closest, so they’d arrived first. Colin dragged a hand through his hair, trying to breathe, to ignore the beeping of machines, the clatter of equipment, the hushed conversations between nurses and doctors circling nearby, and the faces of all the other people waiting in the emergency room.
“Elle,” he croaked out again, as the woman at the desk toggled through her computer screen.
She wrapped her arms around him. “He’s going to be okay.”
But she didn’t sound like she believed it.
Resting his chin atop her head, because he felt like he might topple over if he let go, he turned back to the woman at the desk. “Do you know where he is? Is he in surgery? What’s going on?”
The woman held up a finger. “One minute.”
“Goddammit,” he muttered. “Elle, is your mom working?” Colin asked, desperation coloring his tone. “Can she find out something?”
Elle shook her head. “She’s not an ER nurse, but I can try to find her.”
“Wait.” Colin snapped his gaze in the direction of the woman in pink scrubs. “Sloan, you said?”
Colin let go of Elle and gripped the counter. “Yes. Michael Sloan. What’s going on?”
She opened her mouth to speak, when Colin spotted John Winston rounding the corner. His eyes were downcast, his arm was wrapped around Annalise, and he looked like someone had died.
Colin’s ears rang, and he heard nothing but the screaming in his own head.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Thirty minutes ago
Silver gleamed on concrete—two, maybe three feet away from her next to the wheel of a car—like a beacon.
A harsh pant came from Charlie, then the dragging sound of unsteady feet across pavement.
Her hands were covered in Michael’s blood, her vision was blurred from her own torrential tears, and her pulse thundered in her brain.
But Michael’s heart still beat, and in an instant, her choices crystallized into just one.
She lunged across Michael for the gun, rose to her feet, and spun around.
“I’m not done,” the man seethed, as he rose to his full height, his gun in his uninjured right hand. “You and your white box comment this morning at the diner,” he snarled. “You know nothing about my brother. Nothing about how he was buried.”
She had no clue what he meant, and she didn’t care. She was nothing but nerves. She’d never held a gun and had certainly never fired one. She didn’t know how to hit the side of a barn, let alone the heart of a man. But as he lifted his arm, her focus narrowed, and her mind sharpened.
Adrenaline bathed her brain in pinpoint clarity. She was alive, she was unhurt, and she was going to be faster than the man who wanted to kill her then finish off Michael.
As she raised her weapon, she realized she knew precisely what to do.
Like taking a picture.
Point. Aim.
Shoot.
The bullet flew.
And she prayed. And hoped. And wished.
Charlie crumpled over, grabbing his belly where she’d hit him.
Seconds later, the ambulance screeched to a stop, the medics poured out, and she was on the way to the hospital with her love losing his hold on life.
Now
He’d died in the emergency room twenty minutes later. Annalise had shot him in the stomach, the bullet nicking an artery and tearing through his intestines, the doctors had said. No time to question Charlie Stravinsky—no chance for a deathbed confession, but one was hardly needed.
His confession had been made when he’d arrived at Michael’s building, ready to kill.
John had already put most of the pieces together that morning with the federal agent, and he needed to talk to Annalise to learn what had gone down in the parking garage. She could barely speak, though. Her hands were still shaking, and all she’d managed to say were the barest of details. There would be time enough for that later. After she’d been checked over and cleaned up, he walked her to the ER waiting room where he was rushed by family members—Colin and Elle first.
“What’s going on?” Colin asked, grabbing his arm.
“He’s in surgery. That’s all I know,” John said, wishing he had more news. The doctors didn’t know. The nurses hadn’t supplied any more details. That was standard practice for this kind of trauma. Get the patient in the OR and try to save a life if they could.
Colin’s shoulders rose and fell as he took a deep breath. “Okay. But how does it look? Can’t we get any more information?” Colin implored, his eyes wide with the plea.
John shook his head. “They don’t have any other details to give. As soon as he arrived, he was rushed to the OR. They’re probably trying to figure out the extent of the damage. If—”
“If they can save him?” Colin cut in.
John nodded. “Yes. That’s what they’re trying to do.”
Then an animalistic cry ripped from the throat of the woman next to him, and Annalise slipped from his arms, crumbling to the floor. In an instant, Elle gripped her, wrapped her arms around her, and ushered her away.
Eighteen years ago
He lay on the driveway, his eyes fluttering closed, and Thomas knew this was the end. He could no longer move his lips to utter the word help. The night seemed to wink on and off, the stars in the sky coming in and out of focus and then fading. His body felt light, as if it were floating away from him.
The agonizing pain had ebbed, and as he lay on the asphalt by his home, his last thoughts were of his children. How much he loved them. How much he could continue to love them for the rest of time…here in this world, or in the next one.
And as the earth turned dark, he hoped he wouldn’t see them again for a long, long time…
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Her head was in her hands.
“I killed a man,” she whispered barrenly. “And the man I love is dying.”
Doubled over in shock and consumed with the sharp, cold sensation of impending grief, Annalise sat on the hard wooden bench in the hospital’s chapel.
Elle, who she’d just met today, stroked her hair, trying to comfort her. Annalise thought she must be the one who’d brought her here from the emergency room an hour ago. Or was it minutes ago? She hardly knew anything anymore, except that all her fears were on the cusp of turning true. The prospect of Michael dying hurt so much—an ache in her bones that would never depart.
“You did what you had to do,” Elle said, her voice strong as she ran her fingers through Annalise’s hair.
“I did,” she choked out, needing the reassurance. She had no regrets over picking up the gun and firing. She only hoped it had been enough to save Michael. But he’d been barely hanging on during the ride to the hospital. She’d hardy even been able to hear the words the paramedics barked when they gave him an IV and fought to keep him alive as he bled, and bled, and bled. The ambulance had seemed to fly at the speed of light, confirmation of how tenuous his hold on life was.
Oh God.
She couldn’t imagine losing him. Couldn’t conceive of burying him. Her chest heaved, and she coughed, choking on the pain.
Now, he was in the operating room and no one knew if the doctors could even save him. There was a bullet in his body. Near his heart.
The door creaked, and Annalise lifted her gaze as a platinum blonde rushed toward them—Sophie, the one who’d arranged for her to come to Vegas for a photo shoot.
“Hi. I’ll be ready for your shoot tomorrow,” Annalise said, her voice flat. She wasn’t sure why she’d said that. Maybe because anything else would hollow her out.
Sophie gave her a look like she was crazy as she kneeled by her side and placed a hand on her thigh. “I’m not here to ask about work. Are you okay, sweetie?”
Annalise shook her head. “No. I don’t know. I killed a man and Michael is dying,” she repeated, because those twin moments of her life felt
like everything. Her before, her after, her now.
“You saved a life,” Sophie said, reaching for her hand. “Come on, now. You need to be strong for Michael. You need to be as strong as you can be.”
Strong? What was that? Did she even know what strength was anymore? Did she know anything? Her world had been twisted inside out, shaken cruelly by the hand of Fate, and now Michael was—
She squeezed her eyes shut, blocking out the word dying.
“Annalise,” Sophie said, her voice gentle but firm. “You’re allowed to be sad. You’re allowed to be terrified. But you’re not allowed to think negative thoughts right now. Michael is in surgery, and they are fighting to save his life. We need to be there in the OR waiting room for whenever the doctors come out. Not here.” Sophie glanced around the chapel. It was warm and comforting, but it was a hiding place in some ways. “Come now. You can do this.”
Sophie held one hand, and Elle took the other. Annalise was keenly aware that the three women in this chapel were in love with three brothers, and the other two were there to help her be tough for the brother that needed her. The man she loved.
She took a breath, inhaling hope and letting go of all else.
There was no room for thoughts of that killer. There was no room for hate, for vengeance, or for cold, heartless enemies.
There was only room for love. She would do everything to send her love to Michael, and her strength to the doctors working on him. She left the chapel, Elle and Sophie leading her to join the rest of the family in the OR waiting room.
They waited and they waited and they waited.
For an hour.
Then another.
Then for nearly one more.
Until at last, a woman in green scrubs pushed open the door, and surveyed the scene. She had lines around her blue eyes, and strong cheekbones. “I’m Doctor Brooks. Are you the family of Michael Sloan?”
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
Everyone stood.
Annalise, Elle, Sophie. Ryan, Colin, Shannon, and Brent, his arm protectively around his pregnant wife. The grandparents. Even the detective had stayed, and Michael’s friend Mindy had joined the vigil.
Collectively holding their breath, crossing their fingers, and praying to whoever listened, they waited for the surgeon to speak again.
“It was touch-and-go there for a while. We didn’t know where the bullet hit him until we opened up his chest. And he lost a lot of blood,” the doctor said, her tone measured and even. Annalise was poised on the balls of her feet, every muscle strung tight, waiting, wanting, aching for answers. “Turns out he was shot in the spleen. We got lucky.”
Lucky.
Oh God, never had a word been more beautiful.
Never had anyone said such a perfect word. Lucky was good.
“We were able to remove his spleen, and he’ll be able to live a normal life without it.”
“Oh my God. He’s really alive?” Annalise asked in a breathless rush, desperately needing a second confirmation.
The surgeon smiled and nodded. “Yes. Very much so.”
“Can we see him?” The question came from Michael’s grandmother.
The doctor shook her head. “He’s in recovery now. He hasn’t even woken up yet.”
Two hours later, a nurse said he was asking for Annalise. She brought her hand to her heart, then turned and embraced Elle and Sophie. “Thank God,” she whispered, her voice breaking as it had in the chapel with them, but this time for a much happier reason.
* * *
Sanders set down the phone and breathed a huge sigh of relief. Becky wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed his cheek.
“He’s going to be okay,” he said, so damn grateful for the news his best friend’s mother—Victoria Paige—had just given him. Her grandson Michael was going to be okay.
When Sanders was pulled over for speeding, he’d never expected his role as an informant would curl around and hook into the murder of his best friend from years ago. He’d had no notion that the bastards who ran the company had pressured Dora to commit murder. He’d thought for years, as nearly everyone did, that it was her crime. Her choice and hers alone. He never knew the men he worked for had wanted Thomas dead and had used Dora to make that happen.
It didn’t mean he forgave her. Just meant that she didn’t act alone.
But he could breathe easier, knowing that all her accomplices at last had been rounded up.
Becky sank onto his lap, her arms still looped around his neck, and he stayed there in her embrace for a long time.
* * *
John stepped through the ER doors and paced in front of the hospital, talking to Special Agent Reiss on the phone.
“And with the information obtained from Mr. Foxton, that’s how we were able to focus in on West Limos,” she said, and rattled off the details.
Agent Reiss had been looking into local racketeering activity for some time, and when Sanders Foxton had been brought in for transporting illegal firearms, he’d become the linchpin in the feds’ investigation into the local crime ring that ran guns and drugs across Nevada. Evidently Sanders hadn’t known what he was transporting, but the details of the runs he’d made over the years had bit by bit helped the FBI narrow in on one company.
A company that had appeared squeaky clean.
That company owned by a supposed West Strass. But as it turned out, West had been dead a long, long time. West Strass was an alias for West Stravinksy, the brother of Charlie Stravinsky who’d been killed by an unknown assailant in a poor neighborhood in his native country more than four decades ago. Since then, Charlie had moved to America and had been laundering his money through companies he set up with a fake identity in his brother’s name. Apparently West Strass had many assets around the United States—a carwash in Texas, a dry cleaner in San Diego, a limo company in Las Vegas, and for a while he’d been the owner of a limo company in San Francisco when Charlie had relocated there, working as a loan shark and running rigged poker games.
But Charlie had returned to Las Vegas and established White Box with his friend and business partner Curtis Paul Wollinsky, who he’d taken under his wing decades ago when Curtis—who went by his middle name then—managed the limo company. Seemed all the questions Paige had asked about missing rides had tipped off Paul, who’d tipped off Charlie, who’d decided he wanted Thomas dead.
That task was all the easier because Thomas’s wife was in love with the man who ran Charlie’s army on the street—the Royal Sinners. There was a reason they were one of the most powerful street gangs in the country. They had access to criminal masterminds, to men adept at both violent and white-collar crime. Luke was the head, giving orders on behalf of Charlie and paying the Sinners better than average money for selling and dealing.
“Did he offer health insurance, too?” John asked Reiss with a derisive scoff.
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” she said, then added that they’d nabbed Curtis that morning, bringing him in on racketeering charges.
Funny that their investigations had been on parallel paths for a few months, never meeting until, all of a sudden, the paths collided.
That occurred when Annalise had remembered the term that Thomas heard used years ago, which was still a favorite of Charlie’s today. White Box. While waiting for Michael to wake up, Annalise had told John what happened at the diner, how someone had overheard her conversation with Michael as they’d pieced the two paths together courtesy of that term.
White Box. Supposedly, according to what Annalise had said, it meant something related to Charlie’s dead brother. Everything Charlie did circled back to his brother.
John stopped in his tracks when he realized what its meaning could be. Because Annalise had told him Charlie’s last words. You know nothing about my brother. Nothing about how he was buried.
John’s blood chilled as he realized Charlie’s brother, at age nine, must have been buried in a white coffin. And so Charlie named his businesses for him, and for t
he way he left this earth.
It was oddly commemorative and terribly twisted at the same time. Which described the man who’d built, raised, and run the Royal Sinners. Terribly twisted.
The ways in which people remembered the dead could turn them into killers or into lovers.
John chased away the philosophical thoughts, pushing his sunglasses up the bridge of his nose as he refocused on the call. “Crazy to think this all started from a speeding ticket,” he remarked as he paced the other direction.
“Right? But that’s how it goes. Nothing happens for a long time and then one misstep and all the dominoes fall.”
They were falling indeed. In the last few weeks, the most notorious street gang in the city’s history had been effectively dismantled. John would never have been able to do his part without the help of the Sloan family—each of them had played a role.
That was fitting.
As he finished the call, he stared briefly at the sky, the sun poking through clouds.
Today was something like justice, and that was all he could ask for in this line of work.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
Gently Annalise pushed open the door to Michael’s room, nerves thrumming through her body. Instantly, his eyes swung to her, the blue irises sparkling as he lay in the hospital bed.
“Hey,” he said, his voice scratchy from the anesthesia.
“Hi,” she said, unable to contain a crazy grin, or the relief that flooded her heart. She crossed the few feet to his bed and drank in the sight of him. An IV drip snaked out of his arm, and his chest was bandaged. His face was tired, but a gorgeous smile tugged at his lips.
“You look beautiful,” she said.
“I’d laugh, but it would hurt too much.”
Sinful Love (Sinful Nights #4) Page 26