by Jillian Neal
He pointed to the screen and Ramier nodded. He offered Vindico a sorrowful look.
“317,” Vindico husked to the team and their protectors. Logan and Rainer shared a quizzical glance. Neither was certain how he’d known that.
Rainer glanced at the screen before falling back into line. The room was registered to a Gerald Lindley. That certainly wasn’t one of Wretchkinsides’ aliases, nor any of his top guys’ names.
They stayed behind Vindico, and moved like the well-oiled machine they’d been trained to be as they headed up the stairs.
A grouping of officers stayed in the lobby. They were arresting the men who hadn’t been killed.
With every step, the thought that he’d just killed a man pulsed through his mind. They made another turn to continue their seemingly endless climb.
Everyone led with his pistol, ready to shoot if there was movement or on Vindico’s command.
They stood just outside the door to enter on the third floor. Two men were seated on couches, watching TV in the snack area. Vindico rolled his eyes. He shot a fierce cast over the men draining them of the ability to fight. After cuffing them, he took their weapons, and then led the team down the hall.
Rainer tried to remember to blink as he read the number 317 on the perfectly mundane, tan hotel room door. He tried not to think about what hell might be going on just on the other side.
Everyone watched as Vindico used the master key card he’d taken from the concierge’s desk. The Townsend was old and hadn’t upgraded their key card entries in at least twenty years. A magnetic pulse would release the newer versions with ease, but the older readers weren’t as standardized, and they didn’t have time to try different pulses.
He eased the card through the lock as quietly as he was able. He summoned to hold the lock open.
“On my go,” he whispered.
Rainer’s pulse was racing. He felt his muscles spasm as he panted. Terror and vengeance coursed through him in equal measure.
One of the subordinate officers kicked open the door, and Vindico threw a shield, but Rainer saw no one, save Serena, who was bound and gagged in a chair.
Suddenly a single shot rang out. The sliding glass doors in the back of the room were open, and Rainer caught a glimpse of two men.
Vindico flung his hand to the right and redirected the bullet sending it spiraling back the way it had come. A harrowed, guttural groan came from one of the men as he doubled over and then fell forward over the railing. The second man leapt. They heard one echoed splash from the pool. The far more repulsive sound was the hollow crunch of concrete and bone that came after the splash.
The hysterical scream from below confirmed that one of the men hadn’t made it to the water. Violent rage lit through Vindico.
“Gallic…” hissed through his teeth. “Get her. Carry her down. Governor Carrington is waiting. Take her to the Medivac Ambulance. I have something to take care of,” Vindico growled as he spun and sprinted back out of the room.
Everyone moved. They spun to make certain no one else was hiding in the bathroom or closet.
Garrett paced carefully to Serena. “Just try to relax for me, okay?” he soothed in a kinder tone than Rainer had ever heard him use. He tenderly eased the duct tape from her mouth and the chains that held her in the chair. She began to sob as he lifted her easily into his arms.
Her wrists were broken badly. Her hands hung at odd angles. Rainer’s anger boiled inside of him.
“Shh, shh, I’ve got you,” Garrett soothed.
“Regis,” she pled. Garrett swallowed harshly and gave her a reassuring nod. “He’s right downstairs. I’m going to take you to him right now.”
She was bloody and bruised. Her right eye was swollen shut, and her scalp held dried blood in the roots of her hair. Rainer shuddered as he kept his shield over her and Garrett.
The Price
~Dan Vindico~
“You mother-fucking asshole!” Dan threw Gallic’s soaking wet body onto the black pavement on the street behind the Townsend hotel. “You really think I wouldn’t catch you?”
Gallic’s chest seized, and an involuntary groan choked from him as Dan’s boot shattered several of his ribs.
“So, let’s hear it. What’d he pay you to turn? What did he offer you that would make you take her and hurt her when you were supposed to be keeping her safe? New car, new house in the Riviera? It had to be something good!”
Dan slapped cuffs onto his wrists and sank his knee into Gallic’s back over the ribs he’d just shattered.
“I asked you a question, Gallic. Now answer me.”
Gallic coughed up pool water and blood.
“He said if I didn’t take her, Cascavel would. He had pictures, and he said he’d match the ransom,” Gallic managed.
“Oh, right. So, you took her to keep her away from Cascavel. How noble of you. Pictures of what?”
“Of me and…”
“Of you and what? You and some other guy’s wife?” Vindico demanded furiously, but Gallic shook his head.
“Pictures of what, then, Gallic?”
Gallic’s head tried to shake against the pebbled cement. Blood oozed from his cheek.
Dan was tired of messing around. He stood and jerked Gallic upright in one smooth, sinewy move. He shoved him forward, back towards the hotel.
“I’m still waiting, and I didn’t get to shoot anyone in that little warzone you created. So, go ahead. You decide to keep your mouth shut, and I can arrange for you to remain quiet forever.”
“Just some stuff I was into. I don’t know how he got all those pictures. I only took a few,” Gallic’s entire body shook as he tried to walk upright. He cringed as he fought not to cough.
“And what were we taking pictures of that would’ve looked so bad?” Dan’s secondary predilection honed in on Gallic. He swam through his fractured rhythms. Gallic wasn’t married, and he didn’t have any children. Dan dug deeper until he landed on the malignant sickness that swam in Gallic’s mind.
As he realized what evidence Wretchkinsides had, his body seized with frenzied rage. He fought with himself not to shoot Denton Gallic on the spot.
His hand twitched between his radio and his pistol as he weighed the options. He lifted his radio from his belt.
“I have Denton Gallic in cuffs. I need someone to get to the Crown Governor’s mansion. Get me every computer in the guardhouse. Radio Coriolis. Tell them I’m bringing in a child molester and a kidnapper. He’s to be kept in the back caves, and he’s never coming back out.”
His Plan
~Rainer Lawson~
Vindico shoved Denton Gallic into a squad car. He had appeared in a storm of violent ire just as Garrett had laid Serena in Governor Carrington’s arms. They all watched as the Crown Governor began to sob in earnest.
Rainer was still reeling from the radio call that the head of Serena’s security team had actually been a child molester.
Seven Medios were tending to all of Serena’s injuries. They healed her as she lay in Governor Carrington’s arms. He refused to put her onto the gurney.
All of the taskforce continued to glance around nervously, and still had their weapons drawn. Rainer now fully understood all of his endurance training, the hours he’d spent summoning while sprinting on a treadmill or releasing multiple casts and holding them endlessly. His adrenaline waned and utter exhaustion set in.
“So, how did Vindico know he wasn’t going to kill her?” Logan asked again. Rainer knew he’d heard the question before, but it seemed so long ago. It felt like it had been days, not hours ago that the papers had broken the story of his and Emily’s belly shot.
Rainer felt dizzy. He placed his hand on the Expedition and leaned onto it for support. Vindico walked towards them.
“Good work, gentlemen.” He seemed to have regained some of his composure. He looked more human and less like a furious animal that had been caged.
“And to answer your question, Haydenshire,” Vindico glanced ar
ound as the Crown Governor finally seated Serena on a gurney.
She was moving her wrists with ease now as the Medios continued to clean her wounds.
“This is how Wretchkinsides works. Believe me, if he’d wanted Serena dead and he’d gotten her here, he would’ve killed her. It would never have mattered how much money I showed up with. But he didn’t want her dead. He wants Carrington to step down from office. And judging by the look on his face,” Vindico gestured back toward the Crown Governor. “I’d say his plan just worked perfectly. He wants to control the Senate again, and he’s well on his way.”
Rainer’s stomach seized as he contemplated Governor Carrington’s resignation.
“Well, Lawson, I’d venture a guess that this has probably been about the longest day of your entire life,” Vindico’s quip shook him from his distracted exhaustion.
He was unable to argue or even to speak coherently, so he nodded his agreement.
“Go home. Get some sleep. I don’t want to see any of you until Wednesday morning, bright and early,” he ordered the entire team.
Vestiges
Rainer followed Logan and Garrett back to the Expedition. He watched the first vestiges of light appear over the D.C. skyline.
“Hey,” he yawned deeply as he let the events of his night replay in harrowing detail in his mind. “How did Vindico know that was the room?”
Garrett had requested that Rainer and Logan talk to him, lest he fall asleep at the wheel. He looked morose.
“Wretchkinsides is a sick bastard,” he huffed, though that much had already been proven time and time again. “Gerald was Amelia’s father’s name, I believe, and I know that Lindley is Vindico’s little sister. The one he’s always trying to keep out of trouble.”
Rainer did recall the stories about Lindley Vindico at school. They were rather legendary. She graduated a few years before Rainer and Logan, but her reputation for being a wild child wasn’t lost in the years between their graduations.
“So, basically,” Garrett yawned deeply before continuing, “He’s letting Dan know that anyone close to him is game.”
“I can’t imagine Vindico being related to somebody who did the stuff Lindley did,” Logan was clearly recalling some of the stories.
“I don’t know if Lindley really did half of the shit she claimed she did. I’d graduated by the time she got there, but I think Patrick was just a year ahead of her. You could ask him.”
“How did she not get expelled?” Rainer thought of one particular legend where Lindley Vindico had shown up to class completely naked.
“Everyone loves Governor Vindico so much, and they felt bad about what had happened with Amelia and Dan, and, I mean, he and his other two sisters were such great students. He was head of Ioses.” Garrett gestured to Rainer. “So, the school governors just kept sweeping it under the rug. I was in a bunch of classes with Kara, and she’s as straight-laced as Dan.”
Garrett pulled the Expedition back onto the parking deck beside Rainer’s Mustang. “You mind if I get a ride back to the farm? I’ll get Chloe to pick me up from there.”
“Sure.”
“Shotgun!” Logan cried.
Garrett chuckled and smacked Logan on the back of the head.
“You ever plan on growing up, or you just working the ‘I plan on staying eleven for as long as my fiancée will allow it’ gig?”
Rainer laughed as he cranked the car.
Everyone was so relieved that Serena had been rescued, relatively unscathed, that the joking seemed appropriate. Rainer couldn’t join in, however. He was simply too exhausted. He listened to Garrett and Logan rag on each other for the entire ride home.
They climbed out of the Mustang, and for the first time in his entire life Rainer was uncertain if he was wanted inside the Haydenshires’ home.
Emily flew out the kitchen door and raced into Rainer’s arms. He could tell she hadn’t slept since he left. He embraced her and felt whole again. He clung to her, and wondered if she could feel all that had changed since he’d left her with her father in the middle of the night.
“Is she all right?” Emily kept her hands on Rainer as terror choked her voice. He was unable to take his eyes off of her, so he simply nodded. He was afraid of the memories, of everything he’d seen and done in the past few hours. The man he’d killed flashed through his mind.
“Are you okay?” she laid her head on his shoulder and kissed his neck. After pausing to really consider the question, he shook his head.
He closed his eyes and breathed deeply. He inhaled her heavenly scent. Her cast eased through his shield, and he drank her in. His voice shook, and he was thankful Logan and Garrett had gone back in the house.
“Will you come home with me, please?” he begged, “Your dad doesn’t want me to touch you in front of him, and I don’t want to let you go.”
“Rainer,” she lifted the back of the shirt he was wearing. She touched his back with her hands and he felt her calm, soothing energies flood through him. He reveled in the healing she brought him.
“Dad will be fine, and Mom made you breakfast. Come eat, and then we’ll go home and sleep, okay? I’ll stay with you all day. I’m not going anywhere.”
Rainer wanted to stay right there beside his car. He could feel her wrap her energies around him. He didn’t have anything left to give her. He was thoroughly spent between the day he’d had and then the battle he’d fought in the night. He had to sleep soon.
“Come on, sweetheart,” Emily took his hand and guided him into the house.
“I really don’t think your dad wants to see me, Em.”
“Okay,” she allowed, “But Mom does.”
“Rainer,” Mrs. Haydenshire moved to him and embraced him. “My sweet baby boy. What a day.” She cupped her hand across his face just as she always had for as long as he could remember.
“Aren’t you mad at me?” his voice faltered in his utter exhaustion, and he forgot that he wasn’t supposed to talk about the belly shot in front of Mrs. Haydenshire.
To his relief, she’d seen the papers as well, and he hadn’t given anything away. She grinned at him and shook her head.
“Because you’re a twenty-one year old kid who the Realm and my own husband expect to walk on water, who got caught doing something that my daughter asked you to do?”
She was still patting his face, and he could feel her giving him soothing energies as well. “No, sweetheart, I’m not. And I’m working on him. Just give him a little time,” she gestured towards Governor Haydenshire’s office. The doors were closed, and he was on the phone with Governor Carrington.
Rainer studied her in utter shock. She smiled at him as she guided him to the table where she had prepared a tremendous breakfast for him, Logan, and Garrett.
“Would it make you feel better to know I was a little disappointed?” she teased.
Rainer nodded his admittance that it would. Mrs. Haydenshire laughed at him outright. “Well, okay then, I am disappointed, but not just with you. I feel equally disappointed in all of you. Oh, and Connor and Katie, as well, as I feel certain he was only too happy to induct Katie, only no one photographed that.”
“But right now, I want you to eat, and then I want you to sleep, and we can start making amends after that.”
Feeling thankfulness flood through him like a healing life-blood, Rainer stood and wrapped Mrs. Haydenshire back up in an embrace. Tears leaked down her face as she hugged him tightly.
“Thank you,” he whispered.
“Rainer, sweetheart, you should know by now that you’re just like all the rest of them. You could never do anything that would make me not love you or not want you.”
Grateful adulation filled his soul as he let Mrs. Haydenshire’s words mend his heart.
“Eat,” she returned him to his seat. Rainer dug in. He actually tasted the food for the first time in over twenty-four hours. Emily held his hand as he inhaled eggs, bacon, and biscuits with honey, his favorite. She watched over him obs
essively as he ate.
“I’m okay,” he assured her between bites, but she knew him far too well. She shook her head, not buying his lie for even a moment.
As Mrs. Haydenshire was plying them with seconds, which no one was turning down, Governor Haydenshire emerged from his office. He looked stunned. His eyes fell on Rainer in a baleful glare.
“All right, enough!” Mrs. Haydenshire stood and shot a glare of her own right back at her husband. “I won’t have this. We are a family, through good times and bad. We’re going to be mad at one another or disappointed with one another throughout this life, but when we’re together, at my kitchen table, then you can keep your feelings to yourselves.”
Rainer was bewildered. He didn’t know what to do. He certainly didn’t want the Haydenshires fighting over something he’d done.
“And since I’ve decided to bring this up now,” she dared anyone to dissuade her. “Stephen, I would like to point out that you’ve been aware of the Angels’ induction.” She popped Garrett on the head, thoroughly shocking him. “Since our own son, your flesh and blood, invented the depraved practice. I believe at one point he and our oldest son were written up in the Alexandria Gazette for inducting the entire team one year. Yes, that would be the night that Will threw up in my kitchen sink four times.”
“I would also like to point out that several of our sons, at one point or another, have participated in the act and that you have not reacted this way until you saw our daughter up there doing it.”
She raised her eyebrow, daring the Governor to argue. “And I personally know Rainer Lawson just like I’d given birth to him myself.” She turned to Rainer and gave him a sorrowful expression. “Not to take anything away from our dear Maggie and the effort it took her to get you here. God rest her sweet soul,” she stated thoughtfully as Rainer nodded his understanding.
“But I also know my own daughter very, very well, and I would swear on this farm that it wasn’t Rainer’s idea to lay her up there. He wouldn’t have done it if he hadn’t been asked.” She threw a knowing glare at Emily.