Surrender to Sin

by Michelle St. James

  Surrender to Sin

  Michelle St. James

  Blackthorn Press

  Contents

  Surrender to Sin

  Copyright

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Links

  Also by Michelle St. James

  Surrender to Sin

  Las Vegas Syndicate Book Three

  by Michelle St. James

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright 2017 by Michelle St. James aka Michelle Zink

  All rights reserved.

  Cover design by Isabel Robalo

  One

  Abby was carrying coffee out to the terrace when the breaking news alert came through on Max’s phone. It was September, and they’d had almost three months of blissful peace. Three months of worry-free drinks in public places, of foot rubs and takeout, of handholding in movies and nights in each other’s arms.

  Three months of believing the past was really behind them.

  She should have known it wouldn’t last forever.

  She’d just set the coffee down on the table, already set with crispy waffles made by Max, plus bacon, fruit, and freshly squeezed orange juice, when she noticed his face had gone still.

  “What’s wrong?” But she knew.

  Even then, she knew.

  “We need news,” he said, already moving toward the terrace doors.

  She followed him into the living room and watched as he picked up the remote for the TV, hardly ever used for anything but movies.

  “You’re scaring me, Max.”

  He sat down and took her hand as the local news station came to life on the screen. Her gaze went straight past the newscaster — a young woman in a pink blouse holding a microphone — to the building behind her.

  The Tangier.

  “This morning the Board of Directors of the Tangier Hotel and Casino got a surprise in the return of its majority shareholder and CEO, Jason Draper. The board was set to appoint a new CEO after three months of running the company themselves in absentia of Draper, who had disappeared following the shooting of reported Mob boss Fredo DeLuca in June. Instead, they were met with Draper, asserting his control over the company amid assurances that he’s spoken to the FBI regarding the shooting and was no longer a person of interest…”

  There was more, the reporter still talking while looking at the camera, but Abby could no longer hear the woman’s voice over the roaring in her own ears.

  “Abby… Are you all right?”

  She looked at Max, his brow furrowed, his blue eyes shadowed with worry.

  “How can he… What does this mean?”

  Max shook his head. “I don’t know.”

  “How could the FBI clear him?” Abby asked. “He shot people! He shot Nico!”

  Max stood. “I know. I need to talk to Nico.”

  “They won’t let this happen, will they?” she asked, looking up at him. “They won’t let him come back?”

  “I’m not sure they have a choice,” Max said. “He’s still the majority shareholder. He was adamant about that when the company went public. It limits the power of the rest of the board, and to be honest, I’m not even sure they’d be fighting his return.”

  She stood. “What are you talking about? He tried to kill me. He burned down my house. He shot three people. He could have shot you.”

  It was the last that had kept her up at night. She’d mourned the loss of her house. It had been more than just concrete and wood and stone. It had been her self-built haven, the first refuge in her adult life that had been all hers, the one place besides Max’s arms where she’d felt safe.

  But the possibility of losing Max, the image of Jason pointing the gun at her beloved, was the thing that had almost undone her. She didn’t know why he’d turned the gun on Nico at the last minute, but as much as she’d come to care about the other man, she could only be grateful it hadn’t been Max who had been shot. Nico had survived with a minor shoulder wound. Who’s to say the same would have been true if it had been Max?

  “The board only cares about profit,” Max said. “Jason was their poster boy for years, a perfect spokesperson for innovation and ambition. He could be misrepresenting the FBI’s response to his return — just because he’s met with them doesn’t mean he’s not still a suspect in the shooting — but as long as the board buys it, I doubt they’ll try to get him out. For now, at least.”

  “But you and Nico already told the FBI he was at the Tangier the day of the shooting. That means they have two eyewitnesses.”

  She couldn’t believe this was happening. She hadn’t loved the fact that Jason was still out there somewhere, that he could return at any moment, that she had to look over her shoulder all the time. But even that had been better than knowing he was back in Vegas, back at the helm of the Tangier.

  “Nico’s not exactly a credible witness given his line of work,” Max said. “And I doubt he’d subject himself to a witness stand anyway. Once he’s up there, they can question him about anything — about his business dealings around the world, about the Syndicate.”

  She bit her lip. “Couldn’t they subpoena you? Both of you?”

  “They could,” Max admitted. “But we could forget details, plead the Fifth…” He ran a hand through his hair, one of his tells when he was frustrated. “I don’t know. We’ll have to see."

  “So what does this mean?” she asked. “Jason goes back to business as usual?”

  It didn’t matter that she’d left the Tangier after the shooting. The possibility that Jason might be allowed to return to his old life like nothing had happened — like he hadn’t killed people, like he hadn’t tried to kill her — was perverse.

  Max stood and pulled her into his arms. “It means I need to talk to Nico.” He held her face in his hands and looked down at her. “And it means you don’t need to worry, because whatever happens, I’m going to take care of Jason once and for all.”

  Two

  Max navigated the Porsche through traffic on the Strip, the Tangier’s dome taunting him in the distance. Jason had been gone three months, but the casino was still there like some kind of ageless relic that had survived centuries of war and strife.

  Kind of like Jason Draper.

  Except Max was determined that Jason wouldn’t survive this. Not when it was all said and done. The Tangier would stand, but it would remain under Jason’s control over Max’s dead body.

  And the same conditions would have to apply for Jason to remain in Vegas.

  He and Abby had had a relatively quiet three months since the fire. Abby had been devastated by the loss of her house and had immediately taken up residence with him, the only upside to everything that had happened other than Jason’s departure. Max loved having her with him night and day, loved waking up to the weight of her in his arms, her hair splayed out across his chest. Loved falling asleep to the sound of her even breathing after he ravaged her body.

  Afte
r she ravaged his.

  It hadn’t been all play. He’d set up an office downtown under the name of his father’s old company, Cartwright Holdings. The offices had become a staging ground for the Syndicate’s takeover of the city, the acquisition of the DeLuca family operation, the vetting of their soldiers who expressed an interest in staying on under the Syndicate’s leadership.

  At first, Nico and the other Syndicate partners had been frequent companions in the office, bringing Max up to speed on overlap between the Syndicate’s interests and the DeLuca operations that would be folded into the organization.

  Little by little, Max had gotten his head around the scope of the Vegas operation. Now it was mostly just him, alone in the office except for Jane, the young woman Abby had hired to answer phones and manage paperwork, and Carlos Rodriguez, a DeLuca soldier who’d been only too happy to see the end of Fredo DeLuca.

  Abby had given her notice at the Tangier immediately following the fire and hadn’t yet found another job. Max had been glad when she hadn’t been in a hurry to find something else. She’d never had anyone take care of her, had spent her whole life hustling and working and struggling. She deserved time to regroup, to decide how she wanted to spend the rest of her life. Giving her a safe place to make those decisions was his privilege. Having her around all the time was icing on the cake.

  Jason’s return threatened to overturn their newfound peace — and that was something Max couldn’t allow.

  He slowed down and pulled into the Bellagio. A few minutes later, he was handing the keys to the Porsche to the valet and walking through the front doors of the casino.

  Tourists probably thought every casino was different, but anyone who lived in Vegas saw the homogenization beneath the artifice. The decor might be unique, the various shows and restaurants named in keeping with each facility’s theme, but that was the facade.

  The foundation was the same, the setup of gaming tables in one of two standard formations, the bars and restaurants and at least one all-you-can-eat buffet stocked with subpar food, the mini-marts loaded with kitschy, branded souvenirs and overpriced snack food and bottled water.

  They were playgrounds, theme parks for grown-ups.

  He made his way to the elevators and pressed the button for the Penthouse. Nico had been renting the suite for the last three months. His presence was sporadic — he often went home to Rome or to one of the other Syndicate cities — but he liked having the penthouse there if one of them needed it. Angel was sometimes with him, but Max had never seen their daughter Stella. He could only assume Nico thought the city too seedy for his only child.

  Max didn’t blame him, although Nico’s opinion didn’t lessen Max’s love for the city that had been his home his entire life.

  He exited the elevator and started toward the man standing in front of the double doors. He wasn’t fooled by the man’s suit — like all of Nico’s impeccably dressed guards, this one undoubtedly packed a semiautomatic weapon outfitted with a silencer somewhere under his jacket.

  And that wouldn’t be all. Since joining the Syndicate, Max had learned that all the organization’s men, from foot soldiers to bosses, were required to attain mastery in some form of martial art and hand-to-hand combat. Nico used weapons only when necessary, Farrell preferred to beat opponents to a bloody pulp, and Christophe liked the cold sterility of firearms: the Syndicate’s men were required to master all three methods of violence.

  The realization had given Max additional respect for the men who were now his employers. When he’d been in Afghanistan, any order that came from a suit in Washington was met with suspicion and even derision. Most of them had never seen combat, had no idea what Max and his brothers were up against.

  It was their immediate commanders they respected, whose orders they followed without question, and Max had been surprised to feel a similar brand of brotherhood with Nico and the other men of the Syndicate.

  These weren’t men sitting in an ivory tower, paying other people to do their dirty work. They were well-trained, willing to put themselves on the line, and had already suffered sacrifices of their own. Nico had literally taken a bullet meant for Max, and while Nico hadn’t actively jumped in front of him, Max had the feeling Nico would have.

  All of which made Max even more willing to join them.

  Thankfully, he was already skilled in two of the three required skillsets — weapons and hand-to-hand training — and had been given a temporary pass on martial arts while he brought Vegas under control.

  The guard nodded and stepped aside as Max came to the door. Visitors were typically patted down for weapons during private meetings with Nico, but Max was no longer a visitor.

  He’d gotten used to the suited men who guarded the Syndicate’s leaders, had gotten used to the old-fashioned manners of everyone in the organization from the soldiers on the street right up to Nico. Even Farrell was well-mannered.

  He was an asshole, but he was a mannered asshole.

  Max knocked on the door and a few seconds later heard the lock disengage. The door opened and Nico stood on the other side.

  “Max,” he said, “I’m glad you’re here. I came as fast as I could.”

  Max stepped over the threshold and Nico shut the door behind him.

  “Thank you.”

  Nico had been in Rome when Max called to tell him about Jason’s return to Vegas and the Tangier. Less than twenty-four hours had passed since then, Nico’s speedy arrival a product both of his extraordinary attentiveness to the Syndicate and the fleet of private jets that were kept on hand for their use.

  “Can I get you a drink?” Nico asked him when they reached the suite’s living room.

  “No, thank you.” Six months ago, Max would have happily agreed. In fact, he would have downed the first drink and asked for a refill before they’d even gotten started.

  Abby had changed all that, had changed him.

  The Syndicate had changed him too. His joining them had started as a way to fortify his response to the threat of Jason, but it had evolved into true loyalty. After being in the hands of the DeLuca family and Jason, Vegas was a mess. Max wanted to do right by it and by the Syndicate, and he couldn’t do it walking around with a twenty-four-hour-a-day buzz.

  Nico sat in one of the living room’s chairs while Max sat at one end of the sofa.

  “What have we found out?” Max asked.

  The Syndicate had two extensive cyberlabs — one in Paris and one in New York. Max had paid a visit to the New York lab during a trip in July and had had to hide his shock. Occupying an entire floor of an office building in the city, the lab might have been a satellite location for the FBI or NSA. He could only assume Paris was as well-equipped. It wasn’t at all what he’d expected of an organization once routinely referred to as the Mafia.

  “Jason flew into New York City yesterday and went immediately to the meeting being held by the board,” Nico said. “He explained his absence as necessary due to the ‘misunderstanding’ with the FBI and made it clear he was back and in control.”

  It made sense that the meeting would have been held in New York. It also made sense that Vegas reporters wouldn’t have known until it was too late to cover it there, which was probably why the reporter he and Abby saw on the news had been standing outside the Tangier.

  More than anything else, the casino was Jason’s brand.

  “Has the board put up a fight?” Max asked.

  “Not publicly. Not yet,” Nico said. “Jason is Chairman of the Board and a majority shareholder. As you know, there are ways to stage a hostile takeover, but they take time and planning. Jason was smart to stay away until the morning of the meeting. It prevented the board from putting any of the pieces in place that would be necessary to remove him on the spot.”

  Max tamped down his frustration. Nico had taught him that anger was a weapon to be used judiciously. Anger didn’t change anything, and the Syndicate was all about changing things.

  “What else?” Max asked.<
br />
  “Jason returned to Vegas last night and went immediately to the Tangier. He installed himself in the casino’s Presidential suite and hasn’t left since,” Nico said.

  There was something in Nico’s voice that caught Max’s ear, a hesitation that spoke of things unsaid.

  “Why do I get the feeling there’s more?” Max asked.

  “Bruce Frazier was with Draper both in New York and when he returned to Vegas,” Nico said. “And he’s not the only one. For all intents and purposes, Jason has surrounded himself with a private security contingent of at least fifteen men, with Frazier continuing to act as his body man.”

  Max stood and paced the room, trying to expel the fury that had bubbled to life in his veins, the curtain of red that dropped in front of his vision. Jason had been the architect of the destruction of Abby’s house — of her near-death — but Bruce Frazier had undoubtedly been the one to break into her house and start the fire.

  “So Jason tries to kill Abby, shoots you, takes a long vacation, and comes back to Vegas like nothing happened?” He shook his head. “No. That’s not how this ends.”

  “Of course not,” Nico said calmly. “He’ll be made to pay for his actions. The question is who will make him pay?”

  Max looked at him. “I’m more than happy to do the job.”

  “I have no doubt,” Nico said. “But the FBI is involved now, too, and Jason has installed himself in a fortress of his own making. If anything, his profile is even higher now than it was before.”