His Passion

by Ava Claire

  Yet that strength didn't mean that she wasn't afraid. I saw it shining beneath the determination. The fact that there was no way I could run the shadows from her eyes, no matter how much I puffed out my chest or how many armed men I put around her humbled me. Not all aches could be healed by words. Or money. Or even love. In her eyes I saw that she was just as afraid of Brittany as she was of some faceless criminal.

  I interlaced our fingers and brought her knuckles to my lips.

  A smile ghosted across her face before she turned back to Cole. “I need to know that your plan doesn't involve anything crazy like busting in, guns blazing.”

  I'd never seen anyone look more incredulous in my life.

  “I'm not sure what impression I've given you, but I'm going to use any and all means to find my sister,” Cole spat. “If that offends your delicate sensibilities, I suggest a day in the spa or you can stay in the car.”

  I jerked backward, ready to get in his face but Leila placed a hand on my chest, looking Cole dead on. My wife, my warrior woman—she didn't need me to fight her battles.

  “Make no mistake—I'm not here to hold anybody's hand. I understand the gravity of this situation. You need to understand that I'm just trying to ensure your sister gets out of this mess safe and sound.” She narrowed her gaze, her voice darkening. “And I hope you understand the gravity of that. After what she did, I owe her nothing. But I'm not here for a suicide or revenge mission. And if you think raining bullets is going to get your sister back, you're not just playing fast and loose with her life, but my life too. And Jacob's life. And your own. And that's just dumb and selfish.”

  Cole sat back and grunted an apology, peevishly looking down at his phone.

  “I'm sorry-” I growled at him. “She didn't catch that.”

  “Oh, I'm good,” Leila turned back to the front, her chin up and her expression cool and nonplussed. “I know he's sorry.”

  I smiled to myself as I settled in my seat, stroking her knee. I almost stroked her thigh...and a little farther up. There was nothing sexier than my wife kicking ass and taking names.

  She gave me a tight smile that told me the last thing she was in the mood for was anything more than my support. She was preparing herself for the worst and the closer we pulled to Luxe Hotel, the harder it became to pretend this was going to be as simple as getting a location, picking up the girl, and hopping back on the plane. There was nothing simple about this situation. From the start, there were a million ways things could go to hell and at every turn, that's exactly where we ended up.

  There was one key difference now. We were together, Leila and I. There were no secrets.

  Unfortunately, that realization did nothing to make the ride any more tolerable. The tension in the car was heavy enough to cut with a knife and when we parked at the curb in front of Luxe, we slid out one by one. We stood in front of the marble staircase that ascended to the entrance. The bellhop pounced on our luggage and the manager quaintly welcomed us in French, following it with a translation and a bottle of champagne.

  I wasn't surprised that this was where Brittany ended up. It was the kind of place people went to be seen and throw away a lot of money, just for the privilege of saying they could do just that. We were whisked through the lobby, eyes perking in our direction, double taking as I pulled down the rim of my cap and Leila tugged at her own.

  We filed into the elevator, the manager droning on about the celebrity clientele that had called their 'humble little property' home. “Just last month we had the pleasure of the Carters.” She turned back to look at us, to make sure we were hip enough to know who she was talking about. Leila and I gave her a nod of acknowledgement. Cole just gave her a look that said he couldn't care less if the President stayed here.

  She mistook his silence as a need for clarification. She ran a hand through her cropped blonde hair and leaned in like she was explaining something massively important to someone that had been living under a rock. “That's Beyoncé and-”

  “Can this thing move any quicker?” he snapped, punching the button angrily. “And I don't care about your star clientele.”

  The woman looked positively insulted, but she played it off with a little cough and turned back to the front, grumbling an apology.

  The doors slid open and Cole flew out of the elevator, leaving the rest of us exchanging looks. The manager looked like she was ready to cry. Surely if she was used to celebrities she was used to worst, but I gave her a sympathetic smile nonetheless and apologized for my brother. “We can take it from here. Thank you.”

  She stammered out a goodbye and Leila and I stepped into the hallway, our eyes shooting toward the sound of a scuffle a few feet away.

  “Oh my God,” Leila muttered, releasing my hand.

  Cole had some man dangling in the air like a rag doll.

  I started after him with a sigh, coming to a hard stop when I remembered Leila. I squared my jaw but she held up a hand before I could even get it out.

  “Don't waste your breath. I’m not staying here. And from the look of things, the guy who's supposed to be telling us where Brittany is doesn't have very many left.”

  I put aside the alpha part of me that wanted to keep her out of harm's way. That just wanted her to do what I said—but there was a difference between her submission behind closed doors and obedience. I didn't marry a woman who just obeyed. I married a woman that submitted on her terms and gave me a piece of her mind when I forgot the difference.

  When we got closer, I realized Cole wasn't holding him by his collar...he had the lanky guy up against the wall by his throat. I stopped Leila from approaching and when I gave her a look, that I wouldn't put her in danger when my brother clearly wasn't in a rational frame of mind, she stayed behind me.

  “Let him go, Cole,” I commanded.

  “Me and Frederic are just getting acquainted,” Cole said, his voice disturbingly calm as he squeezed tighter. The guy was clearly half Cole's size, a pale and gangly kid that couldn't be older than eighteen or nineteen. From the way he shook, eking out broken French and the word 'please', it was a clear a simple, 'Where is my sister?' would have made him spill his guts.

  “How can he answer if he passes out or you snap his neck?” I tried to reason with him.

  Cole glanced back at me, a look of confusion rippling across his face as he frowned, like he hadn't even considered that. He released Frederic and the kid crumpled to the floor in a gasping, coughing heap.

  “Where is my sister, Frederic? What happened?”

  When Cole knelt beside him, he scrambled backward. Every feature on his face seemed pinched and terrified.

  This was Brittany's boyfriend? She seemed so cold and calculating that anyone that seemed weak or vulnerable would barely last five seconds in her presence.

  Sweat plastered his inky black hair to his face, his blue eyes bulging out of the sockets. “Everything was fine. We were happy. I was going to...going to ask her to marry-” His face scrunched as he pulled himself to his knees, slouching against the wall. “I couldn't stop them. I couldn't save her.”

  A hollow ache in my chest made me feel for him. I knew that helplessness.

  Cole rose to his feet, showing no mercy. No emotion. He repeated his question, unblinking. “What happened to my sister?”

  “Men burst into our flat,” Frederic sputtered. He balled a fist and slammed it into the wall. Finally showing something other than sadness. The time for tears had passed. It was tie for anger. “They had guns and they said that someone had paid for her. That she had some debt that she owed someone important.” The broken shell was glued back together instantly as he pulled himself from the wall and fixed his glare on Cole. “You don't have to beat the name out of me or pummel me for losing her. There's nothing that you can do to me that I haven't done to myself ten times over. There was nothing I could have done except eat a bullet, and then I wouldn't be here to tell you that she was taken.”

  Cole let out a sound that told me the b
ullet could still be arranged. “Who has her, Frederic?”

  “A man that knows how to make people disappear.” He swallowed, like he knew saying the name was the end. That there was no hope. “Lars Eichmann took her.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  A five second Google search of 'Lars Eichmann' shut down any further involvement of my wife in the retrieval of Cole's sister. The webpage was filled with gruesome tales of female tourists and locals alike drugged, knocked unconscious, or pulled off the street in broad daylight and sold into sex slavery. Many had crossed the wrong person and a wire transfer was all that was required to make these women disappear, bound for a life that made my heart ache, my stomach turn, and my fists ache to dole out pain to everyone from Lars to the disgusting men who frequented his brothels. But for some, there was only one determining factor in their abduction: they were female.

  I clutched the steering wheel, banishing the nerves that threatened to cut through the facade that I was just going to have a rational discussion with a criminal. And not just any criminal. The stories of people who called Lars out and lived long enough to tell anyone...it was clear they were kept alive to strike the fear of God into anyone foolish enough to mess with him. They spoke of a man dressed in a three piece suit, everything perfectly tailored to the massive physique that made lesser men scramble for cover. Eyes the color of money. Greed. Pure evil.

  “Why did you agree to help me?”

  Cole hadn't spoken a word since Frederic answered his question, disappearing into himself. Barely blinking when I told the driver his services weren't necessary. Looking straight ahead like he saw some future and wasn't only resigned to it, but welcomed the bloodiness of it.

  “That's a fair question.” I let a few moments pass, the GPS’ British accent brightly ushering us toward the French restaurant Lars owned and used as a front for his illegal activities. “I started asking myself 'why?' the moment I walked out of the cabin and you were still breathing.”

  “Here we go,” Cole shook his head, regretting his question. “Why did I even ask?”

  I bared my teeth. “It's not like that-”

  “I'll never get anything from you besides regret. You wish I was dead, I wish I was dead. It's the goddamn circle of life,” he said bitterly. “But maybe the reason I'm not is because my sister needs me. And you've done enough. I can take it from here.”

  “Are you done being dramatic? If so, I'd like to answer your question,” I spat out the words. The anger in me wanted to grant his request; pull to the curb and let him out. I'd done my Good Samaritan deed and then some. I refused to let him think that he knew me or allow him to cement me into the monster that had nearly killed him.

  My next words seemed lodged in my throat. I choked on them, wanting to let it go. Knowing as difficult as it was to say aloud, it didn't compare to the agony of keeping it inside.

  I felt the animosity; his and mine. It poisoned the air, turning my lips into a scowl. I saw the way his fingers twitched, his legs shaking like he was in the throes of something too sick and painful to fight.

  I inhaled sharply, taking in the toxicity before I exhaled and rolled the window down the slightest crack. Letting the light in.

  Fuck it.

  “The easy answer would be that I...owe you one.” My scowl deepened, that sentence a hard pill to swallow. “You helped my wife when I couldn't. So now, I help you—and we're square. Or as close to square as you and I will ever be.” I paused, relief flooding me when the GPS announced we were minutes from our destination. There was part of me that felt like my nails were being removed, one by one, and sharing this with him would only intensify the pain. But there was an even bigger part that wanted to clear the air. Needed to. “I'm here because I saw how broken you were. How hard it must have been to come to me for help, after all that's happened. But you put it aside and you did what needed to be done for your sister. I'm here for the brother that I saw in those moments, when nothing else mattered but family. I'm here for the brother I'd hoped to build some sort of a relationship with.”

  I didn't realize I was wincing until Cole cleared his throat and I relaxed. A semi didn't crash into us. A meteor didn't wipe out Paris. The world didn't implode because I gave Cole a glimpse of the stupid, pathetic hope I'd held when we first met.

  He looked down at his fists, clenching and unclenching them, avoiding my gaze. “Jacob, I-”

  “Looks like we're here,” I interrupted, ending the conversation before we did something truly ridiculous like cry or shake hands. I eased into the parking space and killed the engine abruptly, hoping he took it as a sign that we were done talking about our feelings. We met each other's gaze and nothing needed to be said.

  We were going inside and we weren't leaving without Brittany's location.

  I'm not sure what I expected when I walked into the restaurant, but it was nearly identical to any of the number of formal, uptight restaurants I'd been to. The hostess wore a crisp black dress that clung to her like her smile when she took in my suit. She furrowed her brow like I looked familiar, but she couldn't quite put her finger on it. I could practically hear the wheels turning in her head. The smile broadened as she brought a hand to her mouth.

  “You're Jacob Whitmore!”

  I played up the charm, easing a smile across my lips. “The one and only.”

  Cole was given a quick once over and instantly forgotten. “I love your show!” She flipped her guestbook shut and ushered us into the dining room. “Right this way.”

  The money hung in the room like a pretentious cologne that demanded to be inhaled, to be noticed, whether you wanted to notice it or not. The chandelier hung heavy from the ceiling, making everything sparkle and shine from the pearls around the women's necks to the men's cuff links. Crystal, silver, and staff in black suits and black dresses faded in the sea of people who barely acknowledged their existence. These things existed in my world. The world of wealth.

  I guess I'd expected an obvious tell-tale sign that it was Eichmann's base of operations. A burly man near the door. Scantily dressed women with gaudy jewels. Smoke and blood flowing beneath the stench of food. Patrons eyes darting about like at any moment the police would storm through the doors, bullets cutting through the classical music that wafted from the quartet in the center of the room.

  Both Cole and I were tense, preparing ourselves for something real beneath the charade. When we turned down a darkened hallway, my pulse quickened. Here we go.

  We stopped in front of an oversized, intricate set of double doors. It was ivory with gold overlays and bronze handles. She twisted the handle slowly, reverently, and pulled the door open. The room had a dull, ominous glow and the smoke that had been missing in the dining room now overwhelmed me. When I peered closer I realized it wasn't a room at all. It was a landing, with a stairwell that led underground.

  I glanced at the hostess and realized the smile on her face hadn't budged from the moment she's applied it.

  “After you, Mr. Whitmore.”

  There was only one way to go.

  Forward.

  I tightened my tie as I descended, cracking my neck as adrenaline kicked in...just as the bass started thumping around us.

  All the things I'd looked for were draped around this room in abundance. Women in various stages of undress, either puffing on cigarettes, or sipping from cocktail glasses. Strobe lights blinded and trance music screeched over the classical music that whispered upstairs. There were a few beefed up men dancing in the crowd of gyrating women, but most of them were gathered on the far wall. Cole found my eyes as we followed our hostess. It was pretty obvious that we wouldn't have to ask for a meeting with Lars.

  The hostess added an extra twist to her walk as we drew closer, a man standing like the gatekeeper in front of a back, curtained area. “Wait right here.”

  She leaned in to whisper something to a man that looked right past her to us. The growl he aimed in our direction probably made most shrink away, or at least hope they
had their affairs in order.

  We didn’t even flinch.

  The hostess beckoned us with a finger and we went into the belly of the beast. While the dance floor was a place to lose yourself, this was a place that required both eyes to be open. Two men stood in the room and after one barked an order in French, the ones on the dance floor filed in behind us. Every man had a gun in his grasp and a look on his face that said he was dying to use it. The only man that was unarmed sat in a chair, the oversized, luxe, design of it was meant to let everyone know that this was his domain and here, he was king.

  A woman was curled up in his lap like a kitten, naked from head to toe, gazing up at him with a mix of adoration and fear. He gestured at one of the men and he pulled her from him, shoving her into an unmarked, silver door. He returned to his post, unblinking.

  The only thing that distinguished Lars from his muscular goons was his suit. It was a three piece suit, the fabric tailored to his massive frame. It was meant to give him an air of sophistication, but it just intensified the roughness of his features. He had a round, fierce chin and a jaw covered in salt and pepper scruff. It was intensified by a thick nose with nostrils that flared as he took in Cole and I. His green eyes glimmered as he sat back and chuckled.

  “Who is this, Monique?” The snarl of a smile on his lips told me he knew exactly who we were.

  “Jacob Whitmore and Cole Sommers,” she said sweetly before turning to me and winking. “I really do love your show.” She sauntered back the way we came without another word.

  “The billionaire and the brother,” Lars mused, his accent thick and rounding every word. “I knew it was a good idea to keep that dumb kid breathing. How else would I meet Jacob Whitmore?”