The frustration alone was enough to give him the strength to rip the bars apart, but Lucian held himself back. His guys would come through.
“Never thought I’d get to bail out my boss.”
At the sound of Seth’s voice, Lucian stopped pacing and hurried to the cell door. One glimpse at his friend, and Lucian’s worst fears were confirmed. Though he’d joked, Lucian didn’t miss the tightness around Seth’s eyes, the tension in his shoulders that was present even though he held his body loose. He also didn’t miss the way he watched the trooper who held the key, eyes glued on his every move, urging him nearly as much as Lucian did.
“You owe me, Seth,” the trooper said as he slid the key into the lock.
“I saved your ass, Bobby. This is nothing,” Seth replied.
The trooper nodded. “That you did, which is the only reason I’m doing this. You’re paying for the lawyer if I get arrested.”
“No, but he will,” Seth said, looking in Lucian’s direction.
Lucian didn’t argue. He’d buy the entire Supreme Court if this guy hurried the fuck up. But he didn’t say that and instead held the slippery threads of calm as tightly as he could as the trooper finally unlocked the door and then led them out of the station.
There were a few raised eyebrows, but no one tried to stop them. Still, it wasn’t until Seth had slid behind the wheel, Lucian on the passenger side, and they had driven off, leaving the station far away in the distance, that Lucian allowed himself to breathe.
It was a short breath, not at all calming, but it allowed him to speak.
“Where are we?” he said, the words coming out short, clipped, but he managed to maintain something of his professional tone, for which he was grateful. He’d fall into the role of commander, try to distance himself from this, if only because he knew that was the only way he’d stay sane.
“Adam’s on scene. Cruz is in a fallback position. Cassandra is still in your apartment with a lone male presumed to be Elton Miller.”
Having the truth of what he’d suspected confirmed did nothing to help Lucian, but he didn’t freak out either.
“Is she…?”
“Adam was headed there before you got arrested. Miller got there first. But he has eyes on her. She’s fine.”
“For now,” Lucian said, giving voice to what he and Seth and probably Cassandra knew to be true. This situation might appear calm now, might stay that way for a while longer, but Cassandra was in the gravest danger of her life.
Seth cast one sidelong glance at him and then slammed his foot on the gas pedal.
Chapter Twenty-One
“You should relax, Cassandra. We might be here a while,” Elton said.
She didn’t even bother to look over at him, knowing that if she did, she would face a difficult choice: give in to the rage that made her want to stab him in the neck with a dull knife or give in to the fear that she would never leave here. Neither option was viable, so she kept her gaze centered out over the Seattle skyline and ignored him.
Elton clucked, the sound halfway between disappointment and annoyance, but from the corner of her eye, Cassandra saw him shrug. “Your choice. You can be as uncomfortable as you like, but you’re not leaving here until I get what I came for.”
A protest burned on the tip of her tongue, but Cassandra still said nothing. They’d had this conversation before, more than once, and she didn’t seem to be getting through to him, so she wouldn’t waste her breath.
Besides, there was nothing that would convince Elton she wasn’t a gold mine of information, or that Lucian, that the men of Silver Industries, wouldn’t do whatever it took, give him whatever he asked to see her returned safely.
She swallowed at that thought, then immediately pushed it away. Her fate was in question. She couldn’t ignore that. But what she could do, what she would do, was keep her wits about her and not make it any harder on Lucian and the others as they tried to bring this to a close.
Because clearly, Elton was beyond reason. If she had access to sensitive information he sought, there was no way she would give it to him. If Lucian did, and Cassandra didn’t doubt that he did, she knew he wouldn’t put the lives of countless others at risk, soldiers, innocent people, all to appease Elton and save her.
So they’d get her out of there some other way.
And when the time came, she’d be ready.
* * *
“Whose genius idea was it for me to move into the fucking heart of downtown?” Lucian said, voice grating out of his throat.
“I believe it was your idea, boss,” Seth said.
Lucian glanced over at him, then saw the slight uptick of the side of his mouth, certain his words had been employed to distract Lucian from the traffic that seemed to be at a standstill. And it worked, at least for a moment. An instant later, though, Lucian was again looking straight ahead, the sea of cars in front of him, unmoving, each a frustrating obstacle that kept him away from Cassandra for longer and longer.
He’d talked to Adam, knew that Elton Miller was in fact in his condo, that Cassandra was with him. What he didn’t know yet was what Elton was waiting for, but Lucian knew, deep in his bones, he was waiting for something, and that he would leverage Cassandra in whatever way he could.
He clamped down the shudder that threatened to emerge at the thought of her being used as leverage, the thought of her having to share space with someone like Miller, someone who had absolutely no care for her well-being.
Instead he focused on the cars in front of them, could see his building, sleek, tall, standing out just a bit above the rest, so tantalizingly close but so far away.
“Change of plans,” he said as he reached for the door handle.
Before he could open the door, Seth had put the SUV in Park and was getting out of the driver side.
“Excellent plan,” he said and together they took off at a desperate pace, dodging the people who strolled along the sidewalks and ignoring the blaring horns and curses that followed them as people tried to maneuver around the parked SUV. A shitty thing to do, but Lucian couldn’t possibly care less and knew that nothing, nothing at all, was more important than getting to Cassandra.
He reached his building and grabbed the front door, moving automatically, but Seth’s staying hand on his arm stopped him.
“Adam set up across the street. Gives us a better vantage point.”
“What are you talking about? I’m going up there and—”
“No,” Seth said, shaking his head. “You don’t know what he’s up to, and we need to be smart about this. We just can’t barge in, guns blazing.”
Seth was right, but Lucian still held the door tight in his hand. Held it for a second longer, the urge, almost irresistible, to go to Cassandra spurring him on, making him want to cast aside all reason.
Finally, after several more long moments, he relented.
“Let’s go,” he said.
Seth nodded and a moment later they began weaving their way through the four lanes of traffic that separated his home from an office building across the way.
It was new construction, and Lucian had even considered relocating some of Silver’s operations here. He hadn’t pulled the trigger on the deal yet, but he knew the top two floors were empty. Without confirming it with Seth, he made his way to the elevator, reluctantly acknowledging it would take him up the forty-five flights of stairs faster than he could run, and waited, the floors passing him by one after another, the urgency increasing.
When the doors finally opened, Lucian stepped out onto the top floor and immediately headed to Adam, who had set up a makeshift base in the unfinished penthouse.
“What we got?” he said.
Adam was hunched over, busily looking through his binoculars, and spoke to Lucian without looking up.
“One hostile. Elton Miller. One friendly. Cassandra Portersen.”
Neither Adam nor Seth was treating this with anything less than complete seriousness, which only convinced Lucian his
concerns that Cassandra was in grave danger were correct.
“Weapons? Backup?”
“Haven’t seen anything to indicate either, but I know he has something,” Adam said.
“What do you mean?” Seth asked.
“Guys like that don’t work without something on hand. I don’t see any firearms, though they could be concealed. But he has something,” Adam said with certainty.
He lowered his binoculars and turned to look at Lucian, extending them as he did.
Lucian took the offered binoculars and pulled them up to his eyes, focusing five stories below to his fortieth-floor unit.
The privacy shades were completely open, and he knew that Cassandra was the reason. He sometimes liked to enjoy the view, but for the most part didn’t like being as exposed as he was when the shades were open. But Lucian was grateful Cass had opened the blinds this morning after he’d left because they gave him a perfect view of the living room.
A perfect view of Cassandra as she sat, seeming to try to melt into one corner of his sofa.
Outwardly she looked fine, her expression neutral, not suggesting she was in any particular danger.
But Lucian knew her now, and as he looked closer he noticed the way her shoulders were hunched up practically to her ears, the way she kept one hand gripped tight across her knee, the narrowing of her eyes, which were usually so open, so direct.
She was afraid, as afraid as he’d ever seen her, and again, the horror of seeing that on her face grabbed him so he was leaning forward almost as if he could get to her.
But he couldn’t, so after a deep breath, he looked away and found the target. Miller moved around behind Cassandra, wandering aimlessly but not anxiously, his movements more suggestive of hyperactivity, someone who could never quite be still more than a second, making him very dangerous. But Lucian wouldn’t be swayed by appearance.
He looked closer, didn’t see any weight in his steps that suggested he had a weapon at his ankle, looked up and didn’t see anything indicative of a holster or other concealed weapon in his waistband or undershirt.
So Adam’s assessment that he didn’t have a firearm, at least not on him, had been correct. But Lucian wasn’t a fool.
That he was calm enough to infiltrate Lucian’s home and to do so without a handgun only spoke to his training and his commitment.
And if he’d had no hesitation about coming there, he wouldn’t hesitate to hurt Cassandra.
“You got a phone?”
“We set something up,” Seth supplied.
Lucian nodded. “Give it to me. I’m going to make contact.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
It had been one, maybe two hours, and they had been the absolute longest of Cassandra’s life. It was weird, because she’d been thinking of everything and at the same time nothing at all, almost suspended in a state of animation, stuck in purgatory and at the complete mercy of things beyond her control.
Which was why, when she heard the familiar chime of her cell phone, she didn’t immediately react.
Instead she stared at it as it laid on Lucian’s coffee table vibrating and lighting up, the notes sounding loud, jangly, far too normal, cheerful, for her current circumstances in the thickly silent room.
She watched it as though it was a foreign object, as though it wasn’t attached to her most of the time.
But a moment later, the spell broke and she reached for it on instinct.
“Wait!”
She froze, looked over at Miller as he stared at her suspiciously. “Answer that. Don’t try anything.”
Cassandra said nothing, though the question “What can I try?” sat on the tip of her tongue. It was a cell phone. What did he think she would do with it?
Deciding then that that particular discussion was going nowhere, she kept her thoughts to herself and reached for the phone, the weight familiar in her hand, the number splashed across the front of it unfamiliar.
When she reached for the green button, the phone stopped ringing, and a crushing disappointment came over her. It was short-lived, though, because the phone immediately started to ring again, and this time Cassandra didn’t tarry. She pushed the green button and brought the phone to her ear, but spoke tentatively.
“Hello?”
The word came out a breathy whisper, the voice she spoke in not one she recognized as her own.
“Cassie—”
Hearing his voice, the hated nickname that she had fought so hard against, threatened to break her resolve, made something come loose in her chest, and she felt an explosion of warmth, tears of relief and sadness all rolled into one.
Hearing his voice also lifted her weighted heart, gave her a surge of energy that reminded her who she was. But hearing his voice didn’t change the fact that she was here with Miller.
“Lucian, I—”
She cut off when the phone was wrenched from her hand.
Miller glared at her for a moment but then turned and began his irregular pacing again as he spoke into the phone.
“Lucian? Lucian Silver, I presume?”
He paused, listening, and Cassandra moved toward him, straining to hear everything that transpired.
She didn’t, though, only heard muffled sounds, trying to convince herself that it was Lucian’s voice, but knowing that she couldn’t be sure.
“The man himself. I kinda wish you were here.”
Miller lifted a brow.
“Why? Why do I wish you were here?” He repeated the question with as much agitation as Cassandra had heard all day.
“Your friend here watched my sister die, asshole. It might be nice to repay that favor.”
Elton paused and turned, listening intently to what Cassandra presumed was Lucian speaking.
Then, he lifted his eyes to her, narrowed his darkening gaze on her. “You ready to talk? If not, I’d be happy to talk to Ms. Portersen instead.”
He looked away, but not before he smiled triumphantly.
“So I see we have your attention.”
He walked to the enormous bank of windows. “You’re out there, watching?” He paused a moment, then said, “No answer?”
He waited again. “You don’t have to answer. I think I know well enough that you see me. But take a good look.” Then he reached into his pocket, retrieved what looked to be a cell phone. “And while you’re at it, take a look at this,” he said, wiggling the device back and forth.
“I may not have had your attention before, but I’m certain I have it now. Now, let’s talk,” he said.
* * *
“Tell me that’s not what it looks like,” Seth said.
“What does it look like?” Adam said.
“Looks like a detonator to me,” Seth said.
“Then it is what it looks like,” Adam said.
While he spoke, Lucian looked through the binoculars, agreeing with the assessment.
It was a detonator, or the damn finest imitation he’d ever seen, and Lucian’s gut twisted hard, fear threatening to take his breath away.
“What do you plan to do with that?” Lucian finally asked into the phone when he could breathe again.
Miller laughed, which made Lucian want to choke him even more than he already did.
“What does one usually do with detonators?” Miller asked.
Lucian didn’t answer the rhetorical question, but then again he didn’t have to. They had known he’d have something, but this…
“What do you want?” Lucian grated out through clenched teeth. Seeing the detonator had made him afraid, but hearing Miller’s voice, the threat in it, made him so angry he could hardly breathe.
“I’ll let you know. I still need to talk to Cassandra,” he said.
“You motherfuck—”
The line was disconnected and Lucian squeezed the phone, tempted to crush it, if only to alleviate some of the boiling rage.
“Hold it together, Silver,” Adam said gruffly as he peeled the phone from Lucian’s hands. Then he turned. �
�You hold the phone from now on, kid,” he told Seth. Then he looked back to Lucian. “And you need to go take a walk,” he said.
“A walk? That fucker has Cassandra and a bomb. What the fuck is a walk going to do?”
“And what the fuck is you losing your shit gonna do? So take a walk or stay and deal with me,” Adam said.
He put the phone down and now squared up to face Lucian.
Lucian knew that Adam wasn’t going to back down and he also knew what his old friend said was true.
He did need to calm down, and losing his shit wouldn’t help Cassie.
So he did as suggested, or ordered, and did a lap around the unfinished penthouse floor, turning the thought over in his mind. Less than two minutes later, he returned to where Seth and Adam stood huddled at the windows, still watching through binoculars.
“Any idea what this is about?” Seth asked when he returned.
“Not entirely sure, but I don’t think this is about Tammy. Not entirely, anyway,” Lucian said, focusing on the facts and not the emotion that threatened to choke him. The facts, at least, he could understand.
“What? You think Tammy was a front?” Adam asked.
Lucian shook his head. “We looked into her. She was troubled, but he doesn’t seem to have those same troubles,” he said.
“So Cassandra is just an accident?” Seth said.
“Or maybe an unexpected opportunity for him. Without knowing how involved he was in his sister’s life, we can’t say for sure whether he knew about Cassandra. But once he found out about her and Silver Industries, he may have seen a chance.”
“So this is a good old-fashioned negotiation,” Adam said.
“Yeah, except Cassie is the bargaining chip,” Lucian said, not even wanting to say it but knowing that ignoring the facts wouldn’t change them and that thinking this situation through was the only way he could reach the only acceptable conclusion.
“What’s the price?” Seth asked.
“Not certain, but if I had to guess, I’d say access to Silver Industries’ servers,” Lucian said.
Mafia Romance Page 89