Queen's Ransom: A Fog City Novel

by Layla Reyne

  “Red button,” Celia replied, voice shaky but clear. “Between the bay doors. Double tap for the gate too.”

  Helena calculated her steps and the evasive maneuvers she needed to make to cross the several exposed feet to her target. Not quick enough. Another flurry of gunfire erupted. Not aimed directly at or into the garage bays but at the offices and customer waiting area. More glass shattered.

  Damage, then. That’s what they were after.

  The fast and furious second assault ended, and the Charger’s driver revved the V8. Tires smoking, it shot off down the street, bouncing like a pinball between cars to a cacophony of answering horns.

  Escaping.

  Helena shoved the wrench into Celia’s hand. “Stay down!”

  Spinning, she grabbed two throwing knives out of the Duc’s saddle bag and ran flat out toward the opening in the gate. She reached the sidewalk in time to see the Charger’s dented fender disappear around the corner. Too late to throw a knife at its tires, much less get a read on the plates, and too late to give chase, judging by the roaring engine and second wave of car horns a street over.

  Not that Helena would risk leaving Celia exposed in the shop, unprotected if the Charger made a second pass. Chris would never forgive her. And she’d never forgive herself.

  “Fuck!”

  Holding both knives in one hand, she dug out her phone with the other and sent an SOS to Holt, trusting he’d distribute the call for help accordingly. As soon as Helena stepped back into the yard, the chain-link fence began to roll closed behind her, Celia operating it from inside. And as soon as she stepped inside the garage bay, Celia banged the red button a second time, the wrench still clenched in her fist.

  “What the hell was that?” Her voice shook with the same tremors that visibly rippled through her body, but her dark eyes blazed. She was both terrified and furious.

  “A message,” Helena replied.

  “For who?”

  “That’s the million-dollar question.” And Helena didn’t like any of the potential answers.

  Chapter Two

  Three hours later, Celia’s head was still spinning. The fact she was climbing the steps of the Madigan family home with her mom and kids in tow only made it spin faster.

  Celia had visited the Pac Heights mansion several times before to train with Helena, her daughter Mia more often as a babysitter for Holt’s toddler, and Chris most often as Hawes’s fiancé, but it was the first visit for Marco and Gloria and the first time they’d all been there together.

  Mia led the procession, a box of pastries in hand. Beside Celia, her mother, Gloria, oohed and aahed at the Victorian’s extensive restorations. Marco, walking behind them with Chris, was too busy being a punk, as thirteen-year-old boys were prone to do.

  “Uncle Dante,” he said, using the nickname bestowed on Chris by his late ATF partner. “You snagged a sugar daddy.”

  Chris thumped the back of his head and chided in kind. “Watch it, Plato.”

  “Blame it on the hunger trolls in my belly.” He patted his stomach and side-eyed Celia. “We are way past dinner time.”

  Another problem with thirteen-year-old boys; they’d eat you out of house and home, the latter of which Celia had uprooted them from at Helena’s insistence. Chris, who’d met them at the garage—the crime scene—had backed the play, leaving Celia little choice but to go along with them, not that she disagreed with the logic of it. Celia shivered. She didn’t know all the particulars of what the Madigans were into, but she knew it was more than cold storage, and she knew they fiercely protected their own. She’d graciously accept that protection to keep her mom and kids safe. Celia never wanted them to experience the terror she had felt earlier, hiding for her safety, scared for her life and legacy, afraid for the life and safety of the woman with her.

  The woman who’d beaten them there, judging by the Ducati in the driveway next to where they’d parked. But it was Hawes, dressed in a suit despite the evening hour, who opened the front door. “I think I can help with the food problem,” he said, clearly having overheard Marco’s protest.

  Warm air rushed from inside, and on it wafted aromas of fire-baked dough, rich spicy marinara, and melted cheese.

  Marco’s eyes widened, round as saucers. “Is that Tony’s?”

  Hawes stepped out of the doorway and invited them in with a sweep of his arm. “Only the best pizza in town for family weekend.”

  “Yes!” Marco dropped his bags in the foyer and followed his nose to the dining room where pizza boxes were spread the length of the long table. He pumped his fist. “Family weekend was the best idea ever.”

  “Told ya,” Chris said with a wink. Credit to her brother and his undercover skills for coming up with the idea. A blending of the families culminating in the wedding cake tasting at their cousin Angelica’s bakery on Sunday. It was as good a cover story as any for why they were spending the weekend at the Madigans’ instead of at home.

  Celia pushed Marco’s bags out of the middle of the foyer, then set hers and Gloria’s atop them against the stairwell wall. “I swear he has manners.”

  “He did,” Mia said, adding her bulging duffel to the stack. “And then they magically vanished with puberty. Poof!”

  “Hey!” Marco protested around a bite of pizza.

  She rolled her eyes and offered the pink box of pastries to Hawes. “Accept these as our apology.”

  Beside him, Chris peeked into the box. “I’m claiming the mistletoe cannoli.” It was weeks past season but there were perks to being family and perks to Mia also working at AB’s.

  “Apparently,” Celia said, shooting judging glares at both her brother and son, “the lack of manners is contagious.”

  “Yeah!” Marco said. “It’s Uncle Dante’s fault.”

  “Judgment free zone,” Hawes said with a bemused smirk.

  Celia chuckled. “Let’s see how you feel by Sunday.”

  “He’s stuck with us now.” Gloria rose on her toes and kissed her future son-in-law’s cheek. “Thank you for having us.” She’d been a fan of Hawes since their first meeting. The Madigan patriarch turned on the charm any time she was around, belying the lingering chill about him Celia could never quite put her finger on. Even if Hawes were outwardly chilly to them, Celia didn’t think Gloria would care. Hawes had given Chris a reason to come home and stay home; that’s all that mattered to Gloria. And to Celia. Their family whole again after ten long years—and it was expanding.

  “We’re happy to have you,” Hawes said. “Go eat.” He gestured at the bags. “We’ll get all this sorted after.”

  Gloria and Mia followed Marco into the dining room, and Celia was glad the ruse had worked. Her family was safe and on the way to being satisfied, at least where their bellies were concerned.

  “Is Brax with you?”

  She turned to find the biggest Madigan had emerged from the living room with the tiniest one—his daughter, Lily—in his inked right arm. The dichotomy between Holt and Hawes always gave Celia a second’s pause. While Hawes shared many physical traits with Helena—cool blue eyes, pale skin, lighter hair, and sharp features—his fraternal twin was all bulk and muscle, freckled skin, tattoos, warm brown eyes, and a mess of wavy hair that was closer to auburn than blond, especially in the winter. Ditto his full beard. And it wasn’t only the physical differences between the brothers. There was no sense of cold about Holt Madigan. For all his bulk, he reminded Celia of the flannel-dressed stuffed bear Mia had once created at a Build-A-Bear party.

  Those usual differences, however, were not what made her almost gasp. With pronounced bags under his bloodshot eyes, his skin an unhealthy pale, and his Raptors tee and jeans days old and wrinkled, Holt looked more like one of those sad teddy bears from movies or internet memes than he did the cheery one Mia had brought home.

  “He went back to the station,” Chris answered.

  Holt’s misery visibly worsened, then plummeted further as Lily spit out her pacifier and demanded “Ba-B
a!”

  Celia’s first instinct was to glance around for a blanket or bottle, but then the pain that ghosted across Holt’s face, together with the earlier mention of Chief Kane, made it clear who both father and daughter were missing.

  Before any of them breached the awkward abyss, Mia rejoined them, oblivious to the tension. “There’s my birthday twin.” She ruffled Lily’s auburn curls. “I’ve missed you.”

  “Sorry about that,” Holt mumbled. “We’ve been at—” He caught himself, like he wasn’t supposed to say something, then corrected. “Out at the coast. Project there.”

  “Can I hold her?”

  “Mia,” Celia lightly chided. Her daughter loved spending time with Lily, and Celia loved that for her, but she also sensed the toddler was one of the few things holding her father together right then.

  Holt, though, smiled, his inner warmth cracking through the outer misery. “She’d like that.” He shifted Lily into Mia’s arms, and Mia cradled her close as she wandered back to the dining room. At a loss for what to do with his hands, Holt raked one through his hair and skirted the other over his beard, making a bigger mess of both. Only Helena appearing from the living room with his tablet seemed to give him purpose again. “Footage downloaded?” he asked.

  She nodded, handed him the tablet, and cut a glance through all of them in the foyer. “We need to talk.”

  The happy family veneer dissolved and the real reason they were there zoomed again to the forefront of Celia’s mind.

  “Go on,” Gloria said from the end of the dining table. She knelt, a small piece of cheese in each hand, to lure the cats circling Helena’s ankles into the dining room. “Come here, girls.” Once Daisy and Tulip were in her thrall, enticed by their favorite food, Gloria stood and wiped her hands on her jeans. “I’ll hold the fort here.” She knew something was up, but she wouldn’t pry. She’d had to learn that lesson with an ATF agent for a son.

  Celia had had to learn the same lesson, which was another reason why tonight was so head spinning. She was on the inside for a change, and she didn’t like it one bit. She and the family business had been directly threatened. Her mom and her kids could be next. She eyed the mansion’s street-facing windows. “Are they safe down here?”

  “Yes,” Holt said, a certainty in his voice that had been lacking a minute ago. He tapped the tablet screen a few quick times, then handed it to Celia. Displayed onscreen were a dozen different views of the house—interior and exterior—including the street out front and the corners at either end of the block. “We’ll know if any danger is coming.”

  She handed the tablet back. “Thank you.”

  “We can talk in there”—Helena jutted a thumb at the living room—“or upstairs.”

  “Upstairs,” Celia said with a glance toward the dining room. “I don’t want to chance them overhearing.” While she was okay knowing certain aspects of the Madigans’ business, she wasn’t okay involving the rest of her family. Instinct—and Chris’s life the past six months—cautioned against it. “If that’s okay with you all?”

  Chris and the gathered Madigans nodded.

  Helena smirked. “Your chance to peek behind the curtain.”

  Celia didn’t mention that The Wizard of Oz was one of her least favorite movies of all time. Instead, she popped into the dining room, kissed the tops of her kids’ heads and her mother’s cheek, then followed the others upstairs, steeling herself for whatever she was about to see or hear. As with Chris’s job before, and with Helena’s and the Madigans’ now, she tended to test the limits of how much she could or should know. She’d pushed too hard in the past, pushed her brother too far. She didn’t want to risk that distance again, didn’t want to put any more strain on their reunited and growing family, but she also had to trust the Madigans and Chris to decide how much she needed to know.

  No amount of trust or mental coaching, however, could have prepared her for what she saw when she crested the stairs into the bonus room at the top of the Madigan family home. Helena had often referred to the room as “the lair,” but Celia had written that off as hyperbole or a teasing joke. Setting foot in the room for the first time, Celia quickly decided lair was a massive understatement. One half of the space was what you’d expect of a bonus room often inhabited by a toddler. A crib and mobile were tucked in the window alcove, a rocking chair sat where a desk chair should in the corner of an L-shaped desk, and toys were scattered on the floor around a seating area comprised of a plush couch and two high-backed chairs. And then there was the other half of the room. The entire right wall looked like one of those massive computer setups in a blockbuster action movie. An industrial desk ran the length of the wall, keyboards resting on its ledge. Beneath it were multiple computer units, and above it, almost to the ceiling, stretched a wall of monitors and speakers.

  Holt skirted around her and claimed one of the two rolling chairs in front of his… command center. Was that the right word? A flurry of keystrokes later and several of the screens went dark before Celia could even comprehend what she’d seen on them. Good. She didn’t need that much of a peek. A small yet firm hand landed on her lower back, and Helena directed her to the seating area, sinking onto the sofa beside her. Not touching, but close enough for comfort and reassurance. Celia wasn’t too proud to admit she needed both after the day’s chaos.

  Hawes perched on the arm of the high-backed chair across from them, angled toward Holt. “What do we know?”

  Several other monitors flickered on. “That’s the street outside the shop,” Celia said, recognizing and comprehending the images this time.

  Holt nodded. “Surveillance from the shop cameras and from traffic cams and ATMs.”

  He rewound the footage to the moment Celia’s world had started to spin. Not in the good way, not like the first time she’d laid eyes on Helena Madigan. One look at the petite blond at Chris’s hospital bedside and hummingbirds had taken flight in Celia’s belly, making her lightheaded and making her forget, for a few precious seconds, all the bad things that had happened to her that awful week. This was not that feeling. Onscreen, a black Charger, its lights off, veered around the corner two blocks away from the shop. It swerved across lanes of traffic, pulled alongside the shop’s gate, and opened fire, bullets and sparks pinging off the shop’s metal walls. All the bad things that had happened during the awful day were drawn into sharp, deadly focus.

  “That’s the car,” Helena said.

  And sharper still as Holt paused the playback and zoomed in on the car’s rear bumper as it turned the corner at the other end of the street. “We’ve got a partial on the plate,” Holt said. “Arizona. I’ll get it processing.”

  “The bullets?” Hawes asked.

  Chris gathered his long dark hair into a messy top knot and spun the desk chair next to Holt so he could straddle it backward. “SFPD is processing. We’re being kept in the loop.”

  “Tire tracks?”

  “Not enough to do us any good, but we don’t need it. We’ve got enough to work with from the cameras.”

  The rapid-fire back-and-forth among the Madigans and Chris continued, making Celia’s world spin faster. As did another paused image onscreen. A gun perched on the shadowed passenger window frame, aimed directly at the shop.

  Celia’s mind transported her back there and she relived those terrifying few minutes. Helena grabbing her by the wrist and yanking her down. Helena curling her body over hers, muffling each of Celia’s shouts and jerks as bullets pinged off metal, louder and worse than any hailstorm Celia had ever experienced. The crack of glass. A brief silence, then another round of gunfire. The absolute terror when the gunfire ceased, and Helena left her. Celia hadn’t feared for her own safety but for Helena’s.

  A thigh brushed against hers, and Helena curled an arm around her shoulders. “Breathe, Cee,” she said. “Just breathe.”

  “Someone shot up the shop.”

  “Shock,” Hawes said. “Blanket?”

  Holt moved about the roo
m, but Celia’s mind barely acknowledged it, still caught several hours before back in the garage. “The busted window in the Bentley, in the office, in the waiting area… Shit, I didn’t look to see if the SS was hit.”

  “I’m sure it’s fine.” Helena squeezed her shoulder. “I didn’t notice any damage to it.”

  Holt handed a blanket to Helena, who folded it around Celia’s shoulders. The baby powder scent calmed the spinning a little. “That’s Whiskey Walker’s SS.”

  “He’s a friend,” Holt said. “It’ll be okay.”

  “And he’s used to being shot at,” Chris added.

  Celia pulled the blanket around her tighter, grateful Helena’s arm came with it. “Who would shoot up the shop?”

  “That’s what we’re going to find out,” Helena said.

  Chris rolled across the floor, close enough to lay a hand on Celia’s forearm. “We’re going to sort this out. We just have to consider all the possibilities.”

  “Were you having trouble with anyone at the shop?” Hawes asked. “Employees or customers? Anyone from Arizona?”

  She shook her head. “We’re a small, tight-knit crew. No issues there, and none with customers. And we’ve had no Arizona customers that I can recall. Like I told Chief Kane, we’re just a local shop.”

  “That services high-end autos.”

  “Why would anyone shoot those up?”

  “One of those cars was Jameson Walker’s.” Helena’s gaze skipped to her brothers. “Message to his crew?”

  “Why?” Celia said. “He’s a basketball coach?”

  “Who’s famous,” Hawes said. “And married to the agent in charge of the FBI’s San Francisco field office.”

  “Whose family is stupid rich,” Holt added, “and has old school IRA enemies.”

  The IRA shot up the shop? Wait… “Like that boat thing a few years back?”