Bound Through Blood, page 2
I glanced at the house and without a second thought, tossed my backpack and dropped down from the branch. Staying in the shadows, I moved toward the front door.
“Boss, I don’t think you should do what you are doing.”
I ignored the worry in his voice, continuing toward the house. Besides Ryan yelling in my ear the entire area surrounding me was silent. Apparently, logic had taken a vacation.
“Team is on the second level. Something in one of the rooms has them on alert. Trying to locate a camera that will allow me access to what they are seeing.”
My pace remained steady as I listened for Ryan to give me more information. I had no idea how Roark did this on a regular basis. I felt like when we were kids and raced go carts at a track our father had rented out for Roark’s birthday. I just hoped I didn’t get sick like I had that day.
Just as I made purchase with the first concrete step, Ryan’s voice sounded in my ear.
“Kasin, they found someone in the room.”
I paused my steps and swallowed. The next question I asked could give us the information we needed or result in us chasing a ghost.
“Dead or alive?”
It felt like minutes instead of the few seconds it took for Ryan to answer my question.
“Alive.”
Chapter 3
Amara
There were a handful of things that got you out of the country quickly.
The first was money. Greed was the weakness of many. Offer the right amount of money, and people who normally wouldn’t look the other way. Victor had enough money that coming up with six figures was like buying items off the dollar menu.
The second thing was connections. Victor had that in spades. Being one of the heads of the sick and twisted business he was, meant one phone call got him what he needed. In this case that was access to a jet, where no questions would be asked. That if someone came snooping, the lips of those asked would stay sealed like a vault.
Those sealed lips were why I was seated on said jet, all by Victor calling in a favor. The first thought I had when the SUV pulled into the airplane hangar wasn’t concern for my safety. No, it was about who it was that gave him the use of their jet, or more importantly what was promised in return.
Across the aisle from me, Victoria and Sterling sat, expressionless as if this were just a regular occurrence. Victoria was even flipping through a fashion magazine, an occasional “ooh, I need that” slipping past her bubblegum pink lips. The only joy I got was the repeated elbow to Sterling she did to get his attention.
“Babe, do you think this would look good on me?”
Another elbow.
“Umph. Yeah, great, honey.”
If the current situation wasn’t what it was, I might find this comical. If anyone deserved the pile of shit he had stepped in, it would be Sterling.
“You aren’t even listening to me.”
Like the petulant child she was, I watched as Victoria crossed her arms at her chest.
How I could be related to her, I would never know.
As the Sterling and Victoria shit show continued, I directed my attention out the window. It was dark and I couldn’t really make anything out but looking outside made being in there a bit more bearable.
It hadn’t taken rocket science to know that once Isabella had been dropped off at Roark’s estate, there was no way we would be staying in the states. Victor was a creature of habit even after all these years not much had changed about him. When the going got tough, he went to Italy. It was his safe place, and it was also where his winery was. Of course, on paper it didn’t belong to him, but it most certainly was his.
The story I had told Isabella while we were in the room together had a purpose. It was sprinkled with enough clues to point Roark in the right direction. I just hoped she remembered the details of the story when questioned. Yes, I made the deal I did, but I did it knowing Roark wouldn’t stop looking for me just because Isabella was home safe.
All I had to do was play the part of the rule abiding daughter and hope that they would take down Victor before I had to become involved in anything to do with the trafficking. Victoria might not mind the line she toed to help our father, but there was no way I could find a way to justify even a small involvement in it.
In the window, my eyes caught the reflection of Victor before he took a seat in the oversized chair next to me. I continued looking out the window, hoping that the discussion I knew was about to happen, wouldn’t. It wasn’t like there was anything I could do to avoid it seeing we were on a jet. Knowing Victor, he would stand outside the bathroom door to have this conversation.
“You sit here like this is a death sentence, Amara.”
Wasn’t it?
At least he had conceded in calling me Amara. Just hearing the name, I had given to myself gave me a small sense of control. It might seem trivial to someone else, but to me it was something more. That little victory would be the thing I clung to, so that I didn’t slip back to being the person I was when I escaped his clutches the last time. The weak girl with no voice no longer existed. I was far from that, and the proof was in the deal I made with Victor.
That deal was brokered by the person that crawled out of the rubble and built themselves back up.
I turned my head and faced him.
“Well, this is definitely not a vacation.”
He let out a chuckle.
“You have surprised me.”
I laughed at his remark.
“You haven’t.”
I turned my entire body to face him and sat up straighter.
“You can paint stripes on a horse, but it doesn’t make it a zebra. It’s still a horse.”
He quirked an eyebrow at me.
“And that means?”
I took a deep breath and let out a sigh.
“It means the tailored suits, fancy watch, expensive cigars, aren’t enough to cover the fact you are still a nobody playing a somebody.”
I saw his eyes flash with anger, but I didn’t give him the reaction he wanted. He wanted me to bow to his control. I would go down fighting before I ever did that.
“We may have an agreement, and you might be my blood, but don’t think I won’t make your life a hell you would rather be dead then experience.”
I wanted to spew more insults at him. I wanted to tell him that the only reason he ever gained status was because he had married my mother. No one would have ever taken him seriously if it hadn’t been for her. The winery would have never become lucrative.
I wanted to say those things, but instead I sat there silent.
“Good, now maybe we can have an adult conversation. Remember what is at stake if you don’t meet your end of this deal.”
How could I forget.
Chapter 4
Kasin
We were all standing in the foyer of Conrad’s house. Roark glaring at me from across the room. He wasn’t impressed with my logic as to why I had left my original spot. To his reaction I had told him in not so many words, I didn’t give a fuck about his opinion.
Standing off from the group, I made sure to stay where Roark had informed me to. The other option was me being escorted out of the house. He cast another glance at me before turning his attention to the man currently secured to a chair in the middle of the foyer.
“Remove the tape,” Roark demanded.
Maxim stepped forward and ripped the tape from the man’s mouth. His scream echoed off the walls of the room. It was evident from the fear in the man’s eyes that he was just a wrong place at the wrong time victim.
Roark looked him in the eye.
“Do you know who I am?”
The man slowly nodded his head.
“Do you know why I am here?”
The man nodded again before he spoke, “You. You are here for the woman with the red hair. They said you would come.”
The mention of Amara’s hair had me automatically moving forward. My footsteps faltered when Roark brought his eyes to mine. I stopped moving not wanting to be taken out of the house before I heard what this man had to say.
“What’s your name?”
The man swallowed.
“Roman.”
“Well Roman, you would be correct. The woman with the red hair is a friend of mine, and I know she is in danger.”
Roman didn’t respond, just kept his eyes on Roark like he was waiting for him to strike at any moment.
“I... I don’t know where they took her. They. They started packing and putting things in vehicles when Mr. Sterling and Mrs. Victoria took the woman with the dark hair somewhere. I don’t know where they took her, but when they came back, she wasn’t with them.”
The woman with the dark hair was Isabella; he was telling us the truth, but I didn’t know what that meant for him. Would Roark spare his life, or would he end up like Eugene? Only time would tell.
“The dark-haired woman is safe. I know firsthand.”
Roman nodded and seemed to be relieved to hear that. I wondered how a person like Roman ended up working for the likes of Conrad and Victor.
“I am glad she is safe. I feared what might have happened to her.”
“Can you tell me if they all left together or separately?”
He looked down as if to be recalling a moment.
“Mr. Conrad went with his men and Mr. Victor went with Mr. Sterling, Mrs. Victoria, the red-haired woman, and his men.”
“One last question, do you remember them saying anything about where they might be going? Even the smallest thing could be important.”
He was quiet for a few minutes before he spoke again.
“Mr. Conrad told Mr. Victor to be sure to stop and smell the lilies.”
Roark turned toward Maxim as if the man tied to the chair had just laid out a map with an X on it marking the spot where we would find Amara.
With a nod to Roark, Maxim walked out the front door, phone to his ear. Roman’s eyes bounced from where Maxim had exited the house to where Roark stood. I watched as Roark reached for something in his pocket and pulled it out.
The dim light of the room bounced off the metal of a knife. Roman’s eyes went to the weapon in Roark’s hand.
“Please, please. I won’t say you were here. I have a wife and two little girls.”
Roark stepped forward, reached out slicing the knife in Roman’s direction and pressed a button on the knife, causing the blade to swing open. He reached out and sliced the knife in Hector’s direction.
Roman screamed as tears spilled down his face. I searched the ground around the man, looking for the blood I expected to be there, but there was none.
I stepped closer around one of our men to get a better view. I wasn’t expecting to find Roark slicing through the rope that had secured the man. Once he was free from the restraints Roark helped him up.
“I have a proposition for you, Roman. I’m going to ask that you take it and once you do, don’t look back. Don’t speak of what happened here. If you can do that, Roman, your family will be set and safe.”
Roman nodded.
“I just need my family. We will leave immediately.”
Roark motioned to one of his men who stepped forward. He took a wobbly Roman by the arm.
“Take a team with you to his house, get his family on a train out of here. After you do that, have a complete clean done.”
The man nodded in understanding before escorting Roman out of the house.
I had been so lost in the exchange that I failed to notice we were alone. At some point, the others had dispersed. As Roark typed something in his phone, I stood off to the side in silence. A few moments later the men returned, each with items in their hands. One of the men walked directly in Roark’s direction. When the man stopped in front of him, Roark pocketed his phone, giving the man his full attention.
“Found this in one of the rooms upstairs, Boss.”
Roark extended his hand out for the object, but just as his fingers touched it, the item fell from the man’s hands.
My heart thundered in my chest as the light bounced off the charm that dangled from the end of the chain wrapped in Roark’s fingers.
I knew that necklace. The bee at the end was always nestled between her breasts when she was bare to me.
“Fuck!”
My sudden outburst had Roark and the man turning their attention to my direction. Roark looked at me with the unspoken question in his eyes.
“You recognize this?”
I nodded my head and tried to swallow. My throat had gone dry.
“Yeah, it’s hers, Amara’s.”
I stepped forward and clasped the charm that dangled above the ground. Kind of like my heart felt right then, like it was dangling and in danger of crashing to the ground into a million pieces. He released his fingers and the necklace rested in my hand.
“Hold onto that until you can put it back on her neck. Let it be the thing that drives you to make sure that happens.”
I didn’t respond, just kept my eyes on the tiny bee as Roark turned to speak with the others in the room.
“Anything else?”
“Not much. We found a shredder in the office. It looks like Conrad was busy before abandoning ship. We bagged the contents so a team can reassemble the pieces. Other than that, just a few files.”
“Okay, let’s load out and send a message to Conrad and Victor when we leave.”
A man in the back of the group rubbed his hands together and seemed extremely excited when he spoke.
“I love a good bonfire.”
Once back in the SUV, the car was silent. Nothing surrounded us but the darkness of the night. That was until a loud boom sound seemed to shake the vehicle and the night sky lit up like the Fourth of July. turned and looked behind me to see the once intact estate we had just left, engulfed in flames.
Returning to my original position, I stared at the back of Maxim’s head in the driver’s seat. My mind drifting to Roman and what was going to happen to him and his family.
“What are you going to do with Roman?”
In my peripheral vision I saw him look up from his phone.
“What do you mean, what am I going to do?”
I glanced at him.
“Are you going to make him, and his family disappear?”
“If by disappear you mean put him and his family on a train to a safe house no one knows about, then yes.”
I let out a grunt.
“What, you don’t believe me?”
“Honestly, not really.”
He turned his focus back to his phone but didn’t break our conversation.
“He isn’t a threat, but if he turns out to be, I will know exactly where to go to take care of him. If he doesn’t do anything to get on my radar, he and his family will live a comfortable life in a better three-bedroom house with a yard. It will be like living in a mansion compared to the one-bedroom apartment they were currently living in.”
My jaw dropped.
How in the hell did he get all that information since we left the now burning estate?
“I have my ways. Know your enemies but know the strangers you come across even better. Maxim got the information when he walked out of the estate when Roman was still tied to the chair.”
I leaned my head back against the headrest of the seat and closed my eyes. My fingers rubbing the bee charm between them. Something about the feel of the metal seemed to ground me, make me feel closer to her. Roark’s voice broke my thoughts and the tap of his finger on my hand made me open my eyes.
“I gave her that a month after she arrived on my doorstep.”
My eyes went to the object in my hand before I responded.
“She never took it off. At least, every time I saw her, she was wearing it.”
“That was the point of me giving it to her. I knew she would always wear it.”
I stared at the tiny bee in my fingers and that is when it hit me. It was a fucking tracking device.
Chapter 5
Kasin
My vision blurred and anger like I had never experienced before surged through my veins. He had a tracking device on her this entire time so he...
“You knew where they were. You knew who them had even before we started looking for them, before I even went into her house that night.”
With no emotion in his voice, he answered what I already knew.
“I did.”
“What the fuck, Roark!”
My voice boomed in the small confines of the SUV, yet none of the men in the vehicle reacted.
Had they all been in on the guise?
He sighed and put his phone in his pocket before clasping his hands together.
“It was all part of the plan. Well except for Isabella being taken as well.”
I turned to face him as I gripped the necklace in my hand.
“Talk. Now.”
“The plan was for her to be taken. We knew that Victor and Conrad were working together and that he was in town. We didn’t know about Victoria or her ex though. That was just as much of a surprise to me as it was to you.”
“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
“No, just telling you everything. The plan was for her to infiltrate Victor’s operation and work it from the inside out. But even the best plans have holes in them. Something that Isabella said leads me to believe that, but it could have just been part of her acting.”
“What do you mean?”
“Her ex and Victoria, they knocked her off balance. I wasn’t concerned until I was handed that.”
He pointed to my hand and the necklace clutched in it.
“The only reason they would have made her take it off was...”
I sucked in a breath
“Because they knew what it was.”
His eyes flicked to mine in agreement.
“No one but Maxim and I knew what it really was. I never told Amara because I didn’t trust her when I gave it to her. It was a way for me to see if she was a plant or if she really wanted to take on these assholes. “
