Seth
He had managed to work one hand free and link his fingers together to keep his free arm over his head, giving the illusion he was still fully tied up. If Starr or any of his men came close, he was going to wrap his legs around their head and snap their neck.
The plan was then to use whomever as leverage to get his other hand free. If he had all of his strength, Seth could have pulled himself upward enough to loosen the chain, but he was running out of energy.
He managed to wedge his thumb and fingers together so his free arm stayed up and he didn’t need to try and hold it up over his head. It also took the strain off his other wrist.
Weakening by the minute, Seth hoped to hell he had the power to pull this off. It was a last ditch effort to gain freedom. The soft voice hadn’t returned, and now Seth wasn’t sure if he’d imagined it.
Blinking, he looked around the room as much as his blurry vision would allow. After a few moments, the room grew dim and he actually welcomed the darkness.
A scuffle woke him. Not a scuffle with his unconscious body, but rather someone or several someones were in a fist fight. The scene was a blur, and then sharpened into focus as men were beaten and shot, and one was stabbed not far from where he hung.
Phoenix had arrived.
Relief welled and tears streamed down his face, but he didn’t care.
In the next second, the tears of relief turned to shock. His blood turned cold when he heard a vaguely familiar voice. Seth lifted his head and tried to clear his vision, focusing his eyes on the group of men at the other end of the room.
“You got in the way of something you shouldn’t have.” Yakov Lakhonin stood in front of Starr. Yakov spoke in English, but his Russian accent gave the words a drawling thickness.
Stanley Starr hung beaten and suspended between two of Lakhonin’s men.
Seth’s vision swam and he blinked quickly. Did Yakov know Starr? What the fuck was Yakov doing in this rundown, filthy, abandoned office building? It didn’t seem like the kingpin’s usual hang out.
“Fuck you! His father owes me millions.”
“Oh, ya, I read about that. You’re nothing but a common thief,” said the sex trafficking, Russian mobster, drug lord. As if he were better than Starr. Seth might have laughed if he hadn’t been hurting so much.
“Fuck you,” Starr spat at Yakov.
“I believe those will be the last words you will ever speak,” Yakov said, then abruptly stuck a knife into Starr’s stomach.
Starr’s eyes bulged with shock. Yakov yanked the knife up and ripped Starr open to his throat. Then, Yakov quickly stepped back from the blood pouring out of Starr and wiped his sticky blade clean on a pristine white handkerchief.
“Toss him into one of the rooms,” Yakov ordered his men, and then turned to Seth. Seth blinked and opened his crusted eyes wider.
“Hello, Seth. I’ve waited a long time for this moment.”
Seth clenched his teeth. “Can’t say the same.”
Yakov laughed. It was a loud and delighted laugh as if he found Seth to be highly amusing.
“What the hell do you want, Yakov?” he growled around the metallic taste in his mouth.
Yakov studied the end of the knife he’d used to kill Starr with and then lifted his cold eyes to hold Seth’s gaze. “I want Noah Bradford and you’re going to deliver him to me.”
“You’re insane.” The words came out mumbled through his swollen lips.
Yakov’s mouth tightened. “Well, that’s a matter of opinion.”
Seth struggled to draw a breath, the pressure on his wrist was making his head foggy. Yakov frowned.
“Untie him,” Yakov ordered his men. “And put him over there.”
Seth couldn’t stop the sound of pain that bubbled up when his wrists were released and he was lowered onto a filthy blanket on the floor. He curled into a ball, sucking in air.
“Pay attention, Seth!” Yakov yelled. The kingpin’s voice came from in front of his face.
Seth pried open his eyes and found Yakov crouching right in front of the makeshift bed.
“What makes you think that I have anything to do with Noah Bradford?” he whispered and coughed through his raw throat.
Yakov’s head went back when he laughed and then he sobered and nodded to someone on his right. A hand came from that direction and Seth flinched. Expecting a blow, he was completely caught by surprise when a bottle of cold water was pressed to his lips. He almost didn’t drink it. Fear that it was laced with poison or something to drug him concerned him, but the promise of the water drew a sting in his eyes.
“We can’t have you expiring before you serve your purpose. Now drink,” Yakov commanded.
Seth opened his mouth and took several small swallows until the bottle was pulled away. The relief was instant. He didn’t know how long he’d gone without water. He had no sense of time nor how long he’d been held captive in the windowless room.
Fingers snapped in front of his face. His eyes swiveled back on Yakov.
“I think you are very close to Noah.” A deadly look shone from Yakov’s eyes.
“We’re not close.” It became easier to speak.
“I disagree. You see, Seth, just as you were watching me and my men, my men were watching you and yours.”
Seth’s heart skipped a beat. “And what is it you think they saw?”
“You and Noah. He called you cuz.” Yakov’s smirk grew. “I can only think of one reason he would call you cuz. You’re related.”
Fuck. The room wavered, grew dim, and his vision swam. They had to be very fucking close to overhear anything they’d talked about.
“If you were close enough to hear us talking, why not grab us then?” he mumbled. An invisible wad of cotton felt wedged between the roof of his mouth and tongue.
The kingpin’s mouth tightened and his expression turned ugly. “That was a fuck up that won’t happen again.” Yakov tugged at his shirt cuffs with a snap. Seth got the feeling the fucker had killed his own men. The murder caught on video flashed through his mind.
He spoke around his thickened tongue. “We were joking around. We’re not related. Like I said,” he slurred, “we’re not close.” Blood dripped from the side of his mouth and onto the blanket beneath him adding to the filth.
Yakov paused and smoothed a hand over his hair. The room dimmed, whitened, then Yakov came back into focus. The man was really well put together, confident, and maybe in some circles, a much sought after man. If Yakov hadn’t been a madman, he’d probably be considered a catch. Jesus, he was losing it.
“I sure hope that’s not the case, Seth.” Yakov smiled and Seth shivered.
He swallowed, opened his mouth, took a breath and rasped, “What do you want with Noah?”
“He killed my half-brother.”
Seth had been there in the alley the day Terrance Manning, Yakov’s half-brother, had been shot dead while trying to kidnap Noah. Yakov was wrong. Storm had delivered the shot that killed Manning, not Noah.
Yakov went on. “Noah is also the son of Giovanni Rossi. Which I’m sure you know Rossi killed my nephew many years ago.”
Yakov paused, and then went on as if Seth had a choice to listen.
“Terry and I were very close growing up. Our sons were best friends when we grew older. When Terrance was killed in that disgusting alley, well, it enraged me,” the man said with so much calmness. Seth wondered if Yakov ever showed emotion.
Then abruptly that changed. Yakov jammed a fist against his own chest. “It cut out my fucking heart to lose my brother!”
Seth said nothing. Shivers raked his form and even through the pain, he tried to clench his teeth to stop.
“Nothing to say, I see. This is probably old news to you. But to me, I have very little family left. My two sons. One of which is in a Switzerland prison.” Yakov’s nostrils flared.
“That’s his own fault. Hit and run is a crime,” Seth whispered.
“I know about your unit.”
Ice chilled Seth’s veins. He stared at Yakov. The kingpin had just signed his death warrant with those words. How much did Yakov really know about Phoenix or what his team was capable of?
“What is it you do exactly?” Yakov murmured.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” So, apparently Yakov didn’t know as much as he boasted. Seth eased his jaw, poking his tongue at his swollen bottom lip, tasting the tang of blood as the cut welled.
Yakov’s mouth tightened and he brushed at one sleeve and then the other of his pristine suit jacket.
“Nobody is coming for me.” The words slurred on Seth’s tongue.
“Well, for your sake, I hope you’re wrong.” Yakov smiled, but it didn’t reach his cold, dead eyes. Yakov turned to the two men behind him.
“Keep him here and call me when they arrive.”
“How are they going to know how to find him?” one of the men asked, and then gasped when his boss backhanded him.
“Stupid! They are trained to find people. They will follow the wide path that Stanley Starr left for them. Take Noah Bradford alive and kill the rest. Is that so hard to do? There are eight of you. Do what I pay you to do.”
“Yes, sir,” the man said, sounding subdued.
Yakov sighed and turned back to Seth. “Be a good boy and don’t cause trouble.”
“Sure, I’ll get right on that.” His words came out garbled, almost incoherent, yet Yakov appeared to get the gist of it.
Yakov’s eyes narrowed and without another word, he turned and walked out of the dirty room, leaving Seth shivering on the filthy blanket.
Seth let his head roll to the side. He lay waiting for the beatings to start up. But surprisingly, Yakov’s men didn’t touch him. There were only two men in the room. Seth had to wonder where the other six were.
The two men in the room began a debate as to who was going to drive for fast food. They were more worried about where they were going to eat than they were with their prisoner. Which worked to Seth’s benefit. He discreetly used his cheek to rub gently against his fingers and wrists to help the circulation return to his digits. They tingled and he couldn’t form a fist. The hand he had worked out of the chain came to life first and he whimpered. He couldn’t believe his luck that Yakov’s men hadn’t noticed he was only chained by one wrist. Maybe they had and didn’t care. They had guns and he was pretty fucked up. They figured he wasn’t going anywhere.
They figured wrong.
Seth stretched his legs out and bit back a quiet moan. Funny, they’d taken his shirt off but had left his boots on. He couldn’t believe his luck that his feet remained protected. At this point, he’d take his feet over his hands. Feet, he could run with.
Seth lifted up just a bit and tried to get a look at his prison, but the room spun. He dropped back to the hard, unforgiving floor.
He awoke to silence.
Curled into a tight ball on his side, he listened for some time. He heard a distant cough and the smell of cigarette smoke lingered in the air, but all was otherwise quiet.
Taking a breath, he eased to his side and took in the room. It was empty, save for the garbage that littered the floor, an old filing cabinet that sat with the front broken in pieces, and the blanket beneath him.
Gritting his teeth, he eased himself upright to sit. Getting up from the floor and into a standing position proved more difficult than he had anticipated.
Seth rolled to his knees and lunged upward, using every last ounce of strength he had to get to his feet.
And down he went.
He almost sobbed aloud. He couldn’t hold himself up, and he met the floor with a hard smack. Biting his lips to keep the scream bottled up, he took short, quick pants to stave off making any further sounds.
If they walked in right that moment, his attempt at freedom would end. They’d tie him up or worse, beat him and then tie him up. He wasn’t sure he’d survive another beating.
He moved to his hands and knees and crawled across the floor toward a missing chunk in the wall.
The place looked like it was ready for demolition. There were several dark holes to choose from, so he picked the one that he’d barely fit through. He hoped they would think he had gone through one of the larger openings.
Glass on the other side of the hole cut into his palms and he had to slow his crawl through the darkness to avoid any further damage.
“This way,” a soft voice whispered and Seth’s head snapped up. And then quickly lowered when his head swam.
It was the same soft voice from before. A voice he had believed was a hallucination. He slowly lifted his head again and strained to see, but there was only darkness ahead.
“Hurry,” the voice urged.
Seth just wanted to sleep. He was so fucking tired. Reaching deep, he moved toward the voice and kept crawling even when his body screamed at him to lay down. He crawled down a hallway in what he knew now to be an old, abandoned office building. Apparently, an office building that had been condemned if the state of it was any indication.
He reached a set of stairs, there was no way he could go up, so he slid down them on his ass. The voice had disappeared, no longer whispering words of encouragement.
Yakov’s men were going to notice him gone soon and he hunted frantically for a place to hide. Searching for a cubby or a nook to tuck his body away in until Phoenix could find him.
“This way.”
Finally, that soft voice again. Seth gasped quietly, choking back a sob as the voice urged him to keep going. He crawled down another set of stairs, and then another. He must have made it down three flights of stairs by sliding on his ass before he pulled open a door and scooted inside.
Another dark hallway, but his eyes were adjusting. He still couldn’t stand, but he crawled on his hands and knees and made slow progress down the old, carpeted hallway.
Ahead, he saw a faint glow of an exit sign and gave a quiet sob of relief. He made his way slowly toward the door.
Reaching up, trembling fingers grasped the knob. He turned it and pushed at the same time, but nothing happened. Frantic, he used his shoulder, yet the door held firm. Fuck! He’d come all this way. Freedom was so close he could taste it. Failure burned in his throat like acid and hot tears trailed down his cheeks.
A slight sound came from his right and he became aware there was a large, gaping hole in the wall. At least it would give him somewhere to hide. He pushed himself and pulled on his legs until he was inside of the hole. It was there he sat, back to the open-beamed wall, gasping for air. He took shallow breaths, trying to keep his noise down. They’d busted something inside. The pain was getting worse.
He sat there for a long moment before the hair on the back of his neck stood. Glancing slowly to his right, he found three pairs of eyes watching him.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” Seth rasped, resting his head back against the insulation.
“You look hurt really bad, mister,” a young male voice said from the dark, one that sounded suspiciously like the whisper that had helped him.
“This?” He coughed wetly. “Just a scratch.”
A body emerged, accompanying the voice, and moved from the darkest part of the small room closer to Seth.
“You were the one they brought into the office upstairs.”
Seth’s vision blurred. “I am. Thank you for helping me.”
The boy dismissed Seth’s claim like it was no big deal.
“I’d appreciate if you wouldn’t tell them I’m here,” Seth panted, then shifted and winced.
“I won’t. Those are some bad men. They killed some other men upstairs. The ones that carried you in here.”
“They did,” Seth croaked, closing his eyes. His head was still spinning.
“Mister, if they search this whole building, they’ll find you here. I know a safe place.”
“Alright. Just give me a minute,” Seth said, fighting back nausea.
“Here, we’ll help you.” The guy was strong when he helped Seth to his feet. The boy was not as young as Seth had first guessed, but he would bet money the boy was still a teenager. Homeless, on the streets. Life fucking sucked.
It was slow going, the two other kids weren’t much help. They kept their distance, their gazes wary.
They managed to get out of the main office building and into a utility tunnel by way of a completely different exit. Seth would have never found it. A gap in the structure of the building covered by boards. It was slow going and they stopped for him to catch his breath several times.
Finally, cold air hit Seth’s face and he sucked in several deep and grateful breaths. But the guy hurried him along and didn’t let him linger. Across a wide chunk of land that sat empty, land left from a demolished building, large chunks of cement sat lifted where weeds had pushed up through the dirt. The guy helped him over a particularly large chunk of concrete, and that was when Seth noticed the array of tents on the other side.
It wasn’t noticeable at first, but the area was filled with all kinds of people. Mostly tucked away beneath structures or sitting out of the way against fences that ran beneath the freeway. It was a small city of homeless going about their business. They didn’t pay Seth and the boys any attention. The kid moved deep into the area and eased him down onto a pile of thick, old blankets and covered his shivering form with another one.
He couldn’t remember ever seeing this homeless encampment. He remembered the area beneath the freeway at Fifth Street, but this one, he couldn’t place. This smaller one was secluded and off from the main section.
He swam in and out of consciousness and then finally gave up the fight and closed his eyes.