Chapter 21
PULLING UP TO the condo, I saw everything looked peaceful and serene. The brick layout of each house made everything look cookie cutter with kids out playing in yards. Even 729 was well put together. No one would ever think anything was wrong.
The guys were on their way, and we would surround this fucking place in the next five minutes.
My phone rang.
“What?”
“Brother, didn’t our father ever teach you manners?”
“I’m not your fucking brother. Learn that shit right now,” I growled.
He sighed dramatically. “Do you have the money?”
“It’s getting routed.”
“Good. When it’s done, I want you to call me at this number. I will give you the address where you can find your woman, and I’ll be long gone.” He chuckled.
Fucker didn’t know it, but his time was up.
“How do I know this isn’t a line of bullshit? How about this? Once I have Catarina in my arms, then I’ll send the money.”
He laughed. “No way. I wasn’t born yesterday, big brother.” Every time he said that, I wanted to fucking kill him even more. “See, if you want your woman, you’re going to have to trust me.”
“I don’t fucking trust you for shit.”
“Smarter than I thought. Truth is, I set it all up for Sal to pay for killing our father, but since he’s hard to get, I’ll take his daughter. Now I just want the money. Tormenting you was Zan’s idea, and I went along for shits and giggles. I don’t care about you or your ways. I just want to live free.”
“You working with Flynn, too?” I wasn’t sure where that came from, but as soon as the words left my lips I knew the answer and my gut fell before he spoke.
“Oh, that’s the best part. Flynn and Steve, or Ghost … Oh … scary”—he chuckled again, further pissing me off—“they happen to be brothers. I don’t give a shit what happens to either of them. I paid them a lot for their help, and I’ll be so far gone no one will find me.” Brothers? You have got to be shitting me. There’s no fucking way. Techie found no links to Ghost having any family. How the hell was that missed?
“Fine. I’ll call you in an hour.”
“Oh, early, I like it. Fine. I’ve gotta go tend to the woman.” He clicked the phone shut.
“We’re not waiting. Let’s fucking go now,” I barked, grabbing my guns, cocking them before putting them back in the holsters.
Dan’s cell rang. “Yeah.” He paused. “Boss, they’re ready. Surrounding the ground floor.”
I turned to Rex. “Are your guys on the roof?”
He flipped his phone shut with a click. “Yep. We are good to go. All curtains are closed around the perimeter, and no cameras were detected.”
Fuck yeah.
“Let’s go!” I called out, tucking my guns away.
Walking up to the house was eerie with fucking kids playing and cars moving around like absolutely nothing was wrong.
Dan, Brett, Rex, and I took the front. I didn’t bother knocking on the door. I turned it slightly, noting it was locked. I presumed the deadbolt was, too. I quietly picked both locks, hoping the asshole wasn’t close enough to hear the damn thing click, but breaking down the door would cause too much attention to come our way.
As I opened the door, Dan sent a text to the others, saying we were going in.
The house was quiet, new, and smelled like bacon. We broke off, each going separate ways. I took the long hall to what looked like a kitchen. Nothing. All three of the guys nodded their head as we unlocked the door for the rest of the guys, who came piling in.
I nodded to the two sets of stairs, one up and one down. Val and his crew went down, mine up.
Quietly moving through the house, the distinct opening and shutting of drawers caught my attention. I used my hand to signal the door I thought it was coming from. It was wide open, and the man’s back was facing us.
“You must be Jake.”
His body stilled. My gun was aimed right at him.
“Jag, you’re a bit smarter than I realized. How’d you find me?”
“Phone, asshole. Turn around.”
He tsk-tsked. Pussy.
“Damn, Steve was supposed to put a bug in that phone. Oh, well.” He turned around, quickly pointing a gun in my face.
I didn’t hesitate, shooting him in the chest. His gun went off as he slumped to the floor, the gun clattering across the hardwood. Fire burned in my shoulder, but I didn’t take my aim away from him while the guys ran inside the room.
“Where the fuck is she?”
His hand came up, covering his wound as blood poured out of him. I shot him again, right next to the previous entry, and he screamed.
“Answer me!”
“Found her!” was yelled from the hallway.
“Is she okay?” My eyes never left the motherfucker for a second.
“She’s bad, boss.”
“Guess we all go boom,” Jake said, right before I put a bullet through his head, killing him instantly.
My stomach dropped. “Get her and get the fuck out of here. The place is gonna blow!” I yelled, barreling down the hall.
Walking into the room, I saw Catarina’s body laid out, unconscious. My heart stopped in my chest as breathing became difficult. Her beautiful hair was matted, and with each tug Val gave, pulling her out of the cuffs, she didn’t move. She had on the same clothes she’d had on days before, her body dirty with wet spots around her and the potent smell of urine coming off of her. The son of a bitch hadn’t let her use the bathroom.
“Is she alive?” I asked, almost too scared to know the answer.
“Yeah. Track marks in her arms. Fucker gave her something, but she’s breathing.” Val unlatched the final chain.
I rushed to her side, picking her up as gently as possible. Her entire body was still, not reacting to my touch. She was completely unconscious. Fear gripped me.
“Gotta get out of here; the place is going up. I don’t know if it’s on timers or what, but let’s go.”
We rushed down the stairs and out of the house. I was careful not to hit Catarina’s head as I bounced out of the place as quickly as I could.
Stepping out into the light of day, nothing happened. We moved to the car, expecting the whole fucking place to blow any second. Nothing.
“Don’t give a shit. Gotta get her to the hospital.”
“Boss, I know an explosives guy. I’ll take care of it,” Rex said, opening the car door for us.
I nodded as we sped off.
***
For two days, I had been sitting in this white hell hole, but at least I was holding my girl’s hand. Doctors had performed all kinds of tests to find out what she had been given. They thought it was a mixture of different drugs. The good thing was that all the tests came back good. Her brain was doing whatever the hell it was supposed to do. The doctor didn’t suspect there would be any side effects from the drugs, but he said he would keep a close eye on her for a while to make sure.
She had to be put on serious antibiotics because of an almost deadly bladder infection. I guessed lying in your own piss and shit for days after attempting to hold it would do that to someone. Again, doctors said she should be fine, just in pain for a while.
I had been waiting five hours by then for her to wake up. It had been said the drugs were totally out of her system, but her not waking up was a concern.
No fucking shit it was a concern. I couldn’t eat, sleep, or move from her side. My insides were shredded every time I looked at her. I wasn’t a praying man, but I fucking prayed every minute I could. I just wanted her to open her fucking eyes. To come back to me.
I wiped my hand over my face. I was so fucking tired, but nothing I did would allow me to sleep. I didn’t deserve to sleep, anyway. Not until my woman woke up, until we could sleep side by side again. Then I would sleep.
Rex defused the bomb that was big enough to blow the whole block. When I told everyone about Flynn and Ghost being brothers, shit hit the roof. No one believed it, but when Techie really started digging deeper, just focusing on those two, he found it. They were in fact brothers, same father although Ghost’s mother never put it on his birth certificate. No, the confirmation came from Flynn’s mother. Once Techie got an exact location, we sent out guys to investigate. They let themselves in and found an old box with one small letter inside of it. In that letter was the confirmation we were looking for.
We got a hit on Ghost and Flynn’s whereabouts via Rex not even ten hours later. He and his men worked fucking fast. They had better fucking be in the little town in South America as expected since I had talked Vino and Sal into sending Rex, Val, and a few enforcers to take them out. I could have waited. Shit, I wanted to wait so I could pull the fucking trigger, but being in the hospital with Catarina was more important. I only prayed I got the fucking call soon. That this nightmare was over. I wasn’t giving them time to run again.
Mumbling from the bed had my attention turning to it. Catarina’s head moved from side to side, exactly like it had a few times over the past few hours.
I moved up and rested my hand on her forehead. “You’re all right, dolcezza. I’ve got you, baby.” I repeated the words over and over to her, not knowing if they made a bit of difference.
When her eyes fluttered open, my heart stopped, and breath was hard to come by.
“Catarina?” I breathed.
Her hand moved to her throat, no doubt dry as a bone.
“You’re okay. You’re in the hospital. Safe.”
I replayed the moment when the doctor told me she hadn’t been raped in my head. I had never been so fucking relieved to hear something in my life. That stupid son of a bitch had played me, and I was glad the fucker was gone.
Her head shook from side to side. “Blow,” she croaked out, her voice sounding nothing like her own.
“Rex took care of it. Nothing blew.” Questions rose in her eyes, but before she could talk, I answered for her. “He’s dead. Gone.”
“Ghost?” Her eyes closed as exhaustion took over.
After all of this, I realized just how much I loved this woman, and I would do anything and everything to make sure she knew it every day for the rest of our lives. I evaded her question not wanting her to worry. “You have nothing to worry about.”