Maxwell

 

If I were being one hundred percent honest, I knew there was a pretty good chance I wasn’t going to meet up with Nicole at the airport. I hoped some part of her realized this, too, and would understand that I wanted her at that airport in the hopes that she would buy a ticket and get the fuck out of Dodge before things went to shit. There was a possibility that once I was out of the picture—something I hoped wasn’t about to happen to me—they would leave Nicole alone, but the more information I got about Martin, the less I was inclined to think so.

 

He was dangerous in a lot of ways and he obviously had enough power to cause some real waves for people. It left me uneasy and I hoped Nicole would be able to get the hell out of the line of fire without me.

 

I’d given Spin a heads up, at least. I hoped that would mean he’d look out for her if I didn’t make it out of this mess alive. She technically wasn’t his responsibility, but he’d fucked up when it came to how things went down with me, so I was hoping he’d see this as a straight across the board deal.

 

It was how I would have seen it.

 

Once Nicole and the car were completely out of sight, I made my way towards the mansion ahead of me. Nicole had told me she’d crawled down a trellis from the third floor. That would put me in the master bedroom, or maybe it was just one of the regular bedrooms and looked like a master bedroom because everything was so fucking large in one of those stupid, cookie cutter, pre-fab mansions. From there, she couldn’t tell me anything. She had been blindfolded for most of the way to the mansion as well as in the mansion itself. It sucked, because I would have liked some more information, a bit of a heads up about what I was walking into, but it didn’t change things.

 

I still had to confront Martin.

 

I didn’t bother keeping low to the ground as I raced across the bright green, well-maintained lawn right outside the mansion. It was day still and there was no way I was going to blend in with the bright, luscious green foliage of the place. Instead, I focused on speed. Someone was going to see me if I tried to sneak around, and they probably would with me just running, too, but at least if I were fast, they might be looking the other way as I made it to the wall.

 

Making my way around the side of the building, towards where I’d seen Nicole running before, I pumped my legs and created as much speed as possible to propel myself forward. I slammed hard into the wall as a result, but I’d made good time. Heaving slightly, I paused, listening.

 

There was shouting going on and I frowned. Had they heard me? There was definitely a good shot of that, but hopefully they were concerned with something else. Like Nicole’s escape, I thought.

 

Which was both good and bad. On the one hand, if they were shouting about Nicole, that meant they hadn’t yet seen me. That meant I still had a chance for surprise and maybe I’d be able to corner Martin alone. On the other hand, if they were looking for a missing Nicole, there was also a chance they were searching the place top to bottom and they wouldn’t be too upset if they found me instead of her.

 

Either way, I couldn’t stop now. Martin was in this building somewhere, and I was coming for him.

 

I followed the wall of the building for a while. It was huge and I had to crawl through bushes and ferns, but at least the shrubbery was providing some sort of cover. When I was just racing across the grass, I was out in the open and anyone who was looking would have seen me. Here, the angle was harder if someone were in the house, and the bushes meant I was partially concealed, despite the obvious color differences between us. At least they had enough leaves to cover me as opposed to the dried out, winding and gnarled bushes that grew in Nevada.

 

Home was not a particularly hospitable place most of the time.

 

As I continued to move, I saw several people running out across the lawn. I ducked down, hiding farther in the bushes, hoping to avoid their eyes, but I needn’t have worried. They were all scrambling, cursing and shouting to one another and waving guns like they had something to shoot but couldn’t figure out where it was. After a beat, I realized they were still looking for Nicole.

 

I went ahead and let them look. Then, when I could see their backs, I started to move again. Obviously this was a tricky situation, because there was a chance they might see the movement and, assuming I was Nicole, come after me, or worse, just shoot first, but I had to make time. If I just stayed put, eventually someone would think to look where I was hiding. They’d spot me and then I really would be dead. And I wasn’t interested in dying before I got a swing at Martin.

 

Jogging slightly, crouching low now so the bushes did the work of hiding me, I followed the wall about halfway around the building. I was beginning to think Nicole had climbed down something else—there wasn’t a trellis in sight—when I my hand came across a thorny vine. It pricked me and I jerked my hand back, surprised. I cursed it, but that curse died on my lips when I saw what the vine was growing up. A trellis.

 

Doing a quick check of the grounds to make sure no one was coming, I hoisted myself up the crosshatched wood. The vines were thick and curling, making it difficult to find good holds for my bare hands, the thorns pricking and scraping at every opportunity, but I ignored the cuts I received. I moved quickly, hauling myself up first the first story, then the second. I briefly considered stopping there. If Nicole had been held on the third floor, they were probably looking for her there, right? But after taking a moment to think it through, I decided going in right where she’d headed out was the best plan. By this time, they clearly knew she was gone. Men were searching the grounds for her, which meant they knew she wasn’t in the room anymore. And if they knew that, then there was no point in continuing to check for her in that room.

 

So I went ahead and climbed the last stretch to the third floor. There was a balcony there with a large sliding glass door that looked like it was open. I could see a bit of a curtain peeking through, fluttering slightly in the wind. Swinging my legs over the side, I planted onto the balcony and then paused, crouched down so hopefully I wasn’t visible from the ground. There I waited for a long minute, listening. It still sounded like people were making a ruckus downstairs and in the yard. I couldn’t hear anything from the inside of the room—which I should have been able to if anything was going on, because the door was definitely open, I could tell now.

 

Feeling more confident that no one was in the room, I moved to the door. I kept myself low, using the banister to hide me from anyone looking up towards me. When I reached the door, I carefully looked around it, poking just my head inside.

 

Nicole had been right. It definitely looked like a master bedroom. I saw a large chest of drawers and a huge bed. Some paintings, things I didn’t really care about one way or the other. Then my eyes dropped to the doors. There were three of them it looked like. One was open and looked like it led to a walk-in closet that was probably larger than my entire apartment. Another was closed and there was banging on the other side of it. The third was open, as well, and looked like it led into a bathroom. My guess was that had been where Nicole had been allowed to use the restroom, then locked the door and escaped.

 

There was more banging and shouting coming from the other side. I ignored it and checked the bathroom. There was another door there—and the tiny ass window Nicole had mentioned—and on the other side of that I could hear voices.

 

“What the fuck? Open it already!”

 

“I’m fucking trying! But it’s locked.”

 

“No shit it’s locked, genius! I know that; just get the fucking thing open!”

 

I frowned. That meant there were at least three men. Two outside the bathroom door, trying to open it. Another outside the main door, banging and trying to get in. All of which was going to make my job suddenly a lot harder.

 

There was a gun tucked into the waistband of my jeans and I currently held the element of surprise. Two things in my favor. Unfortunately, there were also a lot of things working against me. Like how many people were actually outside in that room. There might be two or three men at the other door, or even a dozen standing just behind these idiots. Plus, I had no idea what the room beyond looked like. I was hoping it was a hallway, because that would mean it was narrow and it would be a lot harder to have a bunch of people shoved in there. They’d want some breathing room and Martin had probably sent a bunch of them to search the grounds and other rooms. But if it was a big, open dining room or work room or living room? Well, that was another story. They could shove an awful lot of people into a space like that.

 

I weighed my options as the pounding continued.

 

“Jesus, how long are you going to try to break that fucking door?” It was the same voice from in front of the bathroom door, so I was thinking there were only three men. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but I hoped.

 

“Shut up, Ricky,” a third voice, fainter than the last, called back. “I’d like to see you try better.”

 

“Try better,” the man, Ricky, snorted. “Where the fuck did you learn English anyway?”

 

“Dick. I talk just fine.”

 

They continued to argue. I walked farther into the room and came close to the door of the bathroom, the locked one that led outside. I could hear scraping and ticking, clicks and catches. Someone was obviously trying to pick it, which was good, because that meant they didn’t have a key.

 

“Just shoot the damn thing open already!” one of the men complained.

 

“Don’t be fucking stupid,” Ricky countered immediately. “If she’s fucking in there, it’s our heads if she gets shot or something. Cain said he wants her alive and I don’t want to be the one to make him come down here and tell us we fucked it all up.”

 

I froze. Cain.

 

Two very important pieces of information had just been floated my way. First, Martin was here. I hadn’t been sure before, but that confirmed it. He must have been on the top floor, sending his men out to do his dirty work, keeping a cool distance as much as possible. Second, it told me they didn’t know for sure Nicole wasn’t in the room anymore. Searching the grounds was a precaution, but no one had seen her outside the room. Which meant they wouldn’t be shooting the room up for fear of harming her, since Martin wanted her as leverage against me.

 

Fitting.

 

Weighing my options, I came up with a rough and dirty plan. Choose a door. Bust it open. Use the element of surprise to take down Martin’s goons. Then go after Martin, who was on the fourth floor.

 

It wasn’t the most foolproof of plans, but it was all I had.

 

I debated which door to go through. The one guy was still banging on the main bedroom door with what sounded like no luck. If I opened it up on him, he’d probably tumble right through and I could take him quickly. But that still left me with two guys, one of who might already have a gun drawn.

 

With that in mind, I chose the main bathroom door instead. Reaching for my handgun, I pulled it from the waist of my jeans and carefully cocked the hammer back, doing it as slowly as possible to avoid making too much of a sound. It made only a tiny click, but I heard a pause. The main bedroom door was still being pounded on, but the guy who was trying to pick the lock sounded like he’d paused.

 

“Did you hear that?” he asked, confused.

 

“You know what I hear? Stupidity floating in the air. Get back to work,” Ricky told him in irritation.

 

I moved closer to the door until I was standing right in front of it. I took a deep, steadying breath, reaching for the handle of the door.

 

“You don’t have to be such a dick all of the time.”

 

“Whatever. I thought you were supposed to do this for a living?”

 

“I got arrested for—”

 

He didn’t finish his response, because right at that moment, I twisted the doorknob and jerked the door open. At the same time, I straightened out my right arm and took aim, catching the standing man, who I assumed was Ricky, right in the chest when I pulled the trigger. He had a moment to be surprised, before clutching at his chest and staggering back. When blood started staining across his shirt, he lifted his hand and stared at his palm, which had become coated in bright red blood. Then he collapsed. Probably not dead yet, but not far from it if the gurgling noises were any indication.

 

Just like Ruins, I thought grimly.

 

This all happened in seconds and I was already taking aim at the guy who was kneeling down in front of the door, working at the lock. He looked surprised, but his expression was tinged in terror, too. He had a little more time than Ricky did and it meant he knew what was coming.

 

I heard an, “Oh shit!” from down the hall—the banging on the other door had stopped—and I had to assume the third guy had noticed what the fuck was going on.

 

I pulled the trigger a second time and the second guy in front of me went down. He didn’t have time to gurgle or feel any pain. I’d caught him right between the eyes and he was already gone as he hit the floor. I might have felt a twinge of guilt if I didn’t know each and every one of these assholes would have killed—or probably worse—Nicole at the first opportunity. It gave me the fuel to continue.

 

Turning to face the third man in the hall—I was relieved to see I was right; it was a hallway and there were only three men—I discovered the reason as to why he hadn’t shot at me yet. He was fumbling with the gun that had been shoved down his pants in the front. It looked like it was caught on something, his belt buckle maybe. He saw me as I took aim and had time to say, “Oh, shit!” once more before I pulled the trigger again.

 

I didn’t bother to check to see if any of the men were still alive when I started running down the hall. The gunshots weren’t silent and someone would have heard them, meaning I had to move quickly if I wanted to reach the stairs before this hallway got a lot more traffic than usual.

 

Hurrying down the hall, I hoped to run into a set of stairs that would take me up instead of down. I lucked out when I turned a corner and found a staircase that went both up and down. I started to climb to the fourth floor as I heard shouting coming up from downstairs.

 

I pushed myself to hurry before they saw me. Just as I cleared the last step, I caught a glimpse of someone on the landing below me.

 

Okay, now I’m on the fourth floor. Where the fuck do I go from here?

 

I wasn’t sure. There was a long hallway to the left and what looked like some sort of sitting room that opened up from the stair landing. I caught a whiff of heavy smoke, cigarettes or cigars. It was coming from the sitting room, I thought, so I decided that was my best bet.

 

Moving quickly but cautiously, I had my gun out in front of me, leading with it as I rounded the corner into the room. The room was large with a painting of some asshole over the mantle. There were several huge, overstuffed sitting chairs that were colored somewhere between brown and red and were probably leather and way too fucking expensive. Sitting in one of these chairs was Martin.

 

“Well. I thought you’d get here sooner, to be honest.” Martin’s voice was just as slimy as I remembered it, or maybe I was just putting slimy with his voice because I knew what a smarmy bastard he was.

 

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” I growled menacingly, keeping my gun aimed directly at him.

 

“You wanna talk? Or are you just planning on shooting me?”

 

I lifted my shoulder in a half shrug, not willing to move too much for fear it might screw up my shot. “What is there to talk about? You’re a traitorous asshole. Pretty much got it all cleared up.”

 

Martin’s eyes narrowed, his already thin lips pursing together as they pulled into a thing, scraggly frown. It wasn’t his most attractive look. For a moment, I thought he looked nervous. Like he was sweating or breathing heavily or something. But then he seemed to regain his composure and forced a catlike smile on his face, which did nothing for his already pale, thin features.

 

“You sure? I wouldn’t shoot me if I were you.”

 

“I promise, if you were me, you’d shoot you, too,” I answered confidently.

 

His smile didn’t waver. “Are you so sure? After all, if you shoot me, you’ll shoot the one man who can keep you out of prison.”

 

I couldn’t help it, I laughed, even as I felt a trickle of fear slick down my spine. I wasn’t a fan of the cops in the slightest and it automatically left me with an awful, uneasy feeling in my stomach to think there was even the slightest, most remote possibility that I might get hauled in by them again. “Prison? I think you’ve got your wires crossed. Last time I checked, it was Spin who was in prison—and I’m pretty sure we both know why he’s there.”

 

His smile widened. “Spin may be in prison, but there’s a deal on the table. If he rolls on a few of the guys, the ‘responsible parties,’ according to the police who are so far up their own asses that they wouldn’t know the head honcho if he were…well, if he were sitting in their own cell about to fork over his own guys to save his ass. Ironic, isn’t it?”

 

“Spin wouldn’t do that.” And that was the truth. We were a bunch of thieves, drug dealers, and arms dealers, but there was a code of honor amongst us. That code started with the cops; don’t snitch to them, no matter what. It didn’t matter if you hated someone, you didn’t tell the police. There was only one instance that I could think of where that might have been acceptable—it involved children, which was always deplorable—but even then it was better to kill the people responsible, because who wanted those kinds of assholes alive anyway?

 

Martin’s eyebrow rose in skepticism. “You sure you know him as well as you think?”

 

I considered his words. I tried to picture Spin going to the police and telling them I had done it, all of it, and he was just some lackey. Would they believe him? Probably. Cops weren’t exactly well known for getting the hierarchy right when it came to things like that. But it didn’t matter. I couldn’t see Spin turning me in just to save his own skin.

 

Besides, he knew I wasn’t the one who’d gotten him thrown in there in the first place.

 

“Doesn’t matter,” I told Martin smoothly, ignoring the small niggling feeling that there might be a part of Spin willing to turn the rat, the real rat who had gotten him busted, in to the police.

 

“No? And why’s that, Maxwell?” Martin asked smugly.

 

It was my turn to grin. “Because Spin already knows that you’re Cain and he knows Cain set him up.”

 

Finally, Martin’s expression dropped. Gone was the smug smile, the superiority. At the mention of Cain, he finally realized he’d lost. I held all the cards and there were still enough people loyal to Spin that Martin wasn’t going to make any moves or plot a coup d'état anytime soon. No one would buy it, especially once Spin told them who had really set him up. Martin’s life was about to get much harder.

 

My smile turned grim, menacing, as I took aim with my gun. “I’m going to tell you this once, you piece of shit,” I said calmly. “You come after Nicole again, if you fucking touch her again, this’ll get worse.” And before he could ask what would get worse, I shot him in the thigh, just above the knee.

 

He screeched in pain, his leg jerking suddenly right before his body spasmed and he slipped out of the chair onto the floor. He gripped at his leg with both hands, writhing on the floor, blood flowing freely. He seemed torn between pressing his hand over the wound to stop the bleeding, and leaving it the fuck alone because touching it was going to make it hurt so much worse.

 

I didn’t stick around to see which he chose. I just left, straight down the stairs, avoiding the crowd that had gathered in the hallway, slipping down the stairs before they realized I had just shot their boss.

 

By the time I was out of the house, the place was probably going nuts and there was a good chance some nosy neighbors had called the cops. I didn’t care. I was already halfway gone and would be farther before they showed up.