I was grateful to him for his support.
“Thanks man. But promise me you do what you have to do. I want to see you happy.”
“I promise, but if you’re implying for me to leave you to do what you have to, it’s not gonna happen. Someone has to make sure you don’t run off and get yourself killed.” He laughed.
He was right to put it that way. It held some element of humor but he was right and I was grateful. There were countless times that Wes had saved my life and more importantly we stuck together, more like brothers than best friends. He’d helped me get through the last few years, emotionally and physically.
“Well, I’m not gonna say no to that since someone has to watch your back too.” I dipped my head for a curt nod.
He chuckled then glanced ahead and the seriousness returned to his face.
“There.” Wes pointed down the path and shined his light ahead to a wall with graffiti on it. There was a drain pipe below that looked like it hadn’t been in use for decades.
“You sure?” I shone my flashlight over the area and checked it over.
“Yeah. This section here will tell all,” Wes stated pointing to a vent in the center of the wall across from us. “From our bearings it looks like we’re adjacent to the casino underpass. Directly where the secret chamber should be.”
I could see that. It was just knowing where to enter.
This section here could be good indeed. We were outside the chamber but the whole area gave off the vibe of secrecy. As far as I knew it didn’t exist and it could have been that way to everyone else too. Giovanni hadn’t made any kind of movements down here at all.
The place looked out of use, but I guessed that was what made it the perfect hiding spot. No one travelling the tunnels and no one knowing what was beyond them. If nobody knew about it, nobody would think to look down here.
It was perfect for secrets.
“Only one way to find out.” I got out my tool kit and pointed over to the large Deflecto style vent on wall above the drain pipe. “This looks like a good way in.”
Wes shone his headlight over it. “Agreed.”
He tapped on his temple signaling to switch back on the microphone on the communicators. I followed him as he switched his back on.
I wondered if Ethan could see the area well enough. “Ethan are you there?” I asked speaking into my microphone.
“I’m here, can barely hear you though. Lost you a few times. I can’t see much just a lot of darkness,” Ethan answered.
I shone my light over the area hoping it would brighten the place up a little. “Found an entry point, we’re going in.”
“Cool, be careful.”
I backed off my jacket but kept on the headlight.
Pulling in a deep breath, I took out my drill and started undoing the screws, hoping like fuck no one was on the other side. The knights were supposed to be away from the casino tonight, but that didn’t mean Giovanni didn’t have separate people down here.
He could have different security altogether, like he had everywhere else. This was more than risky.
The screws gave and came free. When I pried open the panel, light came through from the crevices of another wall before us, showing a cavity between the section where we stood.
I slipped through and thanked God for small mercies when I saw a metal door a few inches down from me. It looked like one of those standard maintenance doors you’d find in a subway.
Moving to it, I picked the lock and pushed the door slightly open. The light then illuminated the area revealing similar vaulted spaces and aisles to the ones above in Giovanni’s Castle courtyard. Up there, I’d mainly seen a bunch of diamonds in the vaults I’d been in. This section definitely looked different. It also didn’t seem like there was anybody else down here.
“We’re in,” I whispered to Ethan, still erring on the side of caution.
“Good work,” he replied.
Wes and I both went in. We held our guns at the ready and only put them away when we were absolutely sure we were alone.
As we looked around, however, the biggest problem presented itself before us. All we could see in our view were several rows of aisles containing endless vaults.
Instantly, I had the same feeling I experienced when I first saw Hangar 51 in Raiders of the Lost Ark. The military installation was a repository for secret items held by the government. There must have been a million crates and containers in there containing all manner of shit.
I remembered looking at it and feeling doom because you knew that once something ended up there it would never be found. That was how I felt now. Instead of the crates though, these were vaults.
All looked the same.
Each and every one of them.
“Well, this sucks,” Wes stated, seeing the problem. “How the hell are we supposed to know which one it’s in? Looks like there’s a million vaults down here.” He frowned.
Fuck.
He wasn’t kidding.
Thinking back to the space I’d seen on the map Wes got of the place, there was easily space for a few hundred vaults so Wes wasn’t wrong in his exaggeration.
“There’s no way we can look through all of them.” I sighed, looking down the aisles before us. The place actually looked like a damn maze.
“What else can we do? I can set up cameras, but what if no one comes down here?”
Damn, there was never a dull moment. There was always something to make each step of the way harder and harder.
Right from the fucking start of this mission there’d always been something to piss me off. Right from the point where I realized I’d actually have to go searching for the blueprints. We all thought the knights would be guarding it in some encasement and I’d be told where it was. Nothing like that happened. hence why we were here.
Now this fucked up shit.
How were we supposed to look through all the fucking vaults?
But… if we didn’t what else would we do?
“Fine… yeah we’ll have to do that.” I bit the inside of my lip. “Set the cameras up and hope for a lucky break. Maybe he’ll come down here. If not we’ll use them as surveillance.”
“Maybe we should just spend the rest of tonight setting up the cameras and motion sensors. That way we can see if Giovanni or anybody else comes down here,” Wes suggested.
If we happened to see Giovanni on camera down here going into a vault then that would obviously work to our advantage. But, since it looked like he might not come down here often we couldn’t just wait for that. Waiting could mean that he actually came to pick the blueprints up to move them or hand them over to The Chameleon. I couldn’t let that happen.
We’d gotten this far. Whatever we did, no matter what we did, or what happened, we had to keep moving.
“Yes. Let’s do that,” I agreed. “Then we can come back tomorrow night to start looking through the vaults.”
He nodded and looked on ahead. “Bro, I think we’re gonna need help. It’s going to take forever to look through this many vaults.”
We’d absolutely needed help. There was no way the two of us could look by ourselves.
“Ethan’s guys will have to chip in. More hands less work.” Ethan had six guys with him. The eight of us working together, putting our brains together, could make this go much quicker than just me and Wes looking.
“Agreed.”
I looked at the nearest vault, walked up to it and saw it had one of those high tech fingerprint recognition security panels.
I had an idea that would totally help us. I took out my kit and dusted for prints. Wes chuckled when he saw what I was doing.
“And hello hacker number one,” he said with admiration.
Nah, this wasn’t hacking. It went back to my grandiose skills in theft. I got the prints and lifted them with a sheet of cellophane.
I planned to make a mold of Giovanni’s fingerprints, then make something that replicated skin so we could use it to open the vaults.
> “It’s mad skills.” I smiled.
Wes grinned back. “I love it. I’m gonna start putting the cameras up. Let’s do this bro.”
Yes, let’s.
I had my fingers crossed that we’d gotten as far as I’d hoped.
If the blueprints were here, I just had to find them.
Somehow, someway…
* * *
“I’m very surprised at the resilience you’re showing,” Giovanni commented.
He’d called me to his office, he wanted to speak to me, to catch up. That was what he called it.
I was scheduled a night off tonight but I could see the prick working overtime in thought.
I saw Jia earlier. We’d looked at each other. That was it, but I must have been really slipping up because I hadn’t seen Giovanni watching me, watching her.
“What sort of resilience?” I asked, pretending I didn’t know what he meant.
“Jia. I’m amazed you’re staying away.”
“Isn’t that what I was told to do?”
He steepled his fingers and stared at me.
“Yes, indeed… I have a job for you. Means you’ll be doing a late tonight.”
I had to try my utmost best not to protest.
Tonight was supposed to be my night off and I planned to go into the chamber with Wes and the team.
Giovanni’s stupid request couldn’t have come at a worst time. And, it was so obvious it only came because he thought me looking at his daughter earlier might mean I’d try to go to her house.
Mother fucker.
Biting back my fury I plastered a smile on my face and nodded, deciding to play nice. “Sure thing boss.”
The last thing I needed to do was allow the stress to get to me and beat the shit out of him for annoying the fuck out of me.
“It’s another shipment. I need you to accompany Frankie tonight to the warehouses.”
That meant Armand would probably be with Jia tonight. I took comfort in knowing when Frankie was watching her. This whole watching business had happened after the shootout at the casino. Giovanni basically had someone watching her all the time.
I hated knowing Armand would try to put his moves on her.
“No problem boss,” I told him. “Anything else boss?” This whole thing was growing tired to me, he could tell big time.
“Nothing,” he replied.
I stood and left him. He was watching me the whole time and continued as I went outside.
I gritted my teeth and made my way up to the coffeehouse. It was the one place in this joint where I could actually relax. It wasn’t as busy as everywhere else because people headed for the bar the same as they headed to the money.
The coffeehouse just had people like me who needed a break.
I grabbed a cappuccino and stood by the balcony looking over the city below. The coffeehouse was on the roof. It was a good thinking spot.
Last night when we got out of the chamber we decided that Ethan, Wes and the team would get started on looking through the vaults while I was here working my shifts.
They’d have to start tonight without me. Wes could take charge.
I’d set the mold for the print from last night so it would be ready for tonight.
Fuck. I wanted to be down there with them. Not working for Giovanni.
It was all shit, and not the only thing on my mind.
Jia was leaving for Europe with Armand in a handful of days.
I couldn’t believe I was actually thinking that and not planning to do something about it.
I straightened up about to move but something caught my attention on the opposite side of the building.
No, not something…
Someone.
I looked over and saw a man mirroring me, standing twenty feet away. The guy straightened up and sipped on his drink.
It took me less than a second to recognize him and I dropped my cup.
Balthazar Kane?
No… it couldn’t be.
Yet… it was.
It was!
It fucking was.
God it was him. I’d been searching the globe for him for the last five years and there he was. Right within my line of sight.
Jesus.
It was him. The asshole who killed Claire.
Adrenaline sparked inside me like a match thrown on a tank of gasoline and I moved on instinct, my brain set on default to kill the motherfucker if I ever saw him again.
However, the fucker moved away from the balcony the minute I made a run for him.
The bastard was walking though.
Walking, knowing I wouldn’t get to him because he was in a fucking different building altogether. I’d have to magically leap from building to building to get to him.
Bastard.
It was always a game with him.
Always. Always knowing I’d never catch him.
Didn’t stop me from trying though.
Not. At. All.
I ran through the atrium connecting the buildings and jumped over the stairs because of the buildup of people.
I looked around everywhere.
Everywhere I could look, I looked.
Everywhere I could think of that he’d go to I looked but he was nowhere to be found.
Gone…
Just like that. He was gone.
Gone…
Fuck… this was what he used to do before.
When I was an agent tracking him this was what he’d do. Except, he didn’t just appear like that and you’d see him, or run into him.
He only appeared when he allowed you to see him. That was how he worked.
You’d see him and be left with the question that was now on my mind.
Why had he wanted me to see him?
What the fuck did it mean?
Whatever it was, it was part and parcel of what would happen next.
Just like last time.
Chapter 8
Xander
Six years ago….
Tension filled the air.
It was actually stifling and honestly the first time that I’d felt this way since joining the unit.
I’d served as a Marine in Afghanistan for four years prior to this. Those were some rough times and I’d seen things I never imagined. Stuff I wouldn’t forget.
People died. Friends died. Acquaintances too.
It almost got to the point where I was scared to get close to anybody because that guy could be dead by nightfall. I could have been dead by nightfall.
It was a different world though. Completely different where I was actually thankful for rules.
Rules were something I’d hated all my life but damn, did I ever wish for rules as an agent sometimes. Especially when we went on these black op missions. I wasn’t sure it was right to call them black op though.
They were a little more than that to me.
This guy Balthazar Kane was a real son of a bitch. In all my time as a marine I’d come up against some real evil bastards.
This guy though… Jesus, he didn’t care what he did to get his job done.
I looked around at the members of my team as our truck pulled up on the edge of the village in Kazakhstan.
Claire, Paul, John, and Lucas. They all looked like they were ready to go in for the kill.
“This is as far as I go,” Darren declared. He was our driver. I’d met him once before. That was, Russia and it was my first taste of Balthazar and his Spades. Like Balthazar the spades represented the power of darkness. Everything they did was a game. They liked to tease and taunt.
On that mission one of them cut off Darren’s right ear and tied him to a tree with it taped to his mouth. They branded a message on his chest too.
Hear no evil.
That was what it said. They only left him alive to send the message and screw with us.
There was no wonder why he didn’t want to go any further than here. It was out of harm’s way.
“Why?” Claire asked. Her voice although filled wi
th an edge of apprehension, was controlled.
I gave her a hard stare as did Paul.
“We have better cover of darkness here. A clear path if you need to escape,” Darren answered. The tone of his voice said don’t fuck with me, and on this occasion I was inclined to agree. He was a guy who knew what he was talking about. He knew the terrain and the area well. If he said that this spot was good for him to stop and wait I believed him.
“It’s too far,” Claire countered.
“Claire, I don’t mean to be a prick. But he’s right,” Paul cut in. He pointed over to where the village began just past the thicket of trees. It was just at the stage where evening was approaching, so we could still see. “The trees give us cover, especially if we have to split up.”
“I don’t want us to split up. There was sighting of Balthazar in this area. We have to get the scientist. It’s balls to the wall, grab and fucking go when we get him. I can’t allow that bastard to get the research.”
She looked to me and I kept quiet. She always did that and I always kept quiet when I didn’t have a solution, or my own take on what we should do.
I wished she wouldn’t do that because people knew we were a couple and it got me in trouble when I agreed with her.
On this occasion I didn’t agree, I didn’t disagree either.
She was in charge of us. I got that. I got that we had to follow her command but damn it to fuck, did she ever push the limits.
Still…wasn’t that the same thing I’d loved about her?
Balls to the wall, grab and go. That was what she’d said, like it was that easy. Those daring ways of hers were the same things that made me fall for her from day one. The sixteen year old girl who stole my heart and led me to this path.
And, what did I expect from Jack McLaren’s daughter?
Jack was a legend. Hard to follow. I didn’t think anyone could follow in his footsteps. She sure came close, however, and she wanted to get Balthazar Kane’s ass real bad.
Putting the team’s lives in danger was not a good idea though.
She looked away from me and back to Darren. “Drive closer. We get closer and do as I say when you get the signal.”
Tease of Spades: Game of Love Series Page 6
