He tried to twist, and buck upward with his hips. The man above him wasn’t all that heavy, but he was strong, thighs like still girders clamped along Albie’s sides.
They scrabbled. Albie felt something hot and wet, and thought he’d poked an eye with his fingertip. Then another blow landed along the side of his head, and his vision fritzed out.
His whole body did.
He drifted, and when he came back to awareness, he lay limp on the floor, and his attacker was on his feet, moving around, thump of his boots over the floorboards. Albie’s bag, slung over his shoulder earlier, was pinned under him now, the broken-down rifle components digging into his back.
Albie scrambled up onto his hands and knees, clumsy, shaking, the room swinging wildly around him. Shit. Shit, shit, shit. How had this happened? He should have been able to handle this – had handled things like this all the time. And here was one guy, unarmed, and he’d reduced Albie to the usefulness of a toddler trying to find its feet for the first time.
The hellish bright light of the bare bulb seemed to slide across the floor, again and again, a loop brought on by dizziness. Concussion; he had a concussion.
His attacker stood in the open window, looking back over his shoulder, cold air pouring in around him, fog that fell to the floor and crept across it, bold as alley cats. He turned to go.
“Wait,” Albie called out, getting up on his knees. The room tilted, and he had to swallow down a surge of bile. He fumbled and pulled the gun off his hip. “Who are you? Where are they keeping my sister?”
The man stared at him a long, unfathomable moment, hood obscuring his face. Then he stepped out of the window onto the fire escape and was gone.
“Wait!” he called again.
Nothing.
It took an age to get to his feet, leaning against the wall. Ringing in his ears, throbbing in his temples. Vision dimming as one eye swelled shut, a fast ballooning of blood under the skin.
He felt intense, dragging shame. Here he was, in the prime of his life, capable, loaded for bear, and he’d been taken out by a couple of hits like the greenest prospect in the world. Like some stupid civilian who’d stumbled into something he shouldn’t mess with.
He was moving toward the door, walking as fast as he dared, the floor seeming at a slant beneath his boots, when he heard it. Distant, at least two floors below. Click. Soft. But not rats in the walls. Not at all.
“Shit.” He spun, arms wind-milling, and charged for the window. Tripping, catching himself against the sill. Hooking a leg over.
Below, a deep, echoing thump.
And then the boom.
He landed on his back on the fire escape, and reached to lace his fingers through the mesh, clinging on for dear life, praying, even. As the blast moved up through the old building in a great fiery draft.
Bomb, he thought. Should have known. And then he was falling, and then nothing.
~*~
“Don’t get comfortable,” Fox said, and he and Nicky dragged the heavy old grate in place and let it fall with a bang. Down below, in the lead-lined fallout shelter under the garage, Clive looked up at them, face pale from blood loss and shock, and let his head thump back against the wall.
Fox straightened and kicked a rug over the grate.
He hadn’t said anything of any importance yet, not while they were securing him, and doing the most basic bandage job on his hand. They would have to get creative.
“Fox.”
He turned, and there was Miles hanging in the doorway, phone pressed to his shoulder, nearly as pale as Clive.
“It’s Albie.”
Twenty-Nine
It had been Detective Hendricks who called. She’d been at the hospital to take a statement from a victim, and the emergency crews had come barreling in, a “heavily-armed” but unconscious man laid out on a stretcher, smelling of brick dust and char. His face had been swollen, and bruised, and covered in soot, but she’d recognized Albie straight off, and given them a ring at the clubhouse.
Given those circumstances, it hadn’t seemed like a good idea for any criminals in cuts to go charging into the hospital to ask for answers.
“Albie Cross,” Raven said to the nurse at the desk. “Where is he?”
The woman looked up slowly, gaze already suspicious. “You’re family?” She looked to either side of Raven, at Eden, and Axelle. “All of you?”
“Sisters,” Raven said.
“I’m his wife,” Axelle said, and Raven’s jaw nearly hit the floor.
She stopped herself just before she turned and gaped at her. Instead drew herself upright and gave the nurse her best managerial stare-down. “Can you please point us in the correct direction?”
The nurse’s expression soured, but she nodded and gave them the room number. “He’s in intensive care. And there’s a police escort.”
“Yes. Of course.”
When they were sealed in the elevator, and shuttling upward, just the three of them, Raven turned to Axelle. “Wife?”
Back at the clubhouse, the girl had said, “I’m coming with you.” No one had argued because there hadn’t been time, and Raven was actually glad of having company; safety in numbers and all that. But it surprised her now to see Axelle with her arms banded tight around her middle, face pale, lower lip caught between her teeth, red from being chewed on the way over. She’d been steady behind the wheel, one of the club lorries, but fine tremors rocked her frame now, visible in the way her hair fluttered around her face. She looked worried: sick with it, and not just the idle concern of an uninterested third party.
“Oh, damn,” Raven said. “You’ve really taken a shine to him, haven’t you?”
Axelle dashed a hand beneath her nose; her jaw clenched and she wouldn’t make eye contact. “Eden could pass for a sister, but I don’t look related.” Voice wooden. “And ‘wife’ grants you automatic immunity from police questioning. I don’t feel like dealing with the cops right now.”
“Hmm. Smart,” Raven said, tone light, gaze assessing. She studied the girl’s face, the shine of her eyes, and the rapid flick of her lashes; white knuckles where her hands were clenched tight on her own arms. “Glad at least one of us is thinking straight. Not emotionally compromised.”
“Raven,” Eden said, quiet but firm.
Raven turned to her, frowning. “I don’t need a lecture.”
“Good.” Eden’s gaze plainly said leave her alone.
Raven rolled her eyes. It’s my brother, she thought sourly. My stupid, criminal, half-dead brother. God…
The ICU bustled with hushed activity. Nurses and doctors moving quick but quiet, ducking behind curtains beyond the glass doors that sealed the place off from the rest of the hospital. They were buzzed through after careful scrutiny, waved down to a room at the very end. It was hard to miss: two uniformed officers stood outside of it.
One stepped forward as they neared, hand held up to stay them. A nurse cut him off.
“Only two visitors at a time, ladies.” The nurse said, with a glare at the cops for good measure, and then he hustled on.
Eden said, “You two go on in. I’ll have a word with the officers.”
Raven hurried forward, heels rapping on the floor – she’d changed back into her own clothes for this trip, wanting to look every inch the businesswoman and not the outlaw in too-small, borrowed biker gear. She shooed Axelle along in front of her, into the room, tugged the door shut, and–
And then she just stopped, still clutching the door handle, frozen mid-step.
The sight of him hit her like a slap. Left her reeling.
Albie wasn’t some big hulking brute of a man, but he’d always had a quietly forceful presence. Even if he wasn’t speaking, he tended to draw eyes in a room, a natural sort of calm authority that others responded well to. He was the first one you’d search out in a time of crisis.
He looked small now. Smaller than he was. He lacked Tommy’s prettiness, or Fox’s sly appeal, but he was handsome in his own
way – but his face now was a mess of red bruises, swollen; one eye was swollen shut, and a long gash marred the skin above his brow. Someone had wiped the dirt and ash from his skin, but his hair was greasy and tousled, and in need of a proper washing. Redness on the side of his throat, and his collarbones: burns that could have been much, much worse. Left arm in a chunky white cast, tubes snaking from his nose, and his chest, and the back of his hand. IV dripping, monitor beeping low and regular.
Raven’s hand slipped down to her side, and it felt like it took minutes to cross the short distance to the bed.
Axelle had gone around to the other side, and her gaze moved restlessly over him, down to the lumps of his toes beneath the blankets, up to his battered face. She breathed through her mouth, quick, sharp in-and-out puffs that belied she’d been thinking only of being questioned. Raven had heard the two of them outside her room earlier – God, that was hours ago – and beneath her own horror and worry felt a pang of real sadness for the girl. Loving a Lean Dog was a burden, and not a privilege – even more so for anyone doomed to love one of this brood.
Albie’s good eye opened a slit.
Raven jumped back, a hand going to her throat.
“Oh,” Axelle said, low and wounded.
Raven recovered. “Albie.” She stepped up to the bed and laid a tentative hand on his unbroken arm, mindful of the IV lines. “Albie, can you hear me?”
“Probably not,” a voice said behind her, and her heart leaped again.
A doctor had entered without either of them noticing, a harried-looking young woman in rumpled blue scrubs, hands dry and cracking from too many washings. She moved to the foot of the bed and checked the chart stowed in the tray there, movements efficient, second nature. “He’s on a lot of morphine,” she explained as she moved past Raven to peer down into Albie’s eyes with a penlight. “Even if he wakes, he won’t be lucid.” She straightened. “Has anyone talked to you about his status?”
“Pardon my French, doctor, but he looks well and truly fucked up. I’m guessing that’s his status.”
Tight smile. “More or less. Fractured wrist, fractured radius and ulna. Four fractured ribs. Lots of bruising, obviously, a few first-degree burns – which is lucky, considering it was an explosion. A concussion. We aren’t expecting any lasting trauma from the head injury. All in all, I’d say it’s miraculous he survived at all, much less with only these injuries.”
“Do you know anything about the explosion?”
“You’d have to ask them out there in the uniforms.” She jerked her head toward the door with a look of real disgust. “God,” she muttered, turning back to Albie, checking his monitors. “Cluttering up my ICU, getting between me and my patients over a bag of bloody guns.”
Raven traded a glance with Axelle – tried to, anyway. The girl was staring down at Albie, slowly, unconsciously fingering a fold of his blanket, over and over, running it between two fingers.
“He’s a Lean Dog, right?” the doctor asked.
Raven snapped back to her, giving her a narrow-eyed look, searching for scorn.
She found none, though.
The doctor shrugged. “A pair of them stopped my little brother from getting jumped one night. You ask me, they keep the city safer.” She dropped the chart back in its slot. “If you need anything, page Candace, she’s the nurse looking out for him tonight.”
“Thanks,” Raven said, a little stunned.
The doctor was at the door when Axelle lifted her head and said, “Doctor, wait. Please.”
The doctor turned back, face softening a fraction; how could it not with Axelle looking as sad and ashen as any real wife?
“Will – is he – he’ll make a full recovery?”
Granted, Raven hadn’t known her long, but she’d never heard her sound like that. It was pitiful, really.
“He should, yes,” the doctor said. “He just needs some rest. We’ll know more about his condition as we wean him off the painkillers.” She gave a professional – though sympathetic – smile, and left them.
~*~
“Sun’s coming up.”
Fox glanced toward the window. Sure enough, the sky beyond was silver with dawn; now that he was listening, he could hear the bustle of morning traffic on the street down below.
Tommy stood at one of the windows that flanked Phil’s desk – they were in his office – and as Fox looked toward him, his vision blurred. He scrubbed a hand down his face, squeezed his eyes shut, and opened them, even blurrier than before. “Shit,” he muttered. It had been a long damn night.
“Here,” Abe’s voice said at his elbow, and a steaming cup was pressed into his hand. He took a sip without looking, and found it was tea, brewed strong, with lots of sugar.
“You should grab a few hours’ sleep,” Abe suggested. “You’re no good if you’re asleep on your feet.”
Fox chugged his tea in two big gulps, not caring that it burned his throat. “We still don’t have a fucking clue where Cass is.” His voice came out ragged, heavy with exhaustion. During his short, violent fight with Clive Mahoney, he’d felt invincible and full of boundless energy. But sitting around, poring over city maps, let the fatigue settle again, and start to take hold.
“They should have made contact by now,” Morgan said. Phillip had relinquished his desk to him, and he was clicking away at a laptop, frowning, nudging his glasses up again and again with frustrated movements. “If you take a hostage, then you call to negotiate terms. That’s just how it works.”
The landline on the desk rang.
They traded startled looks.
Phillip finally stepped forward and pressed the speakerphone button. “Baskerville Hall,” he greeted.
“Who am I speaking with?” a man’s voice asked. Smooth, cool. Abe, Morgan, and Devin all snapped to attention. Morgan nodded. This was Morris, then.
“Phillip Calloway. Where’s my sister?”
A low chuckle. Tight, forced. Someone dialed all the way up but trying to pretend indifference and composure. “She’s all in one piece, I assure you. Tell your father and the other two that we have their friends. If you bring those three to me, you can have your sister back, and all of this stops.”
Phil’s throat jumped as he swallowed. “I want a guarantee. Proof of life.”
A sigh. A rustle. A quick breath. “Phil?” Shaky, and tinny, but Cassandra’s voice, for sure.
Tommy turned away from the window, mouth open.
Fox curled his hands into fists in his lap.
Devin stood up. Expressionless, but his lean body drawn taut as a guy wire.
“Hi, sweetheart.” Something in Phil’s expression broke. He wiped it away with his hand, stony afterward. “You okay?”
She took another shaky breath. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay.” Quieter, “You don’t have to do what they say. I don’t–”
Another rustle, and then Morris on the line again. “As I said: all in one piece. Bring your father and the others to the Pseudonym building at five p.m. Fifteenth floor. Come unarmed.”
The line went dead.
“We have twelve hours,” Phillip said, lifting his head, looking at all of them in turn. “To plan a counterattack, to figure out how to get Cass back, and to stop these assholes, once and for all.”
“No,” Devin said, and for the first time since all of this had started, he looked dead serious. No more grins, or jibes, or indolent shrugs. He vibrated with tension. “I’ll go. We’ll go. Let’s just get this over with.”
Fox sighed. “No, you dumbass. We haven’t turned you over yet. Might as well not cave now.”
“But what are we gonna do?” Tommy asked.
A knock sounded at the door, and a prospect poked his head inside. “Boys,” he said, gaze darting around the room, no doubt taking in their somber faces. “We’ve got guests.”
“Jesus, the cops,” Tommy muttered.
“No,” the prospect corrected. “Guests from America.”
Fox shot up out of his chair
and was the first out the door, nearly mowing down the prospect as he went. He was jogging by the time he reached the final landing, swung around the post and trotted down into the pub, all closed up for the morning, chairs up on the tables, another prospect mopping. It had been a bad, chaotic scene earlier, when Fox had stabbed a man through the hand in front of paying customers.
It was quiet now, or mostly so.
A knot of men stood in the center of the floor. Fox recognized his brothers: Walsh and Shane, shrugging out of coats. A tall, lean, sharply dressed fellow with long auburn hair, and a thickset man in black standing just behind him, clearly a bodyguard. Ian Byron, Fox realized with a jolt.
Dressed in black, his hair a too-long pale shock, gaze flitting around the room with the detachment of a predator: Ghost’s little robot assassin. Reese.
And then a figure that towered over the others. A black beanie pulled down over his ears, long dark hair spilling down his back.
Mercy Lécuyer threw his arms wide and smiled even wider. “Hi, honey, we’re home!”
Thirty
Pain woke him. Albie swam up out of the dark and cracked his eye – only one would work – to bright lights, and even brighter pain, his body pulsing with it. His vision was poor, but he could tell the ceiling from the floor, from the walls, from the IV stand beside his bed…and the golden-haired woman sitting next to him.
He blinked, slowly and badly. Tried to peel his lips apart and work some moisture into his mouth.
“Oh,” the woman said, and through the fuzz of his receding drug haze, he thought she sounded surprised. Familiar, too. “You’re awake. God, hold on. Do you need some water? Or the doctor. I should page the doctor. They said to let them know when the morphine wore off…” She stood up and leaned over the bed, close enough that her face came into focus – for the most part.
It was Axelle.
The haze receded a little more.
He took a breath and forced it back out through his mouth. An attempt at speaking that was really more of a sigh.
Prodigal Son (Lean Dogs Legacy Book 3) Page 25
