Unchained

by Roze, Robyn

  This time, he would not fail.

  He had been shrewd, patient. In the intervening years since that explosive, prophetic night, he honed his skills and sharpened his focus. All the long while, he laid the vital groundwork that had developed the associations needed to build a robust, covert, and widespread network. A tight web of trusted alliances that would ensure he withstood the blowback from toppling a man like Graham Dixon. Not to mention, the privileged, arrogant scum anchored and indulging their perversions onboard the Dream Catcher tonight.

  Since that final botched attempt, when Dixon had tried to bury him under an avalanche of rubble, no one had pulled Sean’s strings again. He was the puppet master now. The smug motherfucker planted across the table would soon learn that.

  As Dixon’s own version of past and current events hardened in apparent calculation across his face, a balance of resolution and acceptance seemed to descend over him, like a bitter pill swallowed.

  “The bad blood between us runs deep; I know my part in it,” Dixon grudgingly conceded. “I’m willing to forget everything that’s happened, though, even sweeten the deal on the table. Call a truce.” He picked up the sheet of paper and scanned it again, teeth clamped down on his lower lip. “I’ll pay an additional fifteen percent on the total when the heat’s off me and this shitstorm is over.”

  Sean remained still, unimpressed, while privately reveling in the bastard’s debasement. For the senator, the mere fact that he believed he was paying substantial sums to a man he hated, plus capitulating further with a generous bonus, had to feel like begging.

  For now, at least.

  “Paying extra doesn’t give you a say in how this goes down. We’re not partners.”

  Dixon chewed on the strong statement; overt cynicism notched on his face. “And yet, here you are, just like the old days. Taking my,” Dixon dragged out the words as if searching for the next, “what did you call it back then? Filthy, rotten money, wasn’t it?”

  No response from Sean. Apathy cloaked him.

  “Looks like someone’s had a case of moral relativity.” Dixon looked pleased with his guess. “You must be in over your head on something. Gambling debts? A lifestyle you can’t afford?” He waved it off. “Doesn’t matter. It means it’s the reason for this fucking shakedown of yours. It means you speak the universal language. It means you’re no better than the rest of us.” His lip twitched with the strident remark.

  When Sean lifted from his chair to leave, Dixon adopted the air and tone of a peacemaker. “But when this situation is over, we can go our separate ways, hatchets buried—for good. No contact of any kind, ever again.”

  Back in his seat, Sean’s head tilted to one side, open skepticism on his face.

  “Ever. Again,” Dixon repeated with more conviction.

  While pretending to consider Dix’s offer, the ready signal he had been waiting for from Mick murmured in his concealed earpiece. That meant two things: he had cleared the path out of MBS and, using a counter-surveillance device, swept and eliminated any eavesdroppers Dix may have planted in the vicinity.

  Sean scanned the area with a professional’s eye, assessing bar patrons and passersby alike, as he had been throughout the evening. Fresh faces had trickled in and out at a steady pace, some preoccupied in rowdy discussions with companions, others engrossed with apps on their phones; some had even managed both simultaneously. The takeaway: no one stood out as a potential threat. Even with that, he had been sitting in this spot longer than he would have liked. Mick’s green light had been timely. Sean nudged up his sleeve cuff to check the time before fixing his indifferent gaze back on Dixon.

  “Well,” Dixon asked, annoyance mixed with nervousness. “Do we have a deal?”

  “After you hand over your cell,” Sean demanded, his fingers drumming, unhurried, on the table, “and the wire and tracking device you’re wearing.”

  Dixon stilled. “Now you just wait—”

  Sean cut him off. “Anybody listening or following is a weak link who can be squeezed later to track you down. I know you thought you could make this go your way, that you’d hand me over to the Morales goons to save your own ass. That just doesn’t work for me. And it’s not even your biggest problem.”

  Pensive seconds passed as the senator focused on his opponent. “I’ll make the call first, and then—”

  “No.” Sean interrupted. “I have the phone you’ll use.” He pulled out a burner and slid it across the table to Dixon. “The choice is yours, senator. You can leave with me. Or without me.”

  Dixon looked perplexed and wary, like jittery prey scenting a predator. “Why would I leave with you?”

  “Have you not been paying attention? You’re already on a countdown clock. There’s no going back for you. Unless you’ve grown a conscience and want to come clean, pay your debts to society and all that.” He let it sink deep for a second or two. “Otherwise, we’re doing this my way. That means you leave now. With me. Period.”

  Dixon’s troubled gaze skimmed the surrounding area, glowering with the burden of undesirable options and, no doubt, scheming a way to get his money back and turn this all around to his advantage at some point along the way.

  “Then we’ll have a deal?” he asked, turning his resentful attention back to Sean.

  Folding his arms and resting his elbows on the table, Sean leaned forward. “After I’ve confirmed the transfers, and you’re relocated, with my bonus in the bank,” he waited a second, then repeated the senator’s earlier inducement, “we will never have contact of any kind. Ever again.”

  Chapter 25

  Deposits confirmed, Sean tucked his phone into his jacket pocket. “Let’s go,” he said, rising from the table, the tab and tip already covered.

  “Where’re we going?” Dixon asked, sounding frustrated as he scrambled out of his seat to keep pace with Sean’s decisive stride.

  Undaunted by the question, Sean crossed the stretch to the stairwell and treaded down steps obscured from view behind the restaurant’s wine cellar showcase. Stepping through the opening at the bottom of the stairs, he kept to the perimeter of Caffé B’s soft-lit dining area, going unnoticed in the chic restaurant, its patrons immersed in conversations and cuisine.

  Pushing through the kitchen service door, Sean chucked the senator’s confiscated spy gear into a heap of dirty dishes jumbled in a bus tub. Mick’s earlier signal indicating he had already neutralized the immediate threat did not negate the need for extreme caution. The tiny surveillance devices would soon swirl down a drain.

  “Where are we going?” Dixon repeated, shouting above the din of commercial dishwashing machines and the earsplitting crash of utensils dumped into stainless steel sinks.

  Sean pivoted so fast Dixon almost slammed into him.

  “You’re on a need-to-know basis. Right now, you don’t need to know.” Sean’s stony expression brokered no room for dispute.

  Dixon backed down.

  Back on course and cutting a path through bustling kitchen staff and around busy prep tables, Sean exited through the delivery door into a wide concrete service tunnel. A quick scan of the area promised a clear route. He marched ahead under the glare of overhead lights, passing wheeled trash bins and carts with inventory to unload. Reaching the second freight elevator, he pressed the call button and ripped away the crisscross of striped yellow and black warning tape Mick had tagged it with earlier.

  The sound of faltering footsteps behind Sean and the reflection in the wide-angle security mirror above showed Dixon’s reluctance to follow. However, when the doors slid open, Sean entered without a word or a glance at the senator. Hardball. He was in no mood to pacify the senator.

  Before the doors closed, Dixon’s foot set them ajar. He reached inside to hold down the open button. “I need to know, right now, where the fuck we’re going.”

  Standing tall, arms locked across his chest, Sean’s expression remained intractable. “I’ve yanked you out of toug
h spots before; this is hardly a first.”

  Mouth shut tight, doors open wide, Dixon did not counter Sean’s persuasive reference to their dicey history. It was critical to remind him of the old days, make him believe tonight was no different from those dangerous times. Because the recollection of those former successes would keep the gun Dixon always carried holstered, his false sense of security grounding him. Patting him down, demanding he hand over the piece, would trigger alarm bells and send the operation south. Sean also knew Dixon would try to figure out how to get this speeding train to slow down enough that he could jump off with as little risk to himself as possible.

  “I wasn’t expecting this to happen so fast. I need a day or two to get my affairs in order, contact my wife, business associates, let them know I’ll be inaccessible for a while…” The harmless sounding explanation died away with the call for accommodation.

  “You don’t have an hour or two to waste, let alone a day or two. You can’t even return to Tan’s house of horrors, remember?” Sean patted the phone in his pocket with the disturbing video on it. “The heli you have waiting to take you to your boat—the one anchored near the Dream Catcher—isn’t your ticket out of the danger zone, either. You, and the intel you’ve relied on, have been breached.”

  Dixon’s hand fell away from the button, arm slack at his side. He looked stunned.

  “While you’re on your way off this island—scot-free, thanks to me—all those sick fucks on the Dream Catcher will be the ones chained and dragged away.” Sean paused. “Tonight.”

  Stiff with visible shock, the senator staggered inside before the doors sandwiched him.

  “Seems you and your friends caught the attention of an international sting operation. Lucky for you, the transfers you made upstairs have already set the gears in motion that will give you cover and get you out of here under the radar. You either disappear while this plays out, or you get off this elevator and go down in flames with the rest of them. It’s now or never. Not later.”

  Dixon seemed stymied, winded. Then his face darkened. “You couldn’t have come to me with this information days ago?” His tone was accusatory, hot anger doused with the chill of raw fear.

  “I didn’t have to tell you at all.”

  His clammy pallor said it all. The senator looked like a man who just glimpsed his own gravestone.

  Sean glanced at his watch, then let out a bored sigh. “In or out, senator. I don’t give a damn either way. I’ve already got your money.”

  “How the hell are you pulling this off?” he asked, stepping away from the control panel.

  Taking the move as an affirmative response, Sean pushed a button, and the car jerked up, lifting them nearer to the loading dock.

  “My power. My influence.”

  The senator’s Adam’s apple bobbed, and he backed up a step, his earlier snub of that assertion now seeming to register as a miscalculation.

  When the elevator chimed and the doors opened, Sean bumped past him without a word, tearing off the warning tape left by Mick, and not bothering to look back. The senator would cooperate. He had been systematically defused, his world spectacularly upended.

  Mick’s voice rumbled in his earpiece. “What’s your status?”

  Mic open, he responded, “Headed your way.”

  “Step it up, chief. Company’s comin’. I’ll entertain ‘em as long as I can.”

  Car door open, Sean aimed a finger inside the sports coupe moved for him from the Harbour Ville Hotel to where he now stood on the Bayfront Link. “Get in the back and stay down.” He glanced past Dixon and down the street where Mick stood, talking, hands waving through the air. He had the two night shift guards distracted near the loading dock entrance with, no doubt, some ridiculous story. Raucous laughter broke out among the three men. Leave it to Mick.

  “I’ll ride shotgun,” Dixon said, disdain ringing in his voice.

  Sean continued to hold the front seat forward, his focus returning to the piece of shit standing in front of him. “Shotgun’s covered. Get in the back.”

  Dixon’s eyes darted warily around the cramped space.

  “It’s the back seat, or the trunk,” Sean warned. His vote was the trunk—tied and gagged. But the back seat would do, confining his movement and restricting his ability to exit the car.

  Grumbling under his breath, Dixon crouched down and squeezed into the narrow space, sliding down just out of view. “How the fuck long am I going to be sardined back here?”

  Sean dropped down in the driver’s seat without answering, shoving the back of it hard against Dix’s shoulder. Surveying the landscape in the rearview mirror, he spotted Mick walking in the opposite direction of the security duo he had sidetracked, the ploy having allowed Sean and Dixon time to exit unnoticed from the restricted zone.

  The guards stopped and checked the access door to the loading dock; they would find it secure. Sean had removed the shim Mick had wedged in it earlier to keep it cracked open. The chatting pair continued along their route to the south carpark and then stepped inside to inspect the first level. That’s when Sean pressed the ignition button and the engine roared to life. Mick glanced back over his shoulder at the distinct rumble of high-octane power.

  “I’m headed your way,” Sean said into his mic. He shifted into reverse, meeting Mick midway. When he climbed inside, Sean accelerated out and onto Bayfront Avenue.

  “Who’s this?” Dixon griped from the back.

  Mick’s head whipped around, his animosity transparent. Any enemy of Sean’s was an enemy of Mick’s. His old friend had always been loyal that way.

  “What the fuck do you care? I’m helping save your sorry ass. That’s all you need to know.”

  “I’m paying your salary, mother—”

  Sean interrupted. “I’m paying his salary, so shut the fuck up.”

  Mick smirked at Dixon, then shifted his focus to the front, neon cityscape rising fast up ahead then flying by in a colorful, blurry streak at the sides.

  Phone at his ear, Sean alerted the listener. “ETA in fifteen.” Then he discarded the cell in an open compartment on the center console and upshifted.

  Dixon shouldered hard against the back of Sean’s seat. “Where are we going?”

  “Private airstrip.”

  “Heli?” Dixon asked.

  “G6.”

  “That’s more like it,” Dixon said, swearing as he pushed around in the back for any extra bit of space.

  “Great. G6,” Mick complained, shaking his head. “Now that shitty song’s gonna be in my head all damn night.”

  Sean snorted, a grin on his face at Mick’s knack for interjecting the mundane into any circumstance, even the dangerous ones.

  Weaving in and out of traffic on the highway, there were no signs of a tail in the rearview, only the lure of freedom and redemption up ahead.

  And justice.

  The donors who bankrolled the early legs of the mission expected the dragnet at sea to haul in the rotten catch of powerful, depraved men. There had been no reason to inform them of his alternate plan for the senator. They only needed to believe their contributions were used for a just cause; their morals intact, the dirty details left to his discretion. After all, his backers were paying for plausible deniability in the worst-case scenario. Anonymity was the preferred outcome.

  Watching the show from their high-priced, elite seats, they, along with the world, would follow the exhaustive news reporting set to unfold over the coming days, weeks, and months. A salacious story of human trafficking: privileged men, corrupt power, and the manhunt for a fugitive—a once high-ranking, decorated marine officer, and former senator. The frenzied twenty-four-hour news cycle would gorge on the shocking narrative, always hungry for more chum.

  A cunning man, Sean imagined the story would go, who had somehow evaded the roundup, warned by someone of his imminent fall from grace. His transfers of large sums of money to untraceable accounts—only hou
rs before disappearing—would prove his back channel connections. Inevitable rumors and alleged sightings would spur the fictional accounts of his escape into the foreseeable future.

  Would the reporting about Dixon’s miraculous getaway cause mistrust among Sean’s sponsors? Grumblings of a double deal? Maybe.

  As always, though, he planned for every possibility. There would be no obtainable evidence for any of those suspicions. No CCTV footage of them on the waterfront, or internal security video of them at Caffé B, earlier—those damning images wiped clean. No audio recording of their conversation at the bar, thanks to Mick. The rest of Dix’s hired hands? Well, they would have their own reasons for keeping quiet while they scrambled for cover to save their own asses.

  Sean felt confident any doubts the mission’s financiers might entertain would soon fade away. Dixon’s life would be in ruins. Captured or not, he could never resume the perks or prestige of his old life. Even with his ‘escape’, the operation’s outcome would still be an undeniable, overwhelming success. Most important of all, the backers’ hands would be clean, no trail leading to them or their financial contributions.

  Sean would finally get what he had been working for, chasing after, for so long.

  Rightful retribution for the man who had poisoned his soul.

  Chapter 26

  Patience and preparation. Vengeance and atonement. Judgment and punishment.

  Past and present collapsed into this one moment for Sean as he sat across from Dixon, watching him struggle to regain consciousness from the knockout blow he had taken earlier to the back of the head.

  The past could never be erased. But the future would hold one less reminder of it.

  Long-awaited justice would finally be served.