In the corner of my eye, I spot Dom on his phone and less than a minute later, Warden Jolly and her SWAT team are inside breaking it all up. Bright lights blind from overhead as I assess the damage we caused to one another. Martinez is nowhere to be found.
Moses gets up and offers his hand. I take it as I look at his face and recall the picture of Iris’ best friend in high school, Peyton Hollister. He smirks as the light illuminates the truth in my darkness.
“… Robbery, really?”
He shrugs, pulling me closer. “It was the best thing we could come up with.”
Moses Hollister isn’t a convicted felon, but an Iris implemented strategy. I haven’t ever been alone in my cage, and I never will be.
Someone always watches over me.
45
The Stinger of a Sliver
In Ronnie’s office the next morning, I quiz Moses about what he knows. Most of the facts he fed me were lies, except for the wife and kid. He joined the military at seventeen, had an injury by twenty-one, and was promptly picked up by the Lotus loss prevention team. He has a house in San Francisco, which explained Iris’ bizarre stop. She was visiting with his wife, Riley, and their baby boy, Justice.
I should mention his wife is as white as they come. With her pale skin, she is blonde-haired and blue-eyed. Justice is beyond precious with a curly mop of hair and bright hazel eyes. He showed them off to me via Ronnie’s phone on social media.
He’s known Iris forever.
I was a favor.
Remind me to blister her ass for this one.
“If I had told you the truth, you wouldn’t have hit me like you did,” he says, pressing the ice pack to his cheek. “And you can’t say you would’ve because we both know what emotional ties do.”
They can make you; they can break you.
“What are you doing now?”
“Staying in here and watching your ass until you leave.”
Rubbing my sore hands, I ask, “So what’s the deal with the Lotus franchises?”
“It’s not as dissolved as everyone thinks. These aren’t independents. Everyone is working with a clear goal in mind.”
“How many are there?”
Dropping the ice pack, he says, “You really want to know that?”
Trying to crack my knuckles, I nod.
“We’re close to fifteen thousand members and about forty-five charters. Most of the growth has been in the last five years. People are tired of the runaround, the blackmail, and paying for security that doesn’t work.”
“… Small town?”
“Sleepers with a high Asian/mixed pop.”
“How the fuck does a big black guy end up working for Lotus?”
“Easy,” he says with a wide smile. “I impressed the hell out of Keishi with my martial arts. I paid my respects, followed his lead, and studied my ass off.”
“Shoes off and incense burning?”
He cackles. “Something to like that, yeah… Why are you applying for a job?”
“Ya,” I cockily reply, rocking in Ronnie’s chair. “I want his blessing to marry the future Lotus Queen.”
“Then I suggest you get to work because arrogant daego won’t fly with The Chairman,” he says with a wink. “Embrace the past, find your inner cool.”
“You make it sound so damned easy.”
“Look, I’ve been to his house for dinner many times. I’ve seen pictures of Luca Raniero. You can pull off classic old gangster, but you’ll have to make those Fisheries look a helluva lot more appealing than they do. Right now, you are a downgrade from where Iris is.”
“Don’t remind me,” I complain, stretching. “I’m a fucking street thug looking to date the damn princess.”
He tilts his head with an accepting nod as I toss a pencil at him. He laughs. “What? You know it, so fix it.”
“The isn’t just an uphill battle; this is scouring over a jagged, steep mountain set on trying to kill me.”
He twirls the pencil back to me, and I catch it between my fingers. “You can do this, Raniero.”
“I swear to fuck you are the most popular prisoner we’ve ever held,” Ronnie whines as the door swings open. “God dang, your eye looks terrible, Sal.”
“Didn’t take long for Dom to show up.”
Her eyes teeter back and forth. “If your visitor is a man, I need some damn glasses.”
I furrow my brow as I do a quick account of where all my girls are. “Who the hell is it?”
“I don’t know, but she’s dolled up like a pin-up from 1955.”
Rushing to the grief—which may as well be welcome back from the dead—room, I take a deep breath. I haven’t seen my cherry girl in almost five years.
A lot has happened.
“Bertrand Miles Jameson,” I mutter, taking in the sight of red leather pumps, gray pencil skirt, and white blouse. Her dark black hair curls past her shoulders as she swings around to face me.
“Lucas Salvatore Raniero,” she softly whispers. “Lucy…”
I close my eyes and growl, “Kitten.” She runs to my arms, and I hold her close as I inhale her scent. My eyes threatened to spill. At one time, she was the drug I could never get enough of. “You’re supposed to be dead.”
“With Javier Diaz’s death, we decided it was time for the dead to walk again,” she says as I refuse to let go. I hold her hand as we walk to the sofa, past the newish coffee table, and we sit. “I’m very sorry about everything that happened, and I know you may not forgive me. I had no choice in the matter. Kaci said we needed to put me into hiding because of Pharm and his supplier…”
“Boudreaux?”
“Yes,” she says, intently staring at me. “They were coming for me.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about Entropy?”
“You didn’t have clearance at the time,” she points out. “You were just a boy running away from the past, but you…” she whispers, running her fingers along my jawline. “You are a man now. My God, you’ve changed.” Her eyes skim over my body and the ink everywhere.
“Why are you here?”
“Because I wanted to see you before I left.”
“Are you still working for Sibyl?”
With a discouraged expression, she replies, “I don’t have much choice. I don’t have a family like you or Iris do. I can’t just leave.”
“You know her…”
“I do,” she says, smiling. “And she’s beautiful, so perfect for you.” I’m not sure I believe a word out of Bertie’s mouth. For all I know, she may be working me. “I didn’t come here to cause you any trouble.”
It may be too late for that.
“Where have you been all these years?”
“Staying low in Europe and quietly doing research for Madeline Grace,” she says, glancing down. Madeline Grace was my first trainer at Sibyl and half-sister to Priscilla Grace, aka Jaid.
Mad knew.
God, I’m an idiot.
Her pristine doll-like features are ever present. “I spent a bit of time in Asia having surgery.” Well, now that we got that out of the way, Bertrand is strangely less appealing.
Go figure.
“That’s awesome!” I proudly say because—what do you say when the girl you loved who had a hard stick suddenly has a wet shell?—there is no training manual for this, so I go with respect—because it always works.
The whole situation feels off to me like I’m supposed to be in some sort of lust/love with this girl from my past. If Bertie expects a grand reunion, she’ll be sadly mistaken. My heart is taken by one. And there is no vacancy. No matter what she offers, there is no comparison. I’m happy she is whole, but I don’t want Bertrand Miles Jameson.
I have a girlfriend.
Her name is Iris.
“I didn’t come here to talk about me, Sal.” Her voice turns grave, slightly deeper. “I came here to tell you my brother is off the rails and you need to watch yourself, your girl, and all you love. He’s set on destroying you.”
> Wait. What?
I’m not chummy with Mitch, but this news is coming way out of left field.
“We’re both agents with Sibyl. I don’t understand what the problem is.”
“The problem is he is heinously jealous of you and has been since your training. He was in the infirmary with you. Mitch had just been shot in Mexico, but before then, he was supposed to be the one they put all their efforts in. You changed those plans and his life. His hatred of you and everyone connected to you is so real. He won’t stop.”
“How do you know all of this?”
Her smile rises on her cheeks as she whispers, “Kaci told me.”
“Fuck…” I don’t need anything else. Kaci wouldn’t have lied about this. She’d manipulate me into doing all kinds of stupid shit, but she would never have told Bertie this if it wasn’t the truth.
“When?”
“Right after you were married,” Bertie recalls as the tears form in her eyes. Losing Kaci still hurts—I understand. “She called me in Norway.”
“… You were in Norway?”
“I was working at Tai Kim’s and Marshall Hope’s bar,” she says, licking her lips and pressing them together. “That’s where I met Astrid and fell in love.” She lifts her hand to show off the ring, and if that wasn’t enough, she flips open her phone to show me the pictures of her dolled up like a pin-up girl in the lap of the turquoise haired punk. “We’ve been married since 2013. We have a daughter, Sabrina.”
Holy fuck…what?
Her motivations have zero to do with my unpierced beast, and that changes everything. “I thought,” I mumble, embarrassed and dropping my head in my hands. “Oh, my God, I’m such a dipshit…”
“You thought I was coming here to rekindle what we once had, but nothing could be further from the truth. What we shared years ago is special to me, Sal,” she consoles, almost with a maternal comfort. “But I don’t want to go back there. I don’t think you do, either. You’re far too pretty for my tastes.” I think I’m offended, but I slyly smirk. “I can’t sit idly by and watch my brother destroy you, I love and respect you too much to let that happen.”
“Who called to tell you Javier Diaz had been killed?”
“I found out from Madeline,” she says. I have no reason not to believe her, but I’m suspicious. I’m wary of everyone now, though. Her intel is too pertinent to not look into. “I called Dale, and we arranged for me to come to Texas. I don’t want to disrupt anyone.”
“You are one of the former eight in Entropy.”
“I am,” she confirms Violet’s intel. “And there have been rumors that they are working to eliminate us one by one.”
“There were only two males,” I state, testing her reaction. “Your brother Mitch and Gabe Herrera.”
“Yes,” she assures as I’m captivated by her features. Her long lashes and gorgeous lips are the things young men dream of, and even though we are not fit for one another, she remains even more stunning than she was years ago. “Both men have used their training for malice. Mitch is set on destroying you, and Gabe returned to the cartel.”
I’m seriously concerned about Gabe Herrera and Immortal. I don’t know nearly enough about them to form an accurate profile, and I’m deeply bothered by that. I feel lacking, and unfortunately, I don’t have the resources in my current situation to change it. My hands are tied.
“Janna was murdered,” she whispers.
Ya, by my boy Nico.
I didn’t order it; Sibyl did.
Execute the enforcers.
Janna Hahn was a young Bulgarian agent. She knew the whereabouts of Diablo Cruz, and she was also the reason Serene picked me for CAE v2.0. They had already weaseled their way into Nico’s mind, and he killed Janna. And in Nico’s deal with Serene, he secured Ainsley’s hiding at H2 and Iris’ future safety—which is why Kaci programmed my stalking of Iris.
“Save Iris…keep Iris…watch over Iris…don’t let anything happen to Iris…”
I didn’t know a damn thing at the time, but my life was predetermined.
Iris Nakamura would be guarded by Sal Raniero.
The Lotus Queen protected by the Dark Mafia Prince.
The venomous eight were all just pawns on their board. Numbers, not names. Skills, not talents. They were the first round of human computers Sibyl constructed, where they focused predominantly on academic and mental skills. The eight were brilliant, but there were flaws in their ability to handle physical duress. Jaid and Mitch were the exceptions, but they had a genetic predisposition to athleticism on their side.
I was the second generation, cognitive architecture experiment—CAE v2.0, built to be a killer with equal parts mind and muscle. To my knowledge, I am the only one. I wasn’t sure I was buying into the theory of being the lone wolf, but I doubt Sibyl had the means to build eight like me. I was born with a photographic memory, a diabolic manifesto, and a ruthless focus. I didn’t ask for these things, but they came organically, in the DNA.
I take a shot in the dark. “Are you familiar with the Julie Kildare case?”
Her eyes shutter close as unbelievable pain forms on her face. “I heard about it, and I know the case went cold.”
“It was one of my first.”
“They never located her remains, did they?”
“Nothing.”
There was nobody.
I sit and stare at Bertrand; she didn’t have a body, either.
It’s not unusual, people die every day, and their remains are never located. Trails run cold. People go silent. Corpses are left in remote locations; the elements and environment take care of the rest.
And we can’t know what we don’t know—it sounds pessimistic, but it’s also the truth. We aren’t mind readers. We’re scouts, hiking through the remnants and debris, only to find bits and pieces. The goal is to reconstruct the scattered fragments.
Thankfully, I’m good at puzzles.
Sometimes, a case gets under my skin like a splinter, oozing with an infection, only to heal and scar over. The splinter stays in the flesh until something comes along and reignites the wound.
Julie Kildare is my splinter.
“You know if I can do anything for you,” she volunteers, touching my hand. I recognize the sparks between us, but they’re nothing compared to the fireworks I have with Iris. But I don’t think she’s crossing the line, and I think’ she’s genuine. “I’ll be happy to help you.”
“Where are you living?”
“Astrid and I moved to Germany last year.”
“Madeline’s probably keeping you busy.”
“Always,” she says. “She’s been cracking the bigger trafficking rings, and I’ve been connecting the dots to the Middle East, South America, and Asia. The overlaps are infinite.”
And my father feeds the beast.
“Thank you for coming to see me, Kitten.”
Her red lips form a smile, touching my heart. We cannot rewind the past. All we can do is move forward and try to do better.
Standing, she gently says, “You’re welcome, Lucy.” With a raise of the white flag, she asks, “Friends?”
I reach to hug her. I never thought I’d have this opportunity to hold her in my arms again. “Yes.” We walk towards the door, and I pivot back to ask, “What was happening with the Pharm case?”
“Cassidy Hope was keeping Boudreaux protected using Cinco.”
I dare say, “Is she in bed with everyone?”
“She was with me,” Bertie volunteers with a wink. “But Cas was my case. She told me everything. That’s why Kaci felt the need to hide me. Cas paid Javier Diaz a lot of money to kill me. I was the Honey Bee; Cas was The Beekeeper.”
46
116G7027F472L71869
The next day, the entire unit is preparing to go to the award ceremony for Deputy Malcolm Martinez for his heroic acts in saving Dr. Gigi Swank. Several influential people will be in attendance, including Lily Miller-Armstrong. I’m hoping she sees me and we can connect in
the crowd.
I need the fuck out of here.
I’m taking a piss in the main bathroom when Handcock walks in. Despite not being done, I stop midstream and tuck my dick away. I curl into the wall, hoping to go unnoticed. I’m lost in the file, not understanding how these two children—Timothy Handcock and Megan Folly, biologically from the same parents—can be so different.
Handcock is a monster; Megan could be a centerfold.
That’s not my perving but a fact.
I consider my own familial relations to the four witches, also known as my four older sisters, and how, despite our philosophical differences, we still look similar. There are distinctions, though. I don’t have the robust Roman nose of my father that my sisters do. I favor the Veramonte side more than the Raniero; the sisters are the opposite.
Moses tells me to tap into my inner Luca Raniero, but I’m not sure I can do that. Anna is right—our mannerisms are much the same, and we both look Italian, but in the pictures on the boat with Old Poppa, I’m the black sheep. The misfit. The odd duck.
I move from the urinal to wash my hands when Handcock comes out of the toilet stall. The whole place reeks of his stench, a thick-smelling, sour, putrid odor. He doesn’t wash his hands but lags in the opening with a big step. The inmates are on edge already, and Handcock’s presence isn’t helping. I turn around, thinking he’s finally gone when he backpedals a few steps.
“Raniero,” he gruffs, pointing at me. “I’m coming for your pretty ass.”
You think.
I want to say something, but I hold back. The last thing anyone needs is the added stress from a skirmish. Most of the guys in here are quiet and reasonably well-behaved, just looking to serve their time in peace. The Handcocks are rare, and that is a good thing.
Famous Last Words (a Tomb of Ashen Tears Book 2) Page 37
