"Your job is to do what I tell you," Cian replied at the same time he gave poor Jimmy a quick smile.
"If Liam were around he’d never allow this," Jimmy reminded him in a fierce whisper.
Cian’s heart tightened. But Liam wasn’t around, and that was how Cian had wanted it. It was best for Liam. That’s what mattered.
"If I ever see him again, I won’t rat you out," Cian murmured. "You know what to do if anything happens to me—" He gave Jimmy a hard look.
"Yes, Sir."
Cian nodded and Jimmy melted away into the darkness, only the soft sound of the car door opening then closing revealing his location.
Taking a deep breath, Cian strode toward the small human-sized door in the side of the hangar. The dark hung around the place like a weight—heavy, damp, oppressive. He did as he’d been instructed and knocked twice. The door swung open, not because it had been opened but because it wasn’t latched and the impact of his knuckles dislodged it.
He reached into the holster beneath his left arm and drew his gun. With it held at the ready, he pushed the door open, revealing nothing but darkness. As he took a step forward, a desk lamp flickered to life in the recesses of the room. Cian stiffened, but saw that it revealed nothing but a laptop sitting alone on an old metal desk.
Cian’s desperation to find Lila had made him take risks he wouldn’t normally, but he was also no fool. If he were killed there would be no one to save her, and that was an outcome he wasn’t going to risk if he could help it. He reached into his back pocket and extracted a cell phone, tapping the screen to engage the flashlight app.
He shone it around the room, illuminating nothing but empty, dirty office space. Shutting the door behind himself, he walked to the computer, noticing the motion detection attached to the desk lamp.
"So, you don’t have the guts to actually face me," he muttered. Then he shone the flashlight into all the corners of the room’s ceiling, finding no cameras. On the keyboard of the laptop was a sticky note. Press play it read. He looked at the camera on the lid of the laptop and pointed his middle finger at it before folding the sticky note over it so it couldn’t record him.
He pressed the play button and the laptop sparked to life. An image of Lila filled the screen and he couldn’t stop the sharp intake of breath that overtook him as his eyes roamed over the slightly grainy black and white image. Her hair was in knots, hanging in a thick sheet around her delicate face. Her body was even thinner than normal, swathed in an oversized white t-shirt, covered in dirty smudges. A pair of black track pants hung low on her slender hips.
He watched as she stood from a narrow dirty mattress and began pacing the tiny concrete room, her lips moving as she spoke—to someone? Herself? He had no idea.
If Cian had been a different man, he would have forgotten that while he’d kept the laptop from seeing him, it might still be recording his voice. But he wasn’t a different man. He was an experienced mob boss, and he wasn’t about to let this sadistic bastard view or hear his reactions when he saw Lila imprisoned.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck!" he mouthed silently in the tiny, empty room not so unlike the one Lila was inhabiting. His fists clenched and he squeezed his eyes shut briefly to get control of his emotions.
On-screen, her lithe body paced the room faster and faster, her lips moving frantically. He felt his chest clutch with a sharp pain and he worked to breathe quietly. He opened them again, watching her jerky movements, the very un-Lila-like way she held her body. Then he noticed that she favored her left side, stopping every so often to lift her foot from the floor and circle her ankle as if it hurt.
Ice flowed through his veins. He was going to peel the skin from Michael Riley’s body before he killed him. Cian had never wanted to do damage to another human being the way he did to this sick bastard.
"I hope you’re enjoying the show." The voice with its strong Irish accent came from the speakers of the laptop. "She’s been a bit of an ungrateful guest, but I’m an accommodating host so I’m patient with her."
Cian stood in front of the laptop, legs shoulder-width apart, arms crossed. Riley couldn’t see him, but Cian knew enough to take a stance of power for himself as much as for his audience. "You think I won’t find you?" Cian answered.
"I think if you could, you would have by now," Riley responded. On-screen, Lila had stopped her pacing, her head buried in her hands as she faced the tiny bed. Cian swallowed, trying not to let the emotions he felt bleed into his voice.
"I’m closer every day," he told the monster who held the love of his life. Because yes, Cian had come to realize since the night she’d been taken that he would never love anyone the way he loved Lila Rodriguez. He’d never once dreamed that true love could grow in a heart as blackened as his, but she’d planted it, and it had grown, like a rose bush, covered simultaneously in perfect blossoms and deadly thorns.
Riley chuckled. "Oh, son. It would be better for you if you weren’t. Because the next time we see one another I’m going to put a bullet through your head and then I’m going to do all the things to your pretty girlfriend that I’ve been planning since she got here."
Burning rage surged through Cian, causing his blood to go from solid ice to boiling lava in a millisecond. In spite of his best efforts, a small sound of anguish escaped his throat.
"What was that?" Riley asked with a chuckle. "Did you say something?"
"What are you after, you sick fuck?" Cian snarled.
"It’s very simple, really. I want it all."
Cian’s gaze narrowed. "All what?"
"The business, of course. I know your Da is done for. You can’t keep him on life support forever. When you pull that plug you won’t have his reputation to back you anymore. There will be a power vacuum and I’m going to fill it. I’m going to be the new boss of Chicago. That’s what I want."
The irony was that Cian would have been happy to let Riley have it all—the business, the organization, the headaches. But Riley would never believe that, and the result would be the same—Lila dead and Cian in custody or on the run. Riley was a psychopath and he would only keep Lila alive as long as he could use her to toy with Cian. Cian knew this as clearly as he knew Lila would do whatever she could to outsmart her captor or outlast him.
Cian paused to watch as Lila shook off whatever she’d been struggling with while she stood in front of her bed. Then she began doing jumping jacks in the center of the room, her face a study in concentration and determination. Good girl, he thought, stay strong. You need to be as strong as you can get.
He turned his focus back to Riley. "You’ll get the Devils over my dead body," he said coldly. "If you think I’d trade the organization for a woman, you’re more insane than I’ve been told."
Riley gave one sharp laugh. "Oh, son, you have no idea how crazy I can get. But let’s up the stakes." His voice grew darker and crueler with each word. "Since you say you’re getting closer to finding me, I’m giving you a deadline. You find me in the next five days and my offer is still open. I’ll give you the pretty girl and you give me the organization. You can take her and leave, I won’t follow. If you don’t find me in time, then I’ll finish her off and come for you next."
Cian’s heart sank. Five days. He’d known it would come to something like this, but he sure as hell wished he’d had more leads on Riley’s whereabouts than this when it did.
"I’ll be seeing you soon then, old man," Cian said, his words the equivalent of a vicious smile.
He gazed longingly at the screen.
"I’m looking forward to it, son," Riley answered.
On camera, Lila stopped her jumping jacks, turned, and for the first time faced the camera. She walked closer, as the lens stared down at her. Then she pinned her gaze directly on the camera, lifting one small hand high in a fist, her lips formed the words, "Fuck. You."
The screen went black and Cian had to stop himself from lunging at it, desperate for one more glimpse of her. But she was gone, in true Lila fashion—defiant
, beautiful, alive. And he was going to keep her that way. No matter what it took. No matter how many people had to die in the process.
The countdown started now.
* * *
Lila stared at the camera a moment more before resuming her walk around the cell. She usually did at least a hundred laps in a cycle, and at least two hundred jumping jacks. She tried to tell her captor to fuck himself at the end of every ten laps and every fifty jumping jacks. It helped her keep count and made her feel better. She knew it was important to keep hope alive. She’d discovered rage was the best way to do that.
Normally, she’d be sleeping while the lights were on. She’d figured out his patterns now, her mathematical mind sorting through the periods of lights on and off, sounds starting and stopping. She probably had a better fix on his habits than he did. Most people didn’t even realize the ways in which they repeated certain behaviors.
She knew that when the lights were on, he was around—watching her, getting his kicks off her suffering. And that was reason number one she slept when the lights were on. She’d deny him any bit of herself she could. If he got off on watching her talk to herself and pace around the tiny room, then she’d stay curled up on the corner of her bed, face away from the camera.
But today, instead of sleeping while the lights were on—Lila had been awakened with a horrifying siren. Then, his voice had come over the speaker he’d installed in her cell. "Rise and shine, sweetheart. Do whatever it is you do, but make sure you look alive and well."
She’d known instantly then that he was showing images of her to someone. The question was, who? Maybe he was asking Cian for ransom. Maybe he was offering her up to the highest bidder—world-class hacker plus sex slave would probably be very lucrative in a dark web auction. God knew there were enough men in the world who hated Lila and would jump at the chance to make her finally submit.
But she’d complied, because she didn’t want to instigate another of Michael Riley’s head games today, and if Cian could see her, she wanted him to know she was okay. That she was being strong. That she was fighting this with everything she had. He would come for her. She knew he would, but she needed him to know she was doing her part, too.
The second reason Lila usually slept when the lights were on was her biggest source of hope, and the other way she was doing her part to help her own rescue. Lila had figured out that while Michael Riley liked to watch her when the lights were on, he left the building when the lights were off. He would turn out the lights, and then he would leave.
She felt certain he assumed she’d just sleep when the lights were off. What else could she do in the pitch black of the tiny room? But Lila realized something—in the dark, the camera he’d mounted in the upper corner of the room couldn’t see what she was doing. She’d looked at that camera and known by the brand and model that it didn’t include audio. He could see her but not hear her. And he couldn’t see her when it was dark. And she determined to use that to her advantage. She’d listened, and observed, she’d roamed her cell, she’d paid attention.
Then, she’d developed her plan. The plan that was going to get her out of this place if Cian didn’t get her out first.
Today, the lights weren’t on long. She guessed he’d gotten what he needed from her and only a few moments after she’d told him to fuck off, the room went dark. She listened for the sound of tires on gravel, and once his car had driven away, she began the routine she’d implemented a few days ago. She quickly pulled the thin mattress off the metal bed frame and began to pull and shake the bed with all her strength.
Her plan was simple—if she could get the bed frame loosened from the bolts that held it to the concrete floor, she could detach it and then lean it against the wall to serve as a ladder. A ladder to the ceiling, where lay the one vulnerable point of her cell—the ventilation shaft.
Lila was petite, and she was flexible. She knew that if she could reach that shaft she could climb through it and come out on the roof of the building. From there she was willing to do whatever it took to get away, even if it meant jumping nine feet onto the gravel outside. She’d survive that more certainly than she’d survive her captor, who was becoming increasingly threatening and unhinged.
She jiggled and wiggled and moved the bed frame and little by little, as it had each time since she’d started, the bed moved a bit more. She reached down to the nearest bolt and was thrilled when it moved in her fingers. She worked to turn it and before long it was moving, twisting and twisting until she was able to pull it loose completely.
Lila would have never known that such a tiny accomplishment could mean so much. Tears came to her eyes as she held the chunk of metal in her hand. She raised her eyes to the ceiling and gave thanks to whatever might be out there. Her heart ached with longing. "Oh Cian," she whispered into the dark, "please be okay. I’m trying to come back."
Then she wiped her eyes and lowered back to her knees. One bolt down, three to go.
Chapter 6
Keira woke to an annoying buzz against her hip. She groaned as her bones protested the cold that had sunk into them while she was unconscious. The buzzing stopped, then started up again.
"Fuck," she muttered as she opened her eyes to a dimly lit corridor. Then she remembered how she’d ended up here. "Shit!" she cried, struggling to sit up.
She quickly looked up and down the corridor, but whoever had choked her into unconsciousness was long gone.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket yet again and she scrambled to drag it out. It was Commander O’Connor. She muttered another curse before putting on her best professional voice.
"This is Watson." She sounded scratchy. Getting choked must do that to a girl.
"What the fuck, Watson? I’ve been trying to get you on the horn for twenty minutes now. What the hell are you doing?"
"Sorry, Sir." She stood and tried to straighten her clothes. "I saw someone entering a back door to Finn MacFarlane’s building who looked like one of his brothers."
"Well, what the hell happened?" O’Connor yelled. She pulled the phone back from her ear and grit her teeth. His volume wasn’t doing much for her mental well-being at the moment.
"I was mistaken," she lied. "It was a workman."
"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph," O’Connor lamented. "Get your ass back to the office. I want you to start going through mugshots of known MacFarlane associates. Then you’re going to start questioning them because that’s how you’re going to find out who killed Danny O'Reilly, not lurking around Finn’s condo while he’s in Federal custody."
Keira swallowed the humiliation. "Yes, Sir," she answered briskly.
"You’d think your old man didn’t teach you a damn thing sometimes, Watson," he snapped, adding insult to injury.
She didn’t bother to respond to that, just disconnected the call and took a long look at her surroundings. She had no doubt it had been one of the MacFarlane brothers she’d had the misfortune to meet. But which one, she couldn’t say. She’d never seen any of them in real life except for Finn. They were all tall, dark and blue or green-eyed. It was pretty tough to know who was whom while he was in the process of strangling you.
She rubbed at her bruised throat, realizing she’d have to stop off and buy a scarf somewhere before she went back to the office. O’Connor wouldn’t take well to handprints branded on the skin of her neck.
Her gaze landed on the panel the MacFarlane brother had been looking at when she’d found him.
"What were you up to?" she murmured to herself as she reached the small door and carefully opened it. Inside were a tangle of gray wires leading up and down from the access panel.
But the space full of wires and pipes told her nothing—or at least nothing that made sense to her. She huffed in disgust before closing the door to the access chute. Regardless, she knew she'd been attacked by a MacFarlane, and if it was Cian, that meant he was still alive and well and in the area. If it was Liam or Connor? Hell, she'd be happy to cuff one of them and bring them d
owntown, as well. They'd both been missing for weeks, and the Feds and CPD wanted them.
She had to admit that it was the first glimmer of hope she'd had since starting this case. And it proved her instincts were right—she needed to spend as much time as she could watching Finn's building. Because if one of his brothers had been here today, they would almost certainly come back. Finn was the key to unlock the door and she'd be ready for them next time.
Keira Watson was going to prove that she was worthy of the name Watson, no matter what it took.
* * *
Cian jolted awake, his neck stiff from sleeping with his head on the desk. He blinked a moment in the darkness that enveloped the tiny duplex in one of Chicago’s older Northside neighborhoods. He’d holed up here for the night after leaving the airplane hangar and the horrid video Michael Riley had provided. He rubbed at the base of his skull, the stiffness making his head ache, as well.
"You haven’t been sleeping enough if I could walk right in here and you didn’t wake up," a voice said from the darkness on the far side of the room where an old sofa sat.
Cian was out of his chair, gun in hand, ready to fire faster than his mind could process exactly who the voice belonged to.
"Down, boy," the man said. "Jimmy’s on duty across the street, he wouldn’t let a threat inside."
Cian swallowed as he blinked into the darkness for a moment. Then he heard the click of a lamp turning on. He dropped his gun arm, a shudder rolling through him as he stared at his brother Liam, who was very definitely not supposed to be in Chicago.
"What the fuck?" Cian growled, shoving the gun back into the holster at his hip.
"Nice to see you, too." Liam grinned.
Cian’s heart started back up and he took a shaky breath as the adrenaline rush subsided, leaving him slightly nauseous.
He examined his next youngest brother with an eagle eye. It hadn’t been that long since they’d parted, but it felt like a century. Liam was dressed in all black, a baseball cap pulled low over his face, but Cian could see his grin. He took in the heavily muscled frame, the thick neck and stubborn set to a square jaw. Fuck he’d missed his rougher half.
Touch of Dark: Dublin Devils 3 Page 4
