The most alarming things were two new additions to the parking lot. They were not the kinds of vehicles purchased for commuting.
A souped-up Nissan GT-R with a spoiler and body kit that weren’t stock, and a heavily modified Ford Mustang GT 500. Those were racing cars. He was willing to bet he had their license plate numbers on file.
One of the external doors opened and a man wearing work boots, jeans, and a plaid shirt speared Emery with his gaze.
“Hey, you from the electric company?” The man stalked toward Emery, crunching the gravel underfoot.
Shit.
He hated interfacing with people.
“I am,” he replied when the workman was close enough he didn’t have to yell.
“Are you here about the combustion problem in—”
“No, sorry, that’s above my pay grade. They sent me out to check the meter lines to make sure you’re getting adequate power. Once I verify that, they can figure out what’s wrong and who to send out.”
“Damn it. We need those working.” The man put his hands on his hips and shook his head.
“What are you making here?” Emery peered up at the building.
“Not sure yet. We’re getting her up and ready to run.”
“Oh, okay.” Emery shrugged. “I’m going to go grab some things from my truck. Is there a better way around here?”
“Where’d you park?”
“On the street. I needed to see the meters over there.” Emery turned and gestured at the line of smaller businesses. “Then the ones over here. I thought I’d just walk it, but that might have been a mistake.”
“Yeah, man, that was a mistake.” The workman chuckled. “Go around the back. I’ll let them know you’re on your way.”
“Thanks, man. I’d appreciate that.”
Emery resisted the urge to sprint for the gate. Someone in Evers’s organization was bankrolling this building. Why? And why were there Eleventh drivers on-site?
The entire walk took less than ten minutes, but by the time he reached the bodega where he was supposed to meet Tori, he was sweating. No red Camaro was in sight.
The bodega was older. The gas pumps had more rust on them than paint. All of the windows were covered by metal bars. But no cameras. He decided to take his chances and ducked inside. It was almost as hot inside as it was outside. Several fans moved the air around, but it didn’t alleviate the stifling temperature. Emery’s stomach growled as the aroma of pulled pork and spices reached his nose.
The back of the shop sported a little Cuban deli, with heating lamps keeping today’s offering warm. Emery grabbed a couple bottles of water and strolled to the back to inspect the food.
Tori loved a good pulled-pork sandwich.
The bells attached to the main entrance chimed and several loud people entered, speaking in a mix of English and Spanish.
Just his luck.
Emery tilted his head to the side. He wasn’t surprised to see the flashy drivers for the Eleventh stroll in. With the way their day was going, this was about par for the course. These guys were more than a thorn in their side now. They were a problem.
The elderly man chopping what looked to be brisket wiped his hands on a towel hanging from his waist and turned his attention on Emery.
“Dos tortas de carne de cerdo deshebrada, por favor.” Emery gestured to the day’s offering, labeled pork on a paper flag stuck into the meat. Chances were the old man didn’t even speak English.
The thugs’ presence was a dark shadow. The deli man glanced several times at the Eleventh Street crew carrying on, picking up candy or chips before putting them down. They were kids with no purpose other than causing trouble. What kind of crap did they pull here? How much had they stolen simply because they could?
Emery couldn’t stop today, but he would put an end to their nonsense.
The man handed over the food and Emery paid in cash. There would be no more plastic currency for him. Not until the threat to Tori was gone. He didn’t know what kind of resources the hit team might have, but they weren’t the only ones on their trail now. CJ probably had his accounts and aliases flagged.
“Gracias.” Emery nodded at the man and turned toward the door.
“Hey you, the electric company man.” The same saggy pants–wearing kid chewed on a straw not five feet away. “You find what you lookin’ for?”
“Yeah, just grabbing something to eat before getting back to work. Have a good day.” Emery strolled toward the front door.
Easy does it. Act natural.
“What electric company you work for?” an older one of Saggy Pants’s companions asked.
Emery paused at the door. “Gexa.”
He had no idea if Gexa serviced this part of town, but it was a guess. His luck, the brains of this little group might actually know. He pushed out of the front door, scanning the street for the red Camaro.
Nothing.
Where the hell was Tori?
A van parked by the street honked its horn. He couldn’t see the driver, but he could guess who it was.
Emery checked his six o’ clock using the reflective lenses of his sunglasses. The brains of the little group watched him. Great.
He crossed the dusty parking lot to the van and pulled the passenger door open.
“Get in. Get in, now,” Tori said, pitching her voice low.
He climbed into the passenger seat and she accelerated before he’d even closed the door.
“Where’d the other ride go?” he asked, strapping in.
“The Eleventh is here.” She’d lost the headscarf, but her hair was up under a baseball hat she hadn’t worn earlier, and half her face was obscured by sunglasses.
“I saw that.” He buckled himself in before he got thrown out of the van, and checked the mirror. The Nissan and Mustang sat in front of the bodega.
“What are they doing here?”
“I don’t know.” But he intended to find out.
* * *
Tori was ready to be done with the day. Nearly two hours after they left the bodega they were strolling on foot toward the safe house. It wasn’t that she’d done much, but the stress of it all wore her out.
Emery tapped at the screen of his phone doing God-only-knew what. He’d reported the car and van as abandoned, using a variety of apps to reroute the calls, all while walking. It was fascinating to think what he could do with something so simple as a phone. All she used hers for was to play games, take pictures, and text.
“Stop.” He reached out, grabbed her arm and pulled her under the overgrown branches of a lemon tree heavy with fruit.
“What is it?” Tori glanced around. Nothing appeared out of place. The street was quiet; only the occasional car passed them by. They were still a block and a street over from the house.
“The webcam feed.”
“The what?” She couldn’t begin to make sense out of those three words.
His brows drew down into a dark slash and the frown was enough to make her anxious.
“What is it?” She pitched her voice lower, for his ears alone, keeping her gaze on the street while he stared at the webcam feed on his phone. What if one of the Eleventh had followed them? What then?
“Someone is in the house. I can’t see their faces. The laptop must be tilted too low.”
Damn it. That wasn’t good. She peered over his shoulder, and sure enough, two men passed by the laptop. One had Emery’s overnight bag in hand.
“Are they there now?” Did they chance a confrontation? Were they friendly? Or had the hit team found them already? Could they get away?
“Not sure. This is from an hour ago.”
She said a quick prayer under her breath. If it hadn’t been for their zigzagging path back to the safe house, they might have been there when these people came looking for them.
“Is it the Russians? Or FBI?” she asked.
“They aren’t FBI.”
Then the Russians had already found her. There was no doubt in her mind
. If they needed confirmation she was in danger, this was it.
A cold sweat broke out along her hair line and down her spine. Despite the heat, she shivered.
“You must have a tracker on your things, or maybe on you.” Emery’s gaze traveled over her body before resting at the base of her neck. “We’ve got to change. Dump everything. What we can’t dump we can mail to ourselves.”
Her necklace. Could someone have done to her what she’d done to Roni? She pressed her fingertips against the charm. It hadn’t been off her body except to take showers, and good luck to anyone stupid enough to come into their apartment. So not her necklace, but what? Trackers could be sewn into fabric. Her bag was a good target. She carried it with her everywhere.
“It has to be my bag. I don’t keep money in it, so I leave it unattended a lot. Anyone could have slipped something into it.” She dropped to a knee, digging through the canvas messenger bag.
“We’ve got to leave it.”
“I want to know for sure.” She dumped the plastic case of screwdrivers on the sidewalk, followed by her small flashlight.
Emery grabbed her arm and pulled her to her feet.
“Trackers can be tiny. So small you’ll think it’s a rock, a bit of nothing. We don’t have time to look for it.”
Tori nodded and took a deep breath. The bag held no sentimental value. It was just a tool to get her things from point A to point B. She scooped it up, walked to the nearest trash can out for pickup, and dumped it all inside. Her necklace, though, that she couldn’t throw away.
“Keep it for now.” Emery’s voice was soft, kind, as if he understood her struggle. “Anyone who would tag it had to have gotten close to you. It’s more likely it was your bag. We’ve got to move.”
“What about the laptop?” she asked. It had value.
“It’s compromised.” Emery grasped her hand, lacing his fingers through hers, and pulled her across the street, away from the house.
Compromised? Had they just lost their leads? All the work Emery had done—was gone? Panic made it hard to breathe. She could deal with one thing, but two? Losing their edge and safe house? This was not good.
“But all the information?” she blurted.
“It’s on my servers. I’ll wipe the laptop remotely.” He started poking at his phone with his thumb while they walked.
“Wait—what? But, Emery, what are we doing?” She gripped his hand, tugging on his arm. His solution was so simple she should have seen it, but she was too amped up to see the forest for the trees. What did she do? What about his role in this? The last thing she wanted was for Emery to get hurt or in trouble on her account.
Emery paused on the sidewalk and turned to face her. They were so close she had to tip her chin up, way up, to look at him.
“We’re going to walk casually to the nearest bus stop, hang out until we know we haven’t been followed. Once we can confirm no one is on our tail, we make our way to the Tesla. It’s not ideal, but I doubt they tracked us to this location through me. It means that we are leaving their means of tracking us behind. The Tesla is too flashy, but we can’t risk getting caught with a stolen car. We’re going to stop at a strip mall, get some new clothes, new supplies, and find somewhere to hide out. As soon as we can, I want to take a look at your necklace just to be certain.”
With each sentence, the tightness around Tori’s chest eased and she drew an easy breath. Emery had a plan. It took a lot to rattle her, but without her sister she felt vulnerable. Having Emery’s support was priceless.
“I know a place,” she said.
“You do?”
“Yeah. There’s this guy, Leo, he races sometimes and he has a cabin out in the Everglades. He’s in lock-up for a bit. No one will be there.”
“What was he arrested for?”
“Too many speeding tickets.” She grinned.
It was a plan. They had something to do.
She took a step, leading Emery down the walk. It would work. It had to work.
“What about my sister?” Tori glanced over her shoulder as Emery drew even with her.
“I’m still tracking Roni, but we can’t communicate with her. It might put her in danger.”
“But if the hit team is tracking me, they’re tracking her.” Who was tracking her? How?
“CJ will be trying to find us. Chances are he’s a few steps behind the hit team. Once he finds the safe house he’ll realize the threat is real and will warn the others. Roni will be protected. The crew won’t hang her out to dry.”
Hearing Emery say it was better than thinking it herself. Whatever was going on with the FBI, it was good to know their crew was solid.
“Why do you think CJ did it?” His betrayal stung. CJ and Kathy had become like family. She’d trusted him. Taught him how to work on a car, blend into the garage. To think that the person she’d shared hours of sweat and hard work with could betray her like that hurt more than she wanted to admit.
“Don’t know. Computer is wiped.” He shoved his phone into his pocket and glanced around.
“Guess.” She wanted an answer, damn it.
Emery’s thumb swiped over her knuckles and she stumbled. She’d almost forgotten the connection in her distress. Heat unfurled low in her belly. She always reacted to Emery. It was an uncontrollable response. Roni was right. Tori probably just needed to get laid, but she hadn’t been interested in anyone else for . . . God, months.
They walked in silence for a few moments. She glanced at Emery’s face every couple of steps. The little lines around his mouth were the first indicator she’d picked up on when he was thinking through a problem. They weren’t frown lines. More like . . . thought lines.
“I don’t see CJ keeping the hit-team intel from us maliciously. He’s been concerned about the lack of federal involvement with Evers, just like us. In his position, being kept in the dark, I’d want to keep the crew together and unified.”
“He didn’t argue when Aiden and Julian said they were going to Orlando.”
“CJ’s treading very delicately around Aiden.”
“He still thinks Aiden should have made Madison go into witness protection?”
“Yes.”
Aiden’s new girlfriend, Madison, was the star witness in the case against Evers. Even Tori thought the woman should be under lock and key, but she respected Madison’s determination to fight for what she wanted, which was a chance at a life with Aiden.
Tori and Emery’s stride relaxed and their joined hands swung in time with their steps. If she didn’t know better, this stroll could be out of her daydreams. A romantic walk with the leading man in her fantasies. The houses were even cute, the scent of flowers mixed with the ever-present scent of salt, and trees shaded them from the early afternoon sun.
“I like Madison,” Tori said.
The former housewife turned accountant-slash-roller derby queen wasn’t as fragile as Tori had first assumed her to be. Madison didn’t shrink from danger, especially when it threatened something she wanted. Like Aiden and the life she’d managed to put together following her messy divorce. It was hard not to like Madison, and that wasn’t factoring in how she’d risked herself to save Roni’s ass. In short, Tori owed her. But she didn’t owe CJ a damn thing.
She shivered and glanced over her shoulder, but the street was quiet. If the hit team was following them, Tori knew she’d never see them coming. This wasn’t the first time the Russian crime organization had tried to squeeze her or her sister for information. When their father had come to America to turn informant in exchange for their safety, he’d divulged many KGB secrets, but not all of them. Both the Americans and Russians had pressed Roni and her for the last bits. The Americans wanted to fill in what they didn’t know. The Russians wanted to know what the Americans thought might be valuable. Truth was, their father hadn’t confided a single thing to his daughters.
Tori just wanted the whole mess behind her. But it would never end. Her father’s legacy would haunt her forever. It
probably wasn’t worth changing her name again, either. No matter how far she and Roni ran, where they went or how careful they were, eventually one side or the other latched onto them again. Working with the FBI was just the lesser of two evils.
“I’d be a lot more inclined to trust CJ if he were honest. Now . . . I don’t know if we can trust him. Or anyone.” She didn’t like admitting the truth. Trust was hard-won in her world, and she’d trusted CJ. Maybe more than she should.
“Me?” Emery swung his head toward her, pinning her with his gaze.
“Of course I can trust you.”
“Good.” He squeezed her hand, and damn it if she didn’t feel those stupid butterflies doing laps inside her again.
Chapter Seven
Emery gripped the Tesla’s steering wheel with both hands, grinding his teeth. Just who the hell was Leo and why did Tori know all about his secluded cabin in the middle of nowhere?
It was jealousy, and he had no right to the possessiveness clawing at his insides. Where was Leo now, when she needed backup? In jail. Which was probably for the best. Emery would enjoy punching the bastard far too much.
“There it is.” Tori stopped toying with her necklace and leaned forward, peering past the trees. She’d been relieved when he told her the necklace was clean.
The cabin was old, with peeling paint and a tin roof that was liberally patched.
“How exactly do you know Leo?” Emery asked.
“I told you. He races.”
“What else does Leo do?”
“Come on. Leo’s a good kid. He just had a rough start is all. Don’t be that way.”
Emery glanced at Tori and found her looking at him, mouth drawn down into a frown. He shrugged and studied the rickety shed and tin awning that probably served as the “kid’s” shop, judging by the toolboxes.
“Leo’s not a danger to us. He’s all of twenty, no connections, no allegiances, no reputable enemies. There were some backwater neighbors that were giving him a hard time, but Roni and I took care of it. He just needs a break in life.” Her tone softened, almost as though she were talking about something else. Had someone given her a break?
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