Bounty

by Aubrey St. Clair

  I hear scuffles behind me, but it doesn’t matter. I know where my dad will be. The conference room. His favorite one in the city.

  The place, I suddenly remember, where I first got the news of my mother’s death, at just seven years old.

  As I approach the double doors, my heart is pounding out of my chest and I’ve completely lost my breath.

  “Let me through,” I pant at the men guarding the door. Seamus and Michael, actually. I know them. They know me. They have to let me through.

  They look at each other instead of springing instantly to the side.

  I right myself, and command more powerfully, “Let me through, Seamus.”

  “Sorry, lass, yer pa is busy.” Seamus says, his face neutrally polite and quite bored-looking. “We’re on strict orders. Not a soul.”

  “Not even his daughter?” I’m outraged.

  “Not even,” Seamus confirms. “Shouldn’ta be too much longer, though. If’n you just wait.”

  I can’t fucking believe it. “This can’t wait! This is an emergency.”

  Seamus’s face still doesn’t shift expression.

  “What’s the emergency?”

  “I — I can’t tell you.” I really not ready to rat Liam out. Not to these random guys, at least. Not to fucking Seamus. I have to talk to my dad. “Just let me talk to him.”

  “Just a mo’, then,” Seamus says, and murmurs something into his earpiece. But he doesn’t move to let me in.

  “Arg!” I lunge forward, but he steps in front of me and he’s quite tall, and I’m not sure I’m ready to pick a fight over this. Or how effective it would be if I did.

  But Liam hasn’t caught up to me. He’s probably caught up by Dad’s people already. What an idiot, sprinting in here after me. I have a little time to catch my breath, to plan what I want to say to my dad.

  Liam was a bounty hunter after him this whole time. He lied to me, betrayed me. When I remember all the times he came to me, tried to win me back, tried keep me in his life. How I thought it meant he cared for me, maybe even… loved me.

  My face cringes. What a fucking idiot I was. He just used me. All the kind things he thought of were just to get in my good books. He saved my life? More like he saved his target. All the sweet little details he’d remember about me? Intelligence. For his handlers.

  And just then, my dad finally emerges from the conference room.

  “What is it, sweet pea? I’m in the middle of something.”

  A dozen men blink at me from inside the conference room. Rich men. Gangsters. Mobsters. Powerful men, making deals behind closed doors to make money off weapons or drugs or whatever it is that makes my father so successful. Hustling, using their brains and wit and privilege to wield power.

  One of the men gestures in annoyance. “C’mon man. Get the girl out of here.”

  And suddenly, I know what to do.

  “April, honey, what’s wrong? Is it that guy Liam?”

  “IT’S NOT ALWAYS ABOUT MEN, DAD.” I mean it is this time, sort of, but I’m so sick of him assuming that.

  “Dad —“

  I’m cut off by a sudden commotion. It’s Liam, shouting.

  He made it through security, but what he hopes to accomplish now, with all these men around...

  And then I hear just what he’s shouting.

  “It’s them!” He’s waving his hands, rushing towards me, trying to gesture me to get away from the door. “April, it’s —” Seamus punches him in the gut, cutting him off as Michael grabs him and they drag him back, beating him with their fists and feet.

  31

  Liam

  It’s the men who kidnapped April. In the conference room, negotiating peacefully with Devlin Sullivan. It’s the motherfucking goddamn Russians, I recognize one of them, the one that ran off. I even recognize the bruises, where my ring made contact with the side of his cheek. The bruising around his nose, where I broke it weeks ago.

  The rage takes me over again. I throw off the Irish bouncers and shout a warning to April but I’m not sure she’s heard. She seems to have her own problems as she’s shrieking and being pushed aside. I’m starting to see red again.

  They all try to draw guns on me, but I’m fast. I get in under their guard, too close for gunshots, but I’m quickly outnumbered, even worse than last time.

  After spending some time beating the crap out of me, I’ve now got both Irish and Russian mobsters pointing everything from revolvers to AKs at my head.

  I dazedly wonder how they got all this firepower into the hotel, but then again, for all I know, Devlin owns the place. Or at least the people that run it.

  I think I hear April shouting at them, or to them? Or at me? But it doesn’t matter. It’s over. I’ve tipped my hand, and my cover is completely blown. All to protect April, who was going to rat me out, anyway.

  “Bring him in here,” Sullivan says, and he’s a very different man than the one I met in Panama. The affable Irishman schtick is gone.

  Locked in a room surrounded by his men, he is terrifying.

  “This asshole used my daughter to get to me. He sold us out. He has no loyalty.”

  I want to shout that he’s the one with no loyalty, breaking bread with the men who attacked his daughter. But of course, I’ve got a large wet towel gagging me, so there will be no words from me.

  I am only a witness. Probably to my own death.

  “April,” her father says, his voice ice-cold. “What should we do with him?” His eyebrow lances above his eye, and a cruel smirk twists at the corner of his mouth. He’s clearly enjoying this.

  “You’re one of us,” he continues.

  “Your father’s daughter,” one of the lackeys chimes in. “Tough to the bone.”

  “So what should we do with him?” Sullivan continues. “Kill him on the spot?” He’s got a blade to my throat now, but casual. “Or something else?” I still see a hint of the relaxed, thoughtful man I met, and it’s even worse than the monster act.

  I watch as emotions flicker across April’s face as she processes everything. Her eyes flash from her father’s face to mine, to the gag in my mouth, the blade at my neck, the guns in the hands of the men around us, the Russians. The one with the broken nose.

  I betrayed her. I have almost no hope now that she will pick me, the man who lied to her and sold her out for a bounty, over her father, her life, her business and her heritage. Everything she’s ever known.

  I can’t get a read on her. Her face goes cold and calculating. Like her father’s.

  A chill of terror creeps up my spine. She is far, far more terrifying than Devlin Sullivan could hope to be. Her speed, her intelligence, the way she holds a gun, the way she thinks on her feet, lies at the drop of a hat. For a split second, I see one potential future. April, inheriting his empire. The most feared gangster in Boston.

  “I want to talk to him,” she says, face set in stone. “Alone.”

  “It’s not safe,” Sullivan scoffs.

  She pivots quickly into the instep of one of the Russians beside her, disarms him in an instant, cocks the gun, and flips off the safety.

  Points it at my face.

  “I want to talk to him.” Her voice is beautiful and terrible. “Disarm him. Tie his hands. I’ll keep my gun on him, and shout for you if anything happens. But I need closure, damn it. He disrespected me, and I can’t let that stand. I can’t let you defend me.”

  Her father gives an actual fist-pump. He’s so proud. “Aye, lass.” He corrects himself. “Aye.”

  They haul me to my feet, get in another quick punt to the jaw for good measure, and push me into a big empty space. The conference room.

  “Give me the room,” April commands. “Time’s ticking.”

  They close the door, and now it’s just the two of us, standing, staring at each other.

  “I should kill you,” she notes. The gun is still on me. “But I need you to talk, first.”

  32

  April

  I keep
my gun trained on him.

  “You’re a bounty hunter?” I ask. The phrase seems strange in my mouth. Bounty hunters are something you see in reality TV, I never really thought about how they were really a thing.

  “Yes,” he says carefully, watching the gun in my hands. The safety is off, he must see that.

  “And you were sent to kill my father.”

  “No, just to take him into custody. We don’t really do that whole ‘dead or alive’ thing anymore.”

  “Careful Liam. We only have about a minute,” I say. “Not a lot of time to waste on jokes. And I should really kill you. Or let them do it. You used me.” Kill him? Could I really do that? Probably not, but hopefully he doesn’t figure that out. It’s bad enough that my father kills people. He really does kill people. I’m having a hard time letting that reality sink in. I was fooling myself by thinking that he would just stop at hurting them.

  “Yes, I did,” he admits, his head hanging. “That’s true. But that’s just how it started, April. I’m not using you anymore. I… I was going to tell you. Right before Vicente called. Outside.”

  “Who?”

  “The FBI. Agent Vicente is my contact there.”

  I guessed that he must be working for law enforcement. I’m not too clear on how real-life bounty hunters work, mostly I just know about Boba Fett or cowboys, but from what I’ve seen on TV they mainly work with law enforcement. So, he works with cops. Or with the FBI. Whatever. That’s who he was talking to on the phone, directing them to my father.

  “Anyway, it doesn’t matter now,” Liam continues. “I just wanted to tell you the truth. You deserve that from me… and your father.”

  “A little late,” I say, pointing the gun at him while my thoughts race. I’m not sure I believe he was going to tell me before I overheard him. Although he did say he wanted to tell me something important, right before the phone rang. “Anyway, my father has told me the truth. Enough of it, anyway. He’s a gangster. He does bad things. I don’t like that, but I understand why he lied. He was trying to keep me safe. Keeping me safe has always been his priority.” At least my dad has that going for him.

  “Then you should ask him why he was in that room making a deal with the same guys that grabbed you the other night.”

  “What?” I can feel my mouth hang open, but I’m too shocked to close it.

  “Those guys, they’re the same ones that I fought off, and they were in there, calmly talking to your dad. That’s what I was trying to warn you about when his guys grabbed me.”

  My head is spinning. Can it be true? Can my father really be dealing with those guys? If he was so concerned about me, if he was so ready to kill Liam, why didn’t he have the same rage against them? What the hell is going on there? I need time to figure this all out. I need someone to tell me the truth. But time is the one thing we don’t have right now. Especially after Liam’s phone call. I overheard him telling the FBI to come. Who knows how much time we have before they’re busting down the doors. “They’re on their way already, right?”

  Of course, they’re coming because… because my father is a criminal. The cops want him because he’s probably committed a lot of crimes. And not just money laundering, or even selling illegal things. He was very willing, eager even, to kill Liam. Obviously that wouldn’t have been his first murder. And who knows what the story is with the Russians and why it involved me. If those really are the same guys. I never did get a good look at them.

  And in truth, if Liam is here to help take my dad into custody, he’s the goddamn good guy in this situation. Even if he did hurt my feelings and lie to me.

  The realization is so obvious that it hits me like a train.

  “Oh my God,” I whisper. I have to choose between my father, and the man I was… falling in love with. Maybe already fell in love with. But was any of that real?

  Still, I have to remember that he’s the good guy here. Whether or not he loves me, can I really sell him out to gangsters and send him to his death? I’d be choosing organized crime over law enforcement. But more than that, I’d have to turn my back on my family. On my dad. But has my dad already betrayed me, first?

  Liam hasn’t answered me yet, so I repeat the question. I need to know how much time I have to decide what the hell I’m supposed to do here. “Are the FBI on their way? How long until they get here?”

  “Not exactly,” he says. “I gave them the wrong address. I couldn’t go through with it.” He grins, helpless and hopeless. “I’m a sucker for you, April. You don’t know the power you have.”

  “What?” I can’t think fast enough. I can’t think at all.

  “Run away with me, April,” he bursts out. “I’m so sorry for what I’ve done, and I’m sure you have some regrets, but let’s leave all of this. Please? I… I love you.”

  “What are you saying?” My gun lowers slightly, my heart is pounding so hard now it feels like it might burst out of my chest.

  “I’d do anything for you. I don’t care about this situation at all anymore. I don’t care what happens with the FBI or the Irish Mafia if it means I get to keep you in my life. Your gangster family, my messed up past, none of that matters anymore. Only you matter. Let’s run away together.”

  I can see the truth of what he’s saying in his eyes. I can hear it in his voice. He isn’t playing me this time. I know it. And if I’m wrong… well, then my heart really can’t be trusted anyway.

  I drop the gun on the table beside me, step into him, and sweep him into a kiss. He might have done some wrong things, but at least he did them for the right reasons.

  “You’re so fucking stupid,” I say. “And… and you love me?”

  “Yeah,” he says gruffly.

  “Oh, Liam. Liam, Liam, Liam.” I hold his cheek in my hand for a moment, stroking the rough stubble, gazing into those mossy blue-gray eyes. I suddenly know what I need to do.

  “We can’t run away together,” I say.

  “I know,” Liam continues, eyes dropping. “I know there’s no way I could ask you to choose me over —”

  “No,” I interrupt. “It’s not about me. It’s about my father. Devlin Sullivan. Famous gangster, remember? You think he’d let you just leave here, at this point? Even if I plead your case?”

  The look on Liam’s face tells me he hadn’t really even considered that until now. And it’s also further proof that he isn’t expecting the FBI to bust in at any moment to help. He was definitely telling the truth about that. Still, all hope isn’t lost.

  “If what you say is true, that the FBI are desperate to take him down, then we have to help them. We can’t let him continue to hurt people.”

  Liam is confused for a moment. “What?”

  “I love you too, you idiot. Of course I do, are you insane? And I’m choosing you. I could never live with myself if I just walked away from everything and let him continue doing what he does. Not now that I really know how bad he is.” I can still see confusion in his eyes, so I make it crystal clear. “I want to help you take down my father. Call your FBI guy back.”

  He keeps staring.

  “Liam!” I snap my finger in front of his face. “We don’t exactly have all night here. We have to figure out a plan, and fast.”

  He leans forward and kisses me hard, then pulls back to look me in the eye. “April. Do you trust me?”

  33

  Liam

  We burst through the doors, my zip-tied hands around her neck, the gun pressed to her head. I can feel her heart pounding through her ribs and into my chest.

  There’s a massive uproar as everyone realizes what’s happened.

  The gangsters are pissed, clearly feeling like they should have known they couldn’t trust a woman to take care of matters. Guess it’s not so unbelievable that I could have overpowered her. Especially for all of these men who still underestimate her. And that includes her father.

  The Russians, especially, want to take me down. I killed on of their men. I can see the hate in their eye
s as they glare at me.

  But Devlin Sullivan’s voice cuts through the commotion.

  “That’s my daughter, goddamn it, put your fucking guns down!” he roars. He puts his hands out to me, as if he could stop me through sheer force of will.

  I do almost feel bad for him. If nothing else, I know the man cares about his daughter. The same woman that I do. Even if we share nothing else, we share that, and that will always mean something. But it’s not enough. He’s not a good enough father. He’s still doing business with the men that attacked her, and I have a hard time believing a man with his resources hasn’t made the connection yet.

  “That’s right,” I say, the barrel of the gun pressed to her precious temple. “Now I’m going to back down this hallway, and none of you will follow me, or she gets it,” I say, inching away from them. They don’t know I’d rather shoot myself than shoot April. That’s the only way this is going to work. They have to believe it’s a real stand-off.

  “I’m not so sure I believe you,” Sullivan says. “You said you really cared about her.”

  “You wanna test that?” I ask, and jerk the gun brutally at her precious temple. I hope she understands why it’s necessary. “Stay back,” I warn.

  We have to buy ourselves some time.

  April was able to text the correct address to Vicente while we plotted. They should be on their way any minute. But if these goons do close in on me before that, I have a backup plan. The only hitch is in how badly I’m outnumbered. At least fifteen to one. If we can just take one guy out, get a gun for April…

  “I thought you really cared about her,” Sullivan scoffs. “And now you’ve got a gun to her head.”

  “I thought you cared about her, Devlin.”

  “Of course I do.”

  “Well then you have a funny way of showing it,” I say. “Making backroom deals with the very same men who attacked her the other day.” I jerk my chin at the collection of Russians.