“You mean to say,” Elliot interrupts him, “that you’ve had an FBI contact sitting on your phone this whole time, and you didn’t tell us?”
Jase mumbles something unintelligible.
“What’s wrong with you?” I ask. “Are you—are you blushing?”
His jaw tightens. “Since when do I fucking blush, Juliette?”
I lean away, my throat tight, my stomach churning. I feel like I’ve laid my soul bare, told him things I never wanted to tell anyone, and he won’t give me anything. Not a thing. “How do we know she’s trustworthy?” I ask. Isobel. Sounds like a pretty girl’s name.
“Do you trust me?”
“Of course I trust you,” I snap.
“Then trust me to know who’s fucking trustworthy.”
I shake my head, staring out of my window. Fuck Jase. Fuck Isobel, whoever she is. Fuck all of this.
Why won’t he just tell me what happened to him while I was with Elliot in Nebraska?
I fold my arms across my chest and grit my teeth. I’m pissed. I don’t like this, not one bit. At least when Dornan was alive I had some semblance of control. I knew what he liked, and I knew how to give it to him. I kept him sated. I kept him in the dark. Now, I’m the one who’s being kept in the dark, about everything, and I’m fucking sick of it.
Jase makes the call. I hear a female voice on the other end pick up, but she doesn’t speak loud enough for me to make out any words. Jase’s tone is clipped, almost hurried. Like he can’t wait to get off the phone to her. Like he’s a nervous teenager. He details our situation to her and I see the visible relief on his face after he listens to what she’s got to say. When he ends the call, Elliot turns to look at him, raising his eyebrows. “You gonna fill us in?”
Jase clears his throat. “She’ll meet with me,” he says. “Tonight. In LA.”
“Just you?” I ask, my tone probably a little too acerbic.
“Just me,” he repeats. “She’s risking her job to come meet as it is.”
“Were you with her?” I ask, the words escaping my mouth before I can clamp my dumb mouth shut.
Jase’s eyebrows practically hit the fucking roof. “You mean how you were with Dornan? Yeah. I was with her. It was a long fucking time ago.”
“Fuck you, Jason,” I snap, my cheeks burning. I’m too angry at what he’s said to form any more words. All I can think about is Isobel and Jase and how he was totally justified in what he just said to me.
“You two should think less about Dornan and more about getting out of this thing alive,” Elliot interjects, his tone serious. “He’s dead, remember? Think about everything you both went through to get here. What’s the point if you’re just going to be assholes to each other?”
Jase lets out a breath he’s been holding, clenching and unclenching his bloodied fist. I shoot laser beams from my eyes into the back of Elliot’s head and try not to scream. I want to get out of this car. I’m fucking dying in here.
Jase glances at me, his expression softening a little. I swallow thickly, a little thrill shooting down my spine. Those eyes. Fuck. I’d melt under that gaze. Elliot’s right. We’re being total fucking assholes to each other and we’re all we’ve got. Self-destruction, a skill we both excel at.
“We were friends,” Jase says. “It was a long, long time ago. You were gone. She needed me for her case, and I needed her to get Dornan locked down. That’s all. Nobody knew you’d burst in like a fucking hurricane and start blowing shit up.”
He says the last sentence like he’s impressed I did that, the corner of his mouth twitching. I take a deep breath and let it out, my frayed nerves and my anger settling back down in my stomach.
Elliot glances at Jase in the rear-view mirror. “She pretty? She single?”
I lean over and smack Elliot’s arm.
“What,” he laughs, taking one hand off the steering wheel and putting it up in a defensive gesture. “I’m single, Julz. I’ve got to take what I can get. Do you think she’ll go on a date with me?”
I smack him again as Jase smirks beside me. “Nobody is dating the FBI chick!”
“Are you trying to make me crash this car?” Elliot asks, pulling his shoulder away from where I’m whacking him. He’s trying not to smile and failing dismally.
“What the fuck kind of car is this?” Jase asks, looking around. “This isn’t a Mustang.”
“Mustang’s a little conspicuous,” Elliot says. “I had it trucked to Tommy’s place in San Francisco to store until this shit blows over. I can’t have it getting smashed in a chase. Besides, do you know how easy it would be to spot?”
“God forbid we should go any faster in this Taurus,” Jase says. Elliot responds by flooring it, making both Jase and I jerk back in our seats. I keep my eyes trained on our surroundings as they whizz past, noticing that we’re getting closer to downtown with each mile. Airstrips aren’t usually downtown, unless we’re grabbing a helicopter out of here.
“Are you planning on smashing this car in a chase?” I ask dubiously.
Elliot shrugs. “Not so far. Depends if we get tailed.”
I look at Jase, my eyebrows raised. I hope to fuck we don’t get tailed.
His hand is still dripping blood, and I’ve got the sudden urge to wrap the edge of my shirt around his knuckles and apply pressure until the bleeding slows. I look back to his eyes, though, and they’re uncertain. I think back to what we just spoke about—how I just bared my soul to the both of them—and I turn away, sinking back into my seat as Miami flashes past us outside. I think of the way he used to make love to me, compared to the way he did this morning, and I wonder if we’ll make it out of this thing together.
CHAPTER TEN
JASE
Fuck my life.
No, seriously. I haven’t spoken to Isobel in two fucking years, since she left the DEA, and now I’m seeing her tonight.
Last time I saw her I came all over her face and then left her tied up and naked in a private room inside The Black Heart.
She wants to meet at the same fucking club. With me. Just me. Nobody else.
Fuck my life.
I’d never, ever touch another woman, not when I’ve got Julz, but the thought of going back to the place where I freely indulged all my darkest desires is making my heart thump out of my fucking chest.
I don’t want to go back there. The old me would be there quicker than lightning, but the old me was a psychopath. And shit, maybe I’m still a psychopath, but: Julz.
I can feel the insecurity rolling off her like flames licking at my skin. I was an asshole; shouldn’t have said what I did about her and my father. But sometimes, I get so fucking angry about it all, I can’t keep it inside.
I knew Julian would find us eventually—Julian or one of the Gypsies. Same thing, different fucking name. The Cartel and the MC are like parasitic twins that feed off each other, interchangeable. One travels on Harley Davidsons, the other in a fleet of slick black town cars with bulletproof windows and plenty of room for stowing bodies in the trunks. Dornan might be dead, and Emilio might be dead, the two power players, the two kingpins of the entire organization, but it doesn’t matter. It never mattered. Fuck, we were so stupid. I really, truly believed that once my father was either dead or behind bars in maximum security, that life would finally begin.
I glance at Julz, who is playing with her engagement ring, the one I gave to her in Colombia when her stomach had just started to swell and she had that pregnancy glow in her cheeks. The band is too big for her—we never did find the time to have it resized—but she insists on wearing it anyway, and that makes me fucking proud. She’s my girl. Despite everything, she’s my girl, and she’s still wearing my ring.
My eyes drop from her fingers to my own. My hand has finally stopped bleeding, the dull ache in my knuckles reminding me, throb by throb, of the story Juliette decided to share about being killed and brought back to life and fucking raped.
I think about what my father did to my mother. Wh
at he did to my girl.
I can’t decide which one is worse.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
JULIETTE
We get to the airstrip with minutes to spare. I can see now what Elliot hasn’t mentioned, the reason the plane is leaving with or without us—a giant motherfucking electrical storm barreling in over the ocean. I glare at the insidious clouds as they gather and darken, rolling towards us. I fucking hate this place. If I weren’t running for my life maybe I’d enjoy a cocktail with one of those little umbrellas poolside, but when you’re running for your life, thunderstorms delaying your flight are really fucking inconvenient.
Elliot parks and jumps out of the car and runs to the plane, Luis greeting him at the door. He points to the sky and I hear a loud rumble that reverberates all the way down to my toes, my senses going on high alert. Fuck this place. Let’s just get the hell out of here, I think.
“You coming?” Jase asks, grabbing his bag and mine. I nod, feeling naked without anything to carry, my only possession the gun in my waistband. He slams his door shut, coming around to my side and yanking mine open. It’s like the thunder and the sudden arrival have fried my brain. I’m moving like I’m stuck in quicksand.
“Let’s go,” Jase says, holding out his hand. I take it, letting him pull me from the car, and before I can marvel at his touch, he’s pulled away again, falling into step beside me. I try not to let it mean anything, but it does. When we were young—before everything was ripped away—he’d hold my hand while it stormed.
“Juliette,” he’d say, under the covers with me so I couldn’t see the flashing lightning. “It’s okay. It’s beautiful. One day, you’ll learn to watch it. It’s just nature.”
He’d distract me by kissing me, by wrapping his strong arms around me. He was my protector, even then, even before any of this.
We board the plane, an upscale Gulfstream that looks shiny and new. I pass the cockpit, where our pilot sits patiently, watching the horizon. Luis is the first face I see, and behind him, Elliot’s already in the back, leaning over Amy as Kayla dozes on her lap.
Luis practically tackle-hugs me as I pass the small galley and step into the airplane’s interior. The seats are arranged in two clusters of four, with an extra two seats at the rear, and one small bathroom at the very back. Luis hasn’t changed a bit, with his shaved head, his dark blue eyes that remind me of Mariana’s, and his low-slung jeans that look like they’ll fall off at any moment.
“How you doing, bebé?” he murmurs. I shrug, giving him my most dazzling smile.
“That bad, huh?” He pats my cheek with his hand. “Try get some sleep on this flight. You’re beautiful, but you look like shit.”
I laugh. “Thanks, Luis.”
The storm’s picking up. I can hear the fucking thing outside. The wind is picking up, and a few drops of rain smack against the small round windows that line the cabin in two neat rows.
“Hey, we’re all here, boss,” Luis calls to the pilot. It’s funny, because Luis is the boss here, and I still have no idea how he finances all this. I know he’s got ties to the Skullz Cartel, but I’m not sure how high up he is.
I wave to Amy, and she smiles back politely. I’m fairly sure she doesn’t like me at all, and I don’t blame her one bit. She’s been dragged into this shit because of me, and I’m actually surprised she hasn’t been more openly hostile towards me. We’ve barely spoken two words to each other since we properly ‘met’ in the hospital after Elliot and Jase were shot by Dornan, and I’m pretty sure we won’t be becoming besties any time soon. Because of the things I’ve done, she’s had to leave her post as a psychologist with the LAPD and drag her daughter around the country. Not to mention that time she was taken hostage by Dornan Ross and threatened with death.
Yeah. I think it’s wise if I sit up front and let her have all the space at the back of the plane.
I take the first seat that faces the cockpit, putting my back to the rest of the plane. I kick my duffel bag underneath my seat and watch out the window, making sure we aren’t followed.
The sky cracks again and I stiffen, gripping my leather armrest. I hate flying. I hate storms. Right now I just want to be on the ground, in a dimly lit room, huddled in the corner so I can rock back and forth for a few months, undisturbed.
I feel the seat beside me shift and look over to see Elliot. I crane my neck past him, seeing Jase next to Amy, chatting to her and Luis.
“You never told me about that,” Elliot says. “What you said back at the apartment …” He trails off.
“I never told anyone,” I said. “It’s not exactly dinner-table conversation.”
“Oh, because we’re sitting at the dinner table so often together,” Elliot says, mocking me.
I smile into my lap. Let’s go, let’s get out of here. I fidget with my seatbelt, making sure it’s pulled tight. I tuck my hair behind my ears. Play with my armrests. All while feeling the questioning eyes of one Elliot McRae as he sits beside me, probably pondering his next sentence.
“Something on your mind, El?” I ask pointedly. I don’t look at him. I don’t want him to see all the bad things inside me.
“What’d you mean when you said he named you?” he asks, his words rushed as they spill out. Huh. I hadn’t expected that. I take a deep breath and raise my eyes to meet his.
“They needed a name for my birth certificate,” I say calmly, feeling anything but calm inside. “Dornan chose Juliette. The name he was going to use if he ever had a daughter.”
Elliot sags in his seat. “Fuck.”
Even my name isn’t mine.
I liked my name. Juliette, like Shakespeare’s, but with a couple more letters. Star-crossed lovers. Juliet and Romeo. Juliette and Jason.
I was named after someone who wants me dead.
Named by someone who almost destroyed me.
I don’t even know who I am anymore.
Fuck,” I echo limply. “That’s definitely the word for it.”
“It doesn’t mean anything,” Elliot says. “It doesn’t.”
“I don’t like it here,” I whisper, fully realizing that I sound just like a child as I look over at Elliot. “It storms too fucking much. It scares me.”
Elliot softens, his expression neutral. I can tell he’s struggling to maintain his poker face. He’s worried about me. They’re all so worried about crazy little me.
“Jase used to hold my hand when I was scared,” I say, wincing as the pilot slams the cabin door shut.
I look down at my empty palm.
“He doesn’t hold my hand anymore.”
Elliot crosses his ankles, pursing his lips as he grabs my hand. “You know what your problem is, Julz?”
“I’ve got ninety-nine problems, El. Narrow it down for me.”
“Your problem is, you stopped being angry. You stopped being vengeful. Where’s that furious girl who killed all the people who did her wrong? Where’s that girl who danced in the dark?”
Ow. I shrug. “She’s dead.”
Elliot shakes his head. “No, she’s not.” He taps my forehead with his index finger. “She’s in here. And you’ve got about five hours to find her and drag her sorry ass back out here.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
JULIETTE
I’m anxious as hell, but I must be exhausted, too. Everyone picks a seat, the plane takes off, and as soon as we’re clear of the weather I fall asleep. I might hate flying, but the one very reassuring thing about it is, nobody can really get to us up here. It’s like we’re suspended from reality for a few short hours, and unless someone is good enough to shoot the plane down, we’re golden. I don’t think that’d ever happen. The Gypsies and the Cartel are full of the kind of men who want to watch you die on your knees in front of them, not shoot you out of the sky.
We get to LA, land at a private airstrip, and what a greeting we receive.
We land beside a square car full of LAPD officers, and the sight both worries and relieves me. Elliot’s called in a fa
vor at the last minute, and it seems the guys from his old precinct—not to mention his female Captain— are on hand to make sure nothing befalls us. We split up, Elliot riding with Amy and Kayla in his Captain’s car, and Jase and I riding with Luis and a couple of LAPD officers Elliot has worked with before. The Los Angeles PD couldn’t help us with our DEA dramas since it’s a federal case we’re part of, so I’m very grateful that they’ve bent the rules to escort us safely for the final part of our journey back to ground zero. From what Elliot said, they’re helping us on their time, and if anyone finds out, they could lose their jobs.
Before I know it we’re rolling down the I-5, the sky blue and wide here. It’s a welcome relief, in an odd way. The Cartel is closing in. We’re in the stronghold of the Gypsy Brothers, the city of Los Angeles. And yet … I know this place. It’s in my bones. It’s the place I was born, the place I grew up. For better or for worse: It’s my home.
The humidity is gone, replaced with a dry, gentle heat that makes my brain fog lift considerably. I can actually think straight for the first time in forever.
A couple hours later, we’re showered, dressed and sitting around a large round table in the middle of the large, nondescript safe house we’ve been installed into in Hollywood. It’s got ten bedrooms, ten bathrooms, an indoor waterfall and an infinity pool that hugs a steep hillside overlooking the city. So much for being discreet.
“Where’d you find this place?” I ask Luis as we wait for Elliot to arrive.
“Airbnb,” Luis replies, winking. Funny thing is, he’s probably telling the truth. I raise my eyebrows, running my hand over the smooth wooden dining table and praying we aren’t tracked to this place. I’d hate this beautiful gangster mansion to get shot up just because we’re here.
Once Elliot’s arrived, there’s a collective silence for a few moments. I already feel a little better just being on home turf. I know these streets like the back of my hand, and I know all the favorite Gypsy haunts. I feel like I could see danger a lot easier here than I could in Miami. And, finally, it feels like something is about to happen. I’m tired of living in limbo. Tired of running.
Zero Hour (Gypsy Brothers #8) Page 5
