“And Nico gets a nice payoff for a joyride,” Zeus said.
“And he knew the estate. Knew the garage codes.”
“Did you create the fake surveillance of him being here that night beforehand, or once you knew we were coming?”
“Beforehand. Just in case. But Nico said the old man would believe Diego did it in a second. He never imagined Diego would—” He waved his hand at Zeus and Odin.
Hire us.
Odin walked up to him, looked him straight in the eye. “Did you drop the dime on us?”
“Wait, what?” Handsome Jack’s eyes nearly popped out of his skull. “What? No. Never. Never—Odin. Guys—”
Odin just watched him.
“I swear to you,” Handsome Jack said. “Look, I’m willing to cop to my part of it but…” He shook his head fervently. “It was fucked up. I got spooked with what I heard of Diego’s plans. But I wouldn’t go to the feds. You gotta believe me.”
Odin turned. Shook his head. Not Handsome Jack.
Nico, then.
Steps in the hall. Thor ushered Nico back and then shoved him into Zeus’s waiting arms. Zeus pulled him upright and cracked him in the jaw and Nico was down.
“Get the fuck up,” Odin growled.
Nico stayed on the floor, lip bleeding, hands up in a defensive posture. Here he was, this man who had nearly gotten us killed. Still might. Why should I feel sorry for him? But I did.
“Don’t kill him,” I said. “Don’t kill him.”
“Give me one good reason,” Odin said.
“Because he can’t confess to Galvano?”
Zeus growled. Thor snorted. Both acting so unconvinced.
Oh, I got it. I was the good cop here.
“I’ll tell him,” Nico said. “I’ll tell everything.”
“You have the wig?” Thor asked.
“I tossed it in the ravine a mile from the car,” Nico said. “But I’ll tell him where it is if he wants to check.”
“And you’ll tell the whole fucking story with every other detail he’d care to validate?” Thor asked.
Nico nodded and proclaimed yes and swore in every way he could.
It was stupid, but I really did feel sorry for Nico, cowering on the floor of Handsome Jack’s back room. Nico had done it for love, and now not only would he likely lose the woman he loved due to not having the money he’d probably pretended to have, but he was also about to be in deep shit with Galvano and Diego. And yeah, we were forced back on the run, but at least we had each other.
Or did we?
My guys presented a fiercely united front, but maybe that’s all we had—a united front and a dangerous federal agent tied up in the trunk of our stolen car.
I got this hollow feeling in my belly as Zeus called Diego and then Galvano. Galvano suggested we meet behind an abandoned warehouse on Alameda Street.
“Please,” Handsome Jack begged. “Aren’t I just another victim in this?”
“Yeah, you’re a victim of your willingness to believe the worst of a brown boy,” Odin snarled.
We headed out back. Zeus threw Nico in the trunk with Agent Denko.
“Gotta love the trunk on a Lincoln,” Thor said. Handsome Jack rode in the back between Thor and me, using the time to beg us to let him go, beg us to make the case to Don Galvano that he’d been hoodwinked by Nico.
Around midway there he was offering us money. That bought him a strip of duct tape over his mouth.
Chapter Fifteen
Galvano’s warehouse was a freestanding concrete building with the words cold storage splashed above boarded-up windows and a door crisscrossed with bars. We drove around back and pulled in between two other cars—Don Galvano’s and Diego’s.
They both got out when we arrived. Thor unlocked the door while Odin pulled Handsome Jack from the back seat. Zeus opened the trunk and pulled Nico out.
Galvano furrowed his brow when he spotted Denko still in there. “Three? I thought you said two.”
“That one’s for us,” Zeus said, slamming the trunk.
Galvano nodded. Because apparently bad guys don’t need more explanation for that sort of thing. For us. Like, what are we? Vampires?
Diego greeted us, but things were definitely cold between him and Don Galvano. And two big dangerous guys like that generated a lot of cold.
We went inside. Zeus put them both on the floor, and then he jabbed Nico with his foot. “You don’t want to make me tell it.”
Nico told the story. He’d wanted a car for Sophia Viga and some nicer furnishings. He hadn’t meant to hurt anyone. He went on and on, apologizing profusely for crashing the Corvette.
“Nico put the scare into Handsome Jack,” Odin said. And it was a sort of kindness to Handsome Jack that he’d say that.
Galvano looked furious. “You two try to play me? And you fuck things up between my daughter and the man she loves? You think you can do that?” He gave Diego a look. “Diego. My apologies.”
Diego nodded.
Galvano turned again to Nico. “You fuck with my family?”
My heart pounded. Galvano had called Diego family. It was sweet in a kind of Hallmark moment way…if you ignored what would happen once we left.
Galvano went and clasped Diego’s hand and arm at the same time. “You said you didn’t crash my ‘vette and I didn’t take your word. I am beyond sorry. I see this here now, what really happened…”
“It’s cool,” Diego said.
“No, it’s not cool. You’re a man of your word, and I know how deeply fucking grievous it is to not be taken at that when you’re a man of your word.”
“I’m glad we cleared it up,” Diego said. “It means a lot, being right with you. For Maria.”
“It means a fucking lot that you pursued this. We’ll rethink this Oxford thing. I was mistaken there. I’ll be proud to have you in our family. Not just proud. Lucky you fucking saw it through. And you guys.” He let Diego go and turned to us. “I’m grateful as hell you worked this shit out. Masterful.”
Diego took Zeus’s hand, going on to shake with all of us, even me, saying a heartfelt thank you to each and every one of us.
“We have this,” Galvano continued, turning to my guys. “And all payment is on me. Whatever your fee, you’ll send me the bill.”
Together they looked down at Handsome Jack and Nico.
Father and prospective son-in-law together. It reminded me of how, back in the farming community where I grew up, prospective sons-in-law would frequently help their fiancée’s family with things like barn repairs or harvesting crops. Plying their trade together.
“Stupid motherfucker,” Diego said to Handsome Jack. “I would’ve fucking lowered your rate. I wouldn’t have used muscle—not for first-round collections. I always automate any kind of first-round collections. It saves money on enforcement muscle. Enforcement muscle is fucking expensive.”
Don Galvano turned to Diego with a look of respect.
“Don’t kill them,” I said suddenly.
All eyes were on me.
“Ice,” Zeus said. “You can’t ask that.”
“It’s what I want.” I wanted our gang back together. And for nobody to die. I wanted the moon. I wanted the world safe for love.
“We’ll see,” Galvano said.
Odin grabbed my hand and pulled me out to the car. He and Zeus got up front as usual. Thor checked on Denko and then got in the back with me. Our usual driving formation.
“Will they kill them?” I asked.
“No,” Zeus said. “Shit, Ice, asking a thing like that?”
“I had to,” I bit out.
Thor gave me an appreciative look. “That’s why you rock.”
We headed out onto the dark street in solemn silence. Maybe Nico and Handsome Jack would be spared, but we might not be so lucky, riding along with a dangerous agent in the car trunk and two elephants in the car—Zeus, threatened by us almost fucking in front of Denko, and Thor and Odin threatened by Zeus’s picket-fence
dream.
“So fucking Millennial of Diego, what with the automation,” Thor said.
“No doubt,” I said, grateful for any conversation at this point. “Somehow I don’t think Handsome Jack’s rate is going to get lowered now.”
“One big happy family,” Thor said.
“I can just see their Christmas dinners now,” I tried. “Diego, you’re saving money on enforcement muscle? Wow that’s brilliant—it really such an annoying expense to have a guy threatened every other fucking day. Yeah, that’s right, Poppa, and if you lower rates, you have to break less kneecaps, which pays for itself. Could you please pass the Baby Jesus cradle gravy boat? Why, thank you.”
No go.
“What do you think traffic’s like on fifteen right now?” Zeus asked.
“Does it matter?” Thor stretched out and slung an arm around me. “I see blackjack in our future.”
“Wait, Vegas?” I asked. “What about Honolulu?”
“We need to get out of L.A.,” Thor said.
I sat back. “Are we going to send Galvano a bill?”
“No way,” Zeus said. “We’ll send him a card. Best to make solving this case a gift from us. A nice wedding gift.”
“Isn’t a couple’s enemies bound with duct tape and bleeding at their feet more of a tenth-anniversary gift?” I said. “Oh, wait. That’s lace.”
They didn’t even laugh.
I was starting to feel panicky, like our beautiful family was slipping away.
“If we let Agent Denko fuck us up, he wins,” I said.
“Not exactly,” Odin said. “In that scenario nobody wins.”
Okay.
Dawn was breaking. We zoomed around one turnpike and then another, and shot off west. The tires hummed, adding to the buzz of tension in the car. We’d never been so far apart from each other before—far apart and drifting further with alarming speed.
Having Agent Denko in the trunk was not helping things. My guys were in vigilance overdrive, all hyperfocused on the mirrors, on the road. Taking in every detail, knowing every agent in the Southwest would be hunting for him by now.
Twice Zeus pulled off the highway to change things up. We’d swing through strip malls, past fast food and quick-stop franchises, all of those colorful logos promising consistency and familiarity. Just then I could see the appeal.
“Remember when ZOX found you that first night?” I asked. “When I was first with you, and Zeus was down in the weight room. We three were upstairs in the suite, and that guy came in like a room service waiter? Remember? And we got out on the roof?”
“Mmm,” Odin said. “And the agent took you hostage down there, and Zeus threatened to shoot him through your head.”
Not exactly the point I was going for. “That’s the first time I understood what family meant for you. All the agents were crawling all over, all out to kill you, and you guys wouldn’t leave without Zeus. That was when I first loved you—all of you.”
Thor looked at me sadly. He knew what I was trying to do.
“You were willing to die for each other,” I continued. “I’d never felt anything like that before. I’d been so into thrills and bungee jumping and all of that sort of shit, but here was something so beyond. Willing to die for love. For your fucking brothers.”
Silence. Give it up, that’s what the silence said.
Fuck it. I’d never give up on us—not ever.
“That’s the real danger—love,” I said. “Love is dangerous. That’s what makes it worth something. Love is the ultimate cliff to jump over, and I’ll do it again and again, knowing you guys are there. I’ll blow everything, give everything, because that’s what we do for each other. You taught me how to love like that.”
I imagined, during the long silence that followed, that I’d gotten through to them. I even felt a little bit hopeful.
“You taught me it,” I said again.
“Love isn’t enough,” Odin said finally. “You need trust, Ice. This is the problem that we have.”
“We have trust.”
“No,” he said sadly. “Zeus and you talked about marriage, about making a life together—the two of you without us.”
“And you nearly brought another person into the mix,” Zeus growled. “It’s a kind of cheating. I don’t fucking care—it’s cheating.”
“It wasn’t cheating,” Thor said. “It was being what we are. It was us expressing our love.”
“With Denko in the mix?” Zeus asked.
“He wasn’t in the mix,” Thor said. “We do fucked-up things all the time—that’s us.”
“We do fucked-up things inside our group,” Zeus said. “We love and accept each other inside ourselves. Just because some married couple out there decides they like to buttfuck, it doesn’t mean they suddenly get to buttfuck other people.”
“This was in no way like fucking Denko,” Thor said.
Zeus snorted. “Are you kidding me? Whether he’s shoving his cock into Isis, holding a dildo, or watching, that’s involving him. What we do is an expression of our love. Bringing him into our mix is involving him.”
“No, our total freedom to be fucked up and dirty is an expression of our love,” Thor said, “and a few weeks ago you would’ve been on board with that. You’re moving the line, Zeus, and you don’t get to do that.”
“Fucking is romantic, and we are a romantic unit of four,” Zeus bit out. “Where Denko doesn’t belong.”
“A romantic unit of four? Are we?” Odin barked. “That’s funny, because explain to me how two can plan to secretly break off and get married.”
“Nobody was planning that,” I said. “There were no plans. You have to be free to talk about dreams—”
“Dreams?” Thor said. “Dreams are the first step of everything. Haven’t you ever heard that saying, in dreams begin reality?“
“That’s not how it was,” I said.
“No?” Odin said. “Zeus, you’re familiar with the concept, are you not? You first start them thinking about it. Visualization.”
“Fuck you,” Zeus said. “Yeah, I wanted to visualize that. Yes, I wanted the woman I love to visualize that with me. You want to pretend you’ve never visualized something other than this? Are you the fucking dream police now?”
“Are you the fucking arbiter of what is appropriately fucked up and what is wrongly fucked up?” Odin snapped.
“Stop it, you guys!”
Odin ignored my pleas. “I don’t want to go through my days wondering if I’m crossing some ever-moving line for you. Anything consensual, that’s what we’re doing here. We can be as fucked up as we want as long as it’s consensual—”
“Unless it’s cheating!” Zeus angrily changed lanes. He was speeding. Everything was spinning out of control. I couldn’t believe the car itself wasn’t spinning.
“It didn’t feel like cheating,” I said, trying to calm things. “It felt like it was about us and what we wanted. And talking about a wedding didn’t feel like planning. It was just about love. God, you guys!”
Zeus turned on the music. Some stupid ‘90s pop stuff. Odin stared out the window, utterly dug in.
I pressed my face into Thor’s warm, solid shoulder. We’d done a beautiful thing together. We’d saved that family. Couldn’t we save ours?
And since when was Zeus so rigid about what we could and couldn’t do? It was true—he’d moved that line, and that wasn’t like him.
And another thing: in the past, Odin had always been patient with Zeus, balancing him, working with him. Now he had no tolerance.
What wasn’t I seeing?
I closed my eyes, thinking about those first days we were together. The rush of excitement the week before my first robbery with them. It seemed forever ago, us drunk and wearing wigs and dancing on the tabletop of our hotel suite to Michael Jackson.
My bank robbers had been betrayed in the worst way by their own country, and they didn’t let it make them small—they’d grown big and bold. They’d found love a
nd brotherhood in the wreckage. Like the losers who get kicked out of a fabulous nightclub, but instead of going meekly, they go up and do the most amazing dance on the club stage where nobody can touch them.
Thor did a little rubbing thing on my shoulder that mixed with the lulling sound of the engine. The sun was up now, but none of us had slept. I found that I was so sleepy. So very sleepy.
Chapter Sixteen
I woke up—or more accurately, got woken up—by Thor shaking me.
“Where are we?” I asked, rubbing my eyes.
“Vegas, baby,” Thor said.
I sat up. “What time is it?”
“After lunch, sleepyhead.” He pulled me out from the car. He was wearing a nice suit. I rubbed my eyes and peered around. We were in the dark corner of some sort of parking ramp full of cars—rows and rows of shiny cars like bullets in the dark. Out beyond the concrete slats of the ramp, it was daylight. More like daylight plus, with flashing lights and jagged energy in the air.
Odin strolled over in a suit and tie, attention all around, hyperaware. He didn’t like being in an area with so many hiding places.
Right behind Odin was Zeus wheeling a dolly with a giant, brightly painted magician’s trick box strapped onto it—the kind where you shut somebody in and pretend you’re cutting them in half. It was here I realized Thor was actually in tails, like a magician.
“What the fuck?” I said.
“We have to get him inside a room,” Odin said. “He won’t be out cold forever.”
“Motherfucker, no way,” I said. “He’s in there?”
“We can’t leave him in the trunk.” Odin shrugged. “Nothing like hiding in plain sight.”
“Where’d you even get that?”
“Rented,” Zeus said. “While you snored away.”
I smiled, knowing they’d probably moved around stealthily, as only they could, using all of their mad covert ops skills to ensure I stayed sleeping. Maybe it gave them something to discuss and focus on. Something to work together on. But nothing was different—that deep sense of sorrow and betrayal permeated the air between us.
Women all over the world complain that their men don’t want to talk about their relationship. They think they have it bad? They should try tripling the number of men in their romantic unit and see how relationship talks go then.
The Most Wanted (Taken Hostage by Kinky Bank Robbers #4) Page 17
