by April Zyon
Chapter Eight
“Are you fucking kidding me? You can’t find anything?” Tony paced behind their tech hacker friend. This man was fucking good. No, he was the best and if he couldn’t find anything on the number Emily had called him from, then there was a hell of a lot more to Emily than he knew. “Keep at it, Kid,” Tony said and gave the Kid a pat on the shoulder. “Call me as soon as you have something.” He encouraged the young man. He had to, because he needed Kid to figure out where Emily was. He needed to find her as much as he needed his next breath.
Tony walked out of the apartment complex and got onto his bike. He pulled into traffic and headed toward one of the restaurants the Family owned. He had to continue to go about business as usual, or Gregorio was going to pull him as second and rightly so. Tony was obsessed right now. He was obsessed with finding Emily and Greg understood that, to a certain point.
Thankfully, Gregorio had agreed to help him. They had put word out looking for Emily with their contacts. So far nothing had come back. If anything, they had been iced out even more, which was odd.
Getting to the restaurant, Tony backed his bike up to the curb in front and the walked inside. He frowned when he saw the very large man sitting at his table. The man was likely six six, six seven and looked to be close to three hundred pounds of solid muscle. He was bald with tattoos covering his scalp, down his neck, and into his shirt. Even with the tattoos the way the man held himself screamed that he was as rich as fucking Midas, and dangerous as Hades. Interesting.
“Who’s at my table?” he asked Marissa, the hostess.
“I don’t know. He came in, said that he was waiting for you. He gave me a card and all it said was Striker Reynolds.”
That hit Tony like a gut punch. There was no familial resemblance between Emily and this man, so who the fuck was he? He stalked forward with purpose in his stride. The man might be as big as a fucking mountain, but Tony wasn’t small by any standards either. Taking the seat opposite from the man, Tony leaned back and reigned in his anger. “I hear you are looking for me?”
“I am. You are important to my little sister. I thought I would come and find out just exactly if you were worth the time of finding out why you broke her heart or not.” The man’s voice was deep and held no accent, which Tony found odd. Emily had that same feature now that he thought about it. She could shift and change her voice when she wasn’t paying attention.
“You don’t look anything like Emily.”
“Well at least you aren’t trying to play stupid and ask me what sister, so that’s a good thing.” The large man leaned forward and offered his hand. “My name is Striker. Reynolds, if you haven’t already figured it out, is obviously a false surname.”
Tony took the man’s hand and shook it, frowning all the while. “Antonio Bruno. No lies there.” There was no need to lie. Tony had a feeling this man was more than a step ahead of him already and it pissed him off.
“Maximillian, by the way, Em’s real last name. She will likely kill me for telling you.” The man laughed and added, “Literally, kill me, but I figured you should know.” The man leaned back again and watched him, which made Tony shift again in his seat.
“It suits her. She’s very regal.” Emily was like fucking royalty. She was far too good for him, so why he was still searching for her was beyond him. Tony should just let her go. “Is she okay?” He had to ask, needed to know that she was good since he hadn’t talked to her in two fucking months now.
“She’s healing. There is a lot you don’t know, Antonio Bruno, a great deal. I need to know something though.” The man put his hands together under his chin and watched him. It made Tony feel like he was being sized for his fucking coffin. “When she called you, what did you say to her that made her cry? She’s never cried. When her daddy died, she cried in private and it broke all of our hearts. But this time, it was more. You shattered her. What did you say?”
Tony snorted and leaned back. This time he was relaxed and shook his head. “Un-fucking-believable. You know, if this is some kind of long running con, you can fuck off.” Now he got it. They ran a scam in tandem. Hook some rich fucker and then try to drain him.
“Con?” The man’s eyebrow with a gold hoop in it arched as if he were offended.
Oh-fucking-well. They’d offended him by trying to run this play on him. They should have chosen someone else, someone who wasn’t fucking in the life. “That’s right, con, you asshole. Send in the hot piece of ass and get the sucker hooked on her cunt. Then get her cleared out only to have her send some schmuck in a week or so later to claim pregnancy. Fuck you.”
Tony saw the man’s hand clench into a fist and could hear his teeth clenching. Interesting, real anger. Good. Good because Tony was fucking pissed off as well.
“The one and only reason you are still breathing is because I made her a promise,” Striker said and took several deep breaths. He tossed a package onto the table and stood. “You don’t fucking deserve her. At all. Just so you know, everything is in there. Why she left that day, what happened to her in that time until we could get her out, and what’s happening to her now. Just remember this, daddy, you cut her and your son out of your life.” The man then moved away from Tony, giving him his back as if he didn’t have a care in the world.
Tony stared at the package that was left on the table while Striker’s words soaked in. No con man would leave shit, would tell Tony to basically fuck off. They would instead tell them where to meet again next. They would set up a meet time and not leave a package of photos. Tony couldn’t deny what he saw. Before him sat photos of Emily unconscious, bleeding and badly beaten with a small pregnant belly clear to anyone that knew her body as intimately as Tony knew it.
Tony grabbed everything that was left and ran out of the restaurant as if the hounds of hell were on his heels, because he needed The Kid to go over every fucking thing, every photo, every recording, everything. He had to know what the fuck was going on.
****
“Calm the fuck down, Tony,” Gregorio, Tony’s oldest friend said as he stormed from one end of the room to the other. They had just watched video of Emily being beaten, and Greg expected Tony to calm the fuck down?
“If that was Alessandra would you calm the fuck down?” Tony shouted and ran his hands through his hair. “Now I can’t even find this mountain of a fucking man calling himself her fucking brother. God fucking dammit, I let my temper get the best of me, again!”
“What was it that you told me, Tony?” Greg stopped Tony and looked at him. “You have some serious fucking apologizing to do, and you have to tell her you love her.”
“If I can fucking find her again. She’s like a god damn ghost, and so is her fucking brother. But the bastard knew exactly where the hell I would be and when I would be there. How the fuck would he know that?”
“Shit, I don’t know.”
Tony didn’t know either. There was something he was missing. “Do you think they are part of a Family we don’t know about?”
“I don’t know. I will ask around,” Gregorio said simply. “They aren’t with the Russians, because those fuckers wouldn’t be able to hide from us and wouldn’t be able to infiltrate us that well.”
“True. Make some calls. I will contact the bosses on the East coast as well. There is something going on right now, something fucking big that’s right in front of us.”
“That’s it!” This came from The Kid. “They are shadows. There is a group of people we didn’t even know about. You have to literally get a referral from a friend of a friend and your kill order has to be just, and I mean fucking real.”
Both Greg and Tony turned to the Kid, obviously having forgotten him for a moment and that had him sitting down hard under their glare.
“Go on,” Tony said. “Don’t stop now.”
The Kid swallowed, hard, several times and then nodded before he continued. “I just thought about it because I remembered reading about Father McAlister four months ago. He got p
opped right inside of his confessional. I had heard whispers for years about him diddling with the little kids. Then suddenly this rich Irish kid stopped going to that church. The next month the good Father is found dead with a single gunshot wound between his eyes. Anyway, like I said, there are rumors of this elite group, but I don’t know how to reach them. We’ve never had need because we’ve always handled our own shit. We’ve never had to farm anything out.” The Kid’s pride was clear even for Tony to hear, but now he wanted to know more.
“What does this have to do with Emily or this asshole that found me?”
“From what I’ve heard, they are trained assassins, like the real fucking deal. They train to do everything from finding where a person lays their head to where they put their dicks. Don’t you think they would know where you would eat?”
Tony looked at Greg and then swore even more. Some of Emily’s scars now took on a whole new light, but there was no way she was an assassin. She was too pure, too good. “Find them. I want a meet and I want to fucking know if Emily is being held by them.”
“What if she’s part of them and not held by?”
“She’s being held by, not part of.” Tony argued with Gregorio, cutting him off before he could get any more of his words out. “She’s too… No, she’s not like us. She’s not a stone-cold killer. She’s not. Find them. I want a meet.”
“I will try,” The Kid said.
“Fucking find them, Kid, or find a hole to hide from me in.” Tony shouted and slammed out of the house before he hurt the Kid.
Chapter Nine
Two years later
Emily gave birth to Antonio Maximillian Bruno six weeks early. She had difficulties with the pregnancy that no one anticipated, but little TJ, as she called him, was born with just a few complications. A bit on the small side, his arm broken at delivery and his hips were dislocated, but it was his lung functions that had them the most concerned. Thankfully, she was at the Pits, so they took the best of care of her little man. He had premiere NICU care, and she had excellent care as well.
Once she was cleared after delivery, and once she had TJ home with her, she began training to get back into shape once more. TJ was everyone’s hero, all the teams inside of The Guild took him as their proverbial godson, and god help anyone that ever dared to bother her son. Especially since the Horsemen and Lucifer were officially his Godfathers; she couldn’t choose just one so she chose all five.
Finally, her son was healthy, thriving, and she was ready for field work. The first task she wanted was the name of who had ripped her family apart before it had a chance to start a year and a half ago. She stood before Lucifer and looked at the note in her hand and then back up at him. “Are you certain this is who ordered for me to be taken away from Tony?”
It didn’t make sense. She didn’t understand why someone so close to Tony would have ordered for her to be removed from his life. Someone who called himself Tony’s friend. Someone who was a part of the Family, if only on the fringes as part of the biker gang that ran for the Italians. Why?
“I wish I could tell you there was a mistake, but there wasn’t. Emily, are you sure that these are wounds you want to reopen?”
“He won’t even know I’m there.” She would ensure Tony never saw her.
“Do you need backup?”
“No. I will need masks, identifications, the normal for a job. You know how to set me up.” Emily looked back at the name on the paper and practically shook with anger. This was a man she knew, a man she had talked to, laughed with, joked with, and partied with along with Tony.
“You will have everything you need. The jet is powered and ready for you. TJ will be safe here with us. I will watch the little guy.” Emily looked up at Kenny, saw his smile, and shook her head.
“You just want to hijack my kid for a while.”
“Well can you blame me? The kid is cute as hell. He looks just like his daddy, but he’s got your eyes and your hair. That kid is gonna be trouble in a few years, but it’s gonna be a joy getting there.” There was pride in Kenny’s voice and Emily realized just how happy he was to be a part of TJ’s life as well.
Impulsively, Emily moved in and hugged Kenny tightly. “I love you, too.” He, like the Horsemen, were like brothers to her and it was time that they all knew it. “I’m happy you are all in my life. You are all like brothers to me and I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Kenny’s arms wrapped around her and gave her a squeeze. “We wouldn’t have it any other way either, kiddo.” He kissed the top of her head and then pulled back. “Love you too, Emily. Be careful out there and don’t take risks. Don’t go anywhere near the Family because they’ve been asking questions about The Guild. Lay low. Do what you have to do and get out. And don’t forget the upgrade we had placed on you.” How could she? They had biometric trackers placed on her that if she were ever in danger again it would send out an all points and they would ride for her, even if she didn’t call for them. It was a little on the humiliating side.
“Will do, but how would they know about the Guild?” Emily asked with a frown as his words suddenly clicked into her mind. She pulled back and saw the look on his face. It was one of, well she didn’t know what the look was, because she had never seen it on Kenny’s face before.
“One of the guys might have went down trying to find out what the hell happened with that phone call when you woke up after surgery. Somehow the videos and photos of you were taken to prove a point. Well, the point was proven too well and in an odd way and somehow they started to look for assassins.”
“And how does that lead them to the Guild?”
“I haven’t figured that one out yet. When I do either someone is dead or seriously reprimanded.”
“I will make sure to stay far from them then.” Great, that made the job even more difficult, but she would be able to do it all the same. Vengeance would be hers, no matter what.
“And if Antonio stands in the way of you killing his friend?”
“I will go through him,” Emily said without inflection. She was going to kill Snake. The fucker was going to die for orchestrating her being taken away from Tony before she could tell him everything and for the hell she had lived through for the last twenty-five months.
“Go get them, Angel. Your mission is a go, but stop in and give your baby a kiss goodbye first or he’s gonna momma us to death while you are gone.”
That had Emily smiling. Her baby, not even two years old yet and he had picked up on how to work the adults around him. He had picked up on talking and walking and could say more than momma, but when he got in a snit and wanted to piss off his uncles, he would only say momma. God, she loved that boy. “Will do. Wouldn’t want to come back and have to pay for therapy for you five.”
****
2 weeks later at the Red Tent
Tony was becoming an alcoholic like his father. He knew it and everyone around him knew it. They just didn’t’ have the fucking balls to say it to his face. It had been twenty-five months since Emily was taken from his life. And a long assed time he had been looking for some elusive unknown urban legend that he was now convinced didn’t exist. No, Emily was gone and whatever child she was carrying was gone as well, all because he didn’t believe her.
He had fucked up and he knew it. When Andy, their newest bartender came over to pour him another vodka, he shook his head. No, it was time he pulled his fucking ass up out of the gutter and prove he wasn’t like his old man. He was better than that.
He felt a woman slide into the seat beside him and didn’t even look. “Fuck off. I’m not interested.” This was his go-to line since Striker Reynolds left him with the proof that his Emily had been taken and beaten, all because of him. No, there was no way in fuck that any other woman would ever do for him. He had to have her.
“Pity, I was hoping you could buy me a drink for information on a long-lost lamb.” The woman’s voice was lilting in an Irish twang. Her words almost danced in a limerick as she spo
ke.
“What lost-lamb would that be?” Tony lifted his hand and then added, “What are you drinking?”
“Tequila, straight up. Just one.” The woman lit a cigarette. Then she turned to look at Tony and lifted her brow. “I hear you lost a woman, such a pity. I also hear she was taken when she didn’t want to be taken, even worse.”
Tony was barely holding onto his shit right now and the woman was pissing him off. “What do you know of it?”
“More than you.” She blew smoke upwards as she spoke. “The question is, do you really want to know the full truth of what happened to your lost-lamb?”
“No, the question is why have you waited so long to come to me?”
“Because I couldn’t see you going down the tubes like your daddy did any longer,” the woman said quietly. That’s when Tony realized she was older than he was by likely twenty years. She’d had work done, good work. She was a kept woman then, very well kept.
“So you knew my father?”
“Aye, that I did. He was a good man, in his own way. He introduced me to the man I love. Without him, I would be lost on the streets, so I owe him this. This is the debt I’m repaying to him through you. I told him on the day I married my Mike that if I could ever repay him I would. He died before I was able, so that debt transferred to you. This is my payment to him, and you. People ignore women, remember that boy. Men, especially powerful ones who are drunk on their own self-importance, tend to talk a lot when there are women around and that’s how I learned what is in that envelope.” She passed an envelope to Tony and kept her hand on it. “Before you open this, you need to be very sure, because when you open this you won’t be able to forget it. Once you learn the truth of who betrayed you it’s something you will not be able to forget.”
