I didn’t think I could hate him any more than I already did. Oh, I was so wrong. I will tear that man’s head from his neck the next time I see him. Fuck Man Bun and the rest of his shit army—I don’t care if they kill me in the process as long as I take Rich down with me. He’d tried to touch her, has told her he will touch her, and that makes him a dead man.
“There,” Ian says, hitting pause, just as a high-pitched, muffled scream shoots over the microphone, and makes my whole body turn to water.
Skye. Fucking hell. What are they doing to her?
“Right before that scream. I think she’s calling our attention to something, but it’s quiet.” Ian taps a few more buttons, and the background sounds amplify to a much higher volume.
Take her down the back exit. Basement level.
My eyebrows furrow as I listen. Back exit. The Revel doesn’t have a back exit. Not on the floor where Rich does drops like this, the second story, away from the casino floor and wide windows of the first floor. He’ll use one of the private rooms, probably the big one so that he can post his men at every corner of it.
But if there’s a second entrance on that floor, another way in that I don’t know about—and that less people would be watching…
Ian and I exchange glances.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” I ask.
Ian dips his head into a nod. “Maybe. Just got off the phone with my contact. He can get me the money—not the additional hundred thou that asshole is suddenly demanding I psychically knew to bring, but at least the base five hundred K.”
“But no backup,” I reply. It’s not really a question. I’ve worked in the underground for long enough to know how incompetent and under-resourced the FBI is. There’s a reason it takes years for the seedier fight spots to be found and for men like Rich keep their thrones for as long as they do.
“No backup,” Ian confirms.
I nod a few times. “Well. Then we’ve got some planning to do.”
It takes us the better part of the afternoon. It’s already sundown by the time we shake on the final plan. And now comes the hardest part.
I’ve pulled a lot of tricks before. Lied and cheated and gambled my way through dozens of dangerous, even deadly situations. But I’ve never dared to try those lies on the man who taught me everything I know about crime.
I’ve never bluffed Rich Tomlinson before until Skye.
First time for everything, I guess. I hole up in Ian’s back room, perch on the edge of his bed, the door locked, all distractions shut down. And I dial Rich’s number from memory, on the burner phone we picked up during a Taco Bell run at dinner time.
“Yes,” he answers. Same way he always does to strange numbers. No name. Give no identifying features that you don’t have to.
“It’s me,” I say, my voice gruff with annoyance.
“Stone. I didn’t think I’d be hearing from you so soon. Aren’t you halfway to Cuba by now, buying a beach house somewhere unreachable?”
I bark out a laugh. He knows I don’t have money like that. The money I made fighting went to my mother’s care at first and I’d burned through that fast. So fast that going to Rich for help seemed like the smartest option. “Like I can travel,” I growl, and he chuckles. “Even if I could, you know what ties me here.”
“You should let her go, Stone,” he says, and I swear the fuck almost manages to sound sympathetic.
“This isn’t about her,” I snap. Then I mollify my tone. Dial it down. He’ll be suspicious if I sound too generous right now. Too nice. I’m doing this out of duty, not any sense of affection, and he’ll damn well know that. “Not directly, anyway. It’s…”
“What’s the matter, do you miss me already?”
I scowl. “I just know how you are. You like your technicalities. Your contracts. You like your people to finish the jobs they start. I don’t want this shit blowing back on me, not if it hits the fan like I think it will. This was my last job for you, so I’ll finish it out proper, and then we’re more than square. Fair?”
“Who knew you could be so loyal, Xander.” He’s silent for a second, mulling it over, then he releases a breath. “Fine, that seems fair. What do you need to tell me with such burning urgency, then?”
“It’s about the brother. Ian.” I glance at the closed bedroom door. Picturing him crouched on the other side, still bent over the laptop on his kitchen counter. Trusting me. Putting all his faith in me, to save his ass and his sister’s both. “He’s working with the feds,” I say.
30
Skye
I wake up to the sound of heavy footsteps outside my cell.