When I looked over at Seb, I knew he was ready to break. He was ready to give this man anything to get Scarlet back. Knowing him, he would just go on a rampage later to try and kill the entire family for trying to force our hand. It wasn’t the worst idea. Elliot was stoic as ever, reclined in the chair and watching everyone intensely. His breathing was even, but only I could see the resignation in his eyes. He wanted this to be over too.
“Deal,” I said and leaned forward to shake his chubby hand. He grinned and shook it with a weak grip. How that man was ever able to run a successful empire was beyond me.
“Deal,” he said. “And now that all of that is taken care of, I can tell you she is being moved almost nightly. We’ve had an informant amongst their ranks almost since she went missing.” His grin was enough to set Sebastian off. I wasn’t sure if it was anger for Scarlet or anger that her father had known this whole time and just played us for the fools we very clearly were.
But Seb snapped and went right for the jugular. He was across the room in seconds, gripping Dulca by the throat and throwing him onto the floor. Dulca’s men reacted at the same time Elliot and I did, pointing guns at each other and shouting orders to stand down. Seb was frozen on top of Scarlet’s father while Dulca just grinned and coughed against his hand.
“Bastard,” Sebastian spat down at him. “She’s your own flesh and blood, and you’re just going to let her rot when you could have had her out by now?” I could see his knuckles turn white out of the corner of my eye.
“Sebastian,” I said in a growl. Elliot stomped out the cigar before it could light the chair on fire. Fuck’s sake, I thought to myself. One more fucking thing that would need to be replaced. At the rate we were going, the entire house was going to have to be remodeled. But we had decided to have the meeting at the manor home for that very reason. The secret location was out, and it couldn’t get any more fucked-up at this point.
“Call off your bitch, mutt!” one of Dulca’s guys shouted.
“Sebastian,” I tried again. “Get the fuck off of him, or he won’t be around to tell us where she is.”
Seb got off him with a grunt of frustration and stalked out of the room like a toddler having a tantrum. The stress of this life was going to put me in an early grave before someone could even try to do the job themselves.
I watched Dulca struggle to get his body off the ground. When he finally stood, he straightened his jacket and looked at his ruined cigar with disdain. He motioned for his men to put down their weapons, and we followed suit. I just wanted him to tell me where she was so that I could get them out of my house and get her back.
“Apologies for the outburst,” I said. “We’re all a bit on edge. We just want to know where she’s being held and where she is being taken and when. That way we can go get our property back.”
He reached out his hand to one of the men beside him, and they handed him a piece of paper. He walked over to me and calmly placed the piece of paper in the pocket of my suit before looking up at me.
“Pleasure doing business with you, mutt. If you find her and she’s still alive, please tell her that her dear father misses her, will you? She’ll be at that next location in a week.”
Elliot walked up to my back as we watched them leave the room. I waited until I heard the door shut before pulling the piece of paper out of my pocket and opening it. It had her current location and her next planned location on it.
“That’s at least a three-hour drive away from here. And that next one is even further away,” he said, reading the piece of paper over my shoulder.
“Trying to get her at her current location is too risky. We need to scout out the next place, get a plan in order, and make sure we don’t fuck it up. Make some calls and get the guys together. I want to meet immediately to start making a game plan. I’m going to knock Seb around a bit before we get going.”
“Don’t hurt him too badly,” Elliot laughed. “We’ll need him at full capacity when it’s time to get her back.”
I rolled and cracked my neck as I left Elliot to get the men together. Sebastian was really, really pushing my limits, and even though we tried to make things as even as possible between all three of us, he needed to remember his place when it came to public transactions.
“Sebastian!” I yelled as I stalked up the stairs. He had been spending every waking and sleeping moment in Scar’s room, so I had a good idea of where to find him. When I opened her door, I found him lying on her bed, playing with a switchblade and staring at the ceiling. I walked up to him and slapped him across the face.
“What was that shit about?” I asked when he didn’t react other than moving his gaze from the ceiling to me and back again.
“Sorry,” he said flatly.
“Sure you are. Let’s go. We’re meeting with Niko and the others to get a game plan together. Get your ass up.”
“And if she isn’t alive?” he asked quietly.
“She is.”
“You don’t know that,” he said, folding his switchblade in and shoving it in his back pocket as he rolled off her bed. “If she isn’t alive, I will kill anyone who so much as looked at her. I will kill everyone who was even remotely involved in this fucked-up little plan. And neither you nor Elliot can stop me.” He brushed past me, shoving my shoulder with his own. His temper tantrums were about to push me over the edge. I could only take so much babysitting with my own burdens weighing me down.
“Hey,” I said, grabbing his arm. Before I was able to register him moving, he spun around and punched me. It was hard enough that I tasted blood, and my head swung hard to the side.
“Do not fucking touch me right now.” His chest was heaving with anger. I hadn’t seen him this hotheaded since I first met him. “Do not try to calm me down. Do not speak down to me like I’m one of your little cronies. I’m an equal third of this fucked-up life we’ve all created together, and I will not be talked down to. Our girl is missing, and I’m over trying to pretend like everything is okay. We should have found her by now.”
“You are an equal third of this,” I said, getting in his face, our noses practically touching. “And that is the only reason I’m not knocking you flat on your ass for that sucker punch you just threw. Get your shit together, Sebastian,” I growled as I shoved a finger against his chest. “You need your fucking head on straight. Scarlet needs you at your best. Understood?”
He shoved me away and stalked out of the room. We were all going to be so fucked if we didn’t get her back alive.