I’d always loved her, but the physical hadn’t been there for either of us. Maybe we’d been too young. Maybe because of the situation we’d been in.
But when the fish truck pulled away and my eyes locked on her, I knew. She’d been my best friend for seven years and it was like we hadn’t been separated at all.
I pulled back and cupped her now flushed cheek, my thumb stroking back and forth over the smooth skin. “You smell like fish, baby.”
She made a half-huff and leaned in to me again and it was the best feeling ever. Chess giving in to me. “I missed you,” she whispered into my shirt.
Then she reached into her pocket and pulled out the necklace I’d made for her when I was twelve. It took me months to find the right stones and I stole fishing wire from the storage room. The hard part was finding a cut stone sharp enough to carve with.
She laid it in the palm of her hand and I glanced down at it. I’d carved one stone into a chess piece, a rook, because Chess was so protective of everyone. The other was a heart. I’d told her no matter what happened to us, my heart would always be inside her beating.
“You were with me, Tristan. It’s what kept me strong.”
I ran my finger over it. She kept it. Somehow she managed to keep it all these years.
Kai’s voice was abrupt and cold as he said, “We miss this flight, London is dead. You decide what I’ll do if that happens.” He folded in the driver’s seat and slammed the door.
I knew exactly what he’d do because I’d do the same thing.
“Who is London?” she asked.
I curled her hand around the necklace. “Kai’s girl.”
“My brother has a girl?” The corner of her lip turned up and her eyes sparked. “Is she willingly his girl? Because I can’t see her being with my brother any other way.”
I kissed her forehead. “Fuck, I love you, Chess.”TorontoI NODDED TO Deck and Vic who stood on either side of the doorway then glanced over my shoulder in the direction of Josh who was on the roof of a neighboring house with his sniper rifle.
Tyler was in the SUV on his computer, taking out the security cameras around the perimeter. Since there were no alarms blazing, he’d been successful—so far. Or we were made to believe that.
Either way, we were going in and coming out with London.
I stepped onto the porch and put my eye up to the scanner. The door clicked and I pushed it open with the toe of my boot.
I had my hand close to my knife as I walked inside.
Two feet into the foyer, I glanced at the camera up in the right corner then crouched to tie my boot. A signal for Tyler to black out the screens for five seconds in the foyer. If he took them all out at once, they’d lock down the basement and we’d never get in unless we blew up the place, and that wasn’t happening with London inside.
Deck came in behind me then Vic and we moved in quiet unison across the marble floors to the oil painting. I nudged the frame of the painting with my palm on the frame and it swung open. Then I punched in the code for the door to the basement.
This was our only chance to get her out. Once Mother’s body was found, security would be almost impossible to break through and then they’d move London most likely to the one place we had yet to locate—the farm.
But it had to be done this way.
I opened the door and started down the stairs with my back against the wall. I reached up to the bulb hanging in the stairwell. It was hot as hell, singeing my skin as I unscrewed it until it flickered off, masking us in the shadows.
Footsteps came toward the stairs and I held up my hand to Deck and Vic who stopped, and then I walked down the last few steps. Brice appeared around the corner, his gun drawn. He smiled when he recognized me then it faltered when his gaze hit my hand on my knife.
He aimed his gun at me, but it was too late. My blade sliced through the air like a bullet. Brice didn’t even have time to pull the trigger before my knife embedded in his neck.
He dropped to the floor, blood seeping between his fingers that were clasped around the handle. Within seconds, he went limp, red-stained skin covering his neck and blood pooling onto the rough cement floor.
I walked over to him, grabbed my knife, and wiped the blood off on his shirt. I had no remorse about killing Brice, because he was responsible for what went down in this place. And that meant he hurt London. I approached the door into the prison, did the retina scan and the lock clicked open.