Ernie’s fate didn’t look good. Fuck. I should’ve gone myself.
“I’ll make you a deal. Give me the drug, the files and the girl, and you can have your man back in one piece. Well, minus a finger.” He laughed.
“How about this? I find you, then nice and slow like, cut you up with my knife. And I’ll do it for weeks, so your shark has meals for a while. And when you beg me for mercy, shit, right, I don’t have mercy. The farm made certain of that.”
He didn’t laugh this time; instead, I heard shuffling and then his words were muffled as he put his hand over the receiver and spoke to someone else. “You just killed your friend.”
“I don’t have friends,” I replied calmly.
But I did. I did have friends. I had Ernie. Had. Fuck, Ernie.
That made him pause and maybe he was getting that I wouldn’t give in to anything he said. But it could’ve been to the sacrifice of Ernie’s life. I wanted to lose my shit. I wanted to whip my phone through the window and destroy everything in sight.
The rage burning through me was putting me on the edge of doing something stupid and blowing this all to shit.
“Okay,” Dorsey said and it was yielding. “You want to head Vault, I can make that happen.”
I laughed. “I don’t need you to make that happen. I can do that myself. But that’s not what I want.”
“You would’ve been here yourself if you wanted me, so my earlier guess is correct. And I want the same thing, so I believe we can come to some sort of agreement.”
“I’m listening.”
“Not over the phone,” Dorsey said. “Meet me. In Vegas. Without the ex-JTF2 guy.”
“I’m alive today because I don’t meet my enemies where they choose.”
“Who said we’re enemies, Kai. We’re merely negotiating for what we both want. And I want the files for the drug.”
“Okay.”
“I give you the information you need and you give me Dr. Westbrook’s files.” I waited for him to include London, but he didn’t. “I can find another scientist, although the girl would’ve made things easier. But I know you won’t give her up. Not after what you’ve done to free her. But I want Connor and the pills you stole from the lab.”
I glanced at Deck, whose scowl was fierce, the lines around his mouth tight. “No Connor. And no Vegas. I’ll meet you tonight. Eleven. Should give you enough time to fly to Toronto. Twenty-four hour diner on Spadina at Niagara. Bring Ernie or none of this happens.” I hung up, opened the back of my phone, took out the SIM card, and smashed it with the edge of the phone on the counter.
“You trust him?” Deck asked.
“Fuck, no.” But Dorsey was all about power and money, which meant he’d probably be willing to give up the board member who obviously had more power than him. “But he wants the drug. If he controls that, he doesn’t need the farm. He’ll do what was done to Connor. Use it on men who are already killers. Make them into machines. Not sure about the conditioning though. That was Mother’s expertise.”
“And even more reason to not give it to him.”
I grinned. “My morals are more flexible than yours, Deck. I have no qualms about making a deal then reneging.”
Deck’s lip twitched.
“I want to come with you,” Chess said.
Tristan laughed to which she smacked him on the arm. He just laughed harder. “Not happening, babe.”
“I have to do something, damn it.” Where I had patience, I was learning Chess did not.
“Yeah, you can look after me.” Tristan bent, shoulder into her belly then had her up over his shoulder within seconds. She yelled. He ignored her and then they were gone.
“How is she?” Deck asked.
He was referring to London.
Vic poured himself a coffee, but I could tell he was listening by the way his head tilted slightly in our direction.
“Pretending to be good. She needs to be far from this.”
Deck nodded. “Georgie, too. Tristan’s idea, we need to make happen.” An idea that was coming into play if everything went as expected with Dorsey. “Girls won’t like it, but if we get what we need from Dorsey, then we have to act. Girls can’t be part of that.”
Deck and I had our differences, but we had one thing in common now—keeping the girls safe. I grinned. “Tristan is in for a war.”
Deck chuckled, a rare sound coming from him. “I’ve had time with mine. She knows when to fight and when there is no chance in hell I’m giving in to her.”
London picked her battles, but I didn’t think this was one she’d argue. She wasn’t a fighter, despite the fuckin’ battles she’d fought in order to survive. She stood her ground when she needed to and believed in something. But her softness and compassion always came through. I saw it with how she’d treated the homeless, the way she moved, quiet warmth emanating from her.