Disbelief and panic clasped hands around her neck, trapping her heart in her throat. Her training kicked in. Assess the situation. Assess options.
Four armed men stood behind her brother. They had guns on her. Her gun was on the ground.
Okay. Only one option kept her alive. She held up her hands. “What do you want me to do?”
Tony let out a breath. He said softly, so softly his voice seemed to float like the airborne seed of a dandelion to her ears, “I have to search you, J.”
He kept his hands out as he approached. A chill ran down her body. She wanted to step back. Every instinct in her body told her not to let him touch her. She stayed put.
He began to search her. She ground her teeth. Betrayer. He didn’t speak. But his face came so close to hers, she could see the regret in his eyes.
He felt along her arms, her back, her butt. He took the knife strapped to the outside of her leg, took the rifle hanging at her back, but left the knife strapped on her calf under her pant leg.
What was going on? He’d obviously felt it. Hell, he’d given her the knife when they’d been getting ready. He stood up. His eyes seemed to be telling her something.
What was going on?
She swallowed.
Tony stepped back. “She’s clean.”
He handed the weapons he’d taken from her to a guard. It was then that she processed and understood that Tony wasn’t armed.
What. The. Hell?
As if given leave to move, to animate, Walid, and the two big guards flanking him, stepped forward. He smiled. He had some really nice teeth. Like he’d taken the money from selling women to be broken and used, and had gone straight to the most expensive dentist in town.
Had Hope’s life paid for those teeth?
She wanted to tear that smile out one tooth at a time.
One of the two men flanking Walid said, “I think I should search her. I don’t trust him.”
Walid considered. He nodded. “Search her.”
The guard moved forward. Tony put a hand to the guard’s chest and shook his head. “No one. And I mean no one is going to touch my sister.”
The man froze, glared. “I’m going to search her.”
Tony kept his arm against the guard’s chest and spoke over him. “Walid, if you want what I have to give you, if you want your brother’s murderer, you will stay the fuck away from my sister.”
Walid licked his lips. Other than that, he stayed composed. A man who’d faced a thousand tense situations, a thousand desperate moments, and who had survived them all.
Walid waved his hand to indicate his guard should withdraw. He stepped back to Walid’s side, shaking his head.
“You see,” Walid said. “Nothing means as much to me as getting my hands on my brother’s true killer. Mukta Parish.”
Chapter 71
Organized with Tony and Walid in the lead and Justice in the middle of four armed men, the group walked past the stables and toward the house in the distance.
Justice walked with her hands raised. Her jaw couldn’t have been tenser. Tony. Tony, who knew what it was like to be used; Tony, whom she loved, whom she had begged her family to adopt, had conspired with Walid. Against her. Against their family. Against Sandesh, who had wanted nothing more than to help people.
It was a good thing armed guards surrounded her.
In front of her, Tony walked side by side with Walid, like a friend, a confidant, a brother.
She wanted to jump on his back and smash his face into the piles of horse dung saturating her senses. Then pounce on Walid.
They passed onto the porch of the main house, an expensive villa with a dry fountain and a thousand ruined lives paying for every spectacular piece of architecture, handcrafted item of furniture, and enough luxury to satisfy a tycoon.
They went through a set of arches, down a red-brick-lined corridor, and into an expansive office.
The brightly lit room had a Tuscan-ranch feel with terra-cotta tile flooring, exposed beams, leather couches, and heavy, parchment-colored drapes.
Two stern-faced guards accompanied her, Tony, and Walid into the room. One of them—he seemed in charge—had ordered the other men to go help someone named Dusty.
Completely comfortable and at home, of course, Walid sat on one of the two red-leather couches. A little awkwardly, Tony sat beside him. Sure, let’s all get comfy.
Justice eyed the room, the layout and possible escape routes, as Walid’s two personal guards positioned themselves.
The first, in-charge guy, who had a thick forehead and matching neck, stood directly behind Walid and Tony on the couch.
The second, smaller neck, colder eyes, stood behind Justice and kept his gun on her. He stayed far enough away that he’d be able to shoot long before she made it to him.
Plan B? Create time to make a plan B.
“So, Tone,” she said. Tony looked up at her, met her eyes with a cringe. “You’re friends with human-traffickers now?”
“Not so much friends as enemies with a common interest.”
Something in her spine snapped to attention. Her hands fisted at her sides. Her bones fused into one giant club of anger. “Which is?”
Tony met her eyes again. And this time there was no regret. Only rage. “Stopping Mukta Parish, so that she never warps another child’s mind. Never takes a kid from the street and turns them into a killer, into someone who can never be good enough, someone allowed only two emotions, anger or shame, someone forced to hate his own gender.”
Justice’s heart lurched, split, and broke in half. Unbelievable, stunning vibrations of pain shot through her. She doubled over.
Walid laughed. “Women. They are the most devious of sexes. If not controlled, they will poison the world. With complaints. With excuses. With the vagaries of being female.”
Justice rallied the muscles in her spine and torso, ordered them to straighten. Fuck Walid. Fuck Tony. Anger boiled in her cells. She pushed it down.
She needed to stay calm and look for the opportunity to save Sandesh. She locked eyes with Tony. She saw them flicker, once, toward the couch across from him.
Fucker.
He wanted her to sit. Oh, sure, Tone, why not? You’ll turn on Momma, but you’ll help me. You shit.
She pushed aside her feelings. She couldn’t afford them. She’d deal with it later.
Legs like steel, unbending and tense, she walked to the couch. Cold eyes kept his gun on her as she moved, but remained stationed where he was. There was a sharp crack as her weight hit the couch. Truthfully, she more fell than sat.
Justice didn’t need Tony’s eyes to keep traveling to his left, toward the window. She saw Victor almost immediately, standing behind one of the heavy drapes.
Victor’s mostly naked body only slightly reflected in the window. And only because of where she sat. She made a point to keep her eyes focused on Walid and not give Victor away.
Tony knew Victor was there, so he must’ve told Victor to be there. What was going on?
“So this has been about Momma? You couldn’t have, oh, I don’t know, told us how you felt? Brought it up over an awkward Thanksgiving dinner like a normal person?”
Tony laughed. Sarcastic. Hurt. And laced with hundreds of thoughts and questions no one had bothered to acknowledge. “You mean like write a letter? A letter that told ev
eryone—everyone in my family of female fanatics—exactly how I felt?”
Female fanatics? What letter? The one with the plan for dealing with the Brothers Grim? She’d never seen it. She hadn’t—
Not now. Deal with it later.
Victor had a gun. She saw it glint off the glass. He had it raised. Was he waiting for some kind of signal? Or maybe just the right moment? Hmmm. “Tone, you don’t think the League is doing the right thing?”
It was Walid’s turn to answer. “The bitches!” His outrage and disbelief made his words drop low and sound heavy. “They are trying to overturn the natural order of things. Women are to be bedded and fed and kept out of the way.”
Tony laughed. He turned his body so that he faced Walid. He put his hand on Walid’s shoulder. He placed a thumb on Walid’s neck, rubbed it back and forth. “That’s the kind of shit that gets everyone in trouble.”
Walid knocked his hands off. Too late. Justice knew. Tony had affixed the clear poison patch.
How long until it took effect? How long until the guards noticed there was something wrong with Walid?
Once they noticed, they’d figure out who did it. They’d shoot Tony. He’d die, and she’d never understand why he’d done any of it.
She needed to do something. Now.
She had a weapon. If she could get Walid close enough, she could use the knife tucked in her pants. Victor could probably take out the guard closest to him, the thick-necked one behind the couch where Tony and Walid sat.
That left Cold Eyes for her. Okay. Kill Walid. Keep the knife, chuck it at Cold Eyes. Hope Victor took out Thick Neck.
Not for nothing.
She crossed her legs, ranch-hand style, right foot on left knee. Her pant leg rose up her calf. “I need to pee. About as badly as your brother did when I shoved that little piece of metal into his heart.”
The room went quiet. Walid’s face turned crimson angry. “You will piss when I dig my knife into your gut.”
Tony grabbed Walid by the shirt. “Knock it off.”
The guard behind Tony put his gun to Tony’s head. By the look on Tony’s face, he’d finally registered the shit he’d gotten them into. Huh, it had only taken a gun to his head.