Driven to the Edge: A Bad Boy Hitman Romance (10 page)

I
t’s time
.

Tension winding through my body in every step, I walk with Alicia down to the car. She’s in that navy dress that hugs her body incredibly, weighted down with all her photography gear. I dressed a bit messier than my usual, let her fluff my hair up a bit. I’m a hoity-toity model who’s hired her for new portfolio shots, and I have to look the part.

Whatever gets us in that building.

When we reach the Maybach and throw all our stuff inside, Alicia and I both pause outside it. Neither of us is really sure where we stand. Neither of us knows what’s going to happen just a few hours from now.

It’s like standing on the edge of a long, high drop. And not being able to see the bottom or even know whether there’s a bottom at all.

So instead of saying anything grandiose, I squeeze Alicia’s shoulder and thank her. Then tell her good luck.

“We’re going to need it,” she says with a short, sarcastic laugh. I hope not.

We park the Maybach ourselves rather than going the valet route. I pack the uzi, both Sigs, and a substantial pile of ammunition in my little silver case. They’ll likely think it’s clothes or more photography crap. They are welcome to keep believing that.

Alicia gathers her things and gestures toward the door.

“I’ll go in first and make a harried scene,” she says. “Just stay back and look pretty.”

First time in my life anyone’s ever told me that.

I follow in behind her as she hustles through the expansive front doors, into the smoky glass foyer. She puts on a peeved expression, heels clacking imperiously on the polished floor. The young man at the front desk looks alarmed when he catches sight of her.

However, once she’s nearer, she softens. She reaches the desk and frowns down at him, camera under her arm.

“I have the world’s biggest favor to ask you,” she starts. The kid looks up, captivated.

“I’m Alicia Munroe, shooting one of my clients this afternoon. We had a floor booked at the Venetian but they fucked up our booking and I can’t shoot there.”

I told her to specify the Venetian. The Császár boys hate the guys who work there. If nothing else, it’s a slight edge.

Alicia takes a deep breath, folding her hands together. I have to say, she pulls off the stressed-bitch-just-barely-keeping-it-in-check act very well.

“I know how spectacular your rooftop gardens are. And I also know they’re VIP only. And no, we don’t have a reservation. But I’ll be in and out in forty minutes and you’ll never know we’re there.”

I stand in the background and look pretty.

The kid resists at first, but I can tell it’s the token resistance that he just wants to be able to tell his boss he offered. Then he says he has to call his boss for any permissions of that nature. Alicia nods several times, encouraging him.

He picks up the phone and dials in to someone. We stand around and wait. The lobby is relatively deserted; not surprising considering the hour is still young. Vin hasn’t called with any additional details yet, so it seems like we’re going in mostly blind.

We can handle that.

It’s a long, tense wait, but finally the kid sets the phone down. Alicia bends toward him, smiling hopefully.

The kid nods just a bit, relief plainly written all over his features.

“Yeah,” he says. “My boss says head on up. Take the elevator to the top floor, we’ll radio in to the guys. There’s a private function going on up there later; they’re still setting up. You’ll need to be out by four.”

Alicia thanks him effusively and I tip him with a hundred on my way past. We stroll up toward the elevator, burdened down with our bags, and part of me can’t believe this is happening.

I’m so close to Eloise. So close to the men who killed my brother. Soon, it’ll all be over.

The elevator glides open to a lush, sparkling paradise. Augustine’s has a series of intricate, famous rooftop gardens. The foliage is exotic, the temperature humid, and it’s the perfect place for a photoshoot.

A security guard in a drab black suit stops us on the way out. He looks us over, then radios in to let the front desk know we’ve arrived.

“Thank you again,” Alicia says. “So much. Where’s a good out of the way place?”

It doesn’t really matter where we set up. We’ll pose and take photos long enough that everyone absorbs us into the background, and then I’ll peel off to do my recon. If I hear from Vin beforehand, great. If not, I’ll just work my way down, floor by floor.

The guard directs us along the perimeter of one garden, the high glass ceiling of the greenhouse sparkling with moisture. We pass servers in white jackets who bustle busily from one location to the next, pushing trolleys and setting up a buffet in the center atrium. There’s no food out yet--likely won’t be for a few hours--which is kind of a shame. Otherwise I’d totally try to nab a dessert or something.

“This will be perfect,” Alicia says when he leads us into an area lined with carved stone benches. It’s all very expensive-looking. Very green.

“Thanks,” I add.

The guard gives us a tight-lipped smile, then returns to his post at the elevator, disappearing around a corner.

“All right,” I tell Alicia. Let’s get some photos taken just for appearances’ sake. Especially if they check your camera for some reason.

I admit I am not looking forward to being a male model for a day. But it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make.

Alicia directs me over to one of the benches and instructs me to stand behind it, one hand on the back of it. It feels ridiculous, posing like this, but I catch a gleam of amusement in her eye as she retreats backward, bringing her camera up toward her face.

When she snaps the photos, she’s smiling. I can see the curve of her mouth.

She looks truly happy, for a few brief moments. I haven’t ever seen her like this, not since I rolled into her life like a disaster.

We take a few more shots: me by the bench, me by the plants. It all looks and feels the same to me, but she promises a lot of the shots have different
feelings.

But I’m getting antsy. I don’t want to waste too much time.

Eventually, it’s time for me to break off. No call from Vin, which means I’m on my own. I call Alicia over to me, moving up close to her, both of us surrounded by ferns and orchids.

“Alicia.” I touch at her chin, bringing her face up toward mine. The greenery around us intensifies the green streaks in her eyes. I want to dissolve into them rather than set down a path of murder and revenge. But it’s too late. And it has to be done.

“Jake,” she says. “Just... Christ, be careful, okay?”

I smile thinly.

“Of course.”

Then I dip down and kiss her. Because for all we know, I’m kissing her goodbye. I don’t want to leave her. I don’t want to take my eyes off her for a second. When I’m kissing her, I feel like maybe there’s more to life than this. Like maybe I need more than just getting Eloise to safety and not caring about the rest.

I have to force myself to pull away.

“Wait a few minutes up here,” I tell her. “If anyone asks where I went, tell ‘em I’m taking a leak. Then book it downstairs and don’t look back.”

She catches her bottom lip in her teeth, looks at me like she wants to say something. There’s a lot I want to say too. But instead we look away from each other and she lets me go. I hurry off down the hall.

Let’s see if I can find the staff elevator before any of these assholes realize who they let into their domain.

I
watch
Jake go and it feels like something inside me is dying. I had no idea it would hurt this much. I’ve only known him for a few days--a few days when he was my
captor
for fuck’s sake--but the strange magnetism that’s drawn us together us undeniable.

And I had no idea what he was fighting for. Now that I know, it’s impossible to not want to help. He’s got to get that little girl out of here. I have no idea who she is or why these casino men have her, but it can’t be good.

I realize that I trust him. Somehow, I trust him. Maybe it’s because he saved me when he could have let me die, the way he opened up to me... but I do.

Keeping up appearances, I adjust the strap on my camera and pick it up, flicking through the photos I took of Jake. He’s a natural. His posing is a little stiff, but with his heavy, thoughtful eyebrows and his brooding stare, he’d be a natural on a magazine cover or something.

I’m scrolling through the photos, my head tilted down, when I hear someone come up behind me.

Assuming it’s a waiter or someone, I don’t look up.

At least not until someone’s pressing a gun against my back.

Or at least I assume it’s a gun. It’s hard and metallic and it juts painfully through the thin fabric of my dress. I cry out in surprise, but someone slaps a hand over my mouth.

“Easy there sweetheart,” says a voice I don’t recognize. “Why don’t you come with me. We’re going to take a walk.”

I let the camera fall back around my neck. My unknown assailant grabs me roughly, hauling me down the lush, plant-lined corridor. I pass creeping vines and blooming orchids, wondering if they’re the last beautiful things I ever see.

Then I think:
oh no. Jake.
Because if someone’s putting a gun to me, that means they know who he is.

He hasn’t been gone long. He couldn’t possibly have had time to rescue the kid.

My heart pounding frantically with fear, I try to calm my shaking as the man leads me away from the gardens, down a slate-walled service corridor. We pass fewer of the white-clad personnel here, but the ones we do pass avert their eyes.

No one here is going to help me.

What was I thinking, breaking into a place like this? I should try to at least talk my way out of it...

“Look, I don’t know who you are, but you can’t just mug someone in here.”

I try to play innocent.

“Someone’s gonna call the cops.”

But the man dragging me down the hall doesn’t listen. Or say a word, even.

Without a word, the man yanks my arm and hurries me through a maze of hallways until we arrive at a wood-panel door. He knocks twice, then opens it, then literally throws me inside.

I stumble, my heels catching on the edge of an expansive, sprawling carpet that pads the office’s foyer. I manage not to fall. The doors slam shut behind me and I whirl to face the man who threatened me.

He’s old, bald, and completely unremarkable. He could be an extra in a Jackie Chan movie. Except the big black sawed-off shotgun he’s holding is very real. So I don’t make any sudden movements.

“I don’t know who you are, but that’s about the dumbest way someone has ever broken into my building,” says a voice from behind me.

I turn slowly until I’m facing the desk. The office is all gleaming red-brown wood, polished to a high gloss. There’s a window behind the desk, latticed in a stained-glass style, though the glass is clear and simply looks down onto one of the floors of the casino below. The massive desk takes up half the room, easily, and a single man sits behind it.

He is
not
some unremarkable action movie extra. I can tell just by the tailored cut of his deep navy suit.

He’s a scrawny guy, so skinny that he looks borderline unhealthy. Clean shaven. A single silver earring in his left ear. He’s bald save for a thin coating of stubble atop his head, like he doesn’t quite shave every day.

I have no idea who he is, but he radiates menace. I take an involuntary step back.

Is it smarter to lie or just say nothing at all?

I’ve only ever been kidnapped once before and it didn’t go as expected.

But before I can make up my mind, the man at the desk gestures to one of the leather chairs before it. He waves me forward, indicates that I take a seat.

“Please, sit. I’ll have Kelly pour you a drink.”

Stunned, I settle into the chair. The hefty guard behind me goes off toward a minibar in the corner.

“I don’t--” I start, but the man waves a hand and cuts me off.

“I don’t really know or care who you are,” he says. “You’re here with Ference and that’s all that matters.”

I blink, genuinely confused. Ference? That’s a name I’ve never heard before.

“Ference?” I ask at length. The man at the table cocks his head sideways, doubtful.

“You can drop the innocent act,” he says.

At that point, the man presumably named Kelly drops a glass of liquor with ice onto the desk in front of me. I take it reflexively but have no plans to drink. At least my hands are occupied now. The camera sits on my lap, heavy.

“I swear to you, I have no idea what Ference is,” I say. I dare to look the man in the eye while I say it.

His own eyes widen, then he throws back his head and lets out an uproarious laugh. His laughter rings off the vaulted ceiling of the office and curdles my blood in my veins.

“Oh dear,” he says, “You mean he hasn’t even told you his real name.”

It hits me: he’s talking about Jake. I clutch my drink a little tighter.

“Jakob Ference. The man you broke in here with. This is rich. He’s got you all wrapped up in his little scheme but you don’t even know his real name.”

On some level, I knew I didn’t know Jake’s real name, but it still stings. Because the guy at the desk is right. I know next to nothing about him.

Leaning forward in his chair, the man twitches his mouth down in a sympathetic grimace.

“I can’t wait to hear what story he spun to get you involved. You seem like such a normal person. Did he tell you it was a dramatic rescue? Did he tell you we’d stolen something from him?”

It feels like someone’s squeezing my throat. I can’t breathe.

I don’t believe what he’s saying. Surely not. But it’s so strange that he’d jump to that conclusion immediately.

“Who are you?” I ask, my voice a dry-throated whisper.

Reaching a hand over the desk as if at a perfectly natural introduction, neither of us here by force, the man offers me his palm.

“My name,” he says, in a voice like velvet, “is Marton Császár. The man you’re here with is trying to steal something from me.”

I don’t take his hand. It feels like all the oxygen has drained out of the room.

He’s lying. He has to be.