Vendetta (11 page)

“You’re a smart man.” Gabe put the pin in his pocket. “But smart doesn’t mean all-knowing. Smart means admitting when you need ask for help. And whom to ask.”

When Sam looked at him in confusion, Gabe explained, “When you began your revenge plot, you were an archeologist, not a hacker. So who helped you connect the dots? The society’s secret server was hidden away, and all of the files were encrypted. How did an archeologist figure out what to do with them?”

Gabe patted his pocket. “How would you know what to do with
this
?”

Sam’s eyes gleamed as he realized that he, too, had leverage. He folded his arms and pursed his lips, the very model of small-minded petulance, although his excitement was impossible to conceal.

“What do
I
get?” he asked. “If I put you in touch with someone who can help you?”

I’m in
, Gabe thought excitedly.
I’m going to make this happen.

“What do you want?” Gabe asked, deliberately keeping his own tone of voice far more casual. As if all he wanted was to identify more criminals and lock them up.

Oh, no, I want something far more incredible.

“What I want is
out
. I heard someone
else
left Rikers last night,” Sam said slyly. “I want a ‘get out of jail free’ card too.”

“You don’t know
how
he left,” Gabe retorted, but his interest was piqued. What had Sam heard about Bob Reynolds’ escape? “You want to leave here alive, am I right?”

“Don’t bluster. I know very well that Reynolds was alive when he escaped,” Sam sneered.

Gabe kept a poker face. “Really.”

Sam smiled. “But
you
didn’t.”

“You’re bluffing.”

Sam’s smile grew and his eyes took a faraway gleam, as if imagining all the things he would do once he was a free man again. Gabe would support his pathetic little fantasy. He might promise Sam his freedom, but in truth, Sam wouldn’t set foot out of here until he needed a walker to do it.

“I want something in writing,” Sam said. “Tell the DA I want a reduced sentence and credit for time served. And I want out of gen pop. These people are animals. Worse than beasts.”

Gabe almost sighed at Sam’s naiveté. Vincent had also demanded something in writing—his pardon—but Gabe had succeeded in ripping it up anyway.

“Give me a name and I’ll see what I can do,” Gabe said. He arched a brow as if to say,
Your move
. As if they were playing chess. Or poker.

The game that was life.

“Agree first,” Sam said.

“I’m not taking this to anyone until I know what I’ve got,” Gabe insisted. “And until then…” He lifted his shoulders. “I’ve really got nothing to lose if this doesn’t work out.”

“I
do
know your past, you know. You were a beast. A first-gen,” Sam said fiercely. “I’ll tell everyone. I’ll blow it wide open.”

Gabe said, “And when they come for
you
in the middle of the night? What then?”

Sam paced. He stopped and wrapped his hands around the bars. “I hate this, I hate being caged,” he whined.

Been there. Done that
, Gabe thought.
Never going to let it happen again.

“No promises,” Gabe said. “If I can’t get you out any sooner, maybe I can get you a nicer, bigger cage. In a minimum security facility.”

Sam gestured for Gabe to come closer. His eyes were shining in an almost predatory way, and Gabe grew wary. Sam had operated on hatred and rage for six years. His revenge had not been complete and, in his despair, he had attempted to jump off a skyscraper. That kind of energy didn’t dissipate. It simmered and steamed, and waited for another change to boil over.

Gabe stayed light on his feet as he approached. For one terrifying moment he thought Sam was going to bite off his ear as he urged Gabe’s head against the bars.

Then Sam grabbed Gabe’s shoulder, pressed his lips against his ear and whispered very softly, “Cavanaugh Ellison.”

“Helped you,” Gabe murmured.

Sam said nothing more. He released Gabe and Gabe would have stumbled if he hadn’t grabbed onto one of the prison bars. Sam snickered.

“Helped you,” Gabe said again.

Shaking his head, Sam crossed his arms. “Never met him. Don’t know him.”

“Then—”

His smile was slow and lazy, and perhaps a little mad after all.

“That’s his pin.”

B
lessed dawn.

Cat leaned her weary forehead against the door of her apartment and took deep breaths to keep herself from bolting back into the streets to search the city, New York state, the
world
for Bob Reynolds. She cared nothing for him, felt no bond with him, although there would always be a connection: he had done terrible things to Vincent and would continue to do them until either he killed Vincent or was stopped.

Or if people finally saw Vincent the way I see him—strong, compassionate, fighting against a terrible curse and winning—then my father couldn’t hurt him.

When. I almost lost him, I lost part of myself. I didn’t know who I was. And then I realized that I am the woman who is in love with Vincent Keller, and whom he is hopelessly in love with. And there is nothing on this earth that my father can do to change that.

Her hand shook. Love was one thing. Survival was another.

Tonight, she, Tess, and their band of unis—Officers Tanaka, LaRochelle, and Kent—had taken on more gangbangers and street toughs than Cat could count. Her knuckles were bloody and Tess was going to have a shiner. LaRochelle and Tanaka had been totally psyched, loving every second of “World Wrestling New York,” but Kent, who sheepishly confided in Cat that her dream was to retire with nothing but a paper cut, had mostly hung back and offered helpful advice such as
“duck!”

Cat had tried to call Vincent dozens of times with no luck—so many, in fact, that her phone battery had died. As soon as she got in the house and plugged her cell in to recharge, she’d tell him about her father.

She turned the knob and pushed open the door with her last vestige of strength. Vincent was standing so close that the opening door missed his nose by a fraction of an inch. He was wearing a black turtleneck sweater and jeans. He’d gone to his place and changed before returning to her apartment.

“Catherine, what’s this about your father?” he said by way of greeting.

She stepped back, startled, then composed herself and shut the door.

“How did you hear about that?” she asked. She put down her keys and started taking off her hat, gloves, and coat. Buying a little time.

* * *

She knew
, Vincent thought. He could hear her heart racing. She was nervous. He had to stay calm, keep the beast side down, but if ever he had a trigger, it was anything to do with Bob Reynolds. Reynolds had turned him into a beast, recaptured him and made him even more dangerous, wiped his memory, and programmed him to kill other beasts. Then Reynolds had planted the heart of one of them, Curt Windsor, in Vincent’s refrigerator to ensure a murder conviction against him. Vincent hated Reynolds as much as he loved Catherine.

Catherine, who, even now, was trying to figure out what to tell him; he could practically see the wheels turning in her mind.

She knew, and she didn’t tell me.

“Don’t spin it,” he warned her. “Just talk to me.”

“Okay, so did you
do
anything? That’s all I want to know,” she said, searching his face. He saw the worry there. The fear.

“Do?” he repeated.

“Just… did you track him?”

“How?” he demanded. “How can I track him when I don’t know anything about this?”
Because you didn’t tell me?

Her heart was beating fast. “How did you find out?”

“There’s an APB,” he said. “J.T. saw it on his computer. Which I only discovered because I stopped by to check on him.” He felt a rush of shame. He had hurt J.T. His best friend. Over
Reynolds.
His hatred of that man was compromising his self-control. Bringing out the beast in him, literally.

“Yes, okay, yes,” she said. “He is missing.”

“And you were going to tell me when?” That was exactly the wrong tone to take with her but he couldn’t help it. He was afraid for her, and that fear sharpened his tone.

She lifted her chin. “When I had a chance to tell you face-to-face because I couldn’t get through on my phone.”

“You couldn’t find a charger? Or use Tess’s phone?”

“I have to be careful, Vincent. Whoever took him, or helped him escape, left evidence that implicated me. And my boss told me that IA’s all over it.”

From her reaction he knew that his eyes had begun to glow. His fingernails stretched in their nail beds; he gave his head a shake and stared past her at the wall. He was spinning out of control. He knew she was a powerful woman who was more than able to hold her own in fair fight. But this wasn’t fair. None of it was.

I’m going to kill Reynolds
, he thought. And in that moment he knew that if her father had been in the room, he would have gone after him.

After promising Catherine repeatedly that he would never take a human life again when there was another choice, he was afraid that he would have broken that promise, and thrown his head back in triumph when Reynolds lay dead at his feet.

“You should have told me as soon as you heard,” he insisted. “I’ve lost so much time—”

“Time for what?” she demanded. “You don’t know where he went. And you can’t get into his cell to gather clues. Don’t even think you’re going to use some stupid false identification to fake your way into Rikers again. You’re as blind as I am.”

Right now I am
, he thought. But he would not sit idle. He’d figure out a way and he would run Reynolds to ground like the dog he was.

“How are they tying you to this?” he asked.

“It’s obvious that someone’s trying to frame me,” she said. “There was an envelope with a map on it and words that are supposedly in my handwriting. It says
Have him ready.
”

He blinked. “You’ve got to be kidding me. Who’d believe that?”

“The same people who believed that you would keep Curt Windsor’s heart in your refrigerator,” she replied. She clasped one of his hands with both of hers. Her fingers were like icicles. “I think this was orchestrated to draw you out, Vincent. Don’t take the bait. Let other people look for him.”

“What other people? The FBI?” He could feel his hand trembling between her palms. “The same organization that has my blood on its hands?”

“People
are
after him already. He was found guilty on multiple counts of premeditated murder. He betrayed his own agency, reinforced people’s belief that the entire department of justice is corrupt—”

“Because it
is!
” he shouted. “I can’t believe you’re talking like this! The FBI probably broke him out themselves! They just waited for the right moment and swooped in just like they always do. Took the law into their own hands and paid him back for years of loyal disservice.”

“No—”

“Yes.
He got me indicted for murder while he was behind bars, Catherine. Why couldn’t he organize a breakout?” He shook himself free of her. “Why was there a blackout tonight? Oh, I’m going after him, believe me.”

He looked at her face, saw that same sickening despair and disbelief as when he had attacked Reynolds the night Cat had arrested him, and Cat had warned Vincent off. He hadn’t listened, and she had shot him, Vincent. Here, now, she was rocketing back to that horrible moment that had cost them so much. He had come so far…

Have I? Didn’t I just admit to myself that if he were here, I’d kill him?

No, he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t kill Reynolds. He was in better command of himself than that.
I just said that because I was angry.

But was he telling himself the truth?
And didn’t I choke J.T. tonight?

“Catherine,” he began, and she choked back a sob.

“I need you to not do this,” she said. “
We
need you to not do this. Listen to me,
please
. You’ve come so far.
We
have. And you know… you know that as awful as it is to stand by and let someone else handle this, you
have
to.”

He rubbed his forehead, to find it smooth and human. He couldn’t go so far as to feel remorse for his fury, but he could refuse to give into his hatred, for Catherine’s sake. There was a world of difference—a world of hurt—between feeling something and acting on it. He had been raised to be a man of action, someone who took care of things. He had been a firefighter. His medical specialty—ER medicine—required an immediate response. He hadn’t simply joined the army—he had put in the extra blood, sweat, and tears to join the elite ranks of Special Forces. Always eager to take the next bold step, he had volunteered for Muirfield.

To him, doing something to affect any situation he found himself in was as natural as breathing. To sit by passively? That felt exactly the same as holding his breath.

But for Catherine, he would do it.

“Catherine,” he said, and walked toward her. At first she stiffened, but as his arms came around her, she laid her head on his chest.

She said, “I’ve been so afraid that we would wind up back in the past. You know what I did to avoid it.”

You tried to convince yourself that you loved Gabe
, he thought.
And I tried to be there for Tori Windsor. Poor Tori. She didn’t deserve the terrible things that happened to her.

“What can I do?” Vincent asked. “To make all this easier?”

She relaxed against him and gathered up the fabric of his sweater. Her warmth was like a caress against the chill that had supplanted the heat of his anger.

Then she reached for her purse, pulled out a glossy color photo, and showed it to him. It showed a young man with curly black hair and large, sad eyes. He looked like a figure in an Italian fresco.

“This is Angelo DeMarco. Yes,
the
DeMarcos. He was abducted last night.”

“That’s weird,” Vincent said. “Two abductions? Was it planned?”