Chapter 24

TWENTY-FOUR

Jack and Asher were giving me a wide berth this morning. That didn’t preclude Jack from giving me dirty looks but so far he hadn’t said anything. Instead of scowling at me, Asher had decided to put distance between us and had left to scout the route to the auction house.

But the day was young and I knew Jack was itching to lay into me. Though there was nothing he could say to me that I already hadn’t said to myself as I’d tossed and turned all night.

As soon as I finished going over the blueprints of the new property I was going over to Atlee’s condo.

The last thing Jack had said to me the night before he’d locked himself in his bedroom was to tell me he’d followed Atlee’s Uber home and watched her walk safely inside her building. He hadn’t elaborated when he updated me on Martin leaving the mansion in favor of the house we’d secured. He hadn’t given any indication of how she was doing when he blandly rapped out she’d been in Martin’s villa and saw Catarina and gave Jack a potential last name for Dale, which had turned out to be correct.

I was lost and going in blind to her mental state—something that made my gut roil.

Jack’s phone rang. Before he could grab it off the coffee table, I caught sight of Atlee’s name. The bastard smirked, snatched it up, and left the living room.

A moment later, mine vibrated.

Rhode.

Just the man I needed to talk to.

“Find anything on Dale Weaver?” I asked.

Rhode cut straight to it and not because we were on a time crunch. He was still pissed at me for the other day and by the sound of his clipped tone, Jack had called in the state of play with Atlee and he was now more pissed at me.

“Dale Weaver’s wanted in Poland for the unlawful abduction and confinement of six women. I called our contact at Interpol. There hasn’t been a Red Notice issued but they’re aware of him. He’s also suspected in the abduction of four Ukrainian women and three Hungarians.”

“Why haven’t they issued a Red Notice?”

“Because he has ties.”

“To who?”

“Rohan Gupta.”

Cold seeped through the layer of pain that had blanketed me after yesterday’s monumental fuck-up. An icy chill I had learned a long time ago never to ignore.

Rohan Gupta was the head of a three-thousand-member criminal syndicate—everything from contract killing, narcotics, money laundering, to sex trafficking. He was Indian but living in Pakistan. The man was untouchable; he knew it, the Indian government knew it, and he liked to use social media to send taunts and not so veiled threats.

“Fuck,” I hissed. “This isn’t good news. Rohan being involved is the last thing we need.”

“Correct. But ties doesn’t mean Rohan is directly involved. Shep’s digging deeper but I didn’t find anything that would suggest a partnership. Weaver is more of a gofer for Rohan in Europe. He’s also American and it’s widely known Rohan has no allegiance to Americans. He’ll use them, he’ll pay them, he’ll use his power to keep their movements unincumbered, but he will not extend blanket protection.”

As true as that was, it didn’t make me feel any better.

“Where’s Weaver’s money come from?”

“Tech billionaire. He got in early on blockchain engineering. Not that he understands DLT but he found people who did and started the company using funds from his software and video game development. Again, he didn’t do the programming, he hired the right people. I haven’t traced how he got the startup capital for that yet. He doesn’t come from money, so my guess would be investors and anyone willing to give a no-name a shit ton of money to start a business with a high probability of failure could mean money laundering but I haven’t gotten that far.”

“Good work, Rhode, thanks.” I paused, knowing I needed to say something about the other day. “Listen, I know the other day you were trying to help and I was a twat. It was a dick thing to do. I’m sorry.”

My apology was met with silence.

“Rhode?”

“I was trying to remember something Cole had spouted off about thoughts are shadows of our feelings and they’re always darker and emptier. You’ve spent over a decade with your thoughts; it’s time to stop thinking about the past.”

Nietzsche.

“You know you’re quoting a man who also said women were God’s second mistake,” I informed him.

“Even an asshole can be right every once in a while. My point remains, Wilson. Instead of healing you’ve locked yourself in your head, convinced yourself you’re a worthless failure who doesn’t deserve to be loved.”

Damn if that wasn’t the truth.

“You’re right. Jack’s right. Atlee was right. I fucked up and if she’ll let me, I’m going to fix it.”

“From what Jack told me, that might mean groveling.”

Speaking of Jack, he walked back in the room with a frown deeper than the one he’d been giving me all morning.

“I’m prepared to fall on my sword and bleed,” I told Rhode while I kept Jack’s eyes. “Listen, I have to go talk to Jack. I’ll call you back.”

“Don’t bite his head off, he cares about her.”

“Not as much as I do.” I disconnected and asked, “What’s wrong? Atlee okay?”

Jack was silent as he made his way to the chair he’d vacated earlier. I didn’t take it as a good sign when he sat on the edge, clasped his hands, and left them dangling between his knees.

“Is she—”

“She’s leaving Vegas for a while.”

Jack’s announcement cracked through the room like a bullet, reverberating and ricocheting until there was nothing left of my already shattered heart.

She was leaving.

Leaving me.

Us.

“When?”

“She called from the airport. She’s going to stay with a friend in Montana.”

There was a small sliver—the part of me who was the leader of Takeback that was pleased she’d be far away from Vegas while the takedown happened. But the much larger part—the man who was in love with a woman who he’d hurt and now had no access to her to fix his fuck-up—was destroyed.

“Did she say when she was coming back?”

“A week.”

My jaw clenched.

She wasn’t coming home until she thought I was gone.

“You’re gonna stay and wait for her,” Jack guessed.

“Yes.”

“That’s the smartest fucking thing you’ve said since this shit started.”

He’d get no argument from me.

“You love her?”

“Yes,” I pushed out through my regret.

“Glad to see you’re not a dumbfuck after all. What’d Rhode have to say?”

I filled him in on Dale Weaver. When I was done, his apprehension matched mine.

“Rohan being involved even in the abstract is seriously concerning,” he noted.

“We need to get word to Cat. Any ideas how to do that?”

Jack’s brows pulled together. He looked as miserable as I felt and that was saying something seeing as I felt like my heart had been torn from my chest and Atlee was now holding the cold, dead organ.

“She’s dark until the takedown.”

“Jack—”

“Save it, Wilson. I know she’s capable. I know she’s smart. I know she’s doing her job. But there is nothing you can say to me that will make me think what she’s doing is okay.”

“Is that because you have feelings for her?” I pressed.

“Sure, that’s part of it, but the larger part is me being a man in the business of saving women, not sending them in as bait. I understand I have no say in how she does her job; I can’t even argue she hasn’t been successful in plays she made. But that doesn’t mean I have to like them or support them. I want her out of there, and that has nothing to do with my feelings and everything to do with me knowing the danger she’s in. Every minute she spends alone with him is another minute she has to find a reason to help herself stay safe. Soon, she’s gonna run out of reasons and when she does that motherfucker is going to violate her.”

“Tomorrow night’s the auction.”

“That’s forty-eight hours. And, brother, you know better than most how drastically shit can change from one day to the next.”

He wasn’t wrong.

Yesterday morning I’d woken up next to Atlee thinking I could spend my life with her. This morning I woke up cold and alone wishing I’d kept my stupid trap shut.

A man could inflict a great deal of pain and he didn’t need days to do it.