CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

ATLAS

I gave an inch, and they took a fucking mile. He was gone for thirty minutes, but that's all they needed to get him. I threatened to put a bullet through both Midas and Trojan, my hand around Midas's throat as I pressed the end of the gun to his forehead, asking him to tell me why I shouldn't shoot him.

In the moment, it was the adrenaline. I knew I couldn't shoot either of them, or I didn't want to shoot either of them either. They'd done so much to help me, that shooting them would be like taking a shot myself.

We took the car out. Trojan stuck to the laptop, searching for any records of Jasiel on the police system or radio. I almost lost everything in a single moment when I forgot to put my mask on. There was a spare mask in the car.

There was a little relief and solace in knowing that they were asking for Jasiel to be taken alive. But that didn't mean I wasn't going to kill the chancers who'd took him. They had to have taken a cheap shot at him, or he'd have been back by now.

Driving around in circles around the blocks, I was looking for someone who might have an answer. I was searching for someone who could be connected. I was looking for someone selling drugs. They fled the scene on every corner as I drove slow and close. It didn't help that the car looked like something a cop would drive.

I knew what they were going to do, so the next guy who tried to run. I pulled my gun out and took a shot at the leg, piercing the flesh, they dropped to the ground and tried to pull themselves across to a dumpster.

Jumping out of the car, I approached him.

It was dark, late at night, and if they thought this gave them any advantage, they were mistaken. I'd lived in complete darkness for months before, I didn't completely rely on sight in these situations. But this wasn't complicated, people begged and cried.

"Which family do you work for?" I asked in a calm voice. "Tell me." I pulled out my silencer, fixing it to the end of the gun. "I'll ask you once, and once only. Who do you work for?"

"The—the—the—"

I pointed the gun at him. "Three. Two."

"Agosti family," he said.

"The boy?" I asked. "Where did they take the boy?"

"Boy—boy? I don't know. I just sell weed, coke, E."

I fired a warning shot into his other leg. "Please, you talk. I know you talk," I said. "Where's the boy?"

The man blubbered, crying as he clutched at the pain in both of his legs. He'd survive, but if I didn't get an answer, right now, he'd be finding his final resting place among the trash in the alley.

"The boy," I repeated. "You know who. Where did they take him?"

"Warehouse," he said. "They have a warehouse. It's just off Brewster Street. The one with the shark on the sign."

"You've earned your life today," I told him, slipping my gun inside my holster.

The man sputtered in his attempt to say something. "You—you want me to tell them anything?"

"No," I said, walking off to the car.

Midas looked at me, his brows turning together. "We killed three men, why did he survive?"

Before him, there had been three others who didn't give me any answers. They valued keeping information to themselves than to use that same information to free themselves and live another day. "He told me what I wanted to know," I said.

I wasn't in the business of sparing lives, but this wasn't business at all. This was personal. And if the intel was wrong, I knew exactly where this man was, and I knew exactly who to look for. Two holes, one in each leg. Even a good patch job on those would require a good hospital, and I'd come back for him if I'd been played.

"Where?" Midas asked.

"Warehouse off Brewster Street," I said, nodding to Trojan in the back. "Shark logo. I want to know who owns it, and if there's any available footage. If Jasiel isn't there, I'm going to make sure it's everyone's problem."

I knew it wasn't anyone else's problem. Jasiel did this, but I wasn't going to blame him. I was blaming myself, and everyone in this car. Nobody stopped for a moment to realize that he was the expensive cargo we should've been caring about the entire time.

"Owned by Vittoria Agosti," Trojan said. "And there's closed security cameras on site, but I can't access them. If he's there, then we can assume they've got men all over that land prepared for us."

That didn't scare me. I'd take on an army of men. I knew I had good chances, if I had a gun, and a moment to prepare for the attack, then I already had the upper hand.

All the lights were out near the warehouse.

I drove right up to the door. There was nobody around. Not a single sign of a soul. No cars. No lights. Absolutely nothing to say anywhere was inside.

Twisting the silencer off the gun, I stepped out of the car.

Midas and Trojan followed with guns and flashlight in hand. But it wasn't looking good, I didn't know if Jasiel was in here, but the likelihood I'd be going back to finish killing my fourth person of the night was looking more likely.

Bursting through the warehouse doors, Midas shone his torch over the empty room. Except it wasn't completely empty, there was a spilled blue slushie on the floor, and a metal chair on its side in the center of the room.

"Fuck!" I roared, raising my gun to the metal ceiling, I fired a shot into it. It didn't bring the relief I'd wanted. Not a single sigh of sweet relief. I could've unloaded shot after shot in several men and still felt nothing but anger.

"There's an envelope," Trojan said.

At the far end of the room, a letter flittered around with one side of it stuck in a small pool of liquid on the ground.

On light blue paper with a familiar wax emblem, I knew immediately this was a letter from Benicio. Unfolding it, I saw it addressed to Vittoria. It was an invite to his birthday on the twentieth. I knew, without a doubt, that's where she was taking Jasiel.

"Where are we going now?" Midas asked.

"I can get intel on her base," Trojan said. "I assume we're going after her."

"Find her," I said, storming out of the warehouse. "I want to know exactly where she is, and I want him located. If he's not found within the hour, we're going after every person she loves, and killing each one of them until he's back with me."

Back in car, my phone buzzed in my pocket. It was an unknown number, no caller ID.

"Hello," I answered. "Who is this?"

"I don't have him," a voice replied. Female.

"Vittoria?"

"Yes, and he's property of the Coronado family now," she said. "I take it you're the one who broke him out of prison?"

"Where is he?"

"If I could ask, what makes him so special?"

She didn't know, that was ok. I could forgive her and her ignorance for not knowing how special Jasiel was. "We'll find him. We'll find you. I hope you have your last words prepared." I hung up on her before she could get more from me. I was a ghost; I was surprised she knew my number.

"She called you?" Trojan asked as I approached. "I'm guessing she has a tech. He could've pulled your number from the GPS and tracking in your phone. You should destroy it."

It was a burner phone for a reason. I threw it out of the car. "She has him, but—she said she doesn't. She's giving him to Benicio. So, either we push up our timeline, or we wait." I didn't like either idea. If we pushed up the timeline, there was a lot we hadn't planned for. If we waited, something could've happened to Jasiel, and I wasn't comfortable with that.

"It's your call," Midas said.

I knew it was my call. Did he want a reward for reminding me I had to decide on what I wanted to happen next? I couldn't even look at him, either of them. They were pissing me off, but I needed them, and they needed me for this job to be complete.

"We'll wait," I told them. "But I also don't think she's given him to Benicio yet. She's going to do this at his birthday. It makes the most logical sense since she's trying to broker a deal with him."

Trojan nodded. "I'll continue trying to track them, I have security footage from the road, but there's a lot of cars going through this area."

"Let me just remind you," I said. "If anything happens to him, I'll kill all three of us." I pulled the door shut. I wasn't joking around either. This wasn't a time to play, and I was far too serious for them to think this was playtime.