Chapter 12 The Invitation

Magnum

Leave it to my team to turn up without notice. They spooked Wren so bad, she locked herself in the bathroom. Fuckers woke me up from a deep sleep where somehow I'd ended up spooning Wren. Do not ask me how that happened because I prided myself on being a light sleeper. If that was the effect she had on me, she was lethal, and I had to keep her at an even greater distance.

Fiona came out of the bathroom first, holding Wren's hand. She looked good. I was an idiot for not offering her a shower last night.

The clothes Fiona gave her seemed to fit well. A long-sleeved sweatshirt covered the marks on her arms. She was still barefoot. We'd have to get her some shoes. The wrinkles at the corners of her eyes and the pinch of her nose told me she still held a hint of worry, but she seemed stable. "It's okay, Mag. I'm ready."

I wanted to talk to her alone, so I gave Fiona a look. "Thanks."

"Oh, right. I'll just..." She scooted away.

Blocking the view of all the folks in the other room, I leaned down to her ear and said quietly, "You have every right to privacy. I will only share what you're comfortable with."

She peered up at me with a slight grin. "I appreciate that, but you trust them, right? "

"With my life many times over." It was true. She'd never know the extent that my team had gone to for me and me for them.

"Okay, then I trust them too." She put on a brave smile and set her shoulders back.

I moved aside and cleared her view of the crowd sitting in the small living room.

"This is Vander, Celeste, Steele, Brandy, and Fiona, who you met. Everyone, this is Wren Song."

It was subtle, but her muscles tensed up and she smiled stiffly. I could see how this group might've been intimidating. The women wore stylish clothes, and the guys were covered in beards and tattoos. Plus their faces were grave, obviously concerned after they'd heard about the explosion last night.

I took her hand and guided her to sit on a couch next to me as they all muttered hello to her and then grew quiet. She pulled out of my grip and tucked her hands in her lap.

"Y'all didn't have to come up. I could've briefed you via telecon."

Vander leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and leveled his gaze on me. "Let's say I called you on Tuesday and asked you to look into my brother's crypto dealings. Then let's say that Friday afternoon, I call you to tell you my brother's missing, and I got a mysterious tail on me."

I did call him after the wedding ceremony.

"On Saturday morning, I'm asking you to look into a notorious drug kingpin while I have Talon install a security system in a random bakery. "

Wren looked up at me when he said kingpin and the fear was fully back in her eyes.

"Zero one hundred hours, Sunday, I'm requesting you send someone to meet the cops after an explosion in said bakery while asking for safe house access. You telling me you wouldn't get in a car at dawn to make the two hour drive to see if I needed backup?"

I grinned and sat back on the couch, knees spread wide. "I'd probably have been on your ass on Tuesday asking what the fuck your brother was up to."

Everyone chuckled at that because Vander and his brothers owned the company, so I'd be checking on one of my own bosses. "Right. Sorry I'm late. What the fuck is your brother up to?" Vander asked sardonically.

The joking between us seemed to relax Wren's stiff posture. I turned to her and raised my eyebrows.

She nodded subtly. She was ready for me to share.

I turned back to the group who was sitting opposite us on chairs and couches. "I'll give you the whole story now. I was vague when we talked because Wren has some personal issues that I didn't feel it was my place to share, but she's telling me now that she trusts y'all based on my word, so it's okay for me to bring you in."

Vander nodded, and I had everyone's full attention.

"I haven't heard from my brother since Tuesday when he told me he was marrying Wren."

I felt all eyes shift to Wren. I was sure before now that they thought she was mine, but she wasn't. She belonged to Gavin, and I was covering for him in his absence, as usual. "He didn't show up at his wedding at the courthouse on Friday. Wren made it clear that it was urgent she got legally married that day. I didn't know why she needed this on that day, but I stood in for my brother and signed his name on the marriage license." I glanced at her, and she was looking down. That was probably the part that embarrassed her the most. Getting stood up on your wedding day was not cool.

"Wait a minute," Brandy interrupted. "You stood in for him? So you're married to her?"

"No. I pretended to be Gavin. She already had the license. She just needed the ceremony part. So I signed Gavin's name."

Brandy shared a glance with Steel, and they looked to me to continue.

"After the ceremony, I spotted a Merc tailing us and lost him en route to the hotel Gavin had planned for their honeymoon. She eventually told me a guy named Kenny Zhao had been threatening her for money in exchange for protection of the bakery that her grandfather, who passed, owned."

I felt her deflate beside me at the mention of her grandfather, and I placed my arm behind her on the couch as a sign of support. "The bakery is in Chinatown in LA. Not the best neighborhood. Commercial, run-down tourist trap. She worked all alone in that shop with an ancient alarm, so I had Talon set up a system and had plans to do the doors on Monday. Saturday night, last night, Kenny or one of his men, breached the door and tossed in a small explosive device. I got her out in time. She wasn't hurt except for some glass in her scalp and upper arms. I brought her here until the situation stabilized. Now, we need to go back and inspect the bakery for damage. "

"Talon and Helix are already there," Vander said. "They'll secure it and then meet us here."

"Good. So my plan was to feed her breakfast and then take her down to San Diego to meet with Locke and Shadow tomorrow because she has intel about Kenny's activities on the dark web."

"Oh. I don't really have any uh... intel ," she added softly, stumbling on intel like she wasn't familiar with the word.

"Whatever you know, you'll tell them."

"Okay."

"Apparently a few weeks ago, she was threatened at gunpoint by an enforcer named Tommy. He took her to Kenny's place and she met with him in person. Kenny threatened to make her his wife in exchange for her debt, so she said she was marrying Gavin to throw him off."

Wren hadn't even said anything yet. Hopefully, I was getting most of it correct, so she didn't have to relive it.

"So we should split the tasks among three objectives," Vander said as he counted them off on his fingers. "Finding Gavin, surveillance on Kenny, and security on Wren. Helix is already heading up finding Gavin."

"I'd like to be in on finding Gavin too," I said, remembering that Gavin could still be at risk here, and he should've been my top priority as my little brother. "But I don't want to leave Wren alone."

"She'll be safe in San Diego," Vander declared. "She can stay with Stella, and we'll put a man on her." I received eager nods from all the women, and Fiona was smiling in a familiar way toward Wren, so that eased some of my concern. Now, I was worried what particular man would be on her .

"I want Celeste on her." Celeste, formerly Misha, was a trained Russian operative. If anyone could keep her safe, Misha could do it.

He shared a look with his wife and she nodded subtly. "Fine. Celeste will be the lead on Wren's security detail. Helix will head the search for Gavin, Steel and I will set up surveillance on Kenny," Vander continued assigning tasks.

"And Tommy," Wren added. I was surprised to hear her mention Tommy by name.

"Right. The whole operation," I replied. I knew he'd held a gun on her, but I intended to ask her more about it as soon as we were alone again.

We were hashing out some details when a series of quick taps rapped off the front door. We recognized it instantly as Helix's code.

Steel opened the door for him and Talon, who entered carrying a duffle bag. "Yo, it's a party." Helix raised a hand like he was a celebrity walking the red carpet.

"We brought your stuff," Talon, the only member of the team who'd met her before today, tossed the bag on the couch next to her.

She jumped, startled by the object flying toward her, and I scowled at Talon for his lack of consideration.

"Thank you." She opened the bag, and I glanced inside as she leafed through it. It contained a jumble of clothes and toiletries, including medicine bottles and electronics. Even a few toy dinosaurs were shoved in there.

"You guys tossed all her stuff in one bag?" I asked Helix .

"Hey, at least we thought to grab her stuff." Helix took a seat on a dining room chair he'd pulled into the quickly filling up living room. "Might be some clues in there."

"There's no clues in her bathroom shit. You could've put it in a separate bag or something. She doesn't need her dinosaurs."

"They're not dinosaurs," Wren said quietly. "They're dragons."

The room fell silent for a long moment before Helix responded. "We were not providing a packing service, Mag. We were there to check it out, and if you'd like to stop being an ass about how we brought her shit, I could tell you what we found."

"Really, it's fine. Thank you," Wren said politely to the jerks who'd ransacked her place.

"Go ahead," Vander ordered calmly, not affected by our exchange.

"The system activated when they breached the door, but response time was such that the occupant was in the vicinity when the device detonated." Talon spoke mechanically, but implied in his statement was the fact that I was late getting her out.

"I got her. She's okay. I'm fine too if you were worried."

"Wasn't worried about you," Talon replied, and I wasn't sure if it was a dig or not. Talon was hard as hell to read. Impassive to a fault.

"When can I go back?" Wren asked.

Helix made eye contact with me. "She's not going back there. The structure is intact. The storage room and kitchen weren't affected, but it's gonna take some time to rebuild the front shop and secure the entrance, if you even want to restore that piece of shit."

"It was her grandfather's bakery," I said to Helix.

He stared at me with a blank face like that meant nothing to him. "Anyway, fun fact, we found this card." He handed me a black card with white cursive writing on it.

I read it quickly and then summarized for the group. "It's an invitation to a Valentine's Day magic show at Kenny's mansion in Brentwood. They specifically want Gavin to be there which confirms my theory that they don't have him. Wren said Gavin knew nothing about Kenny or Tommy. They think I'm him."

Everyone was quiet while we took in this new information that was obviously a set up.

I read the back of the card. "It says the ink will disappear in three days."

"So we're dealing with a delusional Copperfield wannabe?" Steel asked.

"Looks like it." I handed the invite to him.

"I don't like it," Steel said as he flipped the invite over. "Too risky. Walking into the lion's den."

"I go by myself. Wired. Armed. Plant a few devices inside. Find out why they're so interested in Gavin. Leave." I shrugged. I wasn't afraid to face this Kenny guy head on.

"The invite is for Gavin and Wren," Vander said. "You can't risk a weapon. Planting some listening devices would be helpful. See who the players are. There will be a crowd. Chances of getting harmed are low. Maybe he just really wants to see if Wren married Gavin or if she was lying. "

He was right that possibly they didn't believe her. She was a terrible liar from what I'd seen so far.

"Then we go in as a couple, pretend to be married, I'm Gavin. We show Kenny she's protected and tell him to back off." I looked down at her and her hands were shaking, her nails pressed into her skin. "Or not."

"I don't think you have much choice," Steel added. "It was delivered along with a bomb. They're expecting you to attend."

"I'll go." Wren's voice cracked as she blurted it out. "I want to go," she said more firmly.

"You sure?" I asked her. "You don't have to do this. We can take him down another way."

"Yes. I want to do this. I'm tired of being afraid of him. Let's make him afraid of you."

I chuckled at her sudden burst of courage. Last night, she'd mentioned she wanted to be involved, and now a real opportunity was before her. She was clearly nervous, but I liked that she felt confident going with me after I'd bungled the security system. I wrapped an arm around her shoulders and gave her a squeeze. "I'll keep you safe."

"Okay, then. We have a few days to prepare. It says it's black, white, and red only attire," Brandy said. "We should probably call in Stella or she'll be mad if she's left out."

"Oh, I guarantee she's already fuming you didn't bring her this morning," Helix said. He'd known her for a long time, and they were close friends.

"We called her. She was sleeping in and didn't want to come to an early morning intervention as she called it," Brandy replied. "But I'll call her and tell her we're going shopping on Rodeo Drive, and I'm sure she'll be here with bells on ASAP."

"Breakfast first," I announced. "Who's in?"

Everyone stood to indicate they were in on breakfast.

"Mexican alright with you?" I asked Wren. There was a great authentic place on the corner that I always visited when I stayed at this safe house.

"Sure. Sure." Her eyes widened like she was surprised I'd asked her opinion.

Helix turned and walked to the door. "I'm out. I ate a shit ton of whatever the fuck those buns were at the bakery."

Wren's lips sputtered at his confession.

Talon rubbed his belly. "Me too. We received your deliveries then proceeded to consume them."

Traitors, tasting her buns before I even had a chance. I should've ate that shit when I was there.

Wren broke out into full tinkling laughter. "I'm glad someone enjoyed them. Was there any left over for the shelter?"

Talon and Helix shared a look. I knew they wouldn't do it.

"We dropped the rest off at the shelter for you, Wren, as requested." Talon said, cracking a rare smile.

This girl had us fighting over pastries and donating to homeless shelters. She was fucking incredible.