They Endure: A Stone Hearts Novel, page 24
The bomb obviously had been meant for the Russian, as this was his event. It was also obvious that it hadn’t been Ren who orchestrated it because he would have told Lou and Bash. “Thato?” Lou said back as Bash started leading them towards a hysterical Tatiana who was now surrounded by Zaitzev’s guards.
Thato, the thought sunk in.
Panic making her skin go hot and her stomach drop, Lou scanned the mayhem. She wanted to scream for him, turn over tables to find him and drag him out if she had to, but she couldn’t. Where the Carver was Louise Geralt’s friend, he was not Victoria Davies’.
Bash shoved through the wall of guards and grabbed Tatiana. “Where was Mikhail last?” he barked at her, covertly demanding if she thought the man was dead or not. Lou hoped so.
“He went to the restrooms!” she sobbed, looking over at the charred bathrooms and covering her mouth. “He was in there! He was in there!”
Lou had to keep from rolling her eyes. Tatiana was having quite the reaction to the man she mentioned wanting to get away from possibly being dead. Maybe he meant more to her than she let on. Maybe Lou had made a monumental fucking mistake. Brushing her hand over where her knife was strapped for reassurance, Lou moved to Tatiana and did the whole soothing fellow female thing.
“We need to get out of here, now,” someone barked. When Lou saw it was Thato, she nearly threw herself at him in relief. His penis was too perfect and talented to not be in this world anymore. “The bomb damaged a major portion of the structure, the entire hotel is being evacuated.”
People were still running around, calling out for loved ones, but the majority of the party-goers were either gone or nearly so. Nodding, Bash abandoned Tatiana and took Lou’s hand, tugging her along, Thato fell into step on her other side, ushering her with a hand on her lower back. Lou was glad to see that Zaitzev’s men were doing the same with Tatiana who was crying in earnest, begging them to check the bathroom's rubble.
Lou shared a look with both Bash and Thato as they hurried up the stairs, the two men beside her shoving people out of their way. Was Zaitzev really dead? Was this all over? That easily? And who else wanted the Russian dead? Who planted the bomb? She shifted her eyes back to Thato. Having silently questioned him if he was her hero and this had been his work, he shook his head. It hadn’t been him. So then who? A dark thought crawled up Lou’s spine….was her father involved? Surely Bash would have been in the bathroom when the explosion went off if this was Gabriel’s work.
Firemen sprinted past them as they rushed down the stairs into the hotel’s lobby. Police officers and paramedics too since there were both dead and injured people still inside the ballroom. Lou scanned the area as she was swiftly escorted toward the open doors. No sign of Zaitzev anywhere, nor any of the additional men he’d brought with them. Whoever remained was with Tatiana.
Remmington PD and other first responders were yelling at people to move back from the hotel, the hordes and hordes of people staring up at the building in horror, some screaming that their loved one or friends were still inside, some sobbing that their someone was dead. Ignoring the police officer yelling at them to join the crowd, Bash went right for the valet box that had been abandoned and snatched their keys while Thato did the same.
“What kind of car?” Thato barked at the mini army of Russians still guarding Tatiana even though their master was likely dead.
“Escalade,” one of the thwomps said in a thick accent.
Bash pursed his lips. “There are no keys for an Escalade.”
“Where are your girls?” Lou asked Thato as they rummaged through the keys, everyone ignoring the shouting officer.
“Sent them home in a cab.” He slid her a saucy smirk. “We were having our own party in a room upstairs when shit hit the fan.” How very fucking Thato of him.
Lou shook her head with a laugh. “Well I’m glad.”
“Wish it’d been you up there, doll,” he said in her ear while Bash and the Russians were distracted with the missing keys and Tatiana stared up at the burning building, hugging herself tightly. Lou felt a little bad—she should have been consoling the girl considering they tossed salads—but forgot about it when Thato continued with, “no one takes it up the ass as enthusiastically as you.”
“Away from my wife,” Bash growled, suddenly appearing at Lou’s side and taking her hand while she tossed Thato a wink. Just because her and Thato’s physical relationship was over and they were just doing the friend thing didn’t mean that they had to stop flirting. Especially if it made Bash’s jaw tick the way it did then. “A cabs been called for Tatiana and Zaitzev’s men, their keys are gone.”
Lou turned to say goodbye to Tatiana, but was interrupted when they found out why their keys had gone missing instead.
“Moya lyubov!” none other than fucking Mikhail Zaitzev shouted, barreling towards them with the other half of his mini army flanking him.
Tatiana stared at him for a long moment as if she couldn’t quite believe he was alive, and then she was running for him. Again, interesting given what she’d said to Lou. Considering they weren’t dead or in a dark cell being tortured, Lou knew the redhead obviously hadn’t mentioned what they talked about. But Lou was still going to put an end to asking her questions and offering help.
“Well that was a big tease,” Thato said, putting his hands in his pockets as master and mistress crashed together like a fucking sappy chick flick. The police officers were still yelling at them all, but quickly shut up when they recognized Zaitzev.
“We’ll discuss this shitstorm later,” Bash growled. “We’re going. I’d offer you a ride home,” he said to the head Carver, “but my car is a two seater and I don’t want my girl sitting on your lap.”
Lou’s hackles went up at that, but she couldn’t verbally scratch and bite at him because they were still undercover. Bash knew this too, given the evil smirk he gave her over his shoulder while he dragged her to Zaitzev and Tatiana to say goodbye. With a growl from Zaitzev that he would call Bash tomorrow and a hug for Lou from Tatiana, they were rushing off into the crowd to go to the parking garage across the street used for valet. Thank god the garage hadn’t been beneath the hotel, otherwise Bash would have been out two Aston Martins.
When they were clear of the crowd and concealed within the garage that was surprisingly still full of cars and empty of people—guess the high society asswipes wanted to watch the spectacle—Lou ripped her hand from Bash’s. “Your girl?” she demanded. “That comment had nothing to do with our married alias,” she sniped, stopping to unstrap her heels as he fobbed furiously for the car.
Stopping and rolling his eyes, Bash crouched down and batted her hands away to take her shoes off for her, not commenting on what she said. Smart—but Lou was already pissed.
“I can do it myself!” she snapped.
“I’m aware, Loulou.”
Once he was done, she tried and failed to knock him off balance with a shove and stomped forward with no idea where the car was. She just needed to get away from him. Between the explosion that she hated to admit scared the shit out of her—because she was worried about him the moment that boom first sung out—the disappointment of Zaitzev not being dead, and the ‘my girl’ comment, she was in a foul fucking mood.
“Did you have anything important in your clutch?” Bash asked, casually strolling beside her as he kept hitting the button for the car to beep at them.
“Just my favorite lipstick, I left my phone in the car,” she grunted. His crankiness obviously gone, Bash grinned when they heard the car and found it two aisles over. It pissed her even more the hell off. “I hate you.”
Beating her to the car, he wordlessly opened the passenger door for her. Intelligent of him not to let her drive back. Her temper was at a volcanic level.
“Why aren’t you all pissed off anymore?” she demanded once her ass hit the seat.
“Because you’re safe now and I’m taking you home,” he replied with that goddamn grin again, and shut her car door.
Lou blinked at the admission. Did he just say something...sweet? She shook her head as he climbed in and turned the car on. “Are we in agreement that the bomb was intended for Zaitzev?”
Bash nodded. “Yup. Any suspicions tickling at you?”
“My father—but it doesn’t fit. If he wanted Zaitzev dead, he would have found out about us going undercover. You?”
Bash backed out and headed out of the garage. “I agree. If there’s someone else in the fold, it could be good or bad for us. If it’s a competitor, they could either have not cared about what happened to Sokolov and hopefully not be concerned with Zaitzev being eliminated, or view us as a threat and want us dead too.” He shook his head. “We didn’t get a chance to see if he had friends and family at the ball, so there’s that too.”
Possibly yet another enemy. How fun. Lou shrugged, she wasn’t going to worry about it then. And who knew, maybe the attempt on Zaitzev’s life would make him put a hold on his plans for the flesh camp and give them time to take him and his organization out. First they needed to find out if there was an even bigger player behind the Russian as well as his family being involved, or if no one would care if him and his people were dead and gone. “Maybe we should send them a fruit basket.”
Bash snorted.
Lou grabbed her phone from the glove box and started thumbing through texts. She bypassed the messages from past lovers wanting their Louise Geralt fix and found her and Vas’s thread that had a bunch of new photos of the baby. “Did Zaitzev say where he was when the bomb went off?” she asked absently, too focused on the video of baby Amira flinging baby food at her daddy who was roaring with laughter and grinning like a doofus. “Tatiana seemed pretty sure that he had been in the bathroom.” Lou paused. “I was also kind of surprised at her reaction...seemed pretty genuine to me.”
Bash sighed. “I was thinking the same thing. Don’t bite my head off, but I think you shouldn’t push at that angle anymore. I know you want this done and over with, but—”
“I know,” Lou cut him off. She appreciated that he was making the suggestion and not demanding. “I was thinking the same thing. My lady alarms are kind of prickling about it.”
He quirked an amused brow. “Lady alarms?”
“You know, woman's intuition.”
Officially exiting Remmington and pulling out onto the highway, a weight seemed to lift off of Bash’s shoulders. He smirked. “Never heard it referred to as ‘lady alarms’.”
Lou waved that away. “Focus. Zaitzev—did he say where he was?”
“I heard him telling Tatiana that he had stepped out for a call. Him and his men went out a back exit so he could have some privacy.” Bash slid her a sideways glance. “Only I checked out the layout of the hotel before we came and there is no exit that way. So unless he and his men climbed out a window, he was lying to her.”
Lou turned to look at him, cocking a brow. “Well that’s interesting. Maybe Mr. Zaitzev was having himself a palate cleanser in one of the rooms upstairs. I saw him walking towards the bathrooms, but not actually go in. Tatiana knows he has business, so it wouldn’t make sense that he was trying to hide having a phone call from her.”
“My thoughts exactly, gorgeous.”
Lou mulled it all over. Tatiana’s reaction was still bothering her. Were they being played? Or was it that she loved Zaitzev but was still okay with parting ways from him? A mistress could care about their don, right? Lou wouldn’t know. She’d done a lot in her life when it came to sex, but never that. She may have found commitment abhorrent, but only for herself. Nor did that mean that she would be okay being the other woman or condone cheating. Lou didn’t judge others for it, though—your life, your choices after all.
“Maybe Tatiana was the wrong one to have a pantiless-party with in the bathroom,” Lou said, knowing full well what reaction the comment would get from Bash. “Think our Russian friend likes married women?”
Unamused as predicted, Bash’s face turned stormy, but she was saved from whatever he was going to say by the chirping of her phone. Glancing down at the caller ID, Lou growled at the picture of her childhood home that popped up with the words ‘Mom Home’.
“Your mother?” Bash guessed, his anger slipping into concern. “Has she been calling you at all?”
Lou shook her head. “This is the first time.” She pursed her lips as the phone continued to ring. Should she answer? Did she want to answer? Despite her anger with her piece of shit mother, she was apparently still a slave to that good old familial guilt and picked up. Besides, maybe this was the call where her mother asked her to get her away from Gabriel.
“I hope this is the call that you tell me you’ve come to your senses,” she said flatly when she answered. Bash’s hand took hers and she found herself not pulling away.
A deep masculine chuckle that obviously did not belong to her mother made gooseflesh ripple along Lou’s skin and then a fiery rage. “Hello my daughter, how are you?”
Lou put him on speakerphone. “What do you want, Gabriel?” And why was he calling from her mother’s phone?
“Now is that anyway to greet your father? And here I was, calling to see if your boyfriend survived that gunshot wound.”
She wanted to bite out that Bash, in fact, was not her boyfriend, but thought better of it. From what she knew of Gabriel Muerte so far, she wouldn’t be surprised if it pissed him off that she and Bash were an item. “I’m surprised you don’t know the answer to that. Guess you aren’t as good as you thought, Gabriel.”
“Pretty nasty work you did on my man, Louise,” he said conversationally, unaffected by her dig. “I have to say, you did your Daddy proud.”
Fucking ew. “I’m hanging up now.”
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” he barked, all smooth casualness gone from his voice. This was the first time Lou was getting the angry version of Gabriel Muerte. If she wasn’t so nervous about what that meant—as much as she hated to admit it—she would have been gloating that he lost his cool.
She locked eyes with Bash who was looking as apprehensive as she felt. “And why is that?” she asked her father.
“Because if you do and you don’t start answering my questions, I’m going to direct my frustrations at your mother.”
“What the fuck do you want, Gabriel?” Bash asked, slamming his foot on the accelerator. Obviously they were now heading to Lou’s mom’s house.
Gabriel loosened a dark chuckle. “Ah, Mr. Corinado, so you did survive. My man had been under the impression that you suffered a fatal gut wound. I suppose I’ll have to deal with him later. So, what are you two lovebirds doing? I hope you’re keeping your hands off of my daughter, Sebastian.”
Lou mouthed, ‘what the fuck’ to Bash. What game was Gabriel playing right now? And what the fuck did he want? “Where is my mother?” Lou tried to keep the panic out of her voice.
“Why, she’s here with me. We want to have a family night, that's why I called. Why don’t you head on over here, Mija.”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. This was a trap, one she was willingly going to step into since her mother was at its center. “I want to talk to her.”
“I gave you a chance to call the shots, Louise. It’s now null and void. Now come to your mother’s house and come alone or she won’t walk away like your boyfriend did.”
A strangled noise clawed up Lou’s throat, but she swallowed it down. “Fine. I’m on my way,” she said as Bash gave her a look that told her that there was no fucking way in hell he was letting her go alone. The speedometer was at one thirty, the woods and the dark night blurring by, making it feel like they were traveling through space at lightspeed. They were a mile from the Luxton exit. A mile too far. And then they had to drive through the city to get to the other side where her mother’s house was. Lou also had to get rid of Bash.
“Good girl,” he father said, then disconnected the call.
“You’re not going there alone, Louise,” Bash snarled as they ate up the last mile and he took the off ramp at body-breaking speed.
“He’s going to kill her if I don’t!” she shrieked at him, using the outburst to hide her grabbing her knife from her thigh sheath.
Bash ignored her protest and made a call through the car’s bluetooth. When it went straight to voicemail, he cursed and punched his steering wheel. Seemed the both of them were losing their usual cool, calm, and collectedness.
They had entered the city when he dialed again, Bash not slowing the car down but swerving around other vehicles. Knowing full well who he was calling next and the cavalry that would be sent to the house, possibly making her father hurt her mother, Lou acted.
Yanking the steering wheel, the car spun out. Shouting, Bash did as she expected and slammed on the breaks. Lou was out of the car before they’d come to a full stop. Using her readied knife, she stabbed his front tire and made a break for it.
“Fuck!” she heard Bash scream as he got out of the car and started sprinting for her.
But Lou had gotten the jump on him. Grabbing a man in the process of getting into his car by the shirt front, she snatched his keys from his hand and tossed him to the ground. She was speeding down the street, heading for her mother’s house before the door had even shut.
She looked in the rearview before she rounded the corner of the next street to see Bash on the phone, sprinting with all he was worth for her car, terror etched across his face. Ignoring the ache in her chest, Lou put her foot to the floor. He was likely on the phone with Ren—Lou needed to beat whoever was being sent to the house and tell her father that they were coming and convince him that she had no control over it. Tell him that she’d go with him willingly. As long as her mother was unharmed and left behind.
Turning into her neighborhood a few agonizing minutes later, Lou sheathed her knife and tried to stay calm. It was happening again. Her freedom was going to be taken from her. Maybe if she focused enough on the fact that she was making the choice to have it stripped from her, she would be able to handle it. The tremors going through her body, the shortness of breath, and the cold sweat slicking her skin suggested otherwise.
