Darkest Sin (Las Vegas Sin Book 3), page 15
That’s what I can’t wrap my head around. I was able to grasp the notion that Sam had some ill-informed vendetta. He thought I talked and tried to make me pay the price for it. But Gavin asking about my mother. About my past before I came to America. Them telling me that it’s someone else who wants me dead. I just…God, I just can’t.
It all feels to theatrical. Too extreme and far-fetched, and frankly, ridiculous. Who am I? I am no one. I’m just a girl. Any old girl. No one special.
“Come downstairs. Let’s go somewhere you and I can chat. Just the two of us.”
I turn back to Gavin, who is still too engrossed in his phone to give a fuck.
Then again, Sam is his boss, right?
I debate this for a moment. The going somewhere alone with Sam part. It’s been a very long time since that sort of thing has happened. I was in love with this man once. I used to stare into his eyes and envision my future. That’s such a powerful drug. And even all these years later, all this ugly hate later, part of me still wants a small hit.
Even if it’s just for answers and nothing more.
That’s what I tell myself. That any affection I once had for him is long since gone. That anything else is completely unacceptable and weak and forbidden. I mean, the man did shoot me.
I won’t allow myself to be lured in by once upon a time.
I scurry back into the room, locate my pepper spray since a gun is too conspicuous for a hotel like this, and pause, standing over Gavin. It takes him forever to look up at me, and once he does, his expression is the picture of apathy. A stone-cold killer.
“You told me to trust you.”
He swallows, holds my gaze, and nods like I just asked him if Las Vegas is chilly this time of year. Zero emotion.
“Is he going to kill me?”
“No.”
“For your sake, I hope not. Because I will haunt your ass like a motherfucking phantom.” He smirks, but other than that small gesture, he gives me nothing else. I leave Gavin and meet Sam back at the door. “I’ve been told this burns your eyes like nothing else,” I promise as I show him my pepper spray before tucking it into my pocket and shutting the door of the hotel room, leaving Gavin behind.
Sam smiles a smile at me I haven’t seen in ages. He reaches out for me, his fingers gliding against mine without taking my hand. Then he tilts his head, studying me intently. “Did I do this to you? Or were you like this before I met you, and you just did well at hiding it from me?”
Isn’t that exactly what Gavin asked me earlier tonight?
I was a sweet little thing once. That’s what Sam always called me. I had no temper, at least not the sort Gavin accuses me of. Then again, I had nothing to be angry about other than losing my father and brother and seeing my mother dead before me. But as I explained, I never allowed myself to dwell on that part of my life. I had pushed it all back into the darkest recesses of my mind. Treated it as if it were something that happened to someone else.
I had Jeff and Cora to thank for that–a lot of conditioning and self-preservation techniques. But after Sarah died, the darkness inside me has started creeping out, and I haven’t been able to stop it. Now, I’m not sure I want to.
“Likely a little of both.” We step onto the elevator, and he slides in closer, pressing in just a little. He still smells the same. Has the same body temperature. Same effect on my body. Like muscle memory. My insides recognize his. Reflexively pull in toward him.
And I hate it.
“You knew who I really was. What my real name was. All that time.”
It’s not a question. More like a simply stated fact I know to be true.
The elevator doors part, and he clasps my elbow, clutching me tight and leading me through the hotel, down a hallway to an empty bar tucked away in an alcove two steps up and just off the lobby. He releases me, stepping back and flexing his hand as if my touch just burned him.
“Sit, Em. I have so much to tell you.”
I do sit down. But only because I’m not sure what else to do with myself. I feel like I went fifteen rounds with a prizefighter and lost. The weirdest part? All this drama is making me wish Fiona were here. Girls like–hell, need–to talk. That’s how we break down our feelings and emotions. It’s how we make sense of our universe. How we compartmentalize and place shit into its proper baggage.
Because let’s face it, this situation is the very definition of baggage wrapped in filthy drama. It hurts just being here, sitting this close to Sam. It’s so freaking confusing I have no idea how to make sense of anything, and yet, I know this is only the beginning of the knowledge bomb that’s about to be dropped on my head and fuck up my entire existence.
Sam wouldn’t be here otherwise. Neither would Gavin.
So yeah, I could use a girlfriend who understands the true meaning of heartbreak and destroyed.
A waiter comes by, dropping cocktail napkins in front of us, and Sam quickly orders, “Two gin and tonics, please. Lime.”
It’s what we used to drink together. So many memories. So much time and love spent between us. Was any of it real? I stare at him and realize I can’t ask that one yet. I’m still so raw over what happened between us.
All the lies and misdirection and well…the shooting, of course.
I want to hate him. More than anything, I want that. But time is a funny thing. Our minds enjoy twisting around and wrapping us up and destroying our resolve and inner fortitude like it’s their freaking job. Especially when you realize your preconceived notions are off. That the hate, the anger, the fierce determination you’ve been thriving on might be all for naught.
His words from earlier tonight have been ringing loud and clear in my head like a church bell. “For saving your life? For protecting you all these years? For keeping my distance when it was the last thing I wanted?” “Listen closely, love. I am not the one who has been after you. I never touched your family, I swear it. I would never have done that to you.”
I shake my head at him, rattled so thoroughly I’m not even sure how to proceed.
“Are you really…,” I trail off. How do you ask someone if they deal illegal drugs for a living? It disgusts me to no end. If I had known who he was, all that he was involved with, I never would have gone near him.
And now look.
Guilty or not of killing my people, he ruined my life that night. Our life together. Years of a relationship built on a mountain of lies. His name was as fake as mine; only, I had long since buried Emeline Badeaux. She was barely ever real to me.
He never was Samuel Caldwell.
He’s always been this other man.
I lean back into the curve of the fabric chair, glancing around us only to discover we’re alone. As in, this bar feels very closed and most definitely secluded. I wonder if he’s arranged this whole thing. Then I inwardly cock an eyebrow at myself. Of course, he has. Duh.
“What did Gavin tell you?” he asks after our drinks are delivered and he takes a sip.
“About you? Nothing,” I admit.
His head bobs up and down as he thinks all this through. His eyes dance all over me. They haven’t stopped since he first saw me. Like he too can’t believe I’m actually here. “Yes. To answer your earlier question, I knew who you were. I had been searching for you for years.”
“Why?” I’m incredulous.
He stares at me, bemused. “You have no idea?”
I shake my head, staring down at the clear bubbly drink on the table. Is it messed up that I wonder if he had it drugged? Then I smirk. Messed up has so many new definitions in my world.
“You were this beautiful girl. So captivating. So…sweet,” he remarks after finding just the right word to describe a very young and naïve Emma Small. “When I found you that night in the club, I knew it was you. You’re the exact image of your mother.” I swallow down so much with that statement.
“How did you know my mother?”
“I didn’t. I saw pictures of her. What happened to your family is legendary in my world. You were legendary.”
I shake my head, angry and confused. No one wants to be legendary. Not in this way. Legendary for having her family murdered doesn’t quite have the same taste as being a rock star does.
“That night in the club, I will admit, I brought you up to the VIP area because I was going to use you as a weapon. But then we started dancing. We started talking. You were young and flirted, all the while blushing with a shyness I wasn’t expecting. Within minutes, I was utterly enthralled with you. You became a hypnotic drug. I couldn’t get enough. You were lovely and intoxicating and sexy and just…bloody perfect. Before long, I fell so hard for you, and after that, all thoughts of revenge fell off.”
I roll my eyes at him. “Revenge against whom?”
“Your brother, love. Your brother. Well, and your uncle too.”
My breath stalls, my body freezing in place. “What?”
“Who do you think has been after you all this time? Killed your mum?”
“I…,” I trail off, at a loss for words or coherent thoughts. I don’t know who killed her. I always assumed it was the same people who killed my brother and father, and I never got far when I tried to dig into that. Jeff and Cora were not forthcoming. “My brother is dead.”
His eyes slant in as he tilts his head, questioning. “Are you sure about that? How do you know other than your mum telling you so?”
I blink at him, stunned. He’s right. I don’t know for sure.
It’s in this moment of dumbstruck tragedy that I realize so much of my life has been fed to me in the form of stories and words without the benefit of proof. I believed my mother when she told me my father and brother were dead. Why wouldn’t I? I believed Jeff and Cora when they told me I was safe and should put my past behind me, never to speak of or think about it again. I believed Sam loved me, when his every action was pure motive.
My life has been a series of lies, one stacked on top of the other.
“My brother hated me,” I admit. Suddenly, it’s as if I can’t keep the words in.
I never knew or understood why. Truthfully, it’s something I never thought much of. I figured it was like Cinderella–at least it felt that way in my childlike brain. My brother was only my half brother. He was my father’s son, ten years older than me, and when I grew to an age to know better, angry. Hateful. He would let me know at every turn how unwanted I was. I wasn’t sad when my mother told me he was dead. But my father, I mourned. My father was loving. Warm.
“Your brother, Antoine Badeaux, is a rival of mine. A large dealer, mostly in Europe and the Middle East.” I shake my head, at a loss. “Your uncle has done a bit of human trafficking, but now mostly owns Nuit, a series of nightclubs with an erotic touch. Have you heard of them?”
“No,” I scoff sarcastically. “I haven’t heard of them. For the last few years, I haven’t followed the stock market or international politics or even cared about the hottest spot for spring break. I’ve been running from you, or so I thought. So yeah. No…,” I draw out the word.
He ignores my outburst completely. “The clubs are mostly a front. A way to launder money for him and Antoine.”
“Fantastic,” I deadpan. “What do they care about me?”
“Well, for starters, your father killed your brother’s mum.” My eyes pop open wide. Just when I didn’t think it was possible to be any more shocked than I already have been tonight. “Not the nicest bloke, your father. But after he met your mum, he settled down a bit. Was starting to pull back from dealing and trading drugs and arms. But…,” he pauses, rubbing his hand along his jaw and pinning me with a stare I have no name for or experience with. “Do you know what Ares is?” He watches my expression closely.
“Like the Greek God?” My nose scrunches up.
“Exactly. The Greek god of war,” he emphasizes. “It’s a vault banking system in Switzerland. Extremely private. Terribly expensive to buy into. Keys are not replicated. It’s fingerprint, facial recognition, and the keys. The first two are backup methods, but if one has a key, the biometrics aren’t required for entry. Keys are passed down and they’re all that matter.”
My hands reach out, bracing themselves on the table for support as my body trembles and my mind sways. Good thing I’m sitting. Couldn’t this have just been a simple tit for tat thing? Drugs for drugs? Hate for hate? Death for death?
Why did the key have to come into play?
“How do you know about this?” My face pales, voice shaky.
“Because in addition to your uncle and brother despising your living guts and wanting you dead on revenge and principle alone, I believe that’s what they’re after. Why they want you taken alive.”
I swallow. Clear my throat and do everything in my power to school my features. Then I laugh out awkwardly. This is the stuff of movies. Of Netflix original shows. It’s not reality. If it were, why would they bother terrifying people by making it into fiction?
Unfortunately for me, my life seems to be stranger than fiction.
“You’re lying to scare me.”
“Am I?” He cocks a challenging eyebrow, taking a small sip of his drink while his eyes stayed glued to mine.
“What do I have to do with this?”
He sets his drink down, leans forward, and pins me with a stare so potent it makes my stomach lurch and my skin prickle with heat.
“Your father purchased one such vault and fortified it with your biometrics. Ten days later, your brother killed him, and you and your mother were on the run. And no one ever found the key.”
Seventeen
Emma
* * *
For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Only, the laws of physics do not apply to human interactions. No, human interactions, at least in my experience, tend to be more the product of chaos theory. A goddamn butterfly–no pun intended–flaps its motherfucking wings, and lo and behold, there is a tsunami.
Because when I was ten, my father made a decision. And that decision forever changed the course of many people’s lives. For most, it became a bloodbath that led to their end.
For me, it set off a chain reaction.
One that has not stopped. There were only moments when it slowed. When there was a quiet lull in the action.
When I was stupidly, callously, unaware that I was, in fact, still the main player in the game.
“Only one key was produced for that account,” Sam continues amidst my existential crisis, either fully unaware or totally apathetic since he’s out to unnerve me and or cut me out at the knees or however this is supposed to go. “Quite a large sum in it from my understanding.” He states it so simply. So effortlessly. Like it doesn’t hold the weight of the world and the deaths of many.
The agenda of these people is mind-numbing. The world would be a much better–not to mention safer–place if it weren’t run by egotistical, selfish psychopaths like the man sitting across from me. Why else would the prick bother bringing up the key?
I reach out, lift my drink, and down half of it. Wasn’t it just the other night that I told Gavin I’m not a big drinker? I shake my head, dismayed. Fuck all of them. “I have a feeling this has to do with a hell of a lot more than a key and a vault. So, cut the crap already. What do you want with me, Samuel?”
Sam smiles, but something hidden beneath his gleam and pearly white teeth turns my blood cold. There is nothing warm or genuine in it. Nothing flirtatious or sexy. His vacant eyes are chillingly intense and devoid of any basic human emotion other than his own selfish motives.
He sits back in his chair, swiping a finger back and forth across his bottom lip. He’s taking this pregnant pause, suspense thing to another level. If he’s trying to rattle me, it’s working.
“Fine. I’ll cut the crap, as you say. Your uncle and brother want that key, want whatever is in the vault. Then they want you dead. There is a bounty on your head. Has been one for ages. Your brother and uncle weren’t sold that you were dead, since no body of yours was ever found. They offered up money to find you and have you–and the key–delivered to them. Hasn’t worked out so well for them yet. Jeff and Cora hid your identity well. It took me ages to find you, and I only did so because I got lucky.”
“But you did find me,” I interrupt. “Why were you looking for me? For whatever is in that vault?”
“I didn’t know about the vault until recently. That’s not why I was looking for you back then. Your brother and uncle killed my business partner, my cousin, and I planned to take them down with you as my pawn.” Sam shrugs with a sorry, not sorry expression. “Then I fell in love with you like the daft fool I am where you’re concerned.”
I frown at that, my stomach turning sour. It shouldn’t hurt after all this time and all this hatred, but it does. I loved him. I loved him wholeheartedly, and he betrayed me by shooting me, and his words tonight are only making that betrayal worse.
“After I got to know you, I was hooked. I decided to protect you, same as Jeff and Cora, and forget about hitting your uncle and brother back through you. I loved you that much, Em. You were worth more to me than anything else.”
I roll my eyes at him. “Gee, thanks. I feel so special and lucky.”
He disregards my snarky attitude completely. “But it didn’t stop. They found out you were alive and in New York and decided to come after you. The man you witnessed me shoot was one of their assassins.” His expression alters. Turning from love and worry and adoration to pain. To fury and hurt. “I killed that man for you, to keep you safe and alive, and you looked at me as if you’d never seen me before. As if you’d fallen straight out of love with me, just like that. Disgust colored your every feature.”
“You didn’t exactly spell it out for me that night, did you? No. You shot me the moment I turned for the door.”
“I didn’t know what else to do to stop you.”
I fold my arms over my chest, narrowing my gaze and angling my head in his direction. “How about firing into the wall?”
