The old villa is nothing but debris and shadow, perched amid black elms on the top of a hill where the roads have all degraded to dirt. Cars glint in the occasional lightning, hidden among the trunks and briars. It’s the only safehouse within fifty miles of the doctor’s office and what passes for a town this far out in the country.
It was instinct and hope more than anything that led me here. I should be doing as my brother commanded me. I should be driving to Sampson, withdrawing my name from the running. I should be buying a ticket and flying to some hidden corner of the world. I should be letting Emma forget me.
But how can I? Clarence is a sick bastard. I don’t trust him for an instant to do as he’s promised. And if she’s in his care, she’s not safe. All of this is my fault. So it’s my responsibility alone to set her free, even if it costs me my life.
I park on the road and hike up to the house. I’m armed with a torch and two silenced Glocks. I have no one at my back but myself.
Squares of butter-yellow light become visible in gradations as I approach the villa. It’s a soft light—candles, probably, or lanterns, emerging from the mist. A black, heady sort of rage calcifies in my bones as I make headway through the coiled briars and sopping brush.
What is he doing to her?
I blink away the white fury that creeps across my vision. I have no time for feeling or sense. All that matters is that I save her.
Voices reach me when I meet the elms. A few figures smoke in the shadowed hulk of the front doors. They chuckle, their words indiscernible. Softly, somewhere, I hear crying.
Has he hurt her? Am I too late?
I ignore the men posted out front, rounding the house. It’s shockingly unguarded, but then, Clarence might really have bought that I would obey his orders to spare Emma.Should I have?The uncertainty is thick and thorny enough to choke me. Within the next hour, I could have reached Sampson’s estate. Will Clarence be waiting for that call? Are the minutes of my vague imperception ticking down with every minute?
I find a broken window on the lowest level of the villa and vault through. The floor inside is littered with glass and debris. Hulking, forgotten furniture looms out of the dark, cloaked with moldering white sheets. Floorboards are broken out, and the second floor is pocked full of craters. Faint light can be seen above. Footsteps creak somewhere in the house.
I advance, finding the main corridor of the first hall empty, though I can still hear voices. I carefully pick my way upstairs. If I find her, this is going to become a shootout, plain and simple. I have surprise on my side, and with enough stealth, I might be able to pick off a few men as I get closer to Emma and Clarence. But once I’ve confronted him, all I’ll be able to do is fight my way out. Fightourway out.
A man has his back to me on the second floor. I watch him for a moment from the shadows, concluding that he’s solitary. When he strolls idly into a room, I follow him.
Pop pop!
The near-silent bullets nail him in the back of the skull. Blood arcs across the far wall, and he collapses. I rush forward in time to cushion and muffle his fall, lowering him carefully into the shadows of the room.
Patrolling the second floor, I find another man. He leans against the balustrade of a staircase, smoking a cigarette and scrolling on his phone. I watch. Wait. When I’m sure he’s alone, I shoot him between the eyes, hastening to catch him before he falls.
But his phone slips from my hands, clattering loudly to the floor.
“Derry? You good?”
A pair of shadows appears on the third floor landing. I crouch in the dark, waiting. They catch sight of the body—no more stealth.
Pop! Pop!I nail one in the temple, the other in the heart. In unceremonious chaos, their bodies slam down the stairs, blood painting the walls.
There is no time for fear. Clarence is up there with Emma. I have nothing left but the fight inside of me, the fury in my veins.
I go up the stairs.
19
Emma
Clarence smiles down at me.
He looks so much like Malcom it takes my breath away. But there’s a blunt cruelty to him too. His massive shoulders, his barrel chest. His bare arms, black with ink.
He brings a rough palm to my cheek.
“But fuck,” he murmurs, “you’re pretty.” He jerks his chin at the pair of men lingering by the door. They close it.
Dread coils in my belly. I’m unbound, ungagged. It’s almost worse than being tied up. Because it proves that Clarence is in utter control. He has not even the slightest fear I’ll fight or flee.
And he’s right. Any wrong move, and I endanger myself, my babies—and Malcom.
