“The oath I took…”
Liam snorted and stubbed his cigar against the wall.
“That oath is meant to keep shit-stirrers in line. ‘Lose your way, you lose your head.’ Not you. You,” he said and pointed hissmoldering cigar at Emory, “you are the exception. I brought you into this. I’ll find you a way out.”
Emory searched Liam’s face for a bluff, but the fervor had already started with the promise of freedom, and his head swam with a flood of questions. There’d have to be plans, contingencies, a way to do it safely.
“How though?” Emory asked because so often his dreams orbited just out of reach. Until it was in his hands, he wouldn’t trust it. “It’s not that simple. What would I tell the others?”
“I never said it’d be simple, and there’s a catch, of course. I need you to lead this organization through war. Once we put things to rights, I will build you an off-ramp. You’ll be the hero I put to pasture. That’s how we’ll sell it to the others.”
Liam offered his hand. Deals like that existed in word first and legend later, never inked in anything real.
“You really mean it?” Emory asked and cautiously took Liam’s hand.
“My integrity lives and dies by my word. What else do any of us have if not that?”
Locked at the eyes, they shook on it and started for the diner. Giddy in such dire times, Emory’s first instinct was to tell Amelia. The flash of her smile lit up his thoughts, but the punishing darkness prevailed again.She’s gone,he reminded himself as his phone rang in his pocket. Emory dug it out and stumbled to a stop as he stared at the screen.
Dauer calling…
A flurry of activity erupted in the diner. The others hovered around Zulu battering his keyboard.
“Where is she?” Emory demanded. “You can have whatever you want. I will give you everything I have. Just give her back to me.”
A puff of breath rustled on the other end of the line.
“Little brother,” Ivan said in a slow exhale and depravity Emory remembered well—the thrill of the taunt and the chilling way he elongated his words. “Don’t speak. Just listen.”
Emory’s pounding heart plummeted to his stomach and coldsweat slicked his brow. Dizzy on his feet, his vision blurred at the edges. Through the window, Pete gestured to Emory with a twirl of his finger.Keep him on the line.
“Remember that day in the woods, Emory? I’ve never felt closer to you, more proud to share your blood. She can bring us together again, just like that day. I want to be close to you. I want to taste what you’ve tasted, feel what you’ve felt.”
Ignited with sterling hatred, Emory’s knuckles popped as his hands curled into trembling fists.
“Where is she, youfuckingpsycho? I will tear you apart!” he raged, but the call had already ended.
Emory froze with the phone to his ear. The world moved around him, a million miles an hour or more as he stared in a daze at the screen. He palmed the outside wall to steady himself as grief slackened his frame and saliva filled his mouth.He’d be sick soon.
Inside the diner, Zulu shoved pieces of equipment into bags, and Jack tossed cash to the table. Pete bolted out the door with Corey hastening behind.
“Got it!” Pete hollered and sprinted for the car. “We got a location.”
The numbness dissipated and left Emory unsteady on his feet. He removed himself from the wall as the other men hustled from the diner.
He turned to Liam, who smiled softly and said, “Let’s find those calm seas.”
THIRTY-NINE
AMELIA
Ivan hurled the phone at the wall. Amelia shielded her head as it smashed to pieces that scattered around her. Scraps of hope, so very few, shattered with it. Did Emory even know she was alive? She’d meant to scream so he’d have no doubt, but her voice failed her when it mattered most.
With her nose buried in the crook of her arm, Amelia couldn’t even summon tears. A stillness washed over her as the men moved about the room. That stillness quieted the voices in her head, and a memory stepped out of the void.
Years ago, a broken man had barricaded himself in her father’s office with a gun to his head. He didn’t want to live anymore, and somehow Amelia’s father was wrapped up in the man’s courtship with death. Her father had reasoned with the man, who left not quite whole but a little less broken. Months later, he thanked her father for saving his life.
“What did you say to him?” Amelia had asked her dad after the ordeal. It was the only good question that came to mind; not why or how or what any of it had to do with Callum Havick. That seemed to matter less.
