Page 7 of Freedom’s Inferno

“You know what this looks like? It looks like somebody thought they could skim. Do you think you’re clever, Charles?”

“That wasn’t me,” I ground out, jaw tight. I was about another minute away from losing control against the tide of panic threatening to pull me under. I couldn’t breathe.

“Maybe not, but your partner’s dead. That leaves you on the hook, and Mr. Costa wants an explanation.”

My pulse thudded. Damian Costa. His name alone was enough to curdle the blood of anyone with half a brain. He wanted his money, and he’d peel back flesh and bone until he got it.

I sat there, body rigid, while the vehicle carried me further away from the office. My mind wouldn’t stop spinning: Richard was gone, and now his widow had me chained to a mess that didn’t belong to me. Sweet, vicious Lana Blackwell had her fingerprints all over this nightmare. I needed to get that money back, or Costa would take me apart one piece at a time. Maybe it was already too late.

Maybe I don’t care.

The brakes screeched to a stop, and my body jerked forward in the seat.

Whoever sat across from me chuckled, deep and thick. Hands grasped my arm and pulled me from the back, shoving me to the pavement like a sack of bricks dumped from a truck.

I hissed, catching myself, gravel stinging my palms. Before I had the chance to get my bearings, I was hauled back to my feet and dragged into a building. The place smelled of oil and iron. The men pushed me down a narrow hallway until yellow light spilled through the weave of the sack, and someone yanked it off my head. I gasped a breath of relief, choking down air like water in the desert.

Damian Costa stood in the center of a concrete box, metal shelving along the walls.

A storage unit.

His dark eyes studied me with a cold, unblinking stare. He wasn’t a flashy man, he wore no gold chains or gaudy suit. He didn’t need the shine to prove his power. His posture, alone, had weight. A predatory stillness, almost unnatural for a human.

Two other men hovered in the room. One I assumed was the man who had ridden in the back of the SUV with me, a surprisingly short gentleman with a thick black beard and a bald head. The other stood by the only exit, a semi-automatic rifle clutched in his meaty fists.

I swallowed, my throat like sandpaper.

“Charles Sterling.” Damian said, voice smooth as silk over broken glass. “I believe you have something that belongs to me.”

Black Beard passed the file to Costa, who flipped through the pages with idle ease. Richard’s neat accounts. Lana’s signature curling at the bottom of transaction after transaction.

“I’m sure you can imagine my concern,” Damian went on, “When I discovered that my money was missing, and the man who handled it for me was floating in a bathtub.” He lifted his eyes to mine, calm as a priest. “You’re the one left standing, Mr. Sterling, and I am not a patient man.”

“I didn’t take it.” I rasped, forcing my voice to steady.

Costa snapped his fingers. A fist clamped on the back of my jacket and yanked me off balance, bringing me to my knees.

I sucked in a sharp breath as cold metal pressed to the base of my skull. My stomach bottomed out; my vision tunneled.

Damian’s lips curved into something that wasn’t a smile. “No? Then who did?”

The air was thick enough to choke on. The weight of every gaze in the room pressed in on me, pinning me down. I had a barrel pointed at my head, and the only way to escape the bullet was to aim the weapon at someone else.

“The widow,” I said, gesturing to the folder in his hands. “Lana Blackwell. Her signature is all over the accounts. I don’t believe Richard’s death was an accident. The money’s the motive, and she has it. Please.”

My hands lifted reflexively, palms extended over my head in placation.

Costa flipped through the documents again, eyes narrowing.

“Lana Blackwell,” he said, the name rolling off his tongue like a sip of wine. He smiled, though it didn’t reach his eyes.

I’d painted a target on her back, and for some reason something like guilt flickered through my chest, but I extinguished it.

No fucking way. If it comes down to me or her, then Lana can hang.

The hammer snapped with a vicious click.

I don’t want to die.