Chapter 5 - The Price of Loyalty
The first shot struck the wall beside Victor’s head.
He pulled Tessa into the office as bullets destroyed the glass partition behind them.
“Stay low,” he ordered.
Victor returned fire.
One of Gabriel’s men fell against the elevator doors.
Gabriel and Arthur retreated as the doors closed.
Tessa crawled toward the desk.
Victor pressed a hand against his shoulder.
Blood seeped between his fingers.
“You’re hit.”
“It passed through.”
“That is still being shot.”
She tore fabric from a curtain lining and pressed it against the wound.
Victor looked down at her hands.
“You remain strangely calm.”
“I’m not calm.”
“You are giving medical instructions.”
“My mother was a nurse.”
“And you became an accountant?”
“She wanted one person in the family who didn’t come home covered in blood.”
Victor almost smiled.
The fire alarm continued screaming.
His phone had no signal.
“They blocked communications,” he said.
“Can we reach the roof?”
“Gabriel controls the helicopter team.”
“The basement?”
“Too obvious.”
Tessa looked at the building plans mounted beside the door.
“What is that narrow section?”
“An old freight shaft.”
“Does it reach the parking garage?”
Victor followed her gaze. “Yes.”
“Then we use it.”
They entered the smoke-filled hallway and reached a maintenance door.
Victor forced it open.
Inside, a metal ladder descended into darkness.
“You first,” he said.
“With your shoulder?”
“If I fall, I prefer not to land on you.”
They climbed down thirty floors.
By the time they reached the garage level, Victor’s face had gone pale.
Tessa helped him through a service corridor.
Voices approached.
She pulled him behind a concrete pillar.
Two men walked past.
One said, “Costa wants the girl alive.”
The other laughed. “Why?”
“She found the accounts. He needs to know what she copied.”
When they disappeared, Victor leaned close to Tessa.
“You heard them.”
“Yes.”
“If they capture us, they will use you to control me.”
“Why would I control you?”
His expression was unreadable.
“You walked into my booth expecting death and asked me to dance. Since then, my judgment regarding you has become inconvenient.”
Despite the danger, Tessa felt heat rise into her face.
“This is a terrible time to say something like that.”
“I agree.”
They reached an armored sedan.
Victor opened the trunk and removed a second phone.
He called someone named Detective Mara Ellis.
Tessa stared at him.
“You have a police detective on speed dial?”
“She is not on my payroll.”
“That is not reassuring.”
“She has been investigating Gabriel for two years. I refused to help her.”
“Why?”
“Because Gabriel was family.”
Tessa looked at him.
“Family is frequently a fatal weakness,” she said.
Victor met her eyes. “You remember everything.”
“Occupational hazard.”
Detective Ellis answered.
Victor gave her the location and described the evidence.
Then he said, “Gabriel will go to Bellweather Casino. He needs Rourke’s plane.”
Ellis responded sharply through the phone.
Victor ended the call.
“Police are surrounding the casino,” he said.
“Then we stay here.”
“No.”
“You’ve been shot.”
“Gabriel has the notebook, but not the full records. If he reaches Rourke’s plane, he escapes.”
“Let the police handle it.”
“The police surrounding that casino include men whose names are in the notebook.”
Tessa understood.
“Then who can we trust?”
Victor looked at her.
“No one.”
They drove to Bellweather Casino through an underground exit.
The casino occupied a converted waterfront warehouse in Brooklyn.
Victor parked two blocks away.
Tessa turned to him. “What is the plan?”
“You stay in the car.”
“No.”
“That was not a negotiation.”
“I know how Gabriel moved the money. I can identify the accounts he needs.”
“You are not walking into another gunfight.”
“You walked into the ballroom with me.”
“That was different.”
“How?”
“I did not care whether you survived then.”
The words struck harder than Tessa expected.
Victor looked away.
“I care now,” he said.
Before she could respond, headlights appeared behind them.
A black SUV slammed into the sedan.
The impact threw Tessa against the door.
Men surrounded the vehicle.
Victor reached for his weapon, but the passenger window shattered.
Gabriel pressed a gun through the opening.
“Out,” he said.
They were taken into the casino’s private poker room.
Liam sat tied to a chair.
His face was swollen.
“Tess,” he said weakly.
Gabriel pushed Tessa toward him.
“I told you family makes people predictable.”
Victor stood beside her, his wounded arm hanging at his side.
Gabriel placed the black notebook on the poker table.
“Open the offshore accounts,” he told Tessa. “Transfer everything to the numbers I give you.”
“And then?”
“I leave the country.”
“What happens to us?”
Gabriel smiled.
Victor answered for him.
“He kills all three of us.”
May you like
Gabriel placed the gun against Liam’s head.
“Then perhaps she should work quickly.”
