Page 16 of Tainted Blood
“Not the vodka. I mean what’s in your other hand. You’ve held onto those things ever since leaving the parking lot.”
I glance down, surprised to find my fingers wrapped in a death grip around Thalia’s wedding rings.
As the seconds tick away, my eye twitches under the weight of RJ’s stare. I should throw them on the floor, just like she did. But I can’t. Because they’re hers—and right now, they’re all I have left.
I flip the focus back on him. “No more than you’ve held onto that thing,” I say, nodding to where his hand is coiled around his cell phone. “Care to tell me about Rachel Marlow?”
That wipes the confident smirk off his face. “Some woman. Not important.”
I don’t believe him, but who he fucks is his own business, as long as he does it on his own time. And until we find Thalia? All his time is my time.
The moment stagnates, filling the damp room with tension and something I can’t put a name to. But it’s heavy and filled with a darkness ten times more potent than the one lurking inside these four walls. The same darkness hit me when I watched that Italian motherfucker free Marco Bardi on the security feed.
My head snaps up.
The security feed.
“Check the cameras. We run surveillance in the rear lot.”
RJ shakes his head. “Already made the call. Nothing.”
“What about the backup? You said something before about Legado’s previous owner installing backup surveillance.”
“That’s just wired for the inside.”
Then Sanders really is my only hope in finding Thalia.
Damn it.
I own a casino. I know bad odds when I see them. I had no intention of betting Thalia’s life on the slim-to-none chance that Sanders would live long enough to make it to the basement, much less talk. So, once again, I went against every instinct and had every patron questioned and interrogated.
No one left the premises without clearance.
Was it financial suicide? Probably.
Like it matters.
Tonight was the second shooting at Legado in six days. There’s no way it can withstand this kind of bad publicity. Keeping it out of the press and off police records once was a feat in itself. This time, I’ll be lucky to avoid jail, much less keep his casino operational.
“Think he’s gonna make it?”
Following RJ’s gaze, I stare down at Sanders’ face. The fucker looks gone. If it wasn’t for the shallow rise of his chest, I’d call the time of death, and pull the sheet over his head.
“If he doesn’t, the news is going to travel fast.” I catch his eye. “After that, a scorpion shitstorm is going to blow hard across state lines and land right on our doorstep.”
Chapter Four
Santi
The last of the vodka is long gone. Now I’m passing the time by counting Sanders’s shallow breaths.
Twelve hundred in twenty minutes equals ten breaths per minute.
Not great odds.
I’m about to send out one of the guards for another bottle when I hear muffled arguing outside the door. RJ and I lock gazes, both of us drawing our guns, moments before the basement door swings open and stone-faced sicarios spill into the room with clenched fists and darting eyes.
“Sorry, boss,” one says, his chin snapping toward the intimidating man a few steps in front of him. “We told him we had Carrera orders, but…” He grits his teeth. “He pulled rank.”