Sergei, Volume 2 (16 page)

Gaunt and pale, he looked like he might actually be on the verge of dying. He had been attacked earlier in the year in a prison yard fight. A shiv embedded in his back had left him permanently paralyzed from the waist down and reliant on a colostomy bag. There were ugly, pink scars on his face and neck from recently healed stab wounds. Somehow seeing his pain in the flesh diminished the fleeting joy of retribution I had experienced when I had first heard of the attack on his life.

Did he know that it was his own brother who had ordered it? Did he know that he was nothing more than a pawn in his older brother's stupid power play?

Folding my arms on the table, I held Adam's gaze as he was rolled up to the opposite side. He rested his cuffed hands on the wood and stared back at me. Finally, he spoke. "Bianca." His gaze moved to my mother's face. "Mrs. Bradshaw."

Neither of us said a word. We waited to see what would come of out of his mouth before we extended any promises of forgiveness or grace his way.

With a soft sigh, he weakly began an obviously practiced speech. "I wanted you both to know that there isn't a day that goes by where I don't regret what I did. There isn't a morning that I wake up where I don't think about your son, Mrs. Bradshaw." He swallowed hard, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down in his throat. "I wake up sometimes in the middle of the night, and I remember the way you screamed when I hit you, Bianca. I remember the way you fought so hard to live." He blinked rapidly. "I remember the way your brother jumped in front of you to save you from that bullet."

My heart raced as I listened to my brother's murderer recount the awful things he had done. I didn't know what to say so I pressed my lips together and waited.

"I don't know why I was so angry. I don't know why I thought that people like you deserved to be hurt and bullied and killed." He brought both cuffed hands up to his face and wiped them down his cheeks. "It's stupid. All that rage and pain? It was all so pointless."

Adam interlaced his fingers and placed his hands on the table again. "I know it doesn't change anything. It doesn't bring Perry back. It won't erase the memories of the way I beat you either—but I am sorry. Genuinely," he added soberly. "I am so sorry for what I did."

As I stared at the broken shell of a man in front of me, I felt the anger and hatred I had harbored toward him begin to fade. It wasn't going to happen instantly, but in time, I would feel nothing toward this man. He wasn't worth the effort. It struck me suddenly that his entire existence as a human being had been wasted. The twins kicking and stretching inside me were a reminder of everything wonderful that I had known in my life, but Adam Blake? He had nothing. He would die alone and empty inside a prison. No one would remember him. His entire history died with him.

I hadn't expected to feel sadness but there it was. The faint pulse in my chest surprised me, but I embraced it. He was a human being, the same as me, and it was desperately sad what his life had become.

Silently and stoic, Mama reached across the table and placed a gentle, mothering hand atop his. Adam didn't recoil at the touch. No, he leaned into it and began to weep pathetically. His frail body shook and trembled as he sobbed raggedly.

Mama left her hand atop his. "It's all right," she whispered. "It's all in God's hands now."

Marveling at the strength and goodness my mother displayed and praying that I would someday be as strong as she was, I sat quietly while Adam cried out his remorse. The rest of the visit passed in near silence. Other than his sniffling and a tearfully murmured thank you, there were no other words spoken between the three of us. Mama and I watched the nurse wheel him out of the room. The guard who had come with him locked the door and left us with the social worker.

"How are you two feeling?" Jane asked gently.

"Lighter," I said honestly.
Relieved that he didn't mention his brother…

Mama rubbed her finger back and forth across the table. "Finished."

Jane started to talk about closure and the emotions we could expect to process over the next few days, but a shockingly loud alarm interrupted her. Mama and I both jumped in our seats. Pressing a hand to my chest, I glanced around wildly. "What is that?"

"Not good," Jane said honestly. "We should get you two out of here."

Suddenly, Sergei's voice was in my head. He had tried to tell me that prisons were dangerous places. He had tried to make me see that I would be vulnerable inside these walls. Had I listened? No.

With a hand on my belly, I hurried alongside Mama as we were led back down the corridor to the guard room. We could heard snippets of radio traffic and see guards running in the images on the monitors mounted on the far wall. By the looks of it, a small scale riot had erupted in the mid-sized prison. Our belongings were thrust into our hands, and we were hastily pushed into the lobby.

The guard who had been tasked with escorting us tried to put our minds at ease. "You're perfectly safe out here. All of the trouble is contained within the main walls of the prison."

Then why are you walking us to our car?

Out in the parking lot, I noticed that the SUV that had escorted us to the prison was missing. Mama hadn't been happy about the pair following us, but Sergei had explained during Sunday dinner that he had one and only one condition for my going with her. He wanted me watched, just in case. She had relented eventually.

I glanced around and frowned. Where had Boy and Danny gone? They had promised to wait for us.

As if reading my mind, the guard asked, "Did you have friends waiting for you?"

"Yes."

"We clear out the parking lots as part of standard riot procedure. I'm sure some of my coworkers asked them to wait outside the gates." The guard checked the backseat of my car and asked me to pop the trunk before sliding down to look under vehicle. I didn't think anyone was crazy enough to try to hitch a ride out under a car but…

"Okay. You ladies are good to go."

"Hon, you be careful going back into there," Mama urged. "Thank you for walking us back to our car."

The guard grinned and moved closer to me. "Oh, I'm not going back in there."

"Are you off shift?" Mama asked.

"No." The guard's grin melted, and his eyes flashed with danger. That was all the warning I had before the guard stepped behind me in one swift move.

I gasped as I felt the hard bite of a gun muzzle against my belly. Back ramrod straight, I held perfectly still while he stuffed his hand into my purse and retrieved the keys. He unlocked my door and wrenched it open. "What are you doing?"

"Get into the driver's seat right now." He shoved the gun into my side with enough force that I cried out in pain. I felt one of the babies kick at the intrusion. Tears burned my eyes.
Oh, God. No. No. No.

"Don't even think about it!" The guard warned my mother with a snarl as she opened her mouth to scream. "You get into the rear passenger seat. Not a fucking word out of you or else I'll end this pregnancy about twenty weeks too early."

Mama and I exchanged horrified glances but did exactly as instructed. The guard slid into the front passenger seat and held the gun on me while he fastened his seatbelt. He leaned over and shoved the keys in the ignition. "You try anything stupid, and I'll blow a hole in your belly. Understand?"

"Yes." With shaking hands, I reached for the shifter and met my mother's fearful gaze in the rearview mirror. "Where are we going?"

"You're going to ease out of this parking lot and go by the guard shack. You stop, but don't even try to ask for help. They've all been paid the same as me." He pressed the gun against my stomach again. "Go."

I didn't dare dawdle. I put the car in drive and moved through the parking lot as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening. Sure enough, the guard at the gate didn't even bat an eye. He pressed the red button and let the car roll right through and off the prison property.

"Now what?"

"Left," he said. "Stay on the highway."

Gripping the steering wheel tightly, I made the turn and gained speed. Not a mile from the prison on the lightly traveled road, I spotted the black SUV Boy and Danny had been driving. It had been run off the road and was flipped upside down. I didn't see either man but there was blood smeared on the windshield. Could they have survived an attack like that?

"Don't worry. They're alive. You'll see them soon."

Confused and frightened, I demanded, "Why are you doing this?"

"Money," the guard said plainly. "Why else?"

"Who do you work for?" If I was going to be killed, I wanted to know who was really pulling the trigger.

"Who do you think?"

"The Night Wolves?"

The guard laughed. "You can't possibly be
that
stupid. They're gone. Done. Finished. Your husband and his friends saw to that after Derek tried to rape and kill you in your store."

Mama's sharp intake of breath surprised the guard. He twisted in his seat and laughed at her. "What? She didn't tell you that Derek Blake and his goons broke into her store and planned to fuck her bloody on top of all those pretty white dresses?"

"You're disgusting," I spat at him. "You leave my mother alone!"

"Or what?" The gun was back against my belly. "Huh? You're not exactly in a prime negotiating position here, sweetheart."

I gritted my teeth and kept driving. He stretched out his legs and waved the gun around as he spoke. "You backed the wrong horse, sugar. You should have found yourself a nice, rich cartel husband instead of that giant Russian fucker you chose."

The cartel? What in the world did the cartel want with me? I was nothing. I was nobody. Sergei wasn't even in that life anymore. There was no leverage to be gained from kidnapping me or Mama.

My mind raced as I tried to remember every snippet of news I had read over the last few months. There had been that shooting that had nearly killed strip club owner Besian Beciraj. Sergei had explained that Besian was actually the boss of the local Albanian outfit and also one very wealthy loan shark. He hadn't gone into the details behind that shooting other than to say it had been a cartel assassin gone rogue.

Hadn't there been a link to Hadley Rivera? I had met the insanely rich graphic novelist once or twice at artsy gatherings with Vivian. They ran in similar circles around Houston. Hadley had been at the wrong place at the wrong time when that same assassin had taken shots at her and Finn Connolly.

A few weeks ago, there had been that awful mess on the news about all those cartel associated gangsters who were killed on the same night. There had been nearly twenty deaths across Houston and dozens more south of the border. The papers had called it an internal coup. When I had asked Sergei about it, he had simply shaken his head and admitted that he had known nothing. He had wanted it to stay that way too.

Now Nikolai's kind offer to have someone keep an eye on his friends' wives didn't seem so simple. Had he known there was a threat against me? A sickening thought twisted my gut. Was Erin okay? Had they tried to grab her too? What about Vivian and the baby she carried?

"You ever been to Cabo? I'm thinking that's where I'm going after I make this delivery. I'm going to take my money and run, you know?"

I gawked at the guard. "Are you insane? Are you really trying to make small talk with me while you have a gun pointed at my babies?"

He pointed the gun toward the dash. "There? Happy?"

Before I could answer, Mama shocked me by slamming the sharp tip of her thickest knitting needle into the guard's throat. She screamed like a woman possessed as she embedded her makeshift weapon into his neck. The gun fired, the sound so deafening in the enclosed space that I feared I would never be able to hear again. While the guard choked and slapped at his neck, he waved around the gun. I grabbed his wrist while stomping on the brakes and shoved the gun toward his window. He fired again, blasting out the glass.

Ears ringing and head throbbing, I tried to keep the car under control while watching for that gun, but it was too hard. We spun out of control and veered off the road. We hit a tree so hard that Mama was knocked unconscious when her head whacked the window. My seatbelt and the exploding airbag saved me and the babies. The impact caused the gun to fly out of the guard's hand and out the window.

Panting for air and coughing on the caustic dust now so heavy in the air, I unbuckled my seatbelt with trembling hands. I couldn't hear a damned thing because of the gun shots, and my stomach was so queasy. I managed to get my door open and spilled out of the car and onto the grass. Holding onto the door, I dragged myself into a standing position. My shoes had been knocked off and were jammed up under the pedals, but I didn't even care.

I walked around to Mama's door, using the car for support, but I couldn't get it open. Adrenaline left me shaking and sick. Somehow, I worked up the courage to reach through the shattered window to touch the guard's neck. I felt for a pulse but there was none. He was dead, killed by a knitting needle of all things.

Desperate for help, I walked back around to the driver's side and tried to reach my phone. It had fallen between the guard's feet. Dizzy and sick to my stomach, I weakly stretched out my arm. My belly kept getting in the way, and I put a terrified hand to my bump when I realized I hadn't felt the babies move since the wreck.

"Oh, God. Please." I ran my hands over my belly and pressed down to see if I could elicit a response. Finally, blessedly, I felt one kick and then another. Both babies started to wiggle, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

But my joy was short-lived.

Two SUVs and an oversized floral delivery van barreled toward me. My heart sank when I realized this wasn't a friendly rescue. No, this was my nightmare come true.

I stumbled away from the car and thought about running, but how far would I get? Even when I wasn't pregnant, I could hardly make it two blocks without huffing and puffing. With twins inside me and bare feet? I wasn't going to make it to the first tree before these goons caught up with me.