Tempting The Boss (21 page)

Victoria took a deep breath. Lying was definitely called for when dealing with this level of crazy. “You don’t have to do this, Joslyn. I promise that as a member of my family, you will be protected. It was my father who kicked Terry out. I’’m nothing like him.”

Joslyn didn’t even respond to Victoria’s offer. “But either way, I’m not getting caught. The second Terry told me about his situation, Casey Jones was born. Bank accounts, Social Security number, credit history. Everything leads back to him. This apartment is registered to him. The phone number I texted you from today is his. I. Am. A. Genius.”

Victoria glanced to her phone, which was still discarded on the floor.
Terry never sent her any texts?
“You changed his number in my phone when we were planning my father’s funeral.””

“You should really be more careful with that, sweetie. Well, should’ve been more careful.” Joslyn glanced between Donny and Victoria. ““Well, this has been fun, but I think sooner is better than later, right? There’s a dead bodyguard downstairs so we should hurry this along. Let’s go to the roof!”

~~~~~

Dean parked illegally in front of the building and stared up at the ornate brickwork leading up thirty or so floors. “I’m here,” he said into the phone.

“Just sit tight, Dean. The police are on their way.”

Dean eyed the bumper-to-bumper traffic that he’d fought through just to make it there.
Where was the nearest police station?
He didn’t know the Upper East Side well enough.

“I’ll just go inside. Maybe the doorman saw something.” He was already crossing the sidewalk to get to the door. Except there was no doorman.

Dean paused as he eyed the closed doors in front of him. After he glanced up and down the street again, he still didn’t see any sign of Victoria. “Screw it,” he muttered to himself as he reached forward and pulled the door open.

He frowned as he walked inside.
No doorman and no key needed to get into this nice of a building?
The yearly rent in this place was probably more than his entire house was worth. It didn’t make sense for them to not have better security. The entryway leading to the two elevators wasn’’t very big. Just enough space for a small sitting area. It was eerily quiet as Dean stared at the elevators.
The police were on their way. He shouldn’t go charging in with no game plan and no idea what kind of trouble she was in.

But if he didn’t go charging up, that meant he needed to wait and twiddle his thumbs while Victoria was all alone. He paced back to the front door and listened for any sound of sirens approaching.
What if they weren’t in a hurry? What if they thought Gordon was paranoid and taking their time getting there?

Damned if he’d wait around patiently when they were taking their sweet ass time.

He twisted around and found himself looking straight down the barrel of a 9mm handgun. “Whoa.” Dean held up his hands.

The man on the other end of the gun looked ready to pull the trigger any moment. What was probably a clean-cut, Abercrombie type had dust covering his black suit jacket and blood dripping down the side of his face.

“Take out your phone,” he bit out. “You’re going to make a call for me.”

“I don’t want any trouble.” Dean slowly reached for the phone in his back pocket.

The man tensed as though he expected Dean to pull out a weapon.

“I don’t want any trouble,” he repeated. “I’’m here to check on someone. I think she might be in trouble.” Dean wasn’t sure whether he should mention the cops were coming. It could freak the guy out more or scare him off.

“Dean Carey?”

Dean didn’t know whether it was a good or bad sign that the psycho knew his name. “How do you know who I am?”

The guy dropped his gun. “Gordon showed me your file. Shit. Does Gordon know you’re here?”

It finally clicked. This was Victoria’s bodyguard. “The police are on their way,” he said quickly. “What the hell happened to you? Where is Victoria?”

The guy grimaced. “Gordon told me that the brother’s girlfriend was the one who wanted her dead. Ms. Green came here to have dinner with her brother and wasn’t answering Gordon’’s calls, so I ran inside. The doorman and some other guy jumped me.”

Dean tensed and scanned the empty entryway. “Where are they now?”

“I was out cold for a bit. When I came to, I took out one of the guys. The other one was gone.”

“Took out as in…?”

“Alive but not causing any trouble,” said the man. “I need to get upstairs. You stay here and let the police know what’’s going on when they get here.”

“Hey!” shouted Dean as the bodyguard turned towards the elevator. “You’re not going up there alone. You’re bleeding out all over the place and there’s at least one guy who already got the jump on you up there.”

The man twisted back and stared Dean down. “You’re right. You come with me.”

Dean didn’t need to be told twice. He followed him to the elevator and paused by the fire safety cubby carved into the wall. “I’m guessing you don’’t have an extra gun.”

The bodyguard eyed Dean. “Even if I did, I wouldn’t give it to you.”

“Fair enough.” Dean pulled the fire extinguisher free.

The other man grunted and Dean couldn’t tell whether it was approval or annoyance. “Come on.”

Dean came up behind him as they both had to wait for the elevator to come down. Dean’s fist tightened around the handle of the extinguisher. If he found anyone laying so much as a finger on Victoria, they were going to wish they’d never been born.

~~~~~

As Donny approached her, Victoria fought through her nerves. She had the pepper spray, but even if she got a full amount in Donny’s face, Joslyn still had the gun. She’d never make it to the door in time.

And that was assuming it all didn’t go into her eyes anyway.

So when Donny grabbed her by the arm, she swallowed the revulsion and kept herself from reaching for the one weapon she had.

As his meaty hand closed around her bicep, disgust filled her.
He was going to kill her. He’d already murdered Jace, and now he was going to throw her off a roof.
The panic crept in, and her stomach churned with nausea.
Just get out of the apartment.
Once she was in the hallway, she could make a break for it. Joslyn and Donny would be close to each other. One good spray could get them both.

Before her newfound plan could give her any sort of comfort, Donny yanked on her arm. She tripped over her feet, her heels not making the sudden dragging any easier. Her gut instinct was to scratch and claw and punch, but she knew she needed to wait. But that didn’t mean she had to be quiet.

She needed to distract them. Keep them from seeing her when she reached for the spray. “Please don’t do this,” she begged. ““I’ll give you anything you want.”

“Shut up,” he spat out as he pulled her towards the door.

“Money, houses, cars, women. Just name it and it’s yours. Do you have any idea the kind of influence I have in this town?”

Joslyn stood in front of the door, free hand on her hip while the other held the gun loosely. “Are you going to be quiet out there?”

“Joslyn, I can give you anything you want. I will make you the hottest thing to hit the city. You’ll be on the cover of every gossip rag. Everyone will want to be your friend.”

“Thought so,” said the crazy bitch as she slammed the butt of the gun into Victoria’s face.

All her pleas fell into the back of Victoria’s mind as her vision went blurry. The pain reverberated through her and for a moment, the only reason she stood upright was because of Donny’s fingers biting into her arm.

Somewhere through the spinning haze of her vision, she saw Joslyn open the door. “Go now before she gets chatty again.”

And then Donny was dragging her into the hallway.
The hallway! This was her chance. Her plan.
She tried her best to concentrate.
What was the plan? Spray. Hit the eyes and run for the stairs.
Not much of a plan, but better than taking a nosedive off the building.

As they got closer and closer to the elevator, she knew her window was closing. It was now or never. She reached back for her spray when the dinging of the elevator signaled it had stopped on this floor.

Donny and Joslyn stopped in their tracks as the elevator doors slid open. For a moment, Victoria figured she was hit much harder than she originally thought, because Dean and Jace both stood together. Waiting for her to join them.

But then Jace and Joslyn both raised their guns, pointing them at each other.

“No! No guns!” shouted Victoria as Donny pulled her in front of him like a shield.

“Get your fucking hands off her,” growled Dean as he took a step out of the elevator, not paying any attention to Joslyn.
Just her. Damn it.
She wasn’’t going to let any of these crazies touch a finger on Dean’s head.

“If you shoot, the entire building will know,” said Victoria. All she needed was for Joslyn to look in her direction. “You won’’t get a penny from my estate.”

All Victoria could see was Joslyn’s profile, so she couldn’t tell whether she could make it past the crazy to get her attention. All she had to do was get eye contact. “When the papers find out you wanted people to believe this was a suicide and there were bullet holes up and down the hallway, the entire city is going to laugh at you.”

“No one will laugh at me!” she shouted as she started to turn the gun on Victoria.

But she never got the chance. Victoria lifted up the spray, getting a clean shot in Joslyn’s eyes. Donny abruptly released her as the burning vapor filled the hall.

As soon as Victoria realized she made contact, she ducked away from the sudden explosion of movement. Jace jumped for Joslyn, not seemingly deterred by the remaining spray in the air, and Victoria fell on the floor, backing up until the wall pressed into her shoulders.

As Jace tackled Joslyn to the floor, Dean crouched in front of her. “Are you okay? Did they hurt you? The police are coming, baby.” He pulled her into his arms.

Victoria couldn’t relax into his touch the way she wanted to. She pushed back and glanced to where Donny was running for the stairs. “He’s getting away.”” She pushed herself up.

Dean’s mouth tightened. “No he’s not,” he breathed as he sprung up and sprinted after the man.

“Dean!” shouted Victoria. She didn’t think Donny had any weapons, but she was safe for the moment. She didn’t want him to put himself at risk now that she was safe.

She jumped up and chased after him, but before she even reached the end of the hall, Dean was on top of Donny. And apparently he didn’t need any help from her.

Even with Donny’s head start, Dean gained just enough ground to get a hold of Donny’s shirt collar. The yank Dean gave, combined with the momentum of running, caused Donny to lose balance. He and Dean crumbled to a heap on the ground right outside the door to the stairs.

And then Dean started to slam his fists into the man. Victoria’s mouth gaped open at the violence, and for a moment she couldn’t move. Somehow the entire night had seemed so surreal, but seeing the blood and Dean’s anger brought everything home. She’d been so close to dying. Dean was…she had no idea what he was going through.

“Dean.” Her voice came out as barely a whisper. “Dean,” she said louder.

She must’ve gotten through to him as he finally stopped. His breath came in deep gasps and his chest rose up and down as he stared down at the man.

“Enough!” cried Donny. “I won’t hurt her, promise.””

Victoria took a deep gulp, not sure whether she should be relieved that Dean hadn’t beat him unconscious or sad that he wasn’t in more pain. “Damn right, you won’’t hurt me.”

The sound of sirens penetrated through the walls, and the corners of her mouth tugged up. Maybe she really was okay. She looked over to where Jace was restraining Joslyn, mainly by sitting on her and keeping her immobile.

Except now the other residents of the building were poking their heads out to see what all the ruckus was about.

Great. This was definitely going to make the papers.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

“Huh?” muttered Dean. He forced himself to pay attention to the officer asking him questions. Dean couldn’t stop his eyes from following Victoria’’s every move.

“I asked if you were sure there were only three perpetrators involved,” said the woman in front of him. The officer had dark hair pulled back into a stern ponytail that was probably par for the course for a city cop.

“Like I said before, I only saw the woman, Joslyn Devereaux, and her caveman of an accomplice. Victoria’s bodyguard said there was a third.”

The officer glanced over to where Dean had tackled said “caveman.” “Donald Price. You’re lucky you were able to take him down. From the looks of his rap sheet, he’s not used to losing fights.”

Dean nodded, but he knew luck had nothing to do with it. The second he’d seen Victoria in the hallway, her eyes wide with terror, he knew the son of a bitch was going to pay. He’d never felt a rage like that. Hot and burning through him, the only outlet was to beat the crap out of the man until he forgot which hole to breathe out of.