Three-Part Harmony (31 page)

“Got it,” Kress confirmed. “Let’s all move in quietly. Get a visual first if you can.”

“You’re really dragging the senator with you?”

“I have no choice about that, Whitey. Some hardheads need a burning bush to believe.”

Any comeback Moore might have had for that got eliminated by a scream, full of pain and fear, bursting from the cabin. Though the outcry carried a distinct male timbre, their “slow and careful” plan got instantly scuttled.

Kress whipped out his GLOCK and darted to a deep shadow beneath one of the cabin’s side windows. He motioned for David and Moore to follow. After a few seconds to assure they hadn’t been heard, he prepared to dare a look inside, but Corso rendered that risk unnecessary.

“Damn it, be
careful,
Zachary!”

“How else do you expect me to make him cooperate?”

“I don’t
care
how you make it happen; just don’t get him all bruised up. It needs to look like this was all
his
idea, right?”

“All his—what?” The interjection came from someone young, male, and terrified. Likely the source of the scream, Kress deduced. “You people are fucked up! What the hell?”

There was a sigh, also male. “Can’t I just get him a little high, maybe? I’ve been dealing with his disgusting mouth since we left the city, Crys.”

Kress snuck in a sideways look at the senator. An instinct told him that Zack’s use of the nickname wouldn’t sit well with Moore. He was right, judging from the tension at the man’s mouth and temples.

“No,” came Corso’s retort. “You’re not going to jeopardize this now. We’ve got this last piece to slide into place, and then the wheels will start to turn again.”

Kress heard her take a couple of determined steps.

“Nothing is going to stop me from getting to the White House.
Nothing
.”

“You?”

This time, it was
Dasha. Relief flooded Kress so completely at hearing her alive, he indulged a peek through the window. David joined him, though the guy’s harsh breath nearly echoed his when they beheld the state Dasha was in. Corso had her bound up damn well, trussed at multiple points into a chair next to a table that looked like something out of a “World’s Creepiest Murders” documentary. Dozens of candles. Thousands of photos.

And one gun.

But as if the weapon wasn’t lying there in front of her, she spat, “The last time I checked, it wasn’t you they wanted for the job, Crystal.”

“And who says I want it?” The ice queen laughed. “First Lady will be just fine for now, darling. And when I’m the one to help your daddy pick up the pieces of himself after you’re found as the first half of this murder-suicide, that wedding ring is all but locked on my finger.”

Kress and David got to the senator in time to clamp him down by his shoulders. If they hadn’t, Kress was sure the man would’ve dived through the window. Kress tried to give Moore an assuring glance. It sucked that the guy had to learn Corso’s true colors like this, but, yeah, sometimes it really did take a burning bush to create a believer.

“God.” Dasha’s rasp seemed deafening against the onerous pause inside. “Austin’s right. You
are
fucked up, Crystal. And if you really think you’re going to pull this off without anyone investigating, then you’re fucked up
and
stupid.”

Kress’s chest swelled with fierce warmth.
That’s my girl.

Corso answered D with lethal calm. “Shut up.”

“No. If you think that David and Agent Moridian will accept all of this at face value—”

“Shut
up
.”

“If you think they won’t tear the facts apart, if they won’t tear
this
place apart—”

“I said
shut up
!”

The woman’s voice busted into a shriek, making it possible for Kress to scuttle undetected around to the cabin’s corner. “I’ve got the southeast corner now,” he gritted into his headset. “Whitey, let me know the
second
you’ve got the perimeter secured.” Concentrating on ops made it easier to ignore how it sounded like Corso drove home her point by backhanding Dasha.

“God! You really are an idiot, Dasha,” the woman snapped.

Kress lifted his head, able to spot Corso directly now. Her head was dipped low, her stare slicing down at the woman who’d forever altered his heart. “As long as you stayed in your place, I was fine with that. The gap between your father and you was a perfect fit for me—until you decided to go and close it up. Now all you’ve created is a mess. Happy with yourself?”

He should’ve expected Dasha’s reaction, but even now, even knowing her and caring for her as he did, the woman could stun him.

“If this is between you and me, then let’s make it between you and me.” She nodded at the young man on his knees next to them, now grimacing and looking like he was about to crap his pants. “But don’t drag Austin into this. He has nothing to do with this. Don’t let his blood be on your hands too.”

Goddamn it, Dasha. You pick the strangest times to put everyone else ahead of yourself.

That was when the realization hit him.

Forget caring about her. He loved the woman. Undeniably. Uncontrollably.

Fuck. And he derided
her
for crappy timing?

Focus.
There’d be time to think about that mess when Crystal Corso wasn’t laughing like a giddy sitcom track. “Blood?” she echoed. “Oh no, darling. The only thing on my hands will be this stew I whipped up for your dad. He loves my stew, you know. He’s always so grateful when I find a way to make him some, even when we’re on the road together. As soon as it’s done, we can get on with having our friend Austin put a bullet in your brain.”

“Fuck you, lady!” Austin shrieked.

Kress decided he liked that kid.
Keep it up, Austin. Your Wolverine act may come in handy.

Zack’s voice slid through the air in contrast to that: low and determined. “I still think we should wait until nightfall. Less chance of being ID’d as we leave the woods.”

“By who?” Corso snapped. “A handful of squirrels and that ancient excuse for a man who runs the store at the bend? He reeked of Jim Beam anyway. Any testimony he’d give will be tossed like last week’s polls.” She sighed. “Besides, much as I hate admitting it, darling Dasha is right. Moridian is a bulldog. He won’t turn over rocks to try to find her; he’ll blast through the damn things.”

“You’re right about that, bitch,” Kress muttered.

“Fine.” Zack’s comeback took them all by surprise. The guy went from cool-hand to hothead inside ten seconds. “You want to do this, then let’s do it, goddamn it.”

Kress didn’t like the sound of that. Not one fucking bit. “Whitey.” The growl clawed up his throat, rough and urgent. “We can’t wait on the perimeter anymore, man!”

“No need to,” Whitey came back. “We’re good, K. Repeat: we’re good.”

Inside, Corso issued a laugh that would’ve shriveled an elephant’s balls. “What on earth got all over
you?
”

“Lately?” Zack snapped. “It hasn’t been
you
. And I’m done with the games. So you wanna do this? Let’s just do it.”

Kress popped up to the balls of his feet at the same time bodies scuffled inside the cabin.

“No!” Austin shouted. “Fuck—you! No!”

“Crystal!” The scream was Dasha’s. “Please! You don’t have to do this! Please!”

If her outcry wasn’t enough to rip his guts out, what Kress saw next took care of that job with horrifying force.

He dived forward without another thought.

Your whole life in front of your eyes.

Dasha knew the words, of course. She even imagined she’d know what such a thing felt like, if she ever knew she was about to die. She’d envisioned what images would come to mind, maybe even a visit from Mom, taking her hand, welcoming her in peace and harmony to the other side.

She didn’t see a thing.

Everything that hit was sound. The strains of the first song she’d ever composed, at the age of eight. The music at Mom’s funeral. And then just the voices. Dad whooping in joy when she’d won her first Grammy. The happy shouts of her fans at the mall in Atlanta. And David.
Oh, David.
His sarcastic drawl. His biting one-liners. And then, the first time she’d ever heard his adoring murmur.
You’re beyond beautiful.
And the lower cadence that took her heart and soul to amazing places.
Kneel. Good girl. You please me so much.
And Kress. He was there too. His gruff bark of a laugh. The growl that consumed him when she aroused him. And the words
he
used too.
Look at you… You’re gorgeous…

She used their voices to get the strength. She clung to them now as she stared into the black barrel of the gun that Zack forced into Austin’s hand, then pointed at the middle of her face. Soon enough, the chamber would ignite—and her Doms’ voices would be hauntings in her soul instead of memories in her mind.

That black depth reached and consumed her. Forget about going Zen or seeing radiant white lights. There was nothing radiant about this. There was nothing peaceful, complete, or celestial. There was only pain and sadness; the sting of tears on her cheeks and agony in her heart.
I don’t want to do this. I’m not ready to do this.

Where were the voices? Where were David and Kress to at least keep her sane through this?
Damn it, you guys. I need you.

“Move in! Now! Everybody move!”

“You heard the man! Let’s do it!”

There
they were. But she barely had a moment for gratitude. The world exploded. Motion, sound, noise, chaos. Windows crashing, voices bellowing, feet pounding on the cabin’s timber floors. And then, the noise she dreaded the most. The gun went off. And she knew a blast of pain—

Only not in her head. The pain flared from her shoulder. She blinked, disoriented. It took a strange second to realize she’d been…pushed over. She was on the floor, still bound to the chair, now staring at an army of booted feet and black-clad legs.
Black—
what Zack had been wearing when he took her from the mansion—which confused her deeper. Were these more of the bad guys, or—

“Don’t move, Corso. Not a single fucking muscle.”

A sob escaped her. Kress’s command at Crystal was the best music she’d heard in a long time.

The good guys had arrived. Definitely the good guys.

“Hard-ass.” She couldn’t help cracking it at him, even with her cheek mushed on the floor.

“Don’t you forget it.” His voice flowed like a ribbon of warmth. She pulled that ribbon into her heart and wrapped herself in its beautiful strength.

The next second, the world spun again. She’d been jerked upright, and the asshole FBI agent from Miami wasn’t looking such a jerk-off anymore as he went to work on her ropes with lethal-looking scissors. She forgot all about him the next second anyhow. More joy turned the ribbons in her heart into a delirious Maypole dance as David appeared next to her. He fell to his knees, not taking his gaze off her. Tears careened down her cheeks as she stared back. A full smile lifted his noble lips, though exhaustion tormented his temples.

He was the most perfect sight she’d ever seen.

“Holy fuck, Dasha.” It grated out of him.

Thank God her arms were freed first. Every inch of them stung from being in the ropes so long, but she wrapped herself around him with all the might they’d give. When the ropes fell from her legs, she dropped into his lap, shaking and crying harder.

His lips pressed to her forehead, warm and incessant. “Are you okay?”

She managed a nod. Then burrowed against his shoulder. From that vantage point, she took in a scene she hadn’t dared hope for. Kress slammed a pair of handcuffs on Crystal, rattling off her Miranda rights with glee. While he did, a couple more agents carefully took steel-cutters to the cuffs on Austin, who didn’t let even that distract him from his grip on the gun Zack had forced on him—likely because he now aimed the weapon at Zack himself. Like the guy was going anywhere fast with that bullet planted in his shoulder. Zack moaned, trying to push upright with his good arm.

“Stay prone, ass-face,” Austin ordered. “I purposely aimed for your shoulder instead of your eyes, thinking these gentlemen might want to fry your ass in court. I’m not opposed to rethinking that if you give me cause.”

Kress chuffed. “Whitey, get this kid signed up for agent training as soon as he clears college.” His stance tightened, though, as Crystal wheeled on him.

“You have
no
idea what kind of mistake you’ve made, Agent.” She seethed every word of it.

Kress actually lobbed back a shit-eating grin. “Is that so?”

“What kind of evidence do you have here? It’s circumstantial at best, and when Senator Moore gets words that you’ve treated me like this—”

“He’ll wonder why Agent Moridian didn’t cuff
and
gag you.”

Dasha’s grin disappeared as she reacted to that with a full gape. She struggled to stand, but her knees crumbled, still half-numb. David swept in from behind, supporting her with little effort so she could launch herself at the newest arrival in the cabin. “Dad!”

He returned her embrace with a crushing hug. “Dasha. Oh darling, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” she whispered. “I’m just glad you’re here.”

She pulled back to see Dad now looking at David. Her father’s smile glowed with respect. “David,” he said gently, angling her arm to David in a bizarre twist of a wedding-day pass-off. “Take care of her. I know you will.”

David’s grip tightened on her with heart-melting surety. “Yes, sir.”

“If you’ll excuse me, I need to take care of something urgent.”

Dad’s face took on a resigned slant as he pivoted and paced to Crystal. Dasha swallowed, now very interested in his “something urgent.”

“Mark,” she exclaimed. “Oh, thank God!” Her lips trembled with poor-me perfection.

“Crystal,” Dad interjected. Nothing else. His tone didn’t betray a thing. As a matter of fact, the last time Dasha heard him sound so flat it was to tell her about Mom’s cancer prognosis. Just like then, her heartbeat responded in raw fear.