AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Chapter Twenty-nine
V
X had the ability to sit, unflinching, for hours, while I grew uncomfortable after only a matter of minutes, shifting my weight from one foot to another, my thighs and calves threatening to cramp.
X’s elbow in my side snapped me from my own self-indulgence, and I lifted my head to see two different men in suits enter the warehouse—I assumed through whatever door was at the side of the building.
“It’s time,” he said from beside me.
Together, we rose from where we were hidden and ran on light feet toward where the men had entered.
X pressed a gun into my hand, but I pushed it back again. “I need Tony to think I’m totally in on this. I’m sure the first thing he’ll do is have me searched for any weapons. He’ll be suspicious anyway because of what happened on the road, so he’ll send people out looking for you as well. I’ll tell him I dumped you along the way, but I doubt he’ll believe me.”
He took my hand. “Are you sure we wouldn’t be better to get some of your father’s men involved?”
I shook my head. “He said they wouldn’t work for me anyway. I have the reputation of being a rat now, and that’s the worst thing you can be in my father’s world. They’d kill me rather than work with me.”
He reached up and touched my cheek with the back of his hand. “I don’t want anything to happen to you.”
I caught his hand with my own, placing my palm over the back of his, and then turned my face into his hold and kissed his palm. “Neither do I, but I don’t have any choice. I can’t leave Nickie to Tony, and I can’t let my father handle this either. I’m the only chance she’s got.”
“And what happens to us all afterward?”
Was he asking what kind of future we had together? I had no idea, and I couldn’t make decisions about things like that now. Would we have to try to go back into Witness Protection? I was still determined to send my father down, if I could. He had to pay for what he had done. But as for a future with X, I had no idea how he would fit into it all. It was too much to think about.
“Let’s get Nickie back first, then we can talk.”
He stepped away, dropping his hold on my hand, and I hated that he might feel I’d rebuked him. But I needed to focus on Nickie, and whatever this was between us, these growing emotions that scared the hell out of me, only distracted me from my purpose.
We gave the two men enough time to make sure they’d be well away from the entrance, and then cautiously pushed open the door. There was a chance they’d have the door watched, but these people were more cocky than paranoid. They weren’t concerned about unwanted people being on the premises—they probably didn’t think anyone would have the balls to walk right into their territory.
I shivered, and not just because of the chill in the air. The place reminded me so much of the warehouse where my father had forced me to kill my mom, and the thought of stepping inside made me nauseated.
My eyes took a moment to adjust, but then I could make out stacks of large wooden crates, most likely containing whatever kind of contraband Tony the Hound was moving at the moment.
“Plenty of places to stay hidden,” X said in a whisper right behind my ear, and I knew he was talking about himself.
At the back of the warehouse, there was a set of stairs and a platform which led up to offices, and then further offices housed below. I assumed that was where the men had gone, and so would also be where Nickie was being held.
X leaned in and kissed the spot on my neck between my ear and shoulder, sending shivers through me for a whole new reason. I knew why he’d kissed me. He was leaving me now, but I hoped that was his way of saying ‘later’ rather than ‘goodbye.’
Like a ghost, he suddenly vanished, disappearing somewhere between the stacks of crates, I assumed. It was just me now, so I took a deep breath and stepped forward.
“Hey!” came a male voice from the direction of the offices. “Who’s there?”
I put my hands in the air to show I wasn’t armed. I hoped no one would shoot me in the meantime. “I’m here to see Tony.”
“Tony’s busy,” he called back. “He ain’t having no visitors.”
“Tell him Verity is here to see him. Verity Guerra.”
“Mickey Five Fingers’ daughter?”
I nodded, though he couldn’t see me. “That’s right. He’ll want to speak with me.”
The man squinted at me in the gloom, but nodded. “Stay right there, and don’t touch anything.”
I wondered what he thought I was going to touch. It wasn’t like I was a five-year-old in a pottery shop. I held myself still, my ears straining, trying to get a sense of where X might be. I felt like I should be able to pick up on something, some kind of vibes from him, as though we were psychically connected, but there was nothing.
