I know she’s crying as she takes my face between her hands, but the rain is mixing with her tears.
“How?” I demand, feeling her arms and legs wrap around my body.
“I let the moment define me not end me.”
“Semenov?”
“I shot him three times with your gun.”
“Queen.” I seek out her mouth again to share her victory.
The police cars aren’t distant noise anymore. They’re right on top of us. Sliding her back down to the ground, I glance at the semi-circle of flashing lights. I’m going to have to do some serious talking to get out of this one, but all that pales into insignificance when I catch sight of Viper exploding from the wreckage of Encore with his gun in his hand.
“Firearm!” yells the nearest cop when he clocks his weapon.
Two more hit him from the side and tackle him to the ground, holding him in place with their knees between his shoulder blades.
“Get off me!” he snarls, fighting like hell to free himself.
Dropping Ada’s hand, I sprint over to him, yelling at the cops to release him.
He looks up as I approach, his green eyes wild and raging. “She’s gone, Frankie.” For the first time I hear real pain in his voice. “She left her backpack behind. I told her to never leave her fucking backpack behind…”
I stop dead.
And then I know.
CHAPTER 37
FRANKIE
The holding cell is a standard six by eight with a lifetime of regret smeared across the walls. The whole place stinks of bleach and disillusionment. I can feel it seeping into my Armani suit as I approach the metal bars.
For once, I’m standing on the right side of them, but Viper’s not. He’s pacing like a tiger in his standard prison-issued grey joggers and sweatshirt and stalking me with his eyes.
Mine are stalking him right back.
“What’s going on, Viper? I posted your bail four fucking hours ago, but your solicitor says you’re taking up permanent residence and refusing to leave.” I glance at the cameras above me. “Hate to break it to you, snake eyes, but these guys don’t want you sticking around.”
“I wanted to speak to you and Ada first.” His gaze sweeps to his sister who’s standing next to me in a clean white T-shirt and jeans, looking flawless but shattered.
It’s been a long night.
It’s been a long life.
“I wanted to give you both a history lesson with the bars still between us.”
“Whatever it is can’t be that bad. Christ, we don’t have time for this shit!” I spin away from him in anger. Twenty-four hours have passed, and she’s still out there.
“Has he been in contact yet?”
“Who, O’Sullivan?”
“You know he took her, Frankie. Same as me.”
“No, we don’t know that.”
I’m lying, but I’ll tell him the truth once he’s out of this place.
A video message came through from Silas’s old number this morning. There were bruises on her arms already and terror in her eyes, and there’s fuck all we can do about it until O’Sullivan makes contact again.
“What about Santiago?”
I shake my head. “Nothing since Grayson’s call yesterday.” The tone of that silence is more than a warning. “Does this have anything to do with you going AWOL yesterday?”
“Partly.” He walks over to us and rests his wrists on the bars. “It’s good to see you, Ada,” he says, shifting his attention to the woman on my right.
“It’s good to see you too, Viper.” She steps forward to rest her hands on top of his. There must be unspoken words in her touch because the next thing I know he’s nodding and blowing out a heavy breath.
“I was the one who took Roisin from the hospital.”
“I fucking knew it.” I spin away from him a second time, debating whether or not to be mad as hell or impressed.
“Frankie, let him talk.” Ada’s soft reprimand pulls me back to her.
“I knew it might jeopardise the deal with Santiago, but I couldn’t let her die in that place. Not with the constant threat of O’Sullivan hanging over her like toxic smoke. She didn’t deserve it. She lived her hell for eighteen years, and she was fucking done with it.” He grits his jaw and drops his head. “I took her out to North London, and she died in my arms. That was an hour before your message came through.”
No one speaks.
What the hell do you say?
She was one of us, but she never got the chance to be a survivor.
“How did you know she was in hospital?” asks Ada, swiping at her cheeks and trying to be brave again, though I can tell her reserves are exhausted. I tug her into my arms and let her burrow this new grief into my chest.
“Bambi showed me your letter.” His grip tightens around the bars. “Man, I was so pissed at her for going to see you, but mostly I was pissed at the world for breaking Roisin. That’s one of the reasons I came back. I wanted to get her out too, but I didn’t manage it fast enough.”
Ada reaches out to him again, but he moves away.
“I came back before.” His haunted gaze shifts to me. “Eight months after all that other crap went down. I tried to persuade her to run then, but she was too scared. She knew O’Sullivan would never let her go and it would draw too much attention to…” He trails off and looks away.
“I’m taking it you didn’t just stroll into O’Sullivan’s house?”
I’m watching him carefully. He has that expression again. The movement of a spider’s web when an insect is trapped. He’s hiding something, but he’s tired of the burden of it.
“Her housekeeper set up the meet.”
“You mean Orla?” Ada looks shocked. “I remember her.”
“Where?” I demand.
He drops his wrists from the bars and takes a couple of steps back. “Didn’t know if I could trust you, Frankie. Didn’t know if I could trust you with her.”
“Who, Ada?” I say, confused.
He winces, dragging his hand through his black hair. “One thing my old man was great at was making contacts. Used to joke they were the fuel for The Firm. Made sure I was there for the introductions, so they became my contacts too. Every business. Every borough. Fire stations, restaurants, hospitals…” He pauses on that last word, letting it linger. “I know what Silas told you about Alex, Frankie. The guy at the hospital records department called me to say he’d been snooping around.”
I’m sensing the bomb that’s about to drop next is the big one. The nuclear one. The one that levels everything.
“What’s this got to do with our son?” My voice is like stone.
“Part of me wanted to tell you in Spain, but then I thought to myself, nah, Viper. Mafia boy’s been gone a long time. Let’s wait and see if he deserves her first because she’s a fucking diamond. She’s one of a kind. There’s special, and then there’s her, you know what I’m saying? Her good makes all the bad bearable. Then I watched you two together, and you were a fucking natural, Frankie. It’s as if you already knew…” He stops to take a breath. “Roisin’s last words to me were a plea. I needed to stop holding onto something that wasn’t mine. It was time to let her go.”