The King (Black Dagger Brotherhood #12)(142)
Author: J.R. Ward

“That can still be for you.” His voice became utterly flat. “That can happen—any male would want you.”

Ah, yes, but there was only one person she wanted. And even if Trez had been a saint, which he clearly was not, she was still out of time.

“It’s all right.” She struggled to hold back tears—and was successful. After all, soon she would be alone. “It is what it is. I have learned long ago, there is no negotiating with destiny.”

They fell silent for the longest time.

“I don’t love her,” he gritted out. “I don’t know why I feel like I have to say that, but I do.”

“The one you are mating? Yes, you said that before.” Abruptly, she stared across the way at him, noting his lowered head, his aura of sorrow. “Ironic, but we are not so different, you and I.”

As his eyes shifted to hers, she shrugged. “I have had no hand in my destiny, either. The tragedy is that some things follow us like shadows—they are with us wherever we go.”

“Yeah. I just never cared about that. Until I met you.”

She thought of the Sanctuary’s cemetery, of her sisters who had been relegated to a shortened life span, and had had to wait to die in a prison of their own bodies. Then she remembered the feel of him moving inside of her, the liquid warmth flowing throughout her muscles and bones.

“Did you love them?” she asked.

“Who? Oh, the women … no. Never. At all. Hell, half the time I didn’t really enjoy it.” He cracked his neck like those shoulder muscles of his were stiffening up again. “I really don’t know what the f**k I was thinking. I was out of control and just trying to get out of my own head. The problem is, all those women are inside of me now.”

“Inside…?”

“My people believe that you can poison yourself if you have … if you’re with people the way I was. And I have—poisoned myself. It’s eaten me up until there’s nothing in here.”

As he touched the center of his chest, she realized that he was, in fact, hollow, the light gone from his eyes, the animation lacking in his body, his aura dissipated as if it had never been.

Overcome with sadness, she shook her head. “You were wrong.”

“About what.”

So empty, he was … vacant down to his soul. “What I see now … is the worst part of it all.”

As Assail stood on the shores of the Hudson, he was once again dressed in black with a black mask over his face. Behind him, Ehric was silent and at attention, wearing the same articles of clothing.

Both of them had guns in their hands.

“They’re late,” his cousin said.

“Yes.” Assail listened hard. “We give them five minutes. Not one more.”

Off to the left, about four meters into the tree line, his bulletproof Range Rover sat ass to the river, Evale in the driver’s seat with the engine running.

Assail glanced up to the night sky. Following an earlier snowstorm, the moon now had some lazy clouds drifting over its face, and he hoped they took their own sweet time. More light they did not need—although the site was otherwise discreet enough: remote, in a bend on the shoreline, with forest that came nearly up to the river’s frozen edge. Also, the way in had been a lumpy, bumpy barely-there lane, even the SUV struggling in its off-road mode—

“I am worried about you.”

Assail glared over his shoulder. “I beg your pardon?”

“You do not sleep.”

“I am not tired.”

“You do too much of the coke.”

Assail turned back around and prayed for the appearance they awaited for a fresh reason. “Worry not, cousin.”

“Do you know if they made it to their destination.”

It had been so long since Ehric had asked after anyone, that Assail had to pivot around once more. And indeed, his primary instinct was to shut the inquiry down quick, yet the true concern on that hard face stopped him.

He resumed watching the sluggish, icy water. “No, I do not.”

“Will you call her?”

“No.”

“Not even to make sure they are safe.”

“She doesn’t wish for that.” And the whys of this waiting by the Hudson were proof of the soundness of her decision to leave him. “A clean break it is.”

Even he heard the hollowness in his voice.

God, he wished to hell he had never met that woman—

The sound was at first indistinguishable from the ambient night noises, but the hum quickly became distinct: Coming from the left, it announced that perhaps their wait was over.

The fishing boat that puttered around the corner was as low to the river as a floating leaf and nearly as silent. As prescribed, there were three men in it, all of them clad in dark clothes, and each had a line in the depths, as if they were naught but plying what open water there was for a meal.

They pulled in bow-first.

“Catch anything?” Assail inquired as he’d been told to.

“Three trout.”

“I had two last night.”

“I want one more.”

Assail nodded, putting his gun away and stepping forward. From that moment, everything went silently and with speed: a tarp was lifted and four duffel bags changed hands, moving from the boat to him and then to Ehric—who hung them off his shoulders. In return, Assail passed over a black metal briefcase.

The tallest of the men put in the code he had been given, popped the lid, inspected the layout of bundles of bills, and nodded.

There was a quick handshake … and then Assail and Ehric retreated into the trees. Duffels went in the rear, Ehric in the back, Assail in the passenger seat.

As they headed off, bumping back over the rutted lane, windows were cracked to catch any sounds or smells.

There was nothing.

As they came out to the road, they stopped and waited whilst still hidden in the trees. No cars coming or going. The coast, as the saying went, was clear.

On Assail’s command, the gas was hit and off they went, into the night.

With five hundred thousand street dollars of cocaine and heroin.

So far, so good.

After extracting everything from both Benloises’ phones, he’d combed through the numbers and the texts—particularly the international ones. He’d found two contacts in South America with whom there appeared to be a lot of communication, and when he’d called from Ricardo’s phone, he’d been routed into a network of secured connections, a number of clicks occurring before a proper ringing started.