The King (Black Dagger Brotherhood #12)(43)
Author: J.R. Ward

Ricardo barked something sharply.

“Do not listen to him.” Assail kept his eyes locked with Eduardo’s. “Talk to me. Save yourself.”

Eduardo kept trying to see his brother, but Assail shifted positions with that panicked stare until Eduardo moaned, his eyes getting hidden amidst his crinkled face.

Assail gave him some more time, until patience was lost. Reaching out for the dagger, he announced, “I’m going to hurt you again—”

“It’s north!” Eduardo yelled. “On the Northway! North! Southern side of Iroquois Mountain! Only road up to the property breaks off from the base! Go a half a mile and you’ll see the drive!”

Up against the SUV, Ricardo exploded, fury evident in every syllable even if the sentence particulars were lost for lack of translation.

Assail breathed in deep through his nose. There was no scent of subterfuge coming from Eduardo. Fresh blood, of course, and the acrid sting of terror. Also, a rather touching shame that reminded Assail of root vegetables fresh out of a cellar.

The man had spoken the truth as he knew it.

“Put Ricardo back in the car,” Assail said gruffly—

“Wait,” he called out as the cousins complied. “Turn him back around.”

Assail shifted so that he was behind Eduardo and propping the man’s floppy torso up. Staring across the distance between Ricardo and himself, he said darkly, “You take from me, I take from you.”

Jerking the dagger free of the shoulder meat, he streaked the blade directly across Eduardo’s throat.

Ricardo tried to look away, his torso twisting between the cousins.

“This is only the beginning, Ricardo.” Assail shoved the choking, bleeding man out of the way like the garbage he was. “We are just starting the now.”

He closed in on Benloise. “I did, however, believe it was important for you to have one last memory of your brother’s weakness. Just think, if he had been as strong as you, he could have died honorably. Alas, not his destiny.”

Assail got into the passenger seat in the front. Retrieved his vial of coke.

As he snorted two spoonfuls into each nostril, the cousins put Ricardo into the rear compartment, and the squeal of duct tape being ripped free attested to how secure his relations were making things.

Reaching up and clicking on an overhead light, Assail unfolded a New York state map marked with three red As on it—and had no idea where to look.

Ehric got behind the wheel and put his iPhone in Assail’s face. “It’s a five-hour trip.”

Assail’s head started to buzz. Even with Benloise in their custody, he was terrified about what was being done to Marisol. Five hours was so long. Too f**king long in light of the previous twenty-four she’d already been gone.

Damn it, why did Benloise have to be so strategic.

“Then we must needs get driving,” Assail gritted out.

FOURTEEN

The Commodore was arguably the place to live in downtown Caldwell. Rising up over twenty floors high, the condo building overlooked the Hudson River and was cut up into large block apartments that had plenty of square footage as well as state-of-the-art kitchens and bathrooms. Floor-to-ceiling glass windows meant the views in all four directions were as much a part of the decor as anything the owners put into the spaces, and there were rumors that celebrities, looking for a break from Manhattan, used them as drop pads.

Speaking of which, there was even a helicopter landing square on the top.

iAm got off at the eighteenth floor and hung a right. Down about a hundred feet, he stopped in front of a door marked 18A and popped the copper lock he and his brother had insisted on installing when they’d moved in five years ago.

Walking into the three-thousand-square-foot condo, his Merrells didn’t make much noise even though the polished floor was bare of rugs and the modernist furniture was minimal not just in terms of style, but amount.

Damn … that view was still amazing. Especially like this, at night with no lights on inside: The city had its evening face on, everything sparkling, from the patchwork of lights left on in the skyscrapers to the double arches of the twin bridges to the stripes of red taillights and white headlights moving next to the shore down below.

So easy to forget that the heart of Caldie was a dirty place with as much poverty as wealth—if not more: Up here, insulated from reality, with the wailing sirens and stench of garbage so far removed, it was tempting to believe in the sanitized version of the 518.

But he was no fool.

Across the way, there were sliding glass doors that led out to the terrace, and after hitting the lights, he crossed over and opened one up, a cold gust rushing in and agitating the stuffy interior air. His visitor wasn’t due for an hour yet, but he wanted to make sure the place looked lived-in. Doubling back to the open kitchen, he made some discreet clutter by popping a couple of already clean dishes into the rack by the sink and littering up the counter with … let’s see … a spoon or two. A half-eaten bag of Cape Cod potato chips that were stale. An issue of GQ that he flipped through and left open to a page with a jacket Trez would like.

Then he got the coffee started.

He and his brother had no intention of ever coming back here, but he had to keep the place going because it was important that the s’Hisbe have no idea that they’d moved: A search party in Caldwell was not going to be a value add. Especially if it somehow culminated in a visit to the Brotherhood’s mansion—

iAm pivoted to the glass door. Out on the terrace, a figure had materialized from the black night like a wraith, its robes thrashing in the stiff wind racing up the slick side of the building.

“Welcome,” iAm called out to the high priest in a flat tone. “You’re early.”

Okay, which one of them had lost track of time?

The figure came to the doorway, walking in such a controlled, smooth manner you’d swear he was on a hover pad.

“Am I invited in?” came a dry voice.

iAm’s heart skipped one single beat.

Fuck, that was not the high priest.

With those robes covering everything from head to foot, he’d assumed he knew who had come to him.

This was worse. So much worse.

The executioner’s hood should have tipped him off.

“Well, am I, iAm.” You could practically hear the nasty smile. “Such alliteration on that.”

“Yeah, come in,” iAm said, subtly tucking a hand under his jacket. With a flick, he released the holster’s strap across the butt of his Glock. “Never expected you in my house.”