Running Wilde (15 page)

Chapter Eighteen

The waiting was going to drive him into a straightjacket.

Restless, Vaughn pushed out of his chai
r and paced several steps, then grabbed his phone and checked the screen again. Reece had worked his technological magic on the thing, and now they had the ability to record the conversation and track Bellisario in real time.

If only the fucking phone would ring.

What were they doing to Cam? Was his twin in pain? Unconscious? Cam was definitely still alive, because without him, Bellisario had no leverage. Still, Dahlia’s words kept bouncing around in his skull.

Do you have any idea what Giuseppe does to the people who cross him?

Jesus fucking Christ. He was going to explode if he didn’t do something. Any-fucking-thing.

Marcus stepped into his path, which just pissed him off, like throwing accelerant on an already out-of-control fire. He didn’t think, just reacted to the anger and annoyance and took a swing.

Marcus ducked the punch—fucker was fast on his feet—and grabbed Vaughn’s arm, twisting it up behind his back. He shoved Vaughn into a desk as Reece and Jude both jumped to their feet, their chairs flying back and banging into the wall.

Vaughn hit the desk hard enough to have pain singing through his abused ribs. Fuck. He pounded a fist on the desktop in frustration, but stopped struggling.

“Are you done?” Marcus asked.

“I’m done,” he agreed and the pressure lightened on his arm. He straightened and sneered at Marcus as he pressed a hand to his sore ribs. “You only got the drop on me because I’m not at full strength.”

“Sure. You tell yourself that, big guy.”

Vaughn stepped forward, fully intending to pummel that smirk off Marcus’s face.

“Boys,” Libby snapped, stopping him dead in his tracks. “Now’s not the time for a testosterone pissing match.”

Vaughn glanced over at her. She and Shelby had taken up posts next to Eva, who had worn herself down during the endless minutes of waiting and now stared off into space with tear tracks dried on her cheeks.

Libby was right. Punching Marcus, as satisfying as it would be, wasn’t going to bring Cam home any faster.

Vaughn drew a breath and shook out his hands. “I need some air.”

He didn’t wait to hear any of their responses, and he pushed through the door into the now empty parking lot. February slapped him in the face, but he welcomed the bite of cold and tugged on the collar of his shirt. The office had been too stuffy, too packed with tension and fear. At least out here he could breathe.

He checked his phone’s screen again even though he knew it hadn’t rung. Damn. He stuffed it into his pocket and paced the sidewalk.

All they needed was a location. And as soon as they had one, he was gone. He’d tear the place down brick by brick to find his twin and then he’d bury Giuseppe Bellisario in the debris.

Nobody threatened his family and got to walk away unharmed.

A door shut softly across the parking lot. Still spoiling for a fight, he whirled toward the sound and found Dahlia beside the car she’d stolen from him, twisting her hands together in front of her.

For one shining second, elation bubbled up out of all the other poisonous emotions roiling inside him, because she’d come back to him.

She’d come back.

But that bubble of happy popped the moment she opened her mouth. “Vaughn, I-I came to explain—”

“You don’t owe me an explanation.” He turned away, pissed off all over again. He should have known she’d not come back to help. Altruism wasn’t in her nature. “But I would like my fucking gun back if you’re done threatening me with it.”

She ducked into the car and reappeared with his weapon, holding it out in a peace-offering. “I was just scared.”

He stalked forward and grabbed it from her. “Yeah, you don’t trust me. I get it.”

“But I do, Vaughn.” She moved closer. Her scent wrapped around him, something both sweet and tart like strawberries, and he steeled himself against the memories of her rising up over him, riding him so slow and easy as he drowned in that beautiful scent.

She set her hands on his waist and stood on her toes. Her lips were soft over his, gentle, a barely there caress that still sent shocks through his entire system. He didn’t move even though everything male in him screamed to accept what she was offering.

She lowered back to flat feet and stared up at him. Searched his face. He made damn sure nothing of his feelings showed there. He wasn’t about to let her know just how much she’d hurt him.

“You’re the only man I’ve ever come close to trusting,” she said so softly, it was barely a whisper.

“Yeah? You have a shitty way of showing it.”

She dragged her lower lip through her teeth, then nodded, dropped her hands from his waist, and stuffed them into her jacket pockets. She must have stopped for new clothes at some point, because she now wore jeans and a dark red sweater under a motorcycle-style jacket instead of the drugstore sweatpants and t-shirt he last saw her in. She looked good, her face makeup-free and her newly auburn hair wind tousled.

Christ, he didn’t want to still be attracted to her, but he was.

He turned away. “Leave.”

“I’m sorry,” she said.

He slammed to a halt. She was
sorry
? He didn’t need her to be
sorry
. Apologies weren’t going to bring his brother back safe and sound. And fuck her for that line about trust. If she truly trusted him, she’d help save Cam, because when he told her he’d never let anything happen to her, she’d believe it to the very pit of her soul.

But she didn’t. Maybe she was incapable of it. Still, the fact that she didn’t trust him cut like a dull blade. He’d done nothing to earn her mistrust.

He faced her again and had to unlock his jaw to speak. “If you’re still not going to help Cam, you need to walk away from me right fucking now because trading your life for my brother’s is looking better and better.”

She flinched and backed a step away. “I really am sorry for everything I put you through. Please remember that.” She spun on her heel and ran. Same as she always did.

Vaughn stood there for a long time, eyes squeezed shut against the intense hurt shredding his insides. He didn’t know why he’d expected anything more from her, but he had. When she’d appeared out of the swirling snow, he’d expected so much more than an apology and chaste little kiss.

“Vaughn!” Marcus slammed outside. “What the hell? Why aren’t you answering your phone?”

“It’s not ring—” He reached into his pocket and came up empty. “Fuck!” He bolted into the office, hot on Marcus’s heels. “Dahlia was here. She must’ve lifted it off me.”

Everyone was gathered around Reece’s laptop, which echoed each trill of the phone. It stopped just as Vaughn reached the desk.

Dahlia’s voice came on the line, clear and strong. “Let Cam Wilde go, Giuseppe. He has nothing to do with this.”

“Well, now,” Bellisario’s voice replied. “If it isn’t my long-lost daughter-in-law.”

“Let him go, and I’ll come home.”

Libby sucked in a sharp breath and stared across the desk at Vaughn, her cheeks draining of color. “Oh my God! Lark—or Sage or Dahlia or whatever her name is. She’s Giuseppe Bellisario’s daughter-in-law?”

Vaughn nodded, his gut in so many knots it hurt. He stared at the computer and wished he could reach through the digital world and sever the connection. Jesus. She was trading herself for Cam. Why the fuck would she do that? He’d never have asked it of her.

“Why?” Bellisario demanded at the other end of the line. “Who’s Cam Wilde to you?”

“He’s nobody to me,” Dahlia said softly. “I barely know him, but he means a great deal to someone I love.”

Vaughn’s knees went to water, and he sank into a chair. She knew he was listening, just as he knew those words were meant for him.

“Someone you love?” Bellisario snarled. “What about my son? Your husband?”

“No, I never loved him,” she admitted. “I thought so, but I was young. I didn’t know what love meant. I had no frame of reference—until recently.”

“It’s that private investigator. Vaughn.”

She continued as if he hadn’t spoken. “Cam had nothing to do with what happened to Marcel. If you want me, you have to release him. Unharmed.”

“You’re willing to die to save him?”

She was silent for a beat. “When you love someone—really, truly love them—any sacrifice is worth their happiness.”

Vaughn folded over in the chair and cradled his head in his hands. She’d been trying to tell him what she intended to do, but he’d been too much of an ass to listen. The apologies he’d thought hollow hadn’t been apologies at all. No, they’d been a good-bye.

“Well?” Dahlia said, breaking the drawn-out silence, both on the phone line and in the room. “That’s my offer, Giuseppe. Cam for me. Going once. Going twice—”

“All right,” Bellisario said.

Marcus smacked the desk. “Damn. She doesn’t know what she’s doing. He’ll kill them both.”

“Oh, she knows,” Vaughn said and straightened. “But she’s going to try anyway. For me.” He didn’t bother trying to hide his emotions—the ones always running fast and deep just under the surface that he usually kept locked up tight. Didn’t have the energy. Didn’t care that his brothers both gaped at the tears leaking from his eyes. Because, fuck, he couldn’t lose both Dahlia and Cam, which was exactly what would happen if he didn’t find a way to help them.

“I have a warehouse in Ivy City,” Bellisario said. “Meet me there.”

Marcus snapped his fingers and Reece nodded. “Yeah, hang on. I have the address here somewhere—”

“No need.” Vaughn was already headed for the door. “I know exactly where it is.” It was the same fucking warehouse where he’d first drawn Bellisario’s attention to him.

Marcus darted forward, blocking his path. “Whoa. Hold up. Last thing we need is to give him another hostage.”

“He doesn’t want another hostage. He wants Dahlia dead.”

“And unless you want her to end up that way with Cam as collateral damage, you need to listen to me on this.”

“Do you have a plan?” Vaughn demanded.

“I’m starting to. I need to make some calls. If I can get the FBI out there—”

“I thought you said no cops,” Eva said, her voice rising in panic.

Marcus glanced over his shoulder at her. “That was before this all went to hell in a frilly pink hand basket.” He returned his attention to Vaughn. “Give me ten minutes.”

Vaughn shook his head and made to shoulder past him. “We don’t have ten minutes.”

Marcus grumbled something that was probably very unflattering under his breath, but then relented with a heavy sigh and stepped out of the way. “Fine. Go be John McClane and yippee-ki-yay it up. But you get me those ten minutes, whatever you do, and I’ll make sure all three of you get out of there alive.”

Chapter Nineteen

The warehouse was in a part of the city the politicians downtown preferred to pretend didn’t exist. Rundown, abandoned, falling apart—Dahlia had seen plenty of places like this in her travels.
She’d taken shelter in warehouses like this during the months she’d spent homeless, had slept on cold concrete floors, listening to the scurrying of rodents and other unwanted people echoing through the cavernous emptiness.

Her stomach soured, and bile rose in her throat.

She wanted to run.

God, did she want to.

She even took her foot off the gas and coasted to a stop still a half a block from her destination. Her hands shook, and she gripped the wheel harder to get them to stop.

Her personal devil waited inside that warehouse.

She couldn’t do this.

She slammed the car into reverse—but stopped before taking her foot off the brake as a vision of Vaughn flashed in her mind’s eye. The hurt on his face when she’d left him at that motel outside of Atlanta, the pain in his eyes he’d tried so hard to hide when she approached him outside Wilde Security.

She had to do this for him. It was a fool’s errand, but if she had even the slightest chance of saving his brother, she had to try. Because if Cam died, so would Vaughn. It might not be a physical death, but it’d rip out his soul, tear a gaping hole in him that nothing would ever fix. He’d never be the same. She knew all too well what it was like to lose so much of yourself you never found your way back, and she wouldn’t let it happen to him.

She sucked in a deep breath and put the car in gear again, inching toward the warehouse. The side door opened as soon as she parked and Cristiano Bellisario stepped out, followed by his little shit of a cousin, Tommy. They were the same age as her, but seemed years younger due to either coddled, too-privileged upbringings, or a stunning lack of intelligence. Probably both. Cristiano wasn’t going to win any awards for brainpower anytime soon, and Tommy thought the world owed him anything he wanted. He’d always had an ugly mean streak, and the sneer on his face now sent shivers cascading through her. Obviously, five years had done nothing to mellow him out.

“Tommy.” She was surprised at how level her voice sounded since her heart was threatening to hammer out of her chest. “Cris. It’s been a long time.”

Tommy’s only acknowledgment was to sneer again. Cristiano’s expression remained weirdly blank, as if there was nothing going on inside his head one way or another. He held open the door with his big body and said, “Father will be here soon.”

Dahlia gazed at the doorway and told herself she had to go in, but her feet wouldn’t move.

She could do this. She had to do this. For Vaughn.

Tommy gave her a shove from behind, and she tripped over the metal lip of the doorframe.

Despite its dilapidated appearance from the outside, the interior of the warehouse actually was miles away from the ones she’d sought shelter in. It was clean and well-lit with stadium-like seating surrounding an enormous metal cage at the center of the space. Obviously this was one of Giuseppe’s underground fight clubs. Hadn’t Vaughn said that was how he first landed on Giuseppe’s radar?

Cam sat in the cage, his back to the wire, his knees drawn up, head resting on his folded arms. He looked a little banged up, but he was breathing. Which, if she was honest with herself, was more than she’d been expecting.

As her footsteps echoed in the space, he gazed up. One eye was swollen shut and his lip had been split open, but he looked so much like Vaughn that her heart stuttered. Logically, she’d known they were identical twins. She’d even met Cam before and knew he and Vaughn were about as identical as twins got. Even so, she hadn’t been prepared for the gut-check reality of seeing a man with Vaughn’s face all beat-up and held captive.

Cam’s one good eye widened. “Lark?”

Oh, how she wished she could be Lark again. Life had been so much simpler, and for a brief, shining moment, she’d been happy.

But she’d left that life in her rearview mirror months ago, and now she had to face the coldness of her reality. She wasn’t Lark. She wasn’t Sage.

She folded her arms around her middle, hoping they would help hold her together. Because, holy hell, she was definitely not holding it together right now. “My real name is Dahlia Bellisario.”

Cam staggered to his feet. He was limping badly, which made her think of Vaughn snarling at her because she was worried about his leg. God. She’d never see his grumpy ass again, and boy did that ever hurt. Tears burned in her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. Not when Giuseppe could arrive at any moment.

“You need to leave,” Cam said. “Go, get out of here. If something happens to you, Vaughn will lose his mind. He came close when you disappeared on him.”

“No. I’m not leaving. He’d never forgive me if I left and something happened to you.”

In a move that was very much like his twin, Cam banged his fists on the cage, making the links rattle. “Goddammit. We can’t both die today. He’s going to need one of us.”

“And that will be you.” She finally unglued her feet and hurried to the cage, searching for a way to let him out. “You’re more important to him than I’ll ever be.”

“If you think that, you’re delusional. He’s in love with you. Has been from day one. And love means something to him. You know him, Lark. You know how deeply he feels.”

She let the name slip go, mainly because her throat was too closed up to allow for words. She nodded. She heard what he was saying, but still couldn’t believe Vaughn would feel as strongly about her as he did for his brother. Not with the way she’d treated him.

The cage was locked, but locks had never stopped her for long.

She glanced over her shoulder to check on Cristiano and Tommy, but they were both standing at the door, waiting for Giuseppe with their backs turned. Idiots. She reached underneath her hair at the back of her neck and found her trusty bobby pin. After snapping it in half, she got to work on the lock. It didn’t take much. Just a bit of wiggling, a twist of her wrist, and the door opened.

“Impressive,” Cam said. He was struggling to stay on his feet, and she hurried in to help.

“Can you walk?”

“It’s just a sprain.” But he sucked in a sharp breath between his teeth whenever he put the slightest bit of weight on his left foot.

A sprain? Yeah, right. If he had a pain tolerance anywhere in the same ballpark as his twin, that ankle was definitely broken.

“Let me help.” She looped an arm around his waist and nudged a shoulder into his armpit, but they only made it a few staggering steps out of the cage before a voice from the doorway stopped her cold.

“Bravo,” Giuseppe said. “You’ve learned a few new tricks in the last five years, haven’t you, Dahlia?”

She looked up and met the gaze of the man she’d been running from for most of her adult life. The man who had haunted her nightmares and terrified her into insomnia. Save for some gray streaks in his once-dark hair and some extra lines around his mouth, Giuseppe didn’t look as if he’d aged a day since she’d last seen him. He was a blast right out of her past—living, breathing, and walking toward her with a gun in his hand.

She tightened her grip on Cam because she was afraid of what would happen to them if she let him go. “I’m here. I’ve held up my end of the deal. Cam’s free to go.”

“What’s the rush? We have all night.” Giuseppe motioned with his gun. Cristiano and Tommy pried Cam out of her grasp, and he went down hard, his bad ankle giving out underneath him.

“He needs to see a doctor.”

Tommy laughed, and it was an ugly sound. “He don’t need no doctor where he’s going.”

She whirled on Giuseppe. “We made a deal.”

“One you knew I wouldn’t keep.”

“He has nothing to do with this.”

Giuseppe stormed forward and grabbed her by the throat, throwing her against the side of the cage. “He had everything to do with it! Vaughn was fucking me around. I need to send a message.”

She clawed at the huge hand choking off her airway. “Then use me,” she gasped. “Let…him…go.”

“Oh, believe me. I have plans for you.” He glanced casually over his shoulder at his nephew and held out his gun. “Tommy, paint the walls, will ya?”

Tommy took the weapon and pointed it at Cam’s head. There was nothing she could do but watch as Cam defiantly stared down the barrel of the gun, his expression so much like Vaughn’s….

The warehouse door banged open.

Everyone froze in a weird tableau of violence and surprise. Giuseppe loosened his grip on her throat, and she was able to suck in a rasping lungful of air. Tommy swung the gun toward the newcomer, and Cam swept out with his good leg, taking Tommy’s feet out from under him. There was a brief wrestling match on the floor, but Cam came out on top, gun aimed at a cowering Tommy.

Cristiano just stood and watched it all unfold like the big lug he was, then raised his hands slowly as Vaughn stepped into view with a gun aimed in his direction.

Vaughn took in the scene with flat eyes, showing only the briefest hint of concern when he noticed his twin’s limp. But he hid it fast and turned his attention to her and Giuseppe. “Hurt her, and you can say good-bye to your son and nephew.”

Cristiano finally clued in to what was happening and charged at Cam—

And all hell broke loose.

A gun went off and the bullet pinged wildly off the cage near her head. Giuseppe released her and spun around like he intended to join the fight for control of the weapon, but Cristiano had already subdued Cam with an arm twisted up behind his back. Tommy now held the gun, and Giuseppe grabbed her again before she could get away.

He smirked over at Vaughn. “The tables have turned. So what’s your next move, Wilde?”

Vaughn didn’t move. Not at first. He glanced from her to Cam and back. Then, slowly, he lowered his weapon to the floor and held up his hands in surrender.

“See, I knew you were a smart man.” Giuseppe nodded and passed her off to Cristiano, whose hands felt like sandpaper on her skin.

She was forced down to the concrete beside Cam and watched helplessly as Vaughn followed orders to walk forward with his hands locked behind his head. Giuseppe indicated he should sit at Cam’s other side, and he did so without protest.

“You okay, bro?” he asked softly.

“I’d be better if there wasn’t a gun pointed at us,” Cam muttered.

“Yeah, you’ll live.”

“Kinda doubting that right now. Is my wife—”

“Losing her mind. Which is exactly why you need to go home to her.” He leaned back enough to see around Cam. “Vixen, are you hurt?”

“No,” she managed. Despite the burning in her throat, she wasn’t really injured. Not yet anyway. But Giuseppe was like a cat, always playing with his prey until he tired of the game and finished it off. He was only toying with them, and she shuddered to think of the horrors he had lined up for her.

“We’ll be okay,” Vaughn said.

She wanted to believe him. She never wanted to doubt him again, but she couldn’t see how any of this would turn out okay.

Then he climbed to his feet. “Bellisario! I want to make a deal.”

Giuseppe turned. “You’re not in a position to make deals.”

“I’ll fight you.”

“What?” Cam said.

Giuseppe crossed his arms over his chest. “You know what happens to men who get in the octagon with me? I’m undefeated.”

“Because you haven’t fought me yet,” Vaughn said.

“I do enjoy your bravado.” He thought about it for a second, then a smile lifted the corner of his mouth. “All right, I’ll humor you. What are the terms of this deal?”

“I win, we walk away. All of us, including Dahlia.”

Giuseppe’s smile morphed into a sneer. “She’s not up for negotiation. I’ll make the deal for you and your brother.”

Vaughn looked at her. She nodded slightly, telling him it was okay. She hadn’t expected to walk away from this warehouse anyway.

He scowled, shook his head, and faced off with Giuseppe again. “I’ll only fight if Dahlia’s safety is included in our agreement.”

“No.” With that, Giuseppe walked toward the door.

“That was a quick no, huh?” Vaughn said conversationally over his shoulder to his brother. “Think he’s afraid of me?”

Cam looked as if he had to unglue his jaw to speak, and his blue eyes were full of
I’m-going-to-kill-him-for-this
. Still, he played along, his voice almost matching Vaughn’s for casualness, as if they were talking about nothing more life-threatening than the potential for rain. “Yeah, he’s definitely afraid.”

“From all the rumors, I figured he’d have bigger balls than that.”

“Cut him some slack, bro. He’s what? Twice your age?”

“Mm. Old man.”

“You’d put him in a nursing home.”

“In adult diapers.”

“On a puree diet.”

Dahlia’s gaze ping-ponged between the twins. Jesus. They were both completely suicidal.

Giuseppe swung around, color filling his face. “Enough.” Spittle flew with the word. He crossed the room in a handful of strides and grabbed the front of Vaughn’s shirt, got in his face. “Do you have a death wish?”

“Yeah,” Cam said wearily and side-eyed his twin. “He does.”

You both do
, Dahlia thought but kept her mouth shut.

“No,” Vaughn countered. “I only want a fighting chance to save the people I care about.”

Giuseppe stared at him for a long time, then finally released his shirt. “Fine, but there will be no tapping out of this match.”

Dahlia’s stomach dropped. No tapping out? She didn’t know much about cage fighting, but that sounded bad, and Cam’s muttered cursing confirmed her fears. This wasn’t going to be any fight. This was going to go on until someone was on life support. Or worse.

Giuseppe stripped out of his coat and shirt and passed them to his nephew. He motioned to Dahlia and Cam with his chin. “If they try anything, shoot them.”

Vaughn didn’t show a reaction, just stripped off his shirt. He was so good at locking everything up inside, it was no wonder she once thought him intimidating, but she knew him now better than anyone. He needed that protective shell, because for all of his warrior ways, he had a tender soul, one that felt things deeply and could be so easily hurt.