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I’ve been sitting at these god-forsaken computers for hours, trying to find any sign of where Logan may have taken her, but I can’t find a fucking thing. I know my way around a computer. I made it a point to learn as much as I could years ago. Just another way to make myself valuable to Liam. Another way for me to solve any problem he threw at me. For the most part, everything I have learned is self-taught, meaning there are limits to what I can do, and whoever Delcan has scrubbing all of this footage has made me reach my limit. My eyes burn from staring at the screens, and my fingers ache from flying across the keyboards, but I won’t stop.
Mac got back about twenty minutes ago, and I wasn’t the least bit surprised when he walked through the elevator doors. Him being covered in someone’s blood is nothing new, but what is new is the look on his face—or lack thereof. My brother isn’t in there, and I know he won’t be until we get her back. Neither Ronan nor I bothered to ask Mac to whom he paid a visit. Even in this state, we both trust him enough to know he wouldn’t lay a hand on someone who didn’t deserve it. So, even if he didn’t get the answers we needed, at the very least, Mac rid the world of one more asshole.
I continue to work at the dining room table, while we wait for Pascal’s son and his team to arrive. I glance at Mac and Ronan across the table, ensuring they’re not completely falling apart. Mac still hasn’t showered and has barely spoken a word. I know it killed Ronan not to go out with Mac earlier, but we all knew he needed to be here. He did what he does best and took control—directing everyone where they needed to be and what they needed to be doing. The time will come when he can get his hands bloody, and when he does, I will be more than happy to join him. But for now, while we wait for the others to get here, he’s sitting next to Mac, unloading and reloading every weapon he could get his hands on. Every click of him chambering a round or sliding the magazine in and out sets my teeth on edge, yet I keep it to myself because I know that’s what he needs right now. Ronan needs something to keep himself busy, or he will go mad, and the only person allowed to do that now is Mac.
“Where the fuck are they?” he snarls. “Every minute we sit here is another minute we don’t know where the fuck she is!” Tears pool in his eyes, and I know that he, just like Mac and myself, is hanging on by a thread.
“It’s only been twenty minutes, Ronan,” I answer in the calmest voice I can manage, even though I only want to scream right along with him. “They’ll be here any minute. You need to stay calm.” He runs his fingers through his dark hair and pulls on the ends, wincing in pain as it tugs at the cut on his head. The stubborn ass wouldn’t even let us stitch him up.
“Fuck, Finn . . .” He hangs his head, trying to hide his emotions from me, but not before I watch a tear drop onto the table. It’s then I know just how deep he’s in, how deep we’re all in. Because I have never, in all of my life, seen Ronan McDermott shed a single tear. Shit, we just murdered his father, and he hardly even batted an eye. “He can’t have our girl, Finn. Declan can’t have her. We have to—”
I reach across the table and firmly squeeze his forearm, drawing his attention to me and letting me see how deeply he’s hurting. “We will, Ronan. We will get our girl back.” If you had asked me before that night in Hayes’ Bookstore about the prospect of “our girl” being a phrase I would use, I would have told you that you were batshit crazy. But now, sharing Harper with the two most important people in my life feels like it was how all this was supposed to play out. Harper deserves everything she wants in this life and more. If the three of us can give that to her, I’m not selfish enough to want to take that away. Because she is ours, and when we get her back, we’ll give her the world.
I look at Mac, who, with the same distraught look as his brother, is nodding in agreement. I don’t miss the tears that roll down his cheek either, leaving a trail in the blood splattered across his face.
As if the universe knew I couldn’t string together any more words, the intercom buzzes before Ralph’s voice rings through the speaker located on the wall by the elevator. “Excuse the interruption, gentleman, but Mr. Luca Vittori and three of his friends are here to see you.”
Ronan abruptly stands from his chair and sprints over to the intercom. “Send them up, Ralph. Thank you.”
“Do I need to send them through security first, sir?” Ralph, who is now the building’s “doorman,” is a retired Navy SEAL we hired to work the front door of the building. Regardless of his age, he’s more than competent when it comes to hand-to-hand combat and can hold his own against just about anyone. He knows who we are and what we do and is a trusted friend who keeps the coming and going of all of our visitors on the down low and is compensated well for it. He works with the security we have placed throughout the building, ensuring nobody enters our apartment without our approval, as well as the safety of everyone else in the building. The three of us aren’t naive enough to think that someone wouldn’t use one of the other residents against us.
“No. They’re alright, Ralph,” Ronan answers anxiously.
“Okay, sending them up now, sir.”
I nod at Mac, and he and I make our way over to Ronan, ready to meet our guests. A few moments later, the elevator door opens and we’re met with a team that looks as formidable as our own.
“Gentleman.” Luca Vitorri, Pascal’s son—damn near twin—exits the elevator first, shaking each of our hands upon arrival, not even batting an eyelash at Mac’s horrifying appearance. Anyone who’s anyone knows Pascal’s reputation. He’s a ruthless businessman who does whatever it takes to protect everything he’s built and those he loves. However, much like us, he abides by a particular code of ethics, making him more than a trustworthy companion if you’re on his good side. Lucky for us, we are. Considering everything we know about Pascal, it’s safe to say he raised his son, Luca, to be the same way. If he didn’t, Pascal would have never sent him our way to help—son or not. Because of this, my brothers and I trust him and his team immediately. No questions asked. And, if they can help us find Harper, we will be forever in their debt.
“Thank you for coming on such short notice,” Ronan greets him, shoving his hands in the pockets of his joggers, anxiously shifting on the balls of his feet, more than ready to get this fucking show on the road and find our girl.
“Not a problem at all. Any friend of Dad’s is a friend of ours.” If my world weren’t crumbling around me, I would be amazed at how much Luca looks and sounds like Pascal. His voice has a deep timber, but his accent isn’t nearly as thick, indicating he’s spent far more time in the States than his father. He has the same square jaw covered in dark stubble and the same perfectly styled midnight-black hair, albeit Luca’s a lot less gray. He stands about the same height as Ronan and me, around six-foot-five, but is slightly leaner. However, judging by how his body fills out his black cargo pants and Henley, his body is packed with muscle. He has the same eyes as Pascal’s too, such a dark brown they’re almost black yet shine bright with mischievousness; but if you look close enough, much like his father’s, you can see the torment seething inside of him.
“Just tell us what you need, and we’ll help anyway we can,” says the man standing directly off his right shoulder. The three of us look to Luca, waiting for him to introduce us to the rest of his team formally. We’ve heard about the four of them but have never officially met, but based on appearances alone, I can probably figure out who is who, regardless of their matching outfits.
It’s all in the eyes.
“My apologies,” Luca sweeps his hand towards the man beside him. “I’m sure you’ve seen him around. This is Enzo Santoro, my best friend and business partner.”
“Sorry, we had to meet under these circumstances,” Enzo nods.
Luca steps to the side to reveal the man behind him, as if we couldn’t see his giant body already. “This is our muscle, Dante DeLuca.” Dante does nothing but drop his chin in acknowledgment, standing perfectly still with his arms across his chest. “And this is Sebastian Moore. He can find just about anyone and anything using a computer. He’s a fucking genius.”
A look passes between Sebastian and Luca that’s hard to miss, something more profound than friendly adoration, but I choose not to analyze it further. Now isn’t the time. I reach out to shake Sebastian’s hand, immediately recognizing he’s a bit shyer than the other three. “Nice to meet you, man.”
“You too.”
“Alright, now that introductions are out of the way, can we get a fucking move on,” Ronan clips.
Luca smiles softly. “Lead the way, amico.”
* * *
An hour later, the seven of us have split up and are doing everything we can to dig up some sort of lead as to where Declan has Logan and Harper hidden.
Mac took Dante with him across town to pay a visit to some of our Russian friends, not to murder anyone per se, but just to see if they happened to strike up some sort of deal with Declan. I doubt it, as most of them would rather die than work with any of us—us being the Irish mafia—but we can’t be too sure. Ronan, Luca, and Enzo are sitting in the den calling anyone and everyone we know, just hoping someone may have heard or seen something—anything—while Sebastian and I are camped out in front of the computers at the dining room table. Sebastian managed to get into Declan’s bank records, and I am currently combing through every single one of his transactions, hoping there’s something that can give us a clue as to where she is. Sebastian also installed some sort of program onto our computers. With it, he says he should be able to find the IP address of the person who hacked into all the security and street cameras and altered the footage. He tried explaining everything to me, but honestly, the entire thing is so far beyond my fucking pay grade it isn’t even funny. All I know is that his fingers are quite literally going a mile a minute trying to find her, and I couldn’t be more grateful.
I hear Ronan cuss somebody out in Gaelic before throwing his phone across the room. I watch as it hits the wall and shatters into pieces. It’s not the first time that wall has met Ronan’s wrath, and it won’t be the last.
