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Rafe knew all about that.
Nathan was on the ground, no longer struggling. In about an hour, he’d be found by the police with a kilo of cocaine strapped to him and a weapon that had been used in a murder a year ago.
The gun was actually Nathan’s; they hadn’t manufactured that. He’d wiped it down and asked one of his runners to dispose of it. That same runner had come to Blake Security for help getting his sister away from Nathan.
“All good?” Oskar appeared at his elbow, his eyes narrowing as Rafe continued to peer at the buildings around them.
“Yeah. Just had a feeling…”
Oskar snorted. “Your Spidey sense was tingling?”
Rafe scowled. “You can never be too careful.”
“You don’t need to be so jumpy. You’re not a narc anymore, remember? We’re the good guys.”
“I was never a narc,” Rafe responded automatically. But as they led Callie back to the SUV they’d parked a few streets over, the other man’s words rolled around in his mind.
The good guys.
What did that even mean? Fucking guys up in dark alleys, planting evidence? Not so different from his past. Except now he was the one making the decisions.
For years he’d been a member of ORUS, an elite shadow organization supporting the US government. N
ow he was his own man, no longer a weapon to be used for unknown agendas. He could decide what was right and what was wrong. After what they’d done, Callie would be going home and sleeping in her own bed, safe and sound. The streets of New York would have one less asshole peddling poison to those too vulnerable to protect themselves.
Messy, yes. But it was the best result they could have asked for. Rafe had learned over the years that he couldn’t always make things right, but he could try to make them better.
Maybe better was enough. For now.
She had no idea what he was doing.
Diana Vandergraff squinted and then blinked as if her eyes were deliberately deceiving her. She watched in disbelief as her target walked away from the drug dealer, instead approaching the woman behind him. Even from a distance and through binoculars, she could see that his movements were gentle. Reassuring.
He was reassuring her? Nothing about this made sense.
Then again, nothing about Rafael DeMarco made sense. And she would know. She’d been watching him for ages now.
Stalking. You’ve been stalking him.
Diana smiled in satisfaction. Yes, she’d been keeping tabs on DeMarco for almost a year. It was fitting, really. The hunter becoming the prey. After all the people DeMarco had tormented, now he was the one who was looking over his shoulder.
At first she’d only tailed him to and from his apartment. Ideally, she’d have loved to get in there and look around right away, but the place was like a fortress. While posing as a pizza delivery girl coming to the wrong door, she’d noticed the steel contacts around the doorframe. Definitely not your average security system. Besides that, DeMarco rarely left the place except to go to a modified warehouse in Manhattan. The building had been demolished and rebuilt in the early 90s. The first five floors were still warehouse spaces, but a commercial building had been constructed on top of that, boasting some twenty floors. And at the very top sat a penthouse… home of Blake Security.
So far she hadn’t been able to determine exactly what he did there. Either way, she wouldn’t give up until she’d peeled back every layer DeMarco had. It didn’t matter how long it took or that she was currently cold, cramped, and uncomfortable while spying on him from a rooftop.
It had been too long, and she’d come too far to give up now.
Movement below caught her eye, and she swung the binoculars toward the blond giant Rafe had met up with earlier.
Oskar Mueller. German. Employed by Blake Security for five years. Master’s degrees in finance and economics. Employment history blank for years until he started working for Blake Security.
Her mind ran through all the available data she’d uncovered on Mueller. Information was hard to come by on everyone employed by Blake Security. Something she was sure was deliberate. But she’d been able to find out the basics from a routine background check.
Mueller was currently roughing up the drug dealer and finally dropped him with one punch to the face. Diana winced. Not that she felt any sympathy. The guy was clearly not a Cub Scout leader. Everything she’d uncovered led her to believe the firm had a great reputation.
Which didn’t explain why the hell they’d employ a known killer like DeMarco.
Her fingers tightened around the binoculars. Hatred was a powerful drug, and for years she’d been fueled on a steady diet of it for the man who’d killed her father. He was her personal bogeyman and the personification of everything evil in this world. Rafael DeMarco was the very thing that tormented her dreams.
