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His coming here as often as he has been is paying off. Caius leads the way, with Marnix, Odin, me, and the soldiers trailing him. We use a door I hadn’t noticed before to leave the ballroom. It’s one servants might have used to come and go unseen.
Caius really has taken to getting to know the layout of the place. We are in a deserted corridor, where we pass half a dozen closed doors, but Caius heads to the one at the far end. He produces a key and unlocks it, then steps aside. “After you,” he says to Marnix.
Marnix glances at the stairs leading down, then back at Caius. “What the hell is this about?”
I walk around to face him. I’ve managed to get myself at least a little bit under control. I glance down to his belt, then back up. “Is this the belt you used?”
Marnix De Léon, my soon to be father-in-law, goes white as a ghost before my eyes.
I see Odin’s face in my periphery, see his confusion, then a too-quick understanding that leads me to believe this isn’t the first time this has happened.
“Where is my sister?” he asks me, suddenly panicked. He turns to walk back into the ballroom. I gesture to a soldier, who stops him. “Where is my sister?”
“She’s safe. No thanks to you.” I turn back to Marnix. “Down. Now.”
No one waits for him to move on his own. The soldier closest to him grips him by the shoulder and marches him down the stairs.
“It’s not the fanciest space, but I am thinking the way you look, you’re more concerned with privacy and good sound proofing,” Caius says as we follow him down. One soldier stays upstairs to guard the door. We’re in a cave-like space, a wine cellar. It seems to span the length of the building based on the lights that go on one after the other, probably on sensors. The floor is dirt, while the walls are carved stone, and shelf after shelf is stocked full with bottles collecting dust. The building itself is built on a cliff so I guess this was carved out of that rock. “Had a tour,” Caius says to me. “There’s about fourteen thousand bottles down here. Can you believe it?”
“I can, actually.”
“Good stuff, too. I sampled.”
I would chuckle if I wasn’t so preoccupied.
“No one will hear a sound,” he adds to Marnix De Léon’s discomfort. “And although it’s a little chilly, getting blood out of carpet is hard work. Housekeeping will thank you.”
I let out a short exhale. I appreciate my brother’s ability to hold onto his sense of humor no matter what. I’m too fucking serious for that.
“What did you do?” Odin asks his father, who brings his nearly empty whiskey glass to his lips to drain the last drops then sets it on the stone table slab in the center of the room. It has a four-inch wooden chopping block cut to fit on top. He’s right-handed. I make a mental note.
“Yeah, old man. Tell your boy what you did.”
Marnix looks at me with hate-filled eyes. He’s terrified, I can see that. He may have hired crooks to do his dirty work for him before, like he unknowingly hired us to take care of his enemy, but he’s never crossed a mafia family. Does he realize yet that the shit in the movies and the books is real? Does he get that we don’t fuck around?
After tonight, he will, and I can already see the wheels turning.
“We have a contract,” I start when he doesn’t speak. “One that binds your daughter to me. That says she belongs to me.”
His eyes narrow.
“She. Belongs. To. Me,” I say again so as to leave no confusion.
“Not for another two years. Terms are clear.”
“Think of it like buying a car. You negotiate an agreement, pay your money, but then come delivery time, you get that car just not quite in the condition you agreed upon,” Caius says from where he’s leaning against the wall. I see a hammer and nails on the shelf beside him and if I know my brother, he chose that spot on purpose.
“Dad,” Odin says. “What did you do to her?”
Marnix scans the room. He glances at the soldiers standing at the stairs. I hope he’s not foolish enough to try to run for it. I’m glad to see in the next moment that he’s not that stupid, that cowardly. He takes a deep breath. His whole face relaxes then, and he’s the man from upstairs, the one holding court.
“The girl needed to learn a lesson,” he says to Odin, then turns to me. “She has a big mouth. I should wish you luck with her. Hell, you can have her now if you want her so fucking badly,” he tells me, then turns to his son. “You fucking kids are both a disappointment.”
My chest tightens and breathing is hard. “You cannot give what is not yours.”
“What did you do?” Odin asks him again.
The older man shifts his gaze to the far wall.
