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Hannibal glared at Highdive, who gave him a cold shake of his head and kept his hand steady on his shoulder. He understood the message. He wasn’t allowed to ride off.
Looking over at Ink, Hannibal saw his Brother was struggling as well. They needed to make a decision that would have long-standing consequences.
“Cops are on scene and reporting that it was a false alarm. Kids with fireworks.” Tek’s voice didn’t hide his lack of faith in that report.
“Petrov has the cops in his pocket,” Ink growled next to him.
He couldn’t sit there doing nothing. Even if he was too late, he needed to find out what was going on and if Jade was in trouble
Hannibal’s phone rang in his pocket and he pulled it out. Jade’s name flashed like the answer to a prayer across his screen. He took a moment to tap his earpiece. “I’ve got Jade calling me on the phone.”
Hawk’s voice came back almost immediately. “Tek, patch it through. I want to hear what she has to say.”
Hannibal answered the phone on speaker, not waiting to hear how the guy was gonna manage that.
“Are you okay, Jade?”
Her small sob shot right into his heart. “I’m sorry, Hannibal. I want you to know that. I never meant to hurt you or Ink.”
“What exactly are you sorry for,cher?” Hannibal tried to keep his heart out of his voice, but wasn’t sure he was succeeding. Ink got off his bike and moved to stand next to him.
“I don’t want to die without telling you everything.”
Tek’s voice came over the earpiece, “Ask her when–”
Hannibal pulled out the annoying distraction from his ear and focused on the phone. “What do you have to tell me?”
“I planted three of those bugs in the Clubhouse. One under the bar and one in the ladies’ room and one on the pool table. They shouldn’t be hard to find.”
Disappointment settled in his heart. “We already found them.”
“Good. I don’t want that bastard to get anything he wanted.”
“Why did you do it?” For him, nothing else mattered than the answer to that question. He would forgive her if her motivations hadn’t been money or protecting that prick who had spent years taking advantage of her.
“Petrov threatened to hospitalize either someone from my staff or one of my students if I didn’t help him. He made it clear that even the kids wouldn’t be safe.”
“Why did he target you?” Hannibal thought he knew the answer, but wanted to see what she would say.
“Turns out that asshole Eric owed him over $100,000. I stupidly thought he only owed him $10,000. So I agreed to buy Eric out so he could pay it back. Petrov said that meant the debt was now mine. That he owns me.”
Ink’s growl echoed his own. “Why didn’t you tell us?”
“This guy is scary. I recognized some of his tattoos as marks of the Bratva. That’s like the Russian mafia,” she explained like they wouldn’t know. “I couldn’t drag you into that. I didn’t want you guys to get hurt as well. There was nothing you could do against someone like that.”
Hannibal wanted to reach through the phone and either strangle her or kiss her for her naïve assumptions. “Where are you now?”
Her laughter had a slightly hysterical edge to it. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Try me. Wherever it is, I’ll come and get you.” Hannibal ignored Highdive’s annoyed growl.
“No. They killed Eric. I saw his body. I came into Denver to track him down using the stupid ‘find a friend’ app and stumbled like an idiot right into them cleaning up his blood from the pavement.”
“What happened?”
“They saw me and I ran.”
“Where are you now?”
