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“Yeah.”
I set the glass and the bottle on the nightstand and walked out, turning off the light.
Exiting the apartment, I went through a couple of rounds of deep, controlled breathing as I drove to Delirium. Outwardly it helped but my blood was still boiling when I entered the near-empty building.
Nolan was behind the bar, finishing inventory, and Hayden was in the office he shared with Natasha. He looked up when I came to a stop in the doorway.
“Did something happen with Marek tonight? After Ispecificallytold you not to take it out on him?” I asked, cutting straight to the chase.
A muscle in Hayden’s cheek twitched but he set his pen down calmly. “Am I not allowed to do my job?”
“As long as that’s all and you’re not punishing him for what I’ve done.”
“Does he come crying to you after every shift? Or just the ones where he gets in trouble?”
“What did he do? What rule did he break? Tell me. I’ll fire him right now.”
He scoffed, his lip curling. “Yeah. Right. You’ve been protecting him from the moment he got here. The question is, why? Oh, wait. I know.”
I gave him a slow perusal, shaking my head. With nothing else to say, I turned and walked away. Thankfully I didn’t hear his chair roll or any other sign he was following me.
Keying myself into the manager’s office, I locked it behind me in case he changed his mind and then logged into the computer. My first task was to pull up the security feed—not just from the club, but from the surrounding cameras Eduard had hacked and linked to our system.
I rewound through the little boxes until I found the part where Marek and Sveta were attacked on the sidewalk. I zoomed in on their faces, particularly the one who grabbed Sveta. He looked like the ringleader of the group since the others hadn’t moved in until he did it first. Once his face was committed to memory, I turned my attention to the one who went after Marek.
Watching him get punched, even after the fact, made my molars grind again. They damn near chipped when his head smacked into the side of the building. No wonder he was in pain. After seeing that, I had zero doubt that Marek had a concussion. Although I had to hand it to him, he was a scrappy fighter, more than likely another result of his less-than-savory upbringing. He could take a hit and recover quickly, a sad but useful ability in the world in which he found himself. If given the opportunity, he could definitely hurt someone, another sad but useful skill.
Scrolling past the fight, I turned back time to locate the group inside the club. I stopped suddenly when I caught sight of Marek and Hayden, squared off against one another near the bar. Even if I couldn’t hear their conversation, I could tell by their expressions and body language alone that it was not a pleasant one. Besides, the “Fuck you, Marek” was as clear as day on Hayden’s lips.
I shook my head and forced myself back to searching for the original four problems. For Hayden’s sake, it had better be the last incident between them. I couldn’t afford to have him chase Marek off, not when I was finally building some trust with him. Hopefully Marek’s promotion would put an end to most of the problems.
It was easy to backtrack Marek’s movements from the bar to the table of four drunken assholes, confirming they were the same ones from the street. I kept my eyes on them, making a note of when Marek—not Sveta—gave them their bill. The ringleader paid with a credit card.
I smiled to myself and pulled up the receipts from the night, clicking through them to find one with the matching time stamp.
Brock Adams.
Retrieving my phone from my pocket, I initiated a string of text messages, making arrangements for the rest of the night. Once everything was in place, it would be time to pay those assholes a visit and make sure they never set foot in Delirium again.
* * *
“Cameras,”Valery said as we drove by our target’s dark townhouse.
“I’m not worried about cameras,” I replied. “I want him to know exactly who we are.”
Anton turned the Escalade around in the charming little cul-de-sac and parked in front of our destination, though he kept the engine running.
Slipping my cell phone out of my inner pocket, I stared at the black screen, waiting.
Three separate text messages came in at nearly the same time with one word.Done.
The last included a picture of a man’s hand—or what used to be a man’s hand— with a black boot trapping the forearm against a wooden floor. Huge patches of black and dark purple mottled the hand and it had puffed up three times the normal size. Blood splattered out of each fingertip, like overcooked sausages. The outlines of large, bloody circles covered different areas of the flesh, ensuring they got it all. It looked like they used a fairly large hammer, which made me smile. By the time the owner was done having reconstruction surgery, he was going to wish we cut it off instead. Maybe next time he’d think twice about who he punched.
Tucking my phone away with a contented sigh, I looked up at my companions. “Let’s go.”
We exited the car and strolled up the stamped concrete walkway, the worst sort of visitors Brock Adams could ever expect in the early morning.
“Maxim, if you please,” I gestured to the front door. A falling-down apartment building was one thing. Modern construction with a fiberglass door was another. Luckily I had a solution for that.
