Fractured Freedom(79)

There wasn’t an easy answer.

There was no right answer.

And I always searched for the right one.

I’d only ever known how to do the right thing.

When the knock at the door came, I found myself wanting to be anyone else at that point. I wanted to save everyone and not ruin one more thing.





24





Steal an Identity





Delilah





“Izzy, I know you’re in there.” He banged on the door after I looked through the peephole and didn’t answer.

I didn’t know the tall lanky man outside my door, but I knew he must have been a part of Izzy’s undercover work. She didn’t know anyone else here and had only been on the island a few days before she ended up in jail. I’d never seen her with anyone like this.

I took a deep breath. It was answer or throw a wrench in everything.

I did the dumb thing.

I told myself I was smart enough to act like Izzy for as long as we needed.

I swung open the door.

“Hey, sorry. I was in the bathroom.” I cleared my throat and tried not to shrivel when he stepped up to me and then narrowed his eyes.

His pupils were dilated, his breath smelled of alcohol, and the way his body twitched told me it wasn’t the only thing affecting him. “You ready?”

“Um, ready for what?” I tried to hold the door closed to indicate I didn’t want him inside, but he shoved past me and glanced around my room.

“We’re going to the ship now. Fucking agents are onto us. We got word someone’s sniffing around. Probably from you fucking up by getting thrown in jail.”

“I don’t think—”

“No. You don’t think at all.” He turned around, and his words rumbled out so fast that spit flew from his mouth. He pointed a long bony finger at me. “You’re lucky Iago wants to fuck you six ways to Sunday, because otherwise you wouldn’t even be on this boat with us. We got a car out back. Let’s go.”

I didn’t have time to grab anything, and my heart beat so fast that I couldn’t stop the adrenaline from rushing through my veins. I tried to stall. “I need to shower.”

“Shower on the boat.” He smiled, his eyes roving over my body like the slimy scum he was, and he sucked on his yellowed teeth. “We’ll enjoy the show. We have in the past, right?”

He winked at me, like I wanted his advances, like I was into it.

My sister never would have been into this.

And what I had to do became crystal clear at that moment. The shaky ground settled, the quiver in my hand stopped, and my blood ran cold.

Ice cold.

“Let’s go to Iago.” I brushed past him, and he hurried after me like he suddenly couldn’t keep up.

“Remember, I make the rules, Izzy.” He narrowed his beady eyes at me in the elevator. “Iago may want your ass, but it isn’t going to interfere with me getting my cut of that thousand kilos.”

I shrugged. “If you say so.”

The man was fast, so fast I didn’t feel my head ricochet off the side of the elevator wall from his punch to my temple until five seconds later. Maybe I blacked out; maybe I wasn’t exactly used to being hit in the face. Either way, I took my time before responding. And I tried my best to be strategic.

What would an agent do? What would Dante do?

I pointed to one of the cameras. Someone who wasn’t on drugs may not have looked where I was pointing, but this man did. He looked right up at them, and then I murmured, “There’s security at the hotel. Don’t make a scene.”

He nodded, and his brow furrowed as he mumbled, “Good idea. Good idea. Shit, I forgot. Okay, let’s get out of here.”

As the elevator doors opened, I pointed to the back exit. “Less cameras.”

And less Leonardo.

He would be able to tell the difference between me and Izzy and would alert Dante.

I didn’t want anyone alerted. Not until everyone was on that boat with police raiding it, then my baby sister would be safe.

Safe from whatever Iago had done to her.

Safe from these men.

Because I saw from the look in this man’s eyes, something had happened between her and Iago. It wouldn’t happen again.

I was strong enough. Izzy was right about that.

I let the silence descend and didn’t say a word as I folded myself into the black SUV. I took my phone out of my back pocket in front of the idiot of a man, and when he stammered out, “What are you doing?” I lied like I would have if I had been late to a test, to a job, to anything that I knew meant something to my family. This meant the world to Izzy, and I’d always put her and the rest of my family first.

“I’m texting my sister to tell her I’m going out so she doesn’t worry.”

“Your fucking sister,” he mumbled. “She almost cost us this whole damn shipment. They thought her boyfriend was an agent for a minute.” He chuckled like the idea was stupid. “Turns out that guy fucked her more than a few times. We got real nervous when we had someone go check the first time and he turned up dead, but it was a deal gone bad.”

I tried to tune him out as I turned my phone away from him and texted Dante.

Me: Track me. Shipment’s happening tonight. Don’t call. They mistook me for Izzy. We’re going to the cruise ships.