Unbreakable (City Lights, #2)(27)

“Bullshit!” Frankie stomped his foot. “He’s lying. To protect one of the bitches, I’ll bet. The red-haired one. Or the Mata Hari.”

Tanya’s face was verging on purple now, her eyes bulging, her legs scrabbling weakly at the floor.

“I swear, it’s mine, and I can prove it,” I said. “Now let her go. Let her go.”

Drac dropped his arms and Tanya slithered to the ground, coughing and gasping, clutching her neck. Sylvie, showing some real bravery, crawled toward her and helped her move away from Drac, who had his dead-fish gaze fixed on me.

“Well?”

I inhaled but my breath got lost somewhere between my mouth and lungs, and my heart was jack-rabbiting around in my chest. I fished around in my back pocket and came up with the broken pieces of the Bluetooth.

“That don’t prove shit!” Frankie snarled. “Bro, why don’t you just kill the f*cker? Or let me! I’ll do it. I’m all over that!”

“It’s a delicate dance we do with the cops,” Drac mused, rising to his feet. “Killing hostages for no gain isn’t going to get us out of here any faster. On the other hand…” He knelt in front of me and pulled a Colt .45 from the waistband of his pants and took aim between my eyes. “Business before pleasure,” he muttered. “Amita Patel.”

I managed not to flinch. Confusion warred with fear, as I found my gaze caught and held by the little black mouth of that gun.

“Y-yes?” Amita breathed.

“Get up.”

I licked my lips. “Now, wait…”

Drac clicked back the safety and my words died. Still trained on me, Drac spoke to Amita as if she were a small child. “Do you know what I hate more than anything? Repeating myself. There’s a dumb bitch in another room with fingers the size of Polish sausages who could vouch for that. Remember her? Get. Up.”

I couldn’t see anything but that little black hole of nothingness but I suppose Amita looked to me because Dracula pressed the muzzle to the center of my head. “Look at him one more time and you’ll take a shower in his brains.”

The blood in my veins froze up. My heart was a ball of ice radiating cold fear from my chest. Alex’s hand in mine was the only warmth left in the world.

“Okay,” Amita whispered, getting to her feet. “Okay. Please…Don’t hurt—”

“Shut the f*ck up. You’re getting out of here.”

Amita gasped. “I…I am?”

Dracula removed the gun from my head—it felt like the weight of the universe had been lifted—and he sat on his heels, studying me, head cocked to the side.

“You are,” he told her. “All part of the dance. Seems as you mean something to someone important, and giving you up means we get something important in return. Aren’t you lucky.”

I didn’t dare look at her directly, but I saw Amita give me a final, parting glance before she was ushered out of the room by one monster just as another came in.

“Found one, boss.” A white cord dangled from Mummy’s hand. “I think it’s compatible.”

“Let’s find out, shall we?”

Drac got to his feet and took the white cord from his henchman. He fit one end into the bottom of the cell phone and my heart lurched to hear it snick into place.

What did you expect? I thought bitterly. That you’d outsmart the bad guys with your genius plan? At least Amita was safe. There was that. Pops would approve, I thought.

Drac plugged the cell phone into the wall in a socket under the window, and then faced the group again.

“So, here’s what happens next. The delicate dance betwixt myself and the cops has taken a nasty turn. They betrayed me by talking behind my back. Perhaps with you,” he said to me, “perhaps someone else. Perhaps with Ms. Patel who we just let waltz out the front door. In fact, I’d bet ten grand of the money we’re going to steal, that this is Ms. Patel’s cell phone and that you, Mr…?”

“Bishop,” I said dully “Cory Bishop.”

“I’m willing to bet that Mr. Bishop foolishly chose to play the hero in the hopes of saving her. Congratulations. Mission accomplished.”

A flicker of hope came to life…and then was snuffed with Drac’s next words.

“To get what we wanted we needed to set her free. But someone has to be punished for the transgression. Oh, yes they do.”

Frankie snickered and wiped spittle off his chin.

“This phone is going to juice up and we’ll learn who its owner truly is. If it’s you, Mr. Bishop, I’ll reward you for telling the truth by only cutting out your eye. If you’re lying…”

He turned to the door, stopping to put his hand on Frankie’s shoulder.

“Kill him.”





Chapter Eleven


Cory



Kill him kill him kill him…

It resounded in my head, a death knell that clanged in time to the slow, dull thud of my heart. Alex was clutching my hand so hard her nails had left little bloody half-moons on my skin.

Frankie danced around like an overeager chimp, though I thought I saw fear playing in his eyes. Doubt. If he were clean, I’d have hope that he wouldn’t go through with it. But whatever drugs he was taking were giving a manic, false bravado. At the door, Wolfman shook his head as if he were disappointed in the whole thing, in life in general. I forced myself to get calm and think. Maybe there was something in Wolfman that I could use. Appeal to his better nature.