Page 64 of The Queen's Denial

Chapter 34

Andy

I wallow in a corner after fucking Chi, and I drink myself into such a stupor that I’m not even 100% certain how I get back to my hotel room to sleep. I hope I’m not still buzzed while I check out and drive back to my safehouse the next day. It’s normally only a thirty minute drive from the homestead Cas and Mara chose to get married on, but takes me a full hour with the slow driving and the fact that I take more than one wrong turn.

Mara and Cas leave for their honeymoon, and I allow myself a day of all out misery. Just one day, while I’m hungover as fuck and supposedly taking the day for myself anyway, as Cas instructed. I imagine if I were a chick, I’d be calling my girlfriends and watching fucking Hallmark movies, eating an entire box of chocolates and a gallon of ice cream. To be fair, I do eat a lot of ice cream. I find a half-eaten bag of Twizzlers in my pantry and throw it out with far more intensity than is really necessary, but it sure does make me feel better.

The next day, I wake up and decide to do my fucking job. I shake off this negative bullshit and remind myself who I am. I’m Andy Scutari, and I know I can get the long list of high-level shit that the boss of the organization takes care of off Cas’s plate for when he comes back.

I get to my post outside of Chi’s house hours early, and I relieve the sentry stationed there, who looks like he’s barely keeping his eyes open. We’ve had two of our lower-level guys holding the post during the past three days of Cas and Mara’s marriage festivities, but my stand-in has other responsibilities as well, and I’m sure that’s catching up to him. He’s a good soldier, so I make sure he’s okay to drive and send him on his way.

I’m determined to do reconnaissance today as I sit and listen in on Chi’s meeting with the little shit she’s being forced to marry in just weeks. I truly feel myself caring less and less about watching this train wreck. I’m not going to be a part of this, and whatever I personally think of her decision has no bearing on this situation. It’s the only choice she can make if she wants to keep the status quo, and I understand why she’s doing it. It doesn’t matter if I think it’s a terrible mistake, because it’s the only way she can get what she needs.

As soon as I set myself up on my laptop, however, I notice one of the guards speaking animatedly on his phone on one of the cams on my dashboard. There’s something about his face that rubs me the wrong way. I touch the screen, and it opens, but there’s no sound.

“Oxy, you awake?” I voice-to-text her, and she responds promptly.

Now I am, asshole. What do you want?

I dial her number, and she answers on the first ring. “Why isn’t there any volume on cam 3?”

She sighs and sounds like she’s dragging herself up, but only a second later, I hear typing. “Ohhh bad boy. He muted it.”

“Override it,” I order her.

“God, you’re bossy today.” She types at breakneck speed for a few seconds more, and then the sound to the cam comes through.

“It’s back. Thanks,” I say shortly.

“Hey, you gonna tell me—”

I press the end call button and listen in on the cam intently. I try to tell myself it’s not because this feels like the exact scenario I’ve been worrying about over the months I’ve been watching over her house.

The man is speaking in Japanese, and I almost call Oxy back to help translate, but after working here for so long and using her translating software myself so many times, my Japanese has greatly improved. I can parse out just about everything I’m hearing anyway.

“I can’t simply suggest what you ask. I don’t have that type of sway. He’s a very private person.” There’s a long pause, during which I try to figure out how to get the other end of the conversation. I know one of the gadgets I have in this SUV can do it for me, unless he’s using something to block me with.

“It’s fine,” I hear, “we’re on mute. And the sentry is sleepwalking this morning anyway.” I perk up at this. It’s obvious at this point that this particular guard is trying to get away with something he doesn’t want the boss to know about. I immediately hit “record” on the device Oxy equipped all of our sentry cars with when she installed her hardware.

Then, I remember that all I need to do is activate the device we’ve planted on the phones of everyone who works for Akio, and I’ll hear the other end of the conversation with the audio from the guard’s cam.

As I’m fumbling, trying to figure it out, the guard says, “Listen, they run a tight fucking ship. You might have to wait on this one.”

I don’t even feel I need to hear the other side of the conversation anyway, but I finally get it working, and I’m glad I have. The voice on the other end of the line says, in an ominous tone, “We already have approval, and I’m not waiting any longer.”

Then the line goes dead.

*****

I know that Akio and Chi don’t exactly want to see me, but I also know that since Cas is away, I’m effectively the head of the organization. I’m not going to call him just to get permission to approach the mansion, especially since he’d laugh at me if I asked for permission anyway. Although Akio has been dealing directly with Cas since he unceremoniously kicked me out the main house, I’ve been making the big decisions and basically still running all of the safety measures for the grounds.

This revelation feels huge. It feels like what Chi was asking me about at the safehouse weeks ago, and I want to make sure that if it is an idle threat, it goes no further. If it isn’t, I want to find out about the extent of it and squash it before it gets bigger.

I go straight to Akio’s office, and send up a little thank you to whoever makes it so that I don’t run into Chi on my way there. Although I’m relieved once I get there and she’s not with her father, I realize my thank you was perhaps slightly premature.

Akio is not happy to see me. His normally hard, stern face has even more of an edge than usual today. His gun sits next to his hand on the desk, I notice, instead of in the waistband of his crisp slacks where he usually keeps it.

“Akio, good morning,” I say with a nod, pretending I don’t even notice the pistol. I get right to the point, because honestly, I don’t want this meeting to last any longer than he does. “It seems there’s a problem on your grounds.”

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