Page 153 of A Breath of Life
Of course, that was when my boyfriend returned with my latte. Until then, he had probably forgotten that the bullet I’d taken in the church wasn’t the first time I’d had a gun aimed at me that night. Basedon the expression on his face, he was not pleased to hear the reminder from my cousin’s mouth. In my defense, with all that had happened, I’d forgotten about it too.
“Hey, D.” I encouraged him into the room.
He delivered my latte along with a paper bag from the bakery.
“Peanut butter cookie?” I asked with a hopeful grin.
He grunted and muttered, “Your favorite. Just baked.”
I drew him down for a kiss, which he tried to resist. It might have been the audience, but I didn’t let him get away with it.
My cousin diverted his attention elsewhere, but for once, I didn’t think it was from disgust but a desire to give us a private moment.
Diem sat, and Echo joined him, leaning against his side. My boyfriend eyed my cousin with a snarl in his lip that he couldn’t hide. “Keep going. I want to hear this. The Bishop did what?”
Costa wet his lips and glanced between us. “He aimed a gun at your boyfriend.”
And that was the moment our entire plan fell apart.
“I shot him,” Costa said. “Non-fatally.”
“In the shoulder,” I added.
“When he went down, I knocked him out with the butt of my gun and dragged him off into a corner, hoping that he wouldn’t be discovered right away. I confiscated his weapon.”
I stared at Diem, whose lips were pinched so tightly that the skin around his mouth turned white. Learning I’d been two seconds from taking a bullet before I’d even found him in the basement clearly didn’t sit well.
“The shot didn’t go unnoticed,” Costa continued. “The shattering glass of the statue caused its own uproar. A few patrons already thought someone had fired a gun. Panic had set in. A few fights brokeout when people tried to flee, but they were stopped by syndicate security.
“When I fired my gun, someone shouted that the shooter was in the back. They came for me. Had I followed Tallus, they would have been on us in a flash. We’d both be dead. I got Tallus through the basement door and disrupted the key reader on the outside so no one could get down there without a hassle. I told him to get you out while I figured out a distraction.”
Diem’s hot gaze was on me again. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking, but the hand not petting his dog was balled into a white-knuckle fist on his thigh.
Costa cleared his throat and scuffed a hand over his unshaven jaw like he was trying to organize his thoughts. “Kitty called in an anonymous tip to the police hotline, dropping all the right words to invoke an immediate raid response. Intelligence has been hunting the Royal Aces for a long time, so it was not something they could sit quietly on when told specific details. I’d already tipped off a few trusted people in the department, so they knew the call was coming and were ready.”
“Why the fuck didn’t you go to your people first?” Diem growled. “Why send Tallus and the jeweler? Two untrained and unarmed men? Are you a fucking idiot?”
“D—”
“No. I want to know why.”
“Because, like I told my cousin, intelligence would never have moved fast enough. You know how things work in the department, Krause. Even with a hostage situation, which we had, they would have started with a negotiator. What kind of risk would that have placed on your grandmother? Tallus was convinced these people would act without a moment’s notice. Since we didn’t know how Ace’s men were communicating with the home, and we knew that they hadvideo surveillance in place, sending officers there first would have been dangerous. Am I right, or did they not threaten to kill her if you didn’t obey their command.” Not a question.
Diem ground his teeth but stayed silent.
“Before we did anything at the home, Ihadto disrupt communication. Could I have solely done that and gotten your grandmother to safety? Yes, but the disruption would have been an instant red flag, and that would have put your life at risk, as they would rightfully assume something was amiss. They would have killed you and vanished before we got our hands on them. So, we needed to disrupt their systemwhilethey were already distracted.”
“What we didn’t plan for,” I added, trying to soothe my boyfriend’s bubbling temper, “was me literally running smack into the Bishop as he came up from the basement.” I had managed to slip around everyone else as an unknown face in the crowd, but the Bishop got a close-up look at me. He saw through the disguise.
“I didn’t know they drugged you.” Pain and regret creased the skin beside Costa’s eyes. “I wouldn’t have sent you off alone otherwise.”
“They would have caught up to us far sooner, and we would be dead. I can’t believe you stuck around.”
“I had to.”
Costa went on to explain how he’d tried to blend with the crowd while communicating the locations of the head guys to Kitty, but not knowing who most of Ace’s men were, he had to rely on quick observation. Only when the police sirens screamed in the distance did the core group stand out because they immediately fled.
“To the basement and their escape tunnel through the underground to the church,” I said. “Were they apprehended?”
