Page 16 of Corrupted Queen

Bernard drops his gaze and leaves, and there’s something satisfying about having gotten to tell him off like that. I leave the docks on a bit of high.

Definitively learning that Gabriel is involved in purple heroin is a blow, sure, but I get to be the one to bring him down. In the past week, I’ve already pulled together enough information to start working on a piece. Who knows what I could accomplish in another couple of weeks?

* * *

“There’s my boy,” I coo, throwing my bag over the arm of the sofa.

Debbie is sitting on the rug with Harry while his favorite cartoons play on the TV. She shuffles to her feet and brushes out the wrinkles from her pastel purple pantsuit.

“How did it go?” she asks, grabbing her purse from the table. Then, without waiting for me to answer, adds, “I changed him and gave him breakfast already. There’s coffee in the pot.”

“Debbie, you’re a lifesaver.” I slide down to the rug and lift Harry into my arms. He giggles enthusiastically. “It went well. Bernard saw someone who matched Gabriel’s description overseeing a shipment a few weeks ago, around the time the drug first hit the streets.”

Debbie slides into her heels and rests her hand on the door handle, looking back at me. “Good work. Compile everything you’ve got so far and I’ll have a look at it when I get home tonight.”

“Will do.” Harry and I wave as Debbie leaves, then I kiss Harry’s head. “I need some coffee, little man. I’ve been up since four.”

Harry babbles something incoherent that I take as support of my plan, and I lift him onto my hip as I walk to the coffee machine. I grab a mug from the cupboard and fill it to the brim with steaming black coffee, inhaling the rich aroma.

I have grown accustomed to Debbie’s coffee, which is just as bracing and punchy as her personality. I take the mug back to the living room but pause by the window. Debbie only lives a few floors up and has a good view of the street in front of the building, where, right now, three black SUVs are parked in a line.

Oh, shit.

I rush to set the coffee down on the nearest surface, spilling it all over Debbie’s table in my haste. My brain goes into overdrive. Where did I put my go-bag? I race to my room and gaze at the clothes and toys strewn around the room in horror, realizing that I have gotten much too comfortable here in the past week. Harry fusses in my arms and I whisper soothingly to him as I snatch my duffel bag from under the bed and heft it over my arm. I don’t have time to check if it has everything I need.

I go to the front door and press my ear against it, listening for activity, but hear nothing. I check the peephole and, satisfied that the coast is clear, ease the door open. Only once I stick my head out do I notice two men standing with their backs pressed to the wall. The one closest, who I immediately recognize as Gio, the guard I escaped from over a month ago, smiles and lurches forward.

I dive back into the apartment and jerk on the door to close it, but his foot jams in the doorway.

“So good to see you, Alexis,” Gio says, wrenching on the door.

I try to keep it closed, but I only have one free hand. It’s no use. He forces the door open and he and three other men rush in, surrounding me. I hold Harry tight. Will they take him from me now? Or will Gabriel want to personally separate me from my son?

Gio is tall and blond, with a crooked nose and perfectly straight teeth. I remember finding comfort in his soothing baritone and gentle green eyes once upon a time when I had just been freed from Andrew Walsh’s captivity. Now, the sight of him turns my stomach.

“There’s no way for you to escape this time,” Gio says. “We’re not here to hurt you. It will be easier for everyone if you come along without making a fuss.”

He’s right, I realize. I’m trapped. I can’t fight these men, and even if I stood a chance, I can’t risk Harry getting hurt.

My shoulders slump.

“Come on,” Gio says, reaching for my arm.

I jerk out of his grip, glaring. “I can walk on my own.”

He backs off, chuckling. “That you can.”

* * *

The car ride to the mansion feels impossibly short. Harry doesn’t have a care in the world and quickly falls asleep in the car seat. I spend the ride seething, digging my nails into the meat of my palms. Gabriel’s men hunted me down and trapped me like escaped livestock. Like property. And now I’m being toted back to his mansion, where presumably he will laugh about it in my face before tearing Harry out of my arms and locking me away for good this time.

And there is nothing I can do about it.

I want to believe that Gabriel wouldn’t be so cruel. During my time with him he could be very sweet and caring, but he also killed my father and has been importing purple heroin into the city, so I wouldn’t put it past him.

When we reach the gates, I plaster my face to the window and watch as we start to crawl through the familiar scenery. Rolling lawns sparkle with morning dew, and we pass a copse of maple trees whose leaves are tinged with the rust of the oncoming fall.

The main house rises proudly ahead of us, a masterpiece of Georgian symmetry. The red brick glows in the sunlight. I scrutinize the portico, with its marble columns and the oversized black door, its fresh lacquer gleaming. Two guards stand, straight-backed, on either side of the door. When I left, this portico was nothing but a pile of rubble from a recent attack by the Irish. Looking at it now, you’d never know.

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