“Or did your brother refuse to come because he knows a woman’s got no business handling—”
“It’s my bar,” she threw back, straightening as if she were trying to draw away from him without him realizing what she was doing. “And since your boys can’t behave, they can leave, and they can stay away.”
The man came closer, and even the fierce determination in her eyes couldn’t mask the fear. She was cornered now—backed against the wall with no way to get to the door except through this slimy gangster.
From where he hid behind the armchair, Danny watched in horror. Icy spiders crept up his back. His mind tried to drag him back to Cork. To that afternoon years ago when he’d been a young boy, and he’d been pulled away from playing by the screams of a woman. He’d seen. Fear had kept him still, had kept him silent, but he’d seen and heard it all, and he’d never forgiven himself for it.
“Listen to me,” Ricky snarled at the woman, stepping in so close their chests nearly touched. “My boys don’t need your permission to—”
“Get your hands off me!” She batted away a hand he’d apparently tried to put on her, and when Ricky angrily seized her arm, she yelped. Danny jumped, the vicious grip on the woman’s arm reminding him of that other time and place. Another man’s hand on another woman’s throat.
“Let me go!” She shoved him back with a palm on his chest, but he didn’t release her other arm. Suddenly they were screaming over the top of each other in Italian, the woman trying to wrench her arm free while Ricky held fast.
The suite door opened and a burly wise guy leaned in. “Everything okay in—”
“Out!” Ricky barked.
“Yeah, boss.” The door shut again.
They were off and fighting again. Still shouting. Still struggling.
Danny nearly got sick, and he couldn’t just sit here and let this happen. Heart racing, he slipped out from behind the armchair.
Bernard grabbed for Danny’s arm, but he wasn’t fast enough, and Danny thought he heard him a curse.
Ignoring him, Danny crept quickly and soundlessly across the carpet. Just before he reached the place where the pair were arguing in the corner, he grabbed a heavy bronze statue off a table.
The instant Danny raised the statue, the woman’s eyes flicked toward him and she gasped. The gangster spun around, but before he could react, Danny swung the statue, and it slammed hard into Ricky’s face. The woman slapped a hand over her own mouth, stifling a horrified sound, and the gangster crumpled to the carpet. The statue slid out of Danny’s hands, landing with a muffled clang beside Ricky and the pool of blood expanding from one side of his head.
For a second, Danny and the woman were frozen. They looked at each other. At Ricky. At each other again.
And Ricky didn’t move. At all.
The woman was the first to pull herself together. She looked past Danny, and she set her jaw, the panic vanishing in favor of sharp focus and sheer determination. “Do exactly what I tell you to, and you can get out of this alive.”
Stunned, he let himself be shoved back into a side room, just beyond the open door. She gestured sharply at him. “Don’t move. Don’t make a sound.”
He nodded mutely. Looking past her through the crack in the door, he caught Bernard’s eye, and his friend was clearly as confused and terrified as he was.
Then the woman screamed.
Danny jumped. Bernard ducked back behind a couch like a startled rat.
The suite door banged open, and three huge wise guys thundered in, pistols drawn.
“What’s going—”
“In there!” The woman was sobbing hysterically now, flailing her hand toward the bedroom. “He hit Ricky, and then he… he…” She gasped for breath as the men hurried past her. The instant they were in the bedroom, she snatched Danny’s arm and hauled him back into the main room, then toward the door. Quieter now, she commanded, “Go! We have to go!”
Danny didn’t hesitate, and he didn’t ask questions. He hurried out into the hall with the woman on his heels. With a backward glance he confirmed that Bernard was with them, and they sprinted away from the chaos.
Mathew was around the corner, and after pausing for a fleeting glance at the woman, he gestured at the linen cart. “Get in!”
Danny skidded to a halt. “There’s only room for two. Bernard, get in with her, and I’ll—”
“I’m faster than you.” Bernard clapped Danny’s shoulder, ran past, and continued toward the stairs, throwing over his shoulder, “Stay with her!”
There was no time to argue. Danny hoisted himself into the cart. The woman hesitated, but all it took was one glance over her shoulder to convince her to join him. They both swore under their breath as knees and elbows cracked together in the tiny confines, and then heavy linens landed over the top of them. The heat was instantly suffocating. The woman was small, but her weight was enough to make it tough for him to draw breath. Her knee in his ribs didn’t help.
The wheels squeaked beneath them. Danny closed his eyes and tried to remember how to breathe, though he was sure he’d have struggled even without a woman and a mountain of linens piled on top of him. What in the holy hell had just happened?
The woman was surprisingly calm. She was trembling, still panting just like he was, but she was quiet. And she’d thought fast in the room, getting the wise guys into the bedroom so she could flee with Danny and Bernard. She’d been understandably frightened by Ricky when he’d gotten her alone and cornered her—he was bigger than her and probably had a gun or two—but once she’d seen an escape, she’d taken charge and conjured a plan. Because of her, all three of them had made it out of the room undetected and unharmed.
Any chance you want to join a crew of Irish boys who like to steal?
Somehow he doubted that.
After more twists and turns than he could count, something clanged into place. The door to the service elevator, he thought. The movements were nauseating. Or perhaps that was the fear. Guilt, maybe? Ricky had been threatening the woman, but Danny had killed him, and Danny had never killed anyone before. That wasn’t what he and his boys had come here to do, but now there was a dead body—a dead gangster’s body—in a luxury suite, blood soaking into the ugly carpet, and he didn’t know quite what to make of that.
The cart finally lurched to an abrupt stop. The linens piled on top of them were suddenly gone, and both Danny and the woman took in big gulps of the fresh, cooler air. With Mathew’s help, they climbed out of the cart.
The woman looked around, straightening her dress and beaded headband. “Where are we?”
“Ground floor.” Mathew motioned toward a steel door not far away. “That’ll take you outside. Right turn, and you’ll be at Fifth Avenue.”
Danny looked around. “What about—”
“No time,” Mathew shoved an overcoat into Danny’s hands. “Put this on and get out of here.”
“But I—”
“Go!” Mathew grabbed Danny’s arm and shoved him toward the door. “Get out, and we’ll meet you tomorrow.”
Danny didn’t argue. He pulled on the coat, covering his stolen hotel uniform, and then he and the woman slipped outside. The bitterly cold air was a shock, stinging his eyes and cheeks, but it was also a relief—they were safely out of the confines of the luxurious labyrinth that now contained the body of a gangster named Ricky. Not home free, but damn closer than they were minutes ago.