Page 63 of Blood in the Water

“Where is Cas?” I shouted back. Wynn gripped my knee, and it was the only thing keeping me from exploding. “And what about Colin?”

“Here, I’m afraid.” The man’s typically playful voice strained in the receiver. “Got an extra bullet in me, but I’m alive.”

Ice went through my veins. I gulped as I held back tears. “What about Cas?”

“Your ex-boyfriend has him,” Fallon’s voice sliced through the phone again. She cursed and started shouting something I couldn’t understand in Irish. “He followed Caspian and Colin back to the safe house, which he burned to the fucking ground as he ambushed them. And ya want to know what I found when I finally arrived? Colin bleeding out in the dirt, and a dozen red roses.”

I froze. “Roses?”

Colin shouted in protest as Fallon grabbed the phone. “Like they’re a fucking calling card. That mean anything to ya?”

A blood-red rose on my birthday every year since our mothers died. He was taunting me. That bastard was laughing in my face.

“You promised to protect us!” I meant to yell back at her, but fear choked my voice.

“Are ya taking a hand at me? Are ya fuckingjoking?” she seethed. “My safe house is destroyed,mybrother has been hurt, and you’re going to point fingers?”

I sucked in a breath. “Colin said he was going to help him.”

“Unbelievable,” she scoffed. “Colin took a fucking bullet for him. I warned ya before ye are not cut out of this. Ye put Caspian at risk, and now ye must deal with the consequences.”

“How the hell is this my fault?” I pushed out of Wynn’s grip to pace the living room. “What am I supposed to do, Fallon?”

“Ye should have run when I gave you the chance!” she shouted. More voices echoed in the background, along with Colin’s groans of pain. “Ye have no idea who you’re up against.”

I clenched my fist at my side. “I’m going to get him back.”

“If he lives that long! Do ya know how ruthless your Max actually is? Do ya know the reputation he has on the street?”

I turned to Wynn as if he might provide clarification, but he said nothing.

“What do you mean?”

“Volpe is known as the Fox for a fucking reason,” she snapped. “He’s cunning, he’s brutal, and he never lets a target escape. Ya lost your chance to run. Now you’re just a sitting duck, and you’ve killed Caspian alongside ya.”

“No,” I whispered, shaking my head. “We can fight him. We can get him back.”

“There’s nowe, Leona.” Fallon’s voice lost some of the edge and went shallow with pity instead. It made my blood boil even more. “This is what I’ve been trying to tell ya. Ye have no money, no reputation. Caspian was your one line of credit with me. Now, he’s gone, and my men paid the price. I’m done.”

“You’re done?”

“I’m done helping ya,” she said, voice hard. “No more medical. No more safe houses. Ye can run now, though ya won’t get far. But if ya have any sense left, you’ll get as far away fromhim as possible. There’s a war brewing, and ye do not want to be caught in the middle.”

“War? Between me and Max?”

“No. The Italians are making moves, pissing the Russians off. Word on the street is war is inevitable. You’re a target for both sides. Get out of here before ya get killed. Or worse, before you make enemies of the Shadows.”

Wynn observed me, but his thoughts were shrouded behind those platinum eyelashes.

“I can’t leave Cas.”

“That’s on ya,” she replied. “But I’m not helping ya. You’re on ya own from this point out.”

Without waiting for me to respond, she hung up, and I was left there, staring at the phone in my hand, without a clue of what to do.

I couldn’t run. I couldn’t fight Max on my own. I couldn’t rescue Cas by myself. I didn’t have any other option but to get the Shadows on my side. They were my only choice left.

I gulped and collapsed back on the couch, my head between my hands.