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“I’d be with you,” Vittorio corrected. “And if she hadn’t rushed her recovery in the first place, she wouldn’t have needed a second operation.”
“I know, Vittorio, I’m sorry,” Emmanuelle said immediately. “I shouldn’t tease you. Although Grace said she stumbled and hit her shoulder into a rock wall when she was checking out a place to hold an event.” She turned to Elie, nudging him. “Grace took a bullet meant for Vittorio, and it shattered her shoulder, right about the time you came on board with us.”
“I remember,” Elie said. “I was training under Emilio. The call came in that someone tried to kill you, Vittorio. Emilio thought you were all tucked in for the night and he wasn’t the least bit happy that you’d gone out without his knowledge.”
Emmanuelle sent her brother a quick smile. “You got into trouble with Emilio, didn’t you? I despise his lectures. Elie has the best of both worlds. Not only does he get to bodyguard, but he’s a rider. So, you get to boss everyone around no matter what, just like Stefano.”
“No one really bosses Stefano,” Elie said. “Not even Emilio. Stefano is a law unto himself. Even my family walks carefully around him.”
“I think of you more as a Ferraro than an Archambault,” Emmanuelle confessed. “You’ve become such a part of our family.”
Vittorio nodded. “Stefano treats him that way, doesn’t he, Elie? He gives him the same hell he does the rest of us.”
“And the same amount of work,” Emmanuelle agreed. “Thanks for always being so good about it, Elie. There’s so much now. It just seems like no matter how much we take on, there’s always more.”
Elie slung his arm around her shoulders and pulled her in close. “Because you’re letting him send you all over the country, Emmanuelle. You’re going to burn out if you don’t slow down.”
Emmanuelle stiffened and pulled away, glaring at him. “I work the same as everyone else does.”
Elie glanced at Vittorio for confirmation.
Vittorio nodded. “You know it’s true, Emme. I’ve already had the discussion with Stefano.”
“Behind my back?” She looked outraged.
“Of course, behind your back,” Vittorio said, sounding amused. “If you’d been there, you would have kicked our asses. No one was going to risk that.”
Elie covered his mouth with one hand, but there was no hiding the sudden flare of laughter in his intense dark eyes.
A small smile flirted with the curve of Emmanuelle’s lower lip. “You’re not going to charm me, Vittorio. Or you, either, Elie. You’re both in the doghouse.” Suspicion crossed the perfection of her soft features. “Who else was there? Were all of my brothers there? Was Mariko?”
“Betrayal of the sisterhood? You know better. Even if Mariko thought it, she wouldn’t voice it, not without talking to you about it first,” Vittorio said. “While your brothers have always conspired to boss you around and protect you from your stubborn and willful behavior from the day you were born, your sisters-in-law wouldn’t think of joining the many conspiracies we have. Fortunately, you have all of us, and now Elie as well, to look out for you. I know you are especially grateful.” He sounded complacent.
“I love Grace,” Emmanuelle told Elie. “I love her so very much. She’s sweet and gentle and so deserving. Her one failing is that she’s madly in love with Vittorio. If she wasn’t, I’d be tempted to break something important on him and send him limping home. She’d be upset though, and I don’t ever want her upset.”
Vittorio smiled. “I don’t like Grace upset, either. Have you talked with her about planning Nicoletta and Taviano’s wedding? I thought maybe she could spend some time with Lucia and Amo. She might be able to keep them from worrying about Nicoletta until this is over.”
“Do you think it will ever really be over for them?” Elie asked. “Benito has four brothers. In order to stop Benito from pursuing her, we’ve got to kill him. When he’s dead, aren’t the others going to come after her?”
“The hope is they will have no idea she has anything to do with his death, or the death of any member of the Demons,” Vittorio said. “Although the manner in which they were all killed goes back to the same way her step-uncles were killed.”
“That’s true,” Emmanuelle agreed, “but if they lose so many, and no one ever caught a glimpse of the assassins and lived to tell about it, I’d want to stay away.”
“Taviano and Nicoletta will always have to be careful, but then we all do,” Vittorio said. “In any case, we can hunt them if we have to. Elie, your family, in particular, has to be watchful at all times. It is rare to worry that shadow riders might come after us, but with the job your family has, that’s a very real possibility.”
The Archambaults were the only family sanctioned to kill other riders for breaking the laws of shadow riders.
Vittorio suddenly swung his head toward the highway. “I believe the Demons are close. Let’s see where they plan on heading.”
All three were immediately on their feet, stepping into the shadow that would hurtle them straight toward the Y in the highway that would determine which road the Demons would travel to fuel up on their journey, or if they would even stop.
Vittorio had taken the lead and Elie stepped in front of Emmanuelle. She hissed her ire at him as she emerged from the mouth of the tube, but he didn’t so much as turn around or acknowledge that he noticed. The two Ram trucks and Toyota 4Runner were the only vehicles approaching the Y. Traffic wasn’t busy.
The sun had already dropped, providing a purple and blue sky streaked with darker clouds. The vehicles pulled to the side of the road for a brief consultation, although no one got out.
“They’re so lazy, they’re using their cell phones instead of getting out and talking with one another,” Emmanuelle observed.
The truck in the last position sat in the remaining light, engine rumbling, with the shadow of the trees cast right over it. Emmanuelle stepped into it and instantly felt the pull. The tube took her body, flinging her straight down and across the distance at breakneck speed, sliding her right under the door and throwing her into the very back, just missing one of the men in the back seat as the driver put the vehicle into gear and set the truck in motion.
She breathed deeply, crouching low, making herself as small as possible as she tried to rid herself of the disorienting effects riding the shadows always caused in her body. There was no shadow to immediately dive into if one of the five men in the cab of the truck should suddenly turn their head and spot her. As they drove down the highway, shadows occasionally striped the cab but streaked past and couldn’t be counted on to hide in. She remained silent, slowing her heartbeat, breathing slowly and evenly, using calming meditation breathing to let her muscles relax and be ready to spring into action.
There was silence in the truck for the first few minutes and then one of them spoke. “Can’t you put a little lead into it, Brio? Either that or pull the hell over.”
Brio had to be the driver. Emmanuelle locked that into her memory.
“You had your chance, Cruz,” Brio snapped. “You can hold it until we get to the diner. What are you, two?”
Cruz was sitting in the back seat directly to her left.
Cruz squirmed, and the man sitting directly in front of her shoved him. “Stop it. It’s fucking close quarters in here. I told you to quit drinking, but you just kept it up anyway.” He sounded annoyed. Frazzled even.
They’d come a long way, and riding together in the back seat probably hadn’t been very comfortable. They weren’t small men. She risked a look, just tipping her head up enough that she could see the backs of their heads.
Cruz swore in Spanish and elbowed the man. “Shut the fuck up, Eber, I’m tired of you.”
Eber retaliated, slamming his elbow viciously into Cruz’s jaw. It was hard enough to snap Cruz’s head to one side. Eber didn’t stop. He hit him two more times and then turned in the seat, facing slightly away from him.
The man to Emmanuelle’s ri
ght snickered. “Hell, Eber, you just tore him up.”
“What the fuck is going on back there?” Brio demanded. “Lon, what did Eber do?”
“Nothing, they’re just going at it like always,” Lon lied.
“Well, stop,” Brio demanded.
Emmanuelle could see him peering into the rearview mirror, searching suspiciously to see what was going on. The front passenger turned to look as well.
Air moved through her lungs, in and out, no change as she waited for him to turn around.
The driver suddenly cranked up the radio so loud it blasted throughout the cab, making a statement, telling them all he didn’t want any further problems. The moment they all settled, she put her hands on either side of Cruz’s head and wrenched, using the signature kill of all the shadow riders.
“Justice is served,” she murmured under her breath and settled his head in the exact position it had been in.
She waited a heartbeat. A second one. No one noticed. No one cared to check on Cruz to see if he was okay after Eber’s vicious treatment. If someone did notice, they would hopefully attribute his death to Eber’s elbow.
She watched Lon as he shoved his folded jacket under his head against the window and then removed it. He positioned it on the back of the seat under his neck twice and then moved it again. Clearly, he was uncomfortable, but he was careful not to bump into Eber, who was taking up more than his share of space on the seat.
Eber knew it, too. He inched his elbows out, shoving into both Cruz and Lon. Then when Cruz didn’t give him a reaction, he turned his back toward Lon, shoving into him, forcing him closer to the window. There was a malicious little grin on his face.
Emmanuelle didn’t hesitate. She gripped Lon’s head and wrenched. The crack couldn’t be heard over the blasting music, but his jacket started to slip out from under his neck. She had to catch it, and for a moment, the passenger in the front seat started to turn toward the back, and she froze. Brio said something to him and he turned back, leaning closer to the driver to hear. She positioned the jacket under Lon’s head, whispered the required proclamation and sank back down, this time directly behind Eber. He would be the toughest one. Once she had him, she could crawl over the bodies and kill the passenger in the front of the cab and then the driver. That could be accomplished in seconds. Then she would drive the truck to wherever the destination was. Brio had programmed the address into the GPS. She just had to follow directions.
Watching in the rearview mirror, Emmanuelle took her time. One needed to be patient. Even if they reached their destination, she would still have time to kill Eber and possibly the others. It might be difficult depending on where they parked, but it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. She was fast, she knew that.
Eber played on his phone, eventually hunching to gain even more room, still uncomfortable. He straightened, spreading his knees wide as well as his elbows, head down, looking at his screen. The occupants in the front seat watched the road and discussed something she couldn’t catch above the pounding beat of the music, so Emmanuelle ignored them.
She rose up, caught Eber’s head between her palms and wrenched. The crack was satisfying. “Justice is served,” she whispered.
Shoving him to one side, she was over the seat and on the passenger before either he or the driver even knew she was there. She took out the man in the passenger seat without a problem. The driver fumbled for a gun, shouting profanities at her as he tried to bring it up from where he had placed it in the console between the seats.
Emmanuelle had one foot on the console, preventing him from pulling the gun out while she gripped his head in her hands. He fought by throwing himself around, but he had one hand on the box between the seats, still trying for his weapon, and one on the steering wheel. He could do little more than throw his head around. She simply used the leverage of her body and the technique she’d learned from the time she was a toddler and broke his neck. The moment she did, she pushed his body away from the wheel.
It took strength to drag him up and off the gas pedal and shove him against the driver’s side door, but she slid smoothly into the driver’s seat, so the exchange barely took seconds. She was grateful for all the upper body work she did every day. She could never have pushed that deadweight off the seat had she not worked out so hard for so long. It sucked that he was squished up against her as she drove, but it couldn’t be helped.
Fortunately, it was a fairly short distance before the lead vehicle was signaling to turn off the highway. At their destination, a small diner just on the edge of the city, she slowed as the other two vehicles pulled right up to the front. The 4Runner parked in the handicapped space. She didn’t pull into the lot. Instead, she deliberately positioned the truck so a shadow, thrown by the only overhead light, fell across the driver’s side door just to the right of the parking lot. Leaving the truck running, she opened the door, allowing the dead body of the driver to fall onto the ground into the brush. She hopped out, sliding straight into the shadow. It took her fast, shooting her up and over landscaping into a small patch of grass where an old dilapidated gazebo with the roof caving in sat on a cracked concrete slab, surrounded by rock and overgrown weeds.
“What the fuck, Brio!” a big man yelled as he stepped out of the 4Runner. “What are you doing?” He started toward the truck, and immediately, the others leaping out of the 4Runner surrounded him as he came purposefully across the parking lot.
Five more men wearing Demon colors joined them as they hurried toward the truck. The first man, obviously in charge, yanked open the door to Brio’s truck. The passenger spilled out, hanging obscenely upside down.
The men jumped back as if bitten, surrounding the truck, weapons drawn, as if somehow they were going to find the killer in the bed waiting for them. The leader pointed toward two men and sent them toward the gazebo. Two others were sent toward a dark row of shrubs. Two others went in the direction of the small grove of royal empress trees that decorated what had once been an outdoor eating area but now was overgrown with weeds. The leader kept the last two men with him to inspect the truck itself and the other three bodies in the back seat.
Vittorio signaled to Elie to take the two men headed toward the shrubs. Thick green leaves grew so close to one another it was nearly impossible to tell where one plant started and another ended. There had been an attempt to start a garden there at one time. Elie could see the faint stone path every now and then twisting through the thick shrubbery, partially broken in places by overgrown roots.
If the two men were trying to be quiet, they weren’t succeeding. He could hear their boots as they kicked up rocks and dirt and stumbled on the uneven, broken path. It was very dark, with the trees weeping overhead and the ominous clouds covering any light the moon might have provided. They were thorough in their search, splitting up, using their boots to kick under the shrubs when they couldn’t see beneath the thick branches. It was easy enough to find them, come up behind them and administer justice when they made so much noise.
Vittorio followed the two men into the grove of royal empresses. The men stayed close to each other, spoke little and when they had to sweep low, they went back-to-back. They were smart about their search. He was patient. There was always one moment, one second that gave an opportunity. He just had to be ready. He paced along with them, stalking them from only three feet away, sometimes less. One of them was uneasy, looking around, peering into the darkness, sometimes right at him, but he went still and never moved a muscle, and the man always looked away. The uneasy Demon stopped abruptly and retraced his footsteps, whispering to his partner to wait for one moment. He only went back five steps, but his partner had gone ahead an additional five. That was far too big of a gap for either of them to survive.
Vittorio had shadowed the nervous one, knowing the Demon was more likely to know something was wrong and not wait to discover if his partner was dead before making a run for safety. He delivered justice fast, and, as his partner turned back, alarmed th
at he didn’t answer, he killed him as well. Like Elie, he left the bodies where they fell.
Emmanuelle saw the two men headed her way. She didn’t have much cover from the overgrown weeds, but the shadow remained, thrown by the light in the parking lot. She stayed in the mouth of it and let the two men come to her. Cloud cover blocking out the moon cast darkness around the gazebo, so the strange shadow seemed bizarre, thrown like a grayish fog in a stripe over the ramshackle building.
One of the men peered inside before stepping in, beads of sweat gleaming on his face. His partner walked around the outside of the ruins. Emmanuelle waited until the man inside was close to her, his back to the shadow, his eyes on his partner. She delivered the signature kill, eased his body down and was back in the shadow all within two seconds, before his partner had time to turn his head.
“Ed?” His partner rushed inside, looking carefully around before dropping to one knee to feel for a pulse. “This is bullshit.” He turned his head to look around again.
Emmanuelle took him from behind, dropping his body on top of his friend’s. She stepped back into the shadow to ride it back to the parking lot, this time all the way to the pole where the lamp was, right in the middle of the lot. From the mouth of the shadow she could see Brio’s truck with three men just climbing out of it. They consulted briefly, one of them gesturing toward the 4Runner. The large man, clearly the leader, shook his head.
Emmanuelle could see that he was angry. She couldn’t blame him. He raised his voice, calling for his men to come back. He wanted whoever had killed those in the truck, but he also wanted his men to check in, and none of them had. She spotted Vittorio just to the right of the truck, stalking the three men. To the left was Elie.
The leader scowled and stepped around the hood of the truck almost directly into Vittorio’s path. Vittorio didn’t move a muscle. He just seemed to fade into the landscape. She’d seen him do it a million times, but it never failed to move her. She found her brothers extraordinary. They weren’t small men, but they could disappear when they needed to, simply become invisible.