Rush of Redemption (Rush Series #2) (24 page)

Moving rapidly down the
hall of the hotel, Rush stopped in front of Alex’s room and knocked. Alex
appeared at the door, obviously having been rousted from bed. He met Rush’s
eyes with his ever calm stare and waited for Rush to speak. 
Before he could, however, Rush heard a soft, Spanish accented
voice, call out, “Who is it?”

Rush lifted an eyebrow then
dismissed the situation. “I want 
Tiko’s
 daughter
brought to me now.”

“What’s happened?” Alex
asked.

“She’s dying. She’s
unconscious and she’s dying. I don’t care how you do it, but I want 
Tiko’s
 daughter brought to me now. I have to have her
before nine o’clock tomorrow morning. I don’t want to pretend to have her. I
want to have her. I want 
Tiko
 to understand
how this feels and that I’m deadly serious,” Rush said emphatically.

Alex stared at him for a
moment before replying, “What will you do with the girl if…” he allowed the
sentence to hang in the air.

Rush slammed his palm down
on the doorframe. “I’m not a monster. Now, get the girl here now.”

From behind Alex, Devon
Montanez appeared wrapped in a hotel robe. “I’ll have her here,” she said
quietly. “You need to try and get some sleep. Tomorrow’s going to be a long
day,” she said gently.

Rush stared at her for long
time as he struggled to hold it together. “Please don’t let my girl die,” he
begged her.

Devon met his gaze
steadily. “I’ll do my best,” she promised quietly.

Rush gave a shaky nod of his
head and walked back to his room to wait for morning. Moving woodenly back to
his seat in front of the television, Rush sat down and sighed heavily. He
didn’t like not being in control, he didn’t like it at all. He leaned back and
closed his eyes trying to stem his frantic need to do something… anything. Not
just sit here.

Visions of Trinity filled
his mind’s eye: the first time he’d met her at the gallery with her hair
clipped back; the night at the nightclub, with her hair all wild and flowing
about her beautiful face; the way she’d clung to him the first time they’d made
love, so trusting – she’d made him feel 
tenfeet
 tall;
the night of the charity ball in her red dress – she’d blown his mind; the
night he’d finally found her again at the French restaurant; the night she gave
birth to their amazing son – even with her hair slicked back with sweat, he’d
never seen anyone more beautiful; and the last time they’d made love in the hot
tub, their fingers intertwined. Would he ever have that with her again? Be able
to touch her, hold her, love her…

A sharp knock at the door
jarred him from sleep. He sat up quickly. How could he possibly have fallen
asleep? Guilt ate at him as he contemplated how Trinity had slept. What if
she’d died while he sat here sleeping… 
no!
 He couldn’t think
like that. He jumped up from the chair and moved quickly to the door, wiping
the sleep from his eyes as he went.

Alex strode past him when
the door was opened. With grim lips, he said, “It’s done.”

Rush blinked rapidly. “You
have her?”

“Yes,” Alex answered
simply.

“Where is she?”

“Devon has her in my room,”
Alex replied, looking at his watch.

It was then Rush noticed
the blood leaking through at the top of Alex’s shirt sleeve. “What happened?”

Alex gave a dismissive wave
of his hand. “We’ll discuss it later. What do you want to do now?”

“Was the girl hurt?” Rush
asked, rubbing a hand over his eyes.

“No, Angelina is fine…
scared, but fine.”

“How old is she?” Rush
asked.

“Fourteen…
fifteen.”

Rush sighed heavily and
with a shake of his head, said, “What a freaking nightmare. There’s nothing we
can do until 
Tiko
 contacts me again. I need
to get a picture of Angelina on my phone so I can send it to him when he calls.
Is Devon okay?”

“Minor injuries, nothing
important,” Alex replied.

“So, I guess we wait,” Rush
said. “God, I hope Trinity makes it through this alive.”

Alex nodded but didn’t
respond.

Chapter Fifteen

Nine o’clock found Rush and Alex sitting facing each other across
the table in Rush’s suite. Time seemed to stop. Rush glanced repeatedly at his
watch. As the second hand moved further and further away from the designated
time, his nerves began to reach a breaking point. At two minutes past the hour,
Rush stood abruptly and walked to face the windows. He found it odd that the
sun was shining and people were milling about as if it was a normal day and
someone’s life didn’t hang in the balance.

When he didn’t think he
could stand it any longer, his phone vibrated on the table. Rush glanced at Alex,
who pursed his lips but said nothing. Exhaling deeply, Rush picked up the
phone. It was now do or die.

Without any preamble, 
Tiko
 said sharply, “Where the hell is my money?”

“How’s Trinity?”

“She’s not 
doin
’ so well and it appears she’ll be doing worse. Where
is the money, Drayton? We had a deal!” 
Tiko
 snapped.

With his stomach muscles
tied up in knots, Rush licked his lips, glanced at Alex and stared at him for a
long minute. With his jaw muscles clenching, he dove in. “I’m altering our
deal,” he said with deadly calm.

“There will be no altering
if you ever want to see that bitch and your brat again!” 
Tiko
 spat.

Rush gave a mirthful laugh,
“Oh, 
Tiko
. My son happens to be asleep in the
next room… as is your daughter, Angelina.”

Silence filled the line.
“What the hell do you mean?” 
Tiko
 asked
quietly.

“I. Have. 
Your.
 
Daughter!”

Silence again. “No, you
don’t,” 
Tiko
 said on a laugh. “Good try.
But there’s no way. She’s heavily guarded.”

“I can send you a picture, if
you’d like,” Rush said smoothly. “As you said, it is a great motivator.”

“You better not 
freakin
’…” 
Tiko
 paused
before continuing. “You better not hurt my little girl.”

“I won’t. But I want back
what’s mine. I want her back unharmed,” Rush said stonily.

“She’s sick, man. But I
didn’t do it, I swear… it’s a bug or something,” 
Tiko
 began
to ramble.

“Then we need to make this
quick. 
An even trade, Trinity for your daughter.”

Silence filled the line
again. “And if I refuse?”

“I’ll turn your daughter
over to the 
Vato
 Locos,” Rush said calmly.

“They’ll kill her,” 
Tiko
 said frantically.

“I know,” Rush responded
icily.

“I can’t turn your bitch
over, they’ll kill me,” 
Tiko
 said.

With deadly precision, Rush
replied, “I don’t care.”

“I’ll call you back.”

“You have fifteen minutes,”
Rush said before the line went dead.

Rush fell back in his chair
and threw his cellphone on the table. He scrubbed his hands over his face. He
sighed heavily and looked at Alex.

“The ball is in his court,”
Alex said.

Rush nodded and closed his
eyes.

“The Los Rojas will
probably kill 
Tiko
,” Alex said without
inflection.

“We can only hope,” was
Rush’s only response.

After twelve mind-splitting
minutes, 
Tiko
 called back. “You better not
hurt my girl. I want her returned!” he demanded.

“I’ll return her in the
same condition in which I find Trinity,” Rush responded.

“They will kill me,
man,” 
Tiko
 said almost pleadingly.

“You should have thought
about that.”

After several minutes of
silence, 
Tiko
 said, “What do you want?”

“Trinity.”

After several long,
agonizing moments, 
Tiko
 said, “Okay.”

Rush exhaled silently.
“Bring Trinity to my hotel. 
Just you, Trinity, me, and
your daughter.
 We’ll meet in the lobby where there are lots of
people milling around. Any deviation and your daughter will be given to
the 
Vato
 Locos. Do we understand each
other?”

Silence met his words.
Anxiousness curled around Rush’s spine the longer the silence lingered.
Finally 
Tiko
 said, “One hour.”

“No! You’ve wasted enough
of my time. You have until ten o’clock. 
Ten o’clock and not
a minute longer.
 Do you understand?” Rush said abruptly.

Tiko
 paused before muttering, “Ten o’clock, your lobby. 
Just you and me.”
 Then the line went dead.

Rush let out an unsteady
breath before rising, pouring a stiff drink, and tossing it back before pouring
another. “I need an ambulance on standby in front of the hotel,” he told Alex.

Alex nodded and exited to
make the necessary calls.

~*~

At nine forty-five, Rush stood alone in the lobby. From where he
stood, he could see the men Alex had situated in the parking lot. One man was
leaned against a car as if talking on his cellphone, the other sat on a bench
reading a newspaper, and both were heavily armed. Kneeling behind the
reservation’s desk were two additional armed men. Glancing behind him, he met
Devon’s steady gaze as she stood behind the concierge desk in the hotel’s
signature jacket. The huge cut over her eye from her scuffle with Angelina’s
guards was barely visible from where he stood. The ambulance was parked in the
back of the hotel waiting for Trinity. And while he couldn’t see him, Rush knew
Alex was positioned up in the tree adjacent to the lobby doors with a rifle
trained on those doors.

In case things went awry, Angelina
Mars was being kept in a hotel room on the second floor with a guard posted at
the door. The young girl had been understandably frightened. Rush hated having
to put her in the middle of this situation. He was sure 
Tiko
 wasn’t going to like this small change, but Rush
didn’t care. He just prayed 
Tiko
 didn’t
show up with an army.

With his nerves stretched
tight, Rush stood with his hands buried in his pants pockets, willing the time
to pass. How he wished this was already over and Trinity was safely ensconced
in a hospital room. His heart began to pound when a white van pulled into the
hotel’s circular drive. It pulled in and stopped for an instant before
continuing back onto the highway.

In his
earpiece, Rush heard Alex say, “It’s him and he’s not alone.”

“Shit,” Rush said softly.

Slowly, the white van
pulled back into the circular drive and stopped just past the entrance. A
Hispanic man, not 
Tiko
, exited the driver’s door
and went to the back of the van and opened the double doors.

Rush heard Alex say softly,
“Everyone on alert.”

The driver pulled a
wheelchair out of the van and set it on the driveway. A second man, still
not 
Tiko
, carried a limp body wrapped in a sheet
out of the van and placed it in the wheelchair. Rush’s stomach roiled when he
saw Trinity’s head loll back.

“Steady, Rush,” he heard
Alex say in his ear. It took everything in his being to remain still and not
run to the wheelchair.

In his earpiece, Rush heard
their man on the bench say softly, “There’s no one else in the back of the van.”

“Copy,” Alex replied.

The man, who’d placed
Trinity into the wheelchair, rolled it onto the sidewalk and stopped. 
Tiko
 Mars climbed out of the passenger’s side of the
van and stepped up next to the wheelchair. As they approached the entrance of
the hotel, a black pickup truck with massive tires came squealing into the
parking lot. In the back of the truck were half a dozen heavily armed men.
Before the truck had come to a full stop, the men were jumping out of the truck
and the sounds of gunfire became nearly overwhelming.

Rush heard Alex’s voice,
while still calm and level, become louder and more demanding as he directed his
men. The two men behind the counter came out and pulled their weapons. Rush
started forward, intently focused on reaching and retrieving Trinity from the
wheelchair, when the glass windows housing the lobby exploded. Rush threw his
arms up to fend off the flying debris.

Tiko
 and the man pushing the wheelchair began rushing towards the
hotel’s entrance. When they reached the door, the man behind the wheelchair was
spun around after being hit by a flying bullet. The man yelled and fell to the
ground. 
Tiko
 got behind the wheelchair and
began running. He was approaching the entrance when the glass exploded. Without
stopping, 
Tiko
 kept running through the
falling glass.