“Sir,” came through the intercom in my office, “we have a problem out here. There are cops wanting to speak with you.” The guard's voice came through, heavy with reluctance at having to be the one to bear the news. He was probably shitting bricks at the possibility of being rounded up and taken into custody, but lucky for him, he wasn't high enough on the food chain to bother with, at least not yet.
I held the button down, asking, “About what?” When there was no answer in return, I checked the surveillance to find my men at the gate being held at gunpoint and frisked. At the same time, a text lit up my phone, filling me in on exactly what they wanted. I cursed up a storm as I stalked into the hall, yelling for the others to alert them to our newest situation after having barely taken care of the last one. Vanni met me first with Marco not far behind. “Get Santos and call up to the house. We need to make sure this place is clean. Fucking cops are at the front gate with a warrant, and from what I just saw on the video feed, they aren't going to wait patiently for admittance.”
“On it,” my brother reassured me as he pulled out his phone. “They couldn’t have waited until morning, though? I’m fucking beat,” he griped.
Looking as tired as I felt, Vanni veered off to handle his part of the preparations— clearing the security footage and disabling the system. After the dirty cops were able to waltz in and Eden was taken, from our own fucking house no less, we'd set plans for just this situation. We weren’t stupid, they wouldn't leave us holding our dicks in our hands this time. All of us had known someone would eventually make a move against us, trying to take us out of the equation. Personally, I'd expected it a bit sooner.
I agreed with his sentiment wholeheartedly, tired myself, but at least we had the cover of darkness in our favor. It made removing, and then later replacing, the few things to be hidden a simpler task.
Marco kept pace with me, his limp barely noticeable, until I thought he’d forgotten I’d told him to get Santos. But as we neared the end of the hall, he slowed.
“Is he in there again?” I asked, coming to a stop with a worried stare at the closed door. At Marco’s nod, I shook my head. There wasn’t time to mess with it. Santos and his new propensity to sleep in Eden’s room was a massive red flag, but so far that was all he was doing. No fighting, no women, no booze. He did what was asked of him and worked out; other than that, he spent most of his time holed up doing who knew what. “Get him out of there, quickly, and ditch the hardware.”
Marco winked, giving me a salute before beating a fist on the bedroom door. “Yo, Santa, get your jolly ass up. I’m coming in!” Again, all I could do was shake my head. The man had a screw loose, or four, and if he kept fucking with Santos, he was liable to get a few more knocked out. At this point, our enforcer was nothing more than a lit fuse away from going off.
* * *
"We didn't fucking kidnap, Edie, you lying piece of shit!" Marco shouted as he was cuffed and forced none too gently into the back of a squad car. It all happened amid flashes and a line of reporters clamoring to get through the gate and around the police cruiser blocking the entrance. They all wanted to witness our arrest and show just how far the Carlottis could be taken down. We were far enough back that they probably wouldn't pick much up on their mics, but they weren't the only ones we had to worry about. It was a fifty-fifty chance whether the officers were wearing body cams like they were supposed to, and if they were, I was sure the footage would be leaked soon enough.
"Marco, shut it!" I snapped at him as my own hands were directed behind me. The clicking zip of the metal cuffs came a second after the cold, unyielding material hit my wrists. He fucking knew better than to run his mouth, but a small part of me couldn't blame him, even I had to admit that their bullshit charges was far-fetched. Conspiracy this, kidnap that, and...a double homicide that I knew nothing about. At the moment, I couldn't exactly ask the others if they'd done it without telling me. Someone had found and taken out the two dirty cops that had hurt Eden and shot Marco, but as far as I was aware, it wasn't any of us.
"You want to tell me where she is, then? Or how to contact her?" the cop asked Marco, a sly smirk on his face. He knew there was no way in hell we'd let them anywhere near her, not that we even had any idea where she was at.
Vanni could probably find out if he really wanted to, and maybe he was already quietly keeping tabs on her, but he'd never say a damn thing unless she was in trouble and he couldn't get to her himself. Little brother was all in with her, just as Marco blatantly was, but I thought he was trying to hide it until he knew me and Santos were on the same page. I was, and Santos had likely come to his own conclusions by now with the way he was acting, but I had decided to wait until I could tell Eden directly before I let anyone know I was as hung up on her as they were.
"Is that the only way you can get a girl's number?" Marco taunted in return. He was going to get his ass kicked before we even got through processing. I sighed as the cop ignored him, slamming the door on anything else my mouthy cousin might have to say.
I glanced at my father as I turned and dropped down into the back of the squad car. He gave me a nod of reassurance, already on the phone and barking orders. I was sure the attorneys would have us out by morning at the latest. This was a minor inconvenience at best, and I didn't know what they hoped to gain by it.
As the cavalcade that had come to arrest the four of us turned around and headed out, I hoped that Eden had the sense to lay low. No doubt her picture was about to be plastered across national news stations. A small, selfish part of me contradicted that, wanting her home where she belonged, but I squashed that thought down and buried it deep. It wasn't safe for her, or any of us really, until the city was firmly back under the Families' control and Santos' father was dead.
Dad and the head of the Finellis had spent the last month cleaning house and shoring up their truce—nothing like a third player trying to usurp the seat of power to bring out the ruthless dons in full, united, force.
* * *
As we were taken into the precinct, Detective Fields came slamming out with an empty holster in hand and fury pinching his features into a scowl. He'd stepped up for Eden, and again today, even though he'd rather have nailed our balls to the wall than join forces with the same people he wanted to put away. I hated to admit it, but the dude was a good cop. Too bad we were on opposite sides of the line.
The cops that led us in smirked as he went past, giving him shit about being suspended. Despite being sure he saw us, he didn't even attempt to make eye contact, and the first inkling that shit was about to go down crept through my mind.
"Looks like you're losing your cop buddies all over the place,” the officer jeered, holding my elbow just tightly enough to pinch. I made a mental note to teach him a lesson after all of this was over. We couldn’t let this disrespect stand without setting a bad precedent. Also, with only Fields’ text to warn us, I had to wonder what had happened to our other contacts, and why we weren’t aware of them disappearing.
I didn't bother responding—it wasn't worth it—and thankfully, Santos, Vanni, and Marco were also keeping their mouths shut as we were paraded through the precinct like living trophies. And I supposed we were.
A sense of relief filled me at seeing our attorneys coming in as we were taken individually to have our fingerprints, scars, and tattoos recorded. By the time I made it into an interrogation room to have my statement recorded, I gathered that I wasn't actually going to be getting out of there for a while.
They seemed to be dragging the whole process out, and I was getting impatient to be done with the farce. They didn’t have shit on us. Nothing concrete at any rate. It was either a gimmick to buy time, or maybe to wear on us in the hopes that one of us would lose our temper, but whatever the reason, their ability to do so without repercussions was a concern.
My suspicions were confirmed once the charges were leveled at us, or at least me, though I assumed it was the same with the others. Supposedly, there was a witness that said they had seen all four of us leaving the scene of not one, but both former officers’ murder scenes. As if that weren’t enough, Eden hadn't turned up yet, so she was considered a missing person, with all of us as the prime suspects for her disappearance. I was threatened with more than just kidnapping charges. If they were able to find any shred of evidence that suggested otherwise, I'd be up on another suspected murder charge. I also knew they weren’t above manufacturing that evidence after this bullshit.
The thought occurred that they might not have to make anything up at all, and I prayed that she was still okay, that she would use the burner phone to touch base with someone, because if they'd found her and harmed her at all, they were all fucking dead. I’d level the fucking building and anyone in it. With a sense of surreality, I watched as my attorney shook his head and got to his feet as it was declared that I’d be held until I could see a judge to petition for bail. I can’t believe this shit is happening.
* * *
After an uncomfortable, sleepless night on cots, in open cells without any privacy, morning finally came. We weren't in the same one together, but we were near each other, enough that we could at least see that we were all okay. It was better than not knowing, but I was still waiting for the punchline to this joke of an arrest.
It was only a matter of time until we had our arraignment and could get out on bail—unfortunately, it was enough time to give the guards and other inmates the chance to execute their plan. Bring the Carlottis down another peg.
We were taken to the showers and given the hotel-sized toiletries, but we never got a chance to use them. The guard that was supposed to be watching the open showers shut the door after we filed in, drawing his firearm and keeping it steadily pointed in my direction. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that we were about to be in for the fight of our lives, yet what happened after, I could have never predicted. It just wasn't something that was done, not to us anyway, and it wasn’t something we had ever been interested in doing to others.