Against the Dark by Carolyn Crane Read Free Book Online

were still leaving. The kitchen staffers were in a line to head out, waiting for the guards to frisk them. Cole pretended to care. To be alert. That’s when he caught sight of her.
    Angel.
    Her hair was all mussed and black mascara bled down her cheeks like she’d been crying. Adrenaline shot through him and he fought the urge to go to her, ask if she was okay, get the name of who she’d been with.
    And destroy him.
    Focus, he told himself. This was one woman. A lot of people were about to die, and this was just one woman who’d damn well known what she was getting into when she came to the party.
    He looked away. He was tired, that’s all. His search for the secret safe was all-consuming now—he hadn’t slept for too many nights.
    But he’d taken her piece. Maybe she wouldn’t have gotten worked over like that if he hadn’t taken her piece. He still didn’t know what had gotten into him, seeing her. He’d felt like an animal darting after something shiny, and he’d just gone for her, needing to engage with her, frisk her.
    Fatigue. Desperation. That’s all.
    He never went for the hookers. Not that he was some boy scout—there was nothing he loved more than a woman on her knees, begging to be fucked or whatever, but he only loved it if she loved it, he only enjoyed it if his dirty talk or clever fingers had brought her to that point—not money or drugs or threats. What kind of man wanted to be with a woman who didn’t desire him?
    Stupid question. He’d spent that last nine months surrounded by men like that.
    Angel was talking to the coat check girl now. The woman handed over her gun. Angel glanced at him briefly. He made her nervous. He took a step toward her even as he knew he should stay away.
    “Forgot my pistol,” she said.
    This made him sad. That gun was no pistol; it was a powerful little semi-automatic with mother of pearl inlay. She really didn’t belong in such a place. He smiled, wanting to show her he wasn’t a threat. “You know how to use that thing?”
    “I’ve shot it,” she said.
    “If you’re going to carry something like that, you should go to the range and practice at least every six months.”
    She nodded, seeming wired and wrung out. Some of her dark hair was plastered to her forehead as though she’d been sweating. Sweating and crying. He felt his pulse speed.
    Stop.
    She turned and left. Couldn’t wait to get out of there. Well, could he blame her? The party girls—that’s what Borgola called them—had been paid well to come and party. An economic exchange.
    Still, it made him crazy, her looking like that. A man using her roughly.
    He watched her leave with her friend. At least the night would be over for them.
    Mapes sidled up beside him. “Old man offed Sturnvaal.”
    Cole swallowed.
    Mapes stifled a grin. “With a candlestick in the library.”
    Cole fake laughed. Mapes had an idiotic sense of humor, but it was important that his enemies felt smart and comfortable tonight.
    So Borgola had killed Sturnvaal, the head of the security team, probably with a gun in his office. The burglary attempt had ruined his party. Wasn’t that Management 101? To kill your people when they made mistakes? Cole patted Mapes on his back. “Somebody’s going to get promoted.”
    “Might be you,” Mapes said.
    “Doubt it.” Cole hoped to hell it wouldn’t be him.
    Borgola’s assistant came up. Borgola wanted to see both of them in his office.
    “Both?” Mapes muttered under his breath as they headed down the lavish hall under chandeliers draped with pearls.
    “Sure hope he’s not making us co-leaders,” Cole said. “Co-leaders doesn’t work.” He did not want a power struggle with Mapes.
    Mapes gave him a dark look. In addition to the blood stains on his police record, Mapes had a pedigree of vicious killings under Borgola—hell, Mapes was one of Borgola’s most effective killers. He deserved to be the leader of the security team.
    Borgola’s study was a book-lined