Hell, most of the women might not come back after tonight, depending on what happens with Randy. When we deliver him to the police with all the evidence we find, it will most likely come out that A Secret is actually a whorehouse and not just a strip club, and this place will be shut down for good.
“I’m in the attic,” Brian’s voice comes through our earpieces. “Give me five and you’ll be clear.”
Corbin and I go back up the hallway toward the door that enters into the nightclub, turning right instead and finding the elevator close by.
“The surveillance feeds are all on a loop, so just stick to the shadows, boys,” Seth says from Heather’s car, and we back into a doorway to wait until Brian gives the all clear.
Time seems to be irrelevant. It feels like it’s slowed down to a snail’s pace, the seconds ticking by like minutes or hours. But in the same breath, it seems like we’ve only been here a split second. I feel the urgency to hurry and get to Astrid, but the dread at what I might find is fucking with me. We need to get this over with. We need to find my girl, and I don’t give a shit what happens after that.
But at the same time, I do. This motherfucker ruined my life once, and now he’s trying to do it again. If anything goes down, I want to be the one to throw his ass in jail. I want to be the one to cause the life to leave his eyes, the way he did Shelly’s. He might not have held the knife that slit her wrists, but what he did to her, the way he taunted her afterward, was the guiding hand around hers.
“You’re clear. When you come out of the elevator, stay low and as far against the wall as you can, and the guards at the bottom of the staircases shouldn’t be able to see you at their level. Second floor is clear,” Brian repeats, and a surge of adrenaline shoots through my system like NOS in a racecar.
Like magic, the elevator doors open before us without us even having to push the button. At first, I jerk to the side, out of view in case it’s someone who came down from the second floor, but Corbin gives me a half-smile, pulling me back toward the doors and gesturing me in.
“Your chariot awaits,” Seth says through the earpiece, and I realize he must’ve brought it down. His skills never cease to amaze me.
As the doors shut us in for the quick ride, my skin feels like ants are crawling all over me. The anxiousness I feel, I know for a fact I’d never be able to do this or anything close to this as an actual job. When I look at Corbin in the reflection of the doors, he’s completely calm, looking like he’s on his way up to a spa appointment or something, not into battle with a fucking suspected murderer.
“We’ve got her, Doc. It’s going to be okay. The minute we lay eyes on her, you snatch her up and run. I’ll take care of the rest,” he says low, and while I agree nearly wholeheartedly with his plan, the idea of it lets in a sliver of regret, regret that it won’t be me to finally make this piece of shit pay. But Astrid is the most important thing. She’s my main focus, and everything else doesn’t matter. It’ll play out the way fate wants.
The elevator comes to a stop, my stomach dipping, and the doors open silently. I stay back as Corbin glances out, checking in all directions, and then follow his lead, hurrying to the back wall and ducking low as we cross to the other side of the staircases’ landing. A glimpse to the left shows the grand foyer, and we make it to the other side without anyone yelling in our direction.
We stride down the corridor, and over Corbin’s shoulder I see Brian squatted down in front of a door. His hands are up at eye level, and as we grow closer, I see he’s silently picking the lock on the door. There’s no surveillance in his own personal room, so we have no idea what we’re going to be bursting in on.
Or so I think.
When the lock is undone, Brian pulls out what looks like a clear tube and plugs it into his phone. He curves the end of it and slips it slowly beneath the bottom of the door. He touches an app, and suddenly the screen is filled with the image of someone’s feet not far from the camera.
He twists it a bit, and the image travels up a pair of legs, over a dress, and then up until I see my goddess, my Astrid standing there, her face paralyzed with fear, her arms up in surrender. Everything in me wants to bust through the wood the separates us, but Corbin latches onto my shoulder to keep me still. Brian maneuvers the camera again, and what I see on the screen of his phone makes the blood drain from my face.