The Grandmaster's Pawn Page 4

  She sucks in a breath.

  “Gemma is the assistant curator at the British Museum.” I squeeze my eyes shut for a moment, then admit the truth. “And I think I’ve fallen for her. Ulrich broke into her flat and took her. He will hurt her. She means nothing to him. And everything to me.”

  Explaining my actions—how Gemma became more than a mark—to Tatiana grates, but I need her to understand why I have to do this. As I finish, my primary mobile vibrates. “This is too soon,” I mutter, but the words die in my throat when I see Gemma’s battered face come into focus.

  The worst part of the video is the betrayal and shame in her eyes as Ulrich tells her who I am. What I am. Why I first approached her. Tears stream down her cheeks, and her entire body shakes as she moans weakly. The knife at her throat draws a single bead of blood, and all I can see is my future, Gemma’s future, slipping away from me.

  “Daniel. Daniel!” Tatiana snaps at me. “Focus. If you want this woman to live, you need to listen to me. We have much work to do.”

  She’s right. But on screen, Ulrich grabs Gemma by the throat and propels her into a small, dark closet. And when he slams the door, her screams are all I hear.

  Gemma

  How long have I been here? The hours blend together. Endless darkness, Nora’s cries—or are those mine?— and the cold. So cold.

  My throat is raw from screaming, and the tape has torn at my lips. I tried to throw myself against the door, but my left leg won’t hold my weight, and with my wrists tied, every movement brings more pain. The ropes are sticky with blood now, and my fingers are numb.

  The lock thunks, and bright light floods the small space. I can’t see anything but a massive shadow. Matthias, I think. He yanks the tape from my lips, pulls my head back by my hair, and pours some water down my throat.

  It tastes so good, I try to swallow as much as I can, but too quickly, he tosses the bottle away. He doesn’t bother to put the tape back on when he locks me in the dark once more, but i can’t manage more than a hoarse whisper.

  There’s a giant hole inside me. It burns, both hot and cold, right where my heart used to be. I trusted Daniel. I cared for him. And he used me. I’m nothing to him. Just a pawn. One who’s time is quickly going to run out.

  Curled in a corner with my eyes screwed shut, I picture my bedroom. The purple duvet, the scarves that give the lamps such a beautiful glow. Too quickly, though, the vision fades, and there’s only endless darkness and my sister’s faint cries as she begs me to help her.

  Hours pass before I hear voices in the basement. “You are certain? Our men will be in place?” Ulrich.

  “Yes, Herr Ulrich. They know to wait until the painting is safe and then kill Hastings...slowly.”

  Oh God. I knew. From the moment they took me, I knew they’d never let me go. Me or Daniel. But hearing it... I start to hyperventilate and shrink further against the wall, my bound wrists aching and sending sparks down my numb fingers.

  If they’re down here, they’re going to come for me, and I don’t know if I’ll live more than another few minutes.

  I yelp as someone unlocks the door. “Please,” I beg when I get a whiff of Ulrich’s breath. “I...I’ll forget...all of this. Just let me go.”

  He barks a laugh, then wraps his thick fingers around my bicep and pulls me out into the light before he lets me crumple to the floor.

  “Listen to me, you little whore,” he says, his lips only inches from mine. I cough and turn my head, but he grabs my chin hard enough to leave bruises and forces me to look at him. “You are going to behave, or you will suffer. Do you understand?” He squeezes my throat, cutting off my air, and my feet scramble for purchase on the cold concrete.

  As my vision darkens, he lets me go, and I suck in huge lungfuls of air. By the time I no longer feel like I’m going to pass out, he has his phone in hand. Matthias comes up behind me, clamps his hand over my mouth, and pulls me up, my feet dangling helplessly two inches off the ground.

  “Daniel, you have ninety minutes to bring my Lady to Tivoli Park. My associate will meet you. Once you hand her over, I will tell you where your little toy is.”

  Tears burn my eyes until I hear Daniel’s strained voice. “I need proof of life, Ulrich. And don’t send me another bloody video. I want to speak to Gemma. Now.”

  Despite the pain in my heart, hearing him upset—desperate—does something to me. He cares for me. I know he does. There’s nothing that will make me trust him again, but it wasn’t all a ruse.

  Can I send him a message? Something to let him know where I am? Lordship Lane?

  Ulrich turns towards me, and though I can’t see Daniel, not without my glasses, movement registers on the camera screen. “Say something, Miss Watson,” Ulrich sneers.

  “Daniel?” I rasp. Matthias still holds me up, one arm banded tightly under my breasts, the other at my throat. “I can’t...” Looking to Ulrich, I beg, “Please. I’m blind without my glasses and I need to...see him.”

  He makes a vague harumph sound and steps closer. Daniel’s face is still so blurry I can’t make out his eyes, but the terror in his voice is so obvious.

  “Gemma. I am so sorry. Have they hurt you?” He curses under his breath. “Fuck me, I can see the bruises, but...bijou, did they...?”

  “N-no.” I sniffle loudly. “All those nights playing chess...were they all a lie?” I can think of only one way to work the word Lord into anything Ulrich would let me tell Daniel, and it’s so obscure, I don’t know if it’ll even work.

  “Fuck me. No, but you must listen now, Gemma. What would you play if I started our game by moving my pawn to e4?” The anguish in his voice makes my tears spill over.

  He understands. And he’s giving me the chance to tell him something.

  “The Scottish de Sigello gambit,” I whisper. Then, because I can’t help myself, I add, “I’m scared, Daniel.”

  I can’t see his expression, only a bright glow and a hint of dark hair from the blurry phone screen in Ulrich’s hand. But Daniel’s voice softens. “I know, darling. I will fix this. I promise. And when we’re together again—”

  “Enough,” Ulrich barks and turns the phone back around. “Tivoli Park, ninety minutes. Or you will never see Miss Watson again.”

  Before Ulrich can disconnect the call, I scream, “Don’t trust him, Daniel! Run!”

  Matthias curses and slaps his hand over my mouth, drags me back to the closet and shoves me so hard, my head hits the wall. Somewhere underneath my pounding heart, I hear the closet door slam, but darkness has already taken my sight, and I let myself give in. I can’t fight any more. I don’t want to. I just want to sleep.

  Eight

  Daniel

  After Gemma’s scream, Ulrich prattles on for another few seconds, vague threats about carving his name into her flesh before he cuts off her head. Both of which I know he’s capable of. But my mind is racing. De Sigello isn’t a known gambit.

  “I’ll be there, you son of a bitch. Just…” My voice cracks, and I can’t keep a single moment of vulnerability from slipping through my control. “Don’t hurt her again.”

  “What I do with her depends on you, Daniel. Show up with my Lady, and your bitch will live.”

  The call disconnects, and on the video screen to my left, Tatiana clucks her tongue. “That bastard deserves what is coming to him.”

  “And more. Did you get anything off the trace?”

  She shakes her head. “He is still in London. But that is all I can tell you. He is a brute who hates technology, but he knows how to mask his mobile signal. And as you are not going anywhere near Tivoli Park, we have less than ninety minutes to find them.”

  “There is nothing I will not do to save her, Tatiana. If that means bringing the Lady to Tivoli Park, I will do it.”

  “And you will die.” With a huff, Tatiana pins me with a hard stare. “Do not think for a moment Ulrich will do what he promised. He will not let Miss Watson go, and he will not let you live.”

>   She’s right. But if I lose Gemma, I will not survive it. Turning to my keyboard, I bring up a search engine and search for De Sigello. “What would a twelfth century Scottish lord have to do with Gemma? Or me?”

  “It is not a chess move?” Tatiana asks.

  “No.”

  “Send me the first video.” Her voice holds a tone I recognize. One that tells me she’s caught a scent. If she has, she won’t let go until she knows exactly where it leads.

  “Uploading now.”

  Forty-five minutes later, I pull the black knit cap lower as the car coasts to a gentle stop two streets over from where I pray Ulrich is holding Gemma. Unbeknownst to me, Tatiana started trying to triangulate Ulrich’s location from the moment he left Gemma’s flat. She’d already tracked him to this sector of the city, but lost the car because of a faulty traffic camera.

  There’s only one street in this area with the word Lord in the name, and two entire blocks around it are slated to be demolished in a month. I can feel it. Ulrich is close. He’d want somewhere no one would see him. Somewhere she could scream.

  The video haunts me. The bruises on her face, her neck. I did this to her. Ulrich may have thrown the punches, but Gemma is suffering because of me.

  “It is done,” Tatiana says in my ear. “You must be gone in fifteen minutes, Daniel. If you are not, I cannot help you.”

  “You’ve done enough.” I swallow the lump in my throat. “More than enough. For so many years. I owe you my life ten times over, Tati.”

  “You do. And you will repay me by putting an end to Ulrich for good. In case we do not speak again, goodbye, Daniel.”

  I crush the earbud under my heel, sling my bag over my shoulder, and take off at a run. My shoes make almost no noise on the empty sidewalks, and the streetlights are mostly broken in this run-down neighborhood. Still, I keep to the shadows. Listening.

  On Lordship Lane, I slow and pull a tiny device out of my pocket. Flicking the switch, I wait for the light to blink green, then red. No cell signals in the first house. I know Ulrich. He’ll stick to the middle row houses, wanting as much space on each side of him as possible.

  Six houses later, the light flips to green, and I press myself against the front wall of a dilapidated two story tear-down. The signal isn’t strong enough yet, so I creep forward until I see a faint light coming from the front window of the next house over. The curtains are drawn, but this has to be it.

  Scaling the fence, I drop down against the side wall. Brilliant. Tatiana was right. A hopper window at ground level. On the video call, the arse holding Gemma was standing in front of a bare concrete wall. A basement wall. I withdraw a set of tools from my bag and have the lock picked in under a minute, the entire window pane removed in two. Nine minutes until Gemma and I have to be out of here. Fuck me.

  The basement is blessedly empty, only a dim bulb in the center of the room providing any light. A single table and chair, a few boxes. Nothing else save for a set of stairs leading up to the ground floor and a door in the corner. With a padlock on it.

  It takes me only seconds to pick it, and when the door swings open, my heart shatters.

  Gemma is huddled in the corner, her arms tied behind her back, her head on her bent knees. She shudders and stifles a sob but doesn’t react to me at all.

  “Gemma.”

  No response. Wherever her mind is, she can’t hear me.

  “Gemma. Look at me,” I order as I kneel next to her. I don’t want to touch her until she knows who I am, but how can I reach her? “Pawn to e4.”

  Her breath hitches, and she stills.

  “Pawn to e4,” I repeat. “Your move, Gemma.”

  Her voice is barely a whisper, rough and hoarse. “Pawn to c5.”

  “The Sicilian Defense. Your favorite.” I try to keep my tone gentle, but if she doesn’t recognize me soon, I’ll have to scoop her up and run, damn her fear.

  “Daniel?” She squints up at me, her eyes unfocused and wild. “I can’t…see…”

  Pulling her glasses from my pocket, I slide them onto her nose. They’re a little crooked; one of the ear pieces isn’t completely straight any longer. Gemma’s left eye is almost swollen shut, but she scans my face and her lower lip wobbles.

  “You came.”

  “Of course I did, bijou. No one takes what’s mine. And you,” I meet her gaze before I reach behind her and cut the ropes around her wrists, “are definitely mine.”

  “You lied to me.”

  Nothing I can say in this moment will make up for using her, and we have only minutes before Tatiana’s plan is set into motion.

  “We have to be quick, luv,” I say as I scoop her into my arms and she buries her face against my neck. “When we get outside, can you run?” Setting her down on a short stack of pallets next to the window, I pull a tube from my bag.

  “I…I don’t know.” Trembling fingers rub at her knee, and the look on her face…it shatters me that I put it there.

  “How badly are you hurt?” The Lady slides from the tube, and I unfurl her in all her glory as Gemma gasps and betrayal wells in her pale green eyes. “You had it. The painting. He was right. You stole it from him.”

  “I’ve stolen a lot of things. But not anymore.” Laying the painting out on the table, I shake my head. “Never again. And the Lady never belonged to Ulrich.”

  This time, when I pull Gemma into my arms, she’s stiff, but we can argue later. Now, we only have five minutes to get the fuck out of here.

  Before I can lift her up so she can scramble out the window, a door slams, and Gemma screams.

  “Turn around, Daniel.” A knife pierces my wool sweater, the tip of the blade digging into my skin too close to my spine. “Your luck has finally run out.”

  Gemma

  Daniel’s entire body goes rigid, and he turns slowly with me still held in his arms. The look on Ulrich’s face...it’s pure glee, and the tip of his knife holds a smear of Daniel’s blood.

  “Ulrich. You have your Lady back. I am taking mine.”

  If I weren’t so scared, I’d probably rail at being called Daniel’s lady. After all, he lied to me. About…everything. But he also came for me. Not that we’re likely to get out of here now.

  Setting me down carefully, he steps in front of me. My knee sends shooting pains up my leg, and I grab onto Daniel’s waist to keep myself upright. It’s dark outside. It was dark when Ulrich took me. I’ve been here a full day. No food, barely any water. I’m dizzy and terrified.

  “You’ll do no such thing.” Ulrich gestures with the knife as he backs away from the crates we’re standing on. “Get down and perhaps I’ll kill Miss Watson quickly. You won’t have to watch her suffer.”

  Daniel meets my gaze over his shoulder. Fear churns in the depths of his green eyes as he looks towards the open window. It’s still a full three feet over my head. There’s no way I can climb up there. Not in my current state.

  I shake my head, tears welling in my eyes. With a hard swallow, Daniel jumps down, takes me by the waist, and sets me behind him again. ”Belt,” he mouths before turning back to Ulrich. “What now? Shall I dance a jig? Or do you prefer impressions? Charades?”

  Ulrich slams the hilt of the knife into Daniel’s jaw, and he stumbles back, crashing into me and knocking me against the crates. But I feel it. The hard bulge tucked in his waistband.

  “You will not be joking for long,” Ulrich snaps. “Soon, you’ll be nothing more than a stain on the sole of my shoe.”

  My fingers curl around a molded handle, and I pull a stun gun from Daniel’s belt as he takes his time getting to his feet. Quickly, I tuck it into the pocket of my flannel sleep pants.

  “Bugger,” Daniel says after spitting blood onto the concrete floor. “As if you have any right to judge me. You have at least six lives on your ledger. For all my faults, I’ve never killed anyone.”

  “Let’s make it an even eight,” Ulrich says. He springs forward, and Daniel sidesteps him, grabbing his arm and sending hi
m reeling into the wall.

  Matthias advances on me, his blade glinting in the dim overhead bulb. Cowering against the box we were just standing on, I beg, “Please, don’t.”

  “Been waiting for this,” he says with a grin. I turn to the side like I’m bracing for a blow, and yank the stun gun from my pocket. As the thug advances on me, I thrust the weapon against his groin and squeeze the trigger. A loud clicking noise startles me, and I almost lose my grip, but Matthias falls over with a high-pitched scream, his arms and legs twitching.

  Daniel grunts, and I look over to see him pinned under Ulrich, both hands wrapped around Ulrich’s wrist, trying to keep the knife from sinking into his chest.

  “Get off of him, asshole!” Diving forward, I jam the stun gun into Ulrich’s calf—the only part of him I can reach—and squeeze again. But the damn thing isn’t fully recharged, and he doesn’t go down, just kicks his leg out and catches me in the shoulder.

  The weapon goes flying, and I land flat on my back. But the momentary distraction is enough for Daniel. He knees Ulrich in the groin, and the big man screams like a baby.

  It’s over in seconds. Daniel pinches a spot on Ulrich’s neck, then another under his arm, and the man sinks to the ground with a moan and passes out. Matthias, who’s still twitching and whimpering like a baby gets the same treatment.

  Digging into his bag, Daniel pulls out a thick envelope and drops it on a table in the corner. With a final pat to Ulrich’s jacket pocket, he straightens and turns to me. Sirens blare in the distance. “We have to get out of here, Gemma. Right bloody now.”

  The wail of the police car gets louder as Daniel helps me to my feet and lifts me onto the box. “Out the window, luv. I’m right behind you.” Rolling out onto the weeds, I suck in fresh air as the rain starts to fall.

  Daniel climbs out after me, then scoops me into his arms and takes off at a jog down the street. “You’re safe now. I promise. No one will ever hurt you again.”

  I’m so tired, and I wish I could believe him. I let my head rest on his shoulder as four words run on a loop in my mind.