Sins Of The Syndicate

The Glass Cage

The discharge from the clinic happened in the middle of the night. Julian Vane didn’t wait for the sun to come up.

By four in the morning, a nurse was helping me out of the hospital gown and into a set of oversized grey sweats. My hip felt like it had a hot iron pressed against it, and walking was more of a shuffle than a stride, but Julian was in a hurry.

"The longer we stay in one place, the easier the trail is to follow," he said, standing by the door. He had swapped his suit jacket for a dark sweater, but he still looked like he lived in a different world than mine.

He didn't ask me to walk to the car. He had a wheelchair waiting. I hated it, but when I tried to put weight on my left leg, a sharp spike of pain shot up my spine and made my vision go blurry.

I sat down and let them wheel me out.

We went out through a basement exit. No sirens, no bright lights. Just a black SUV idling in the rain.

"Is this your house?" I asked as we pulled away.

I watched the blurred lights of Madrid through the tinted glass. Every time a pair of headlights appeared behind us, my heart did a painful gallop against my ribs.

"One of them," Julian replied. He was looking at his phone, his thumb sliding across the screen. "It’s a villa outside the main city. High walls, private security. You’ll be able to sleep there without looking at the door every five minutes."

"You don't know who is looking for me," I whispered. I leaned my head against the cold window.

"You think walls can stop them? They aren't just criminals, Julian. They're the ones who own the people who build the walls."

Julian finally looked up. His eyes were calm, scary calm.

"I’ve spent ten years building a business in a city where everyone wants a piece of the pie. I know how the world works, Sofia. I know about the Thorne Syndicate. And I know Leonardo."

I froze. My breath caught in my throat. "You know him?"

"By reputation," Julian corrected quickly. "He’s a shark. But even sharks can't breathe out of water. My home is my water. He has no reach there."

I didn't believe him, but I was too tired to argue.

The drive took forty minutes. We wound up in the hills where the air got thinner and the houses got further apart.

I was thinking hard all through the drive about how he was able to figure out it was Julian behind the hit before the horn interrupted.

When the gates opened, I saw what he meant. The villa was a fortress of glass and white stone, perched on the edge of a cliff. It looked beautiful, but to me, it just looked like another cage. A more expensive one, but still a cage.

Julian helped me inside. The floors were marble and the lights came on automatically as we moved. He led me to a bedroom on the second floor. It was huge, with a balcony that looked out over the dark valley.

"This wing is yours," Julian said, gesturing to the room. "There’s a cord by the bed. If you need a nurse, pull it. If you need me, hit the intercom."

I hobbled over to the edge of the bed and sat down. The silk sheets felt like a mockery of the emerald rags I’d been wearing at the Golden Lily.

"Julian?"

He stopped in the doorway. "Yeah?"

"Why are you doing this?" I asked. "A man like you doesn't just pick up a bleeding girl off the road and hide her from the Mafia for fun. What do you want?"

Julian didn't answer right away. He looked at the floor, then back at me. For a split second, his "billionaire" mask slipped, and I saw a flash of something raw. Something that looked like a very old, very deep anger.

“Leonardo Thorne took something from me once,” he said, his voice dropping to a low hum. “Something I can never get back.”

His grip tightened slightly around the door frame, his jaw hardening for a brief second before the expression vanished.

“Sooner or later, Sofia… you’ll understand.”

Before I could ask what he meant, he stepped out into the hallway.

He didn’t wait for me to respond. His footsteps faded into the silence of the villa, leaving me alone with the weight of his words.

I laid back on the bed, my body finally giving in. I was in a fortress. I was guarded by a man who hated my captor as much as I did. But as I closed my eyes, all I could hear was Leonardo’s voice in the back of the club.

You are my debt to be collected.

I touched the bandages on my hip. The debt wasn't paid. It was just growing. And in the silence of the big villa, I realized that Julian Vane might be my savior, but he was also using me. I wasn't a guest. I was a weapon.

I fell asleep dreaming of fire and silver blades.