Dane

Dane was pretty confident his instincts had been correct. The bouncer led him into the strip club that was a front for every kind of nasty and perverted branch of organized crime in the city that could be imagined. It was empty now, the floor still littered with trash and sticky puddles from the night before. But Dane knew it was only waiting to be brought to life. The housekeeping staff would come through any minute. And a few hours after that the girls and the bar staff would begin to arrive. A long line of miserable, underpaid, overworked, intimidated staff that kept dingy holes like this one ticking.

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Meanwhile, the rooms and floors above and behind held the real business. There real money.

As expected the Bouncer led him across the floor of the club to a door marked STAFF ONLY just beyond the first bar. It opened into a wide hallway with a linoleum floor, and gray walls, with doorways off each side every ten feet or so. But they didn't stop at one of those doors, they walked the entire hallway, to the door at the end marked EMERGENCY EXIT ONLY. To the warehouse space beyond that where Dane was told to sit in a little white room for a few minutes, then three men entered, their eyes shining at him.

Dane sighed, but didn't fight as they cuffed his hands and put a blindfold over his eyes. Then two of them took an elbow each and led him into the parking lot and crammed him into the back of a car that wasn't big or comfortable like Dane's towncars.

But while he was driven around for what had to be at least twenty minutes, he paid attention. He couldn't see anything except the darkness of the inside of the blindfold. But he could feel the car, feel his own weight shift. And the turns were almost all right-hand, with long straight lines through the city streets between them.

By the time they slowed and took a left, he knew the route had ultimately been a big circle. And the grate the car rolled over leaving the original carpark had the same noise as the one they ran over moving back into this new building.

He also heard the same ding in the elevator.

His father had been here, right nearby. Only a few miles from his offices, just as Dane had suspected. Or at least, Doug Daniels had space here that he was using—and probably for Lila. Dane took a deep breath and sat quietly in the car.

Minutes later he'd been dragged out of the car, walked between the two men again to an elevator that stopped twice. Then, when they got out, they walked a long, carpeted hallway that smelled like a corporate office building. Somewhere along that hallway, Dane was tugged into a room and urged to sit in a leather chair that was slightly too small for him—especially with his hands restrained behind his back.

He was left there for quite a while—either alone, or with someone who was expert at making themselves still and quiet. He did his best not to seem threatening. He sat where he'd been put, didn't try to look under the blindfold, and didn't fight the cuffs. He hoped they'd take them off soon, though. He'd tweaked that shoulder the other day and it was aching already.

That made him think about Lila, which made his palms sweat. He cursed himself for losing the numb calm that he needed. He couldn't afford to fuck this up.

When the door opened, a spear of adrenalin shot through him as three pairs of feet entered. He forced himself to wait without asking as one of the people came to stand behind him, while the others walked around in front of him.

A moment later hands tugged at the blindfold and Dane was blinking into the light of a lamp on the end of a massive executive desk in a room that was distinctly masculine—lined in cherry wood panels, plush carpet, and expensive furnishings.

There was art on the walls, two doors leading out of the room, and a second leather chair next to where he sat. But none of that mattered. Because for the first time in eight years, Dane sat in front of his father, face-to-face.

Douglas Daniels had come to stand in front of the desk, leaned back against it, his arms folded, staring at Dane like he was some kind of science experiment that had to be figured out.

"Cuffs, Dad, really?" He turned his head to scan the room. "And two guards?" he looked at his father again. "Don't feel safe with me, even in the middle of your hideout?"

"I'm not stupid, Dane."

Dane met his eyes and smirked. His father lifted a single eyebrow in an expression so like the one Dane knew he made, it was eerie.

Dane scanned him and his stomach dropped. It was like looking in a mirror that aged him twenty years. Less. His father was looking well. He tilted his head and watched Dane, a hunger on his face that Dane had to believe was calculated—surely his father wouldn't be so obvious? There was a scrape on his cheek that was fresh, that made Dane's fists clench. But he ignored it. Made himself cold. Untouched.

"Why are you here?" his father asked quietly.

Dane shook his head. "Don't play games. Not with me."

"Answer the question, Dane. I want to hear it out of your lips."

Dane leaned forward and held his father's gaze. "I'm here to make sure Lila's safe. And if she is, I'm going to give you what you want—as long as you let her go."

"What is it that you think I want?" he asked, his voice low.

Dane snorted. "We both know what you want—what you've wanted all along. The prodigal son has returned, Dad. I'm here. And I'll stay. As long as you let her go."

His father's gaze had the glint of razor-wire.