Chapter 4

 When she had first heard the ping of the elevator, Raven had quickly moved into her hiding place. The air shaft vent was located low on the wall inside the bedroom. The cover held in place by four small screws were easily removed by the small screwdriver she carried in her backpack. She barely had time to get inside before Yuri and Kosta were inside the room. She’d hardly dared to breathe when the two men were inside searching the room. Her fingers locked in place as she’d held the cover to the shaft in place.

Raven had then waited another fifteen minutes before she unfolded her small body and came out of hiding. Carefully leaning the cover against the wall, she now crawled out of the vent and slowly stood. Lucky for her she was flexible enough to still get into small places. At only five feet tall, she was small enough to go unnoticed by most. Replacing the screws, she moved to the kitchen area.

She didn’t go to the front door. Instead, she moved to the service elevator or the dumbwaiter system. Crawling inside, she opened the top panel and shimmied through the roof. Coming out on the top, she closed the metal plate and began climbing up the shaft. The top of the penthouse was only a crawl space width but Raven maneuvered herself into the space and wiggled into position. Flipping herself over, she crawled over to the vent and opened it to let herself out onto the roof.

Closing the vent again, she moved over to where she’d gained access. Finding her rope coiled and waiting for her, she attached it to her belt. Lowering herself over the edge of the building, she moved along the outside. Then as she kept a lookout below, she let herself down to the street.

Quickly and quietly, she detached the rope then flicking her wrist, a ripple snapped the rope free. When the hook hit the sidewalk she quickly coiled the length, shoved it into her pack and walked away, heading to her ten speed.

After riding across town again, Raven arrived at her apartment.

As soon as she closed the door Nicky asked, “How did it go?”

Raven grimaced. “He almost caught me.”

Nicky groaned as he hung his head low.

Raven sighed. “Please don’t do that again. Yuri Anatoly is a dangerous man.”

“Then why the hell are you working for him?” Nicky demanded.

Raven shrugged. “When we came here three years ago, I was tired of running, tired of looking over my shoulder. All that time waiting for Carlos to find me. I thought, what better place to hide than under the nose of the Russian Bratva? Carlos isn’t a stupid man and he has his enemies too, and I think Yuri is one of them. He would never come here willingly and that is our safeguard.”

“How do you know Carlos will avoid this place?” Nicky asked. 

Raven looked over at her brother. “Because the last job I did for Carlos was the night he held you prisoner, do you remember?” Fear rippled through her voice.

Nicky swallowed hard. “I remember. They put me in that damn closet and locked me in there.” He shuddered. “I hated that damn place.”

Raven nodded. “Carlos had me break into a house on Cannel Street, down by the docks. I didn’t know it but the Russian Bratva’s accountant lived there. He wanted me to steal some flash drives in the safe. I got the flash drives but I also found evidence of what they were. I knew if I took them back to Carlos he would make us both disappear, so I did what Carlos didn’t expect. I took the drives and came back to the house to get you. I watched the house and saw Carlos and his friends celebrating in the garage. I could hear everything they said.” Tears rolled down her face as she recalled the past.

Her brother shook his head sadly.

 She wiped her tears away. “Carlos was never going to let us go. He had grandiose plans to take over this city. Do you know what was on those flash drives? The Bratva’s bank accounts and the billions of dollars they control. Carlos and his no good friends were going to steal the money and force them to hand over this territory. He was going to start a war no one could…win for money.”

Nicky sat down in the chair hard. He hadn’t seen Carlos in almost a decade and didn’t miss him at all. They’d spent their last few years in the system with Carlos and his wife Rachel but he’d been a kid back then. He hadn’t understood everything Raven had done to keep him safe from Carlos and his unsavory friends until much later. The fact that Carlos taught him how to steal had impressed the young boy he was then, now as a young man… not so much. “What happened to the flash drives?” 

“I hid them all these years,” Raven admitted. “I couldn’t put us in danger by giving them to Carlos. As soon as he got his hands on them, he would have killed us. That’s what his plans were.”

Nicky nodded. “I know, I heard him and Rachel talking after they locked me up. They had buyers all lined up. I wanted to tell you but I couldn’t, you were already gone by then and when you came back, there wasn’t time. You grabbed me and we left. After that, we were already on the run and I didn’t think about it again.”

“We were trying too hard to survive.” Raven nodded. “Staying under the radar while trying to survive was really hard.”

Nicky smiled. “Yeah, but we did it, didn’t we? Working together, we can do anything.”

Raven walked over to her brother and took his hands in hers. “We can and that’s why right now, we have to be smart, little brother.”