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“Don’t kill him yet. That would mess up the plan.” A female voice calls out from the shadows cast by the lights.
Click, click, click.
A tall, curvy brunette emerges from a different corner, strutting toward us with a gun in her hand pointed straight at my head. My jaw just about drops to the damn floor.
She stops directly in front of me, an evil smile tugging at her lips. “And the plan is going to make us very fucking rich.”
“Layla…” My voice trails off, my mind unable to find words. That doesn’t happen to me often, but right at this minute, I have no fucking clue what to even say.
“What are you going to do, Max?” She sneers at me. “You’re here to save the day, but it looks like you’ve just been outnumbered.” Layla leans toward me, resting the tip on my forehead. “Who do you think is going to save you now? Can you even save yourself?”
My throat tightens, my fingertips white, still hovered over the trigger. “What the hell are you doing here? And where is Sloane?”
“Put the gun down, Max,” she hisses. “You aren’t going to shoot me. We both know that. You want to get your girl, and I’m your only chance to find her.” She waves a hand at the guys around us. “If you try to take one of us out, you know exactly what will happen. And that would make some people very angry…angry enough to do things that will make your head spin right off your body.”
“Where is she?” I growl.
Layla lets out a shrill giggle. “Oh, sweetie, the where is not what you should be concerned about.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
Layla pushes my hand down because she knows I’m not going to shoot her. If she’s the only link I have to finding Sloane in this fucking tenement, she knows I’m not about to hurt her. “You’ll find out soon enough.” With a glance at her bodyguards, she nods at me and Rocco. “Take them upstairs.”
A meaty fist grabs my hair, yanking my head backward. “Drop the fucking gun, asshole,” he snarls. I drop the metal piece and it clatters to the floor. Fucknut doesn’t bother to frisk me, and he’s gonna be sorry about that later.
Very fucking sorry.
Another guy drags Rocco to an elevator in the far corner of the lobby, shaking the gun from his hand.
“Things didn’t need to turn out this way, Max,” Layla murmurs, following me as I’m thrown in to the elevator next to Rocco.
“What do you think your father would say, Layla? To see you working with our enemies? To see you working against the family with those assholes? I thought we were—”
“Friends?” She lets out a loud, dry laugh. “Come on, Max. You made your choice. You never gave a shit about me. I thought maybe you did, but I was wrong. You came to rescue me on Thanksgiving because you wanted to take out Bonnaro. But you didn’t. You knew what was going to happen, that he wouldn’t rest unless he got his revenge on you and your family. You let him win. You gave him the power to do all this because you didn’t take your shot. So, really,” she leans in close, eyes narrowed. “This is all your fault. Everything that happens tonight comes down on you alone.”
I clench my fists. I knew going after Layla on Thanksgiving would lead me to Bonnaro, and yeah, I wanted to fuck his shit up. Mikey and Gianni kidnapped my sister. They were part of the hit on Nico’s dad. They went after our businesses. But I lost focus for a second too long when Mikey plugged Gabe that night. I saved Layla, but I couldn’t save Gabe. I couldn’t save a lot of things.
“You fucking bitch!” I struggle in the grip of one of the guys. “You betrayed the family by working with those assholes! Don’t think you’re gonna survive this. You’re fucking dead, and you know it!”
“Shut your fucking mouth,” the guy behind me growls.
Rage bubbles in my chest, and I spin around, landing a hard punch into the guy’s insanely tight and hard abs. Sharp pains shoot up my arm to my elbow, but I go for a second punch anyway. Another one of the guys grabs me by my hair and flings me into the elevator wall just as it dings.
The doors creep open, and I’m pulled back to a standing position, just in enough time for a thick fist to crack me in the jaw. I double over, the taste of blood filling my mouth. Layla bends her head down next to me. “I would worry more about you not surviving this than me, sweetie.”
She turns and walks out of the elevator, and Rocco and I are pushed out, guns pressed to our backs. They shove us past a group of guys playing cards and smoking weed around a cheap folding table in the middle of the floor. Doors line either side of the hallway. Some are open, some are closed. I peer into the open ones as we pass and catch glimpses of women laying listless on makeshift beds. Some are dressed, some aren’t. They’re all motionless. No sounds emerge from any of the rooms. Clouds of smoke come from the room at the end of the hallway, and the whole place reeks of horror.
What in the fuck did we walk into?
Layla stops in front of one of the doors and pushes it open. She crooks her finger, motioning for me to follow her inside. The guys push me and Rocco into the room and slam the door shut. It’s dark, and I can’t make out much beyond a few shapes. A light switch is flipped, and I blink fast to adjust my eyes.
For a second, I wish I hadn’t.
My fingers twitch to grab one of the guns stuffed into my jeans but the barrel pressed into my spine stops me. My heart thuds hard against my chest. “It’s about fucking time. Max.” Gianni takes a long drag from a joint and drops it into an ashtray next to a bed...the bed where Sloane is sprawled out in nothing but a bra and panties. He blows out a thin stream of smoke, watching me take in the scene. My eyes burn. The air is so damn cloudy, but my mind is clear as day. I want to leap at him and claw his fucking eyes out, right before I stick the barrel of my gun so far down his throat I make his body explode from the inside fucking out.
But I don’t. I can’t. I’ve got a gun in my face and one pointed at the back of my head.
Gianni grins at me, waving a gun at Sloane’s head. He leans down, dragging the metal down the side of her pale face. I swallow hard. Her eyes are closed but I can make out a slight flutter. Her head rolls back and forth a couple of times, so I know she’s alive. I catch a glimpse of the paraphernalia on the end table, and my gut clenches. They’ve drugged her. With what, I don’t know. But it’s enough that she’s barely responsive.
