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By the time we got an hour into the search, Luca was muttering constantly to himself. He stopped and glared over at me. “She knows what she’s doing.” He pointed to a spot where the branches and brush were overgrown. “She fucking crawled through here to avoid breaking branches except those low to the ground. Then she brushed out her tracks through here. Someone who didn’t know what they were looking for would think this little trail was made by a small animal, not a five-foot-eleven woman.” He shook his head and I couldn’t tell if it was admiration or disgust in his eyes.
I nodded and used my machete to hack away at the brush. Luca was side by side with me, doing the same.
“How does a city girl know to do that?” He muttered, then cursed in Italian when a larger branch rebounded off his slash and smacked him in the face. He stood there breathing heavily, staring at the offending branch for a moment. Without another word he started hacking it, and the tree it belonged to, into pieces. He wasn’t getting as far with the thick trunk, but managed to put twenty or so healthy, deep scars into it.
Wheeling around he stalked forward, continuing to hack away at the undergrowth. I let him go. He needed to work off his rage. I was saving mine. I’d be working it off in… other ways.
When I caught back up to Luca he was staring down at a small stream. “How does she know to do this?” He gestured to the water. “If we were using dogs this would throw off their scent.” He rubbed the back of his neck and sighed. “We should have caught her almost immediately.”
I debated whether to tell him the truth. Luca was my right-hand man. I knew I could trust him with the information I had about her. Despite what Havoc thought, I had no intention of killing her. She was mine. I planned to keep her. In my world, if people found out she was a cop—even a former—she’d be in danger.
Not that I couldn’t keep her safe. Maria’s death had been a mistake. I’d kept her safe for years, trusted her fully, and yet that day she’d slipped out of the house without me knowing. She’d left her guards behind. I’d likely never know why she did it. I didn’t hold her responsible. The Guzman’s and I were to blame for her death.
“She was a cop and did two years of search and rescue.”
He stopped and looked at me like I’d lost my mind. “You kidnapped a cop?”
“She’s not anymore,” I growled at him.
“Once a cop, always a cop,” He replied.
I smirked. Havoc had proven that statement false. If my brother found out the things she’d been up to he’d lose that little schoolyard crush in a heartbeat. I doubted it would matter to him what her reasons for killing those men were. Killing in self-defense or in the defense of others were the only reasons he believed in taking a life.
Crashing brush nearby had me holding up my hand, motioning for Luca to pause. A slow grin spread over my face and I tossed the flashlight and machete in front of him before I took off sprinting through the woods. It took a few minutes for my eyes to adjust to the dark, but once they did I increased my speed.
She’d been close to the stream while we’d stopped there talking. Now, she was really on the run. Little did she know there wasn’t anything I enjoyed more than chasing down my prey.
Chapter 18
Havoc
Muffled voices floated down toward where I was crouched behind some bushes. I heard them coming, hacking at the brush I’d used to try to conceal my path through the forest. It hadn’t worked. I could hear the calls and the radios of the men that had spread out to search. Nico was close. I wasn’t sure how I knew it was him, but I did.
My heart thudded almost in slow motion, like it was trying not to be so loud so we wouldn’t get caught. I couldn’t explain my reaction to Nico. Dante made me feel less numb when he was around, like there might be a way out of the darkness. Nico, Nico made me feel…ALIVE. He made electricity course through my body down to every last nerve ending. I didn’t like it. I wasn’t ever supposed to feel that way again. It was wrong, like I was disrespecting my dead husband.
Not that Tony would be likely to recognize the woman I’d become. I shoved my dark, guilty thoughts down deep. Nico’s men were getting closer; I could hear him speaking to someone now.
Glancing around, I ground my teeth together. I was in a shitty spot. They were nearly on top of the bush I was hiding behind. It wouldn’t be long before they spotted me, but if I ran it wouldn’t give me much of a head start. I didn’t know how they’d found me so easily. I’d taken care to hide my tracks wherever possible. If this was how hard it was to stay off Nico’s radar I was in deep shit.
Fuck it.A crappy head start was better than none. I sprinted in the opposite direction of the voices, in what I hoped was a southern direction. There wasn’t time to orient myself with Nico on my tail. It didn’t take long for my lungs to start burning and my muscles to tire. I’d been working out religiously for a few weeks, but I hated running. I preferred to lift and spar.
If I made it out of here, I promised to make myself spend more time on cardio. Shouts filled the air behind me. I didn’t recognize the voices. My ears strained to hear if anyone was close to me. I was a better sprinter than long-distance runner and soon my body forced me to slow. I needed to keep a steady pace, though, if I was going to outrun these guys.
A flash of movement off to my right caught my attention, and I peered hard into the shadows. It was pointless, the moon was high enough that I could see enough to run, but not what was in the trees surrounding me.
My heart was convulsing in my chest, begging me to stop and rest. My breath came out hard and fast, like tiny explosions. I slowed down to a light jog. I couldn’t hear much over the rushing of blood through my head, but it seemed like I was alone. I frowned and stared over my shoulder. Stopping, I finally gave my body a break.
I hadn’t expected it to be so easy.The thought had no sooner formed in my mind than a shadow bolted out of the trees on my right-hand side. Yelping, I spun to run again, but the wind was knocked out of me as I sprawled to the ground beneath what felt like a building landing on top of me.
Sputtering and spitting dirt out of my mouth, I lay there and tried to breathe. It took me a moment to realize someone was panting hard in my ear. The shudder that wracked my body told me who it was before he spoke.
“You shouldn’t have run.”
I rolled my eyes and tried to respond. It came out as more of a wheeze. I couldn’t argue with the man when he was crushing me into the dirt. “Get. Off.”
His chuckle was like dark, smooth chocolate—delicious, but left a bitter taste on your tongue.
He leaned on me harder and gripped my arms tight with his hands. “Not happening. You belong to me, Havoc.”
