It’s raining in Boston when the plane touches down. I don’t know what time it is, but I’m exhausted. Everything aches, including the soles of my feet, which are covered in tiny cuts and bruises.
Wherever I ran in my escape attempt before they finally got me onto the plane, it must’ve been far.
I wish I could recall, but there’s a black hole in my memory. It matches the black holes of Declan’s eyes every time they swing in my direction.
“Let’s go,” he says in a muted tone, reaching down to grasp my arm.
He pulls me to my feet, handling me more gently than before. The gentleness is confusing, considering he has even more reason to hate me now than he did earlier.
Not that he’s confirmed anything, but I’m reading between the lines.
Unlike the gag, my handcuffs remain in place. Declan guides me down the metal airstairs leading to the rain-swept tarmac, his hand wrapped firmly around my biceps. Both of us are getting wet in the cold, steady drizzle. My teeth start to chatter halfway down.
When we reach the bottom, I slip on the last step.
Before I do a face plant onto the wet asphalt, he catches me and swings me up into his arms, as easily as if I weighed no more than a feather.
Startled, I inhale sharply. I look at him, handsome in profile and very grim, and start to open my mouth.
“Not a word,” he warns, carrying me toward the waiting limo.
He’s furious, of that I’m certain. I’m less certain now, however, that his anger is directed at me. His arms feel less like a cage and more like a kind of protection.
The way his gaze sweeps the area feels protective, too, as if he’s expecting an armed gang to pounce from the shadows. If they are, he seems fully prepared to take them on.
Stavros and I were once caught in a gunfight. Well, technically, Stavros and his minions started a gunfight, and I was caught in it, but I digress. I remember very clearly how panicked he was, how even though he had a weapon and was doing his best to protect me, his hands shook and his voice came out high and he hyperventilated so badly, he almost passed out.
I can’t picture Declan hyperventilating.
I can’t picture him panicking.
I can picture irritating him to death, but that’s a different story.
A uniformed driver opens the back door of the limo as we approach. Two other vehicles wait behind the limo, SUVs that I assume are for the rest of the crew.
Declan sets me on my feet and helps me into the car, sliding across the leather bench seat to sit beside me. The driver slams shut the door and jumps into the front, gunning the engine before peeling out so fast, I gasp.
“Here.”
Declan holds out a hand towel he removed from a compartment near the door. When I take it from him, he says, “Wait.”
He removes a small key from the inside pocket of his suit jacket and uncuffs me. He looks at the glinting circles of metal in his hands, then abruptly throws them against the smoked-glass partition that divides the back of the limo from the driver’s seat. They bounce off and clatter to the floor. His suit jacket follows the cuffs, then he drops his head against the headrest and closes his eyes, muttering in Gaelic.
I sit holding the towel and stare at him, lost. “Are you okay?”
After a moment, he turns his head and peers at me.
“I mean, you just seem…oh, sorry. I forgot I’m not supposed to be talking.”
I busy myself with drying my hair and face, blotting my mascara carefully so I don’t wind up with raccoon eyes. I wipe the rain off my bare legs, too, wondering what I’m going to do for clothes for however long I’m going to be a captive.
All the while, I’m aware of him silently watching me. The air is thick with all the things he wants to say but doesn’t.
We drive. He takes phone calls, one after another, speaking in Gaelic through each one. After maybe a dozen, he hangs up and turns to me.
“Don’t try to run. It’s safer for you with me than anywhere else right now.”
“Trust me, my feet hurt too much to… What do you mean, it’s safer with you?”
“Exactly what I said.”
We gaze at each other as the limo speeds through the night. Wherever we’re going, we’re going there fast. “So all that stuff you threatened me with on the plane—”
He interrupts, “What kind of guns have you handled?”
When I blink, he growls, “Answer the fucking question, please.”
Please. Astonished, I open my mouth, then close it again. My second attempt is successful. “.357 Desert Eagle. Glock G19. AK-47.”
His brows lift. He’s surprised by the AK.
“Stavros had rifles lying all over the place. He liked to shoot at fish in the lake.”
“Of course he did. Fucking Russians.” He shakes his head in disgust, then leans down and pulls a small black pistol from a holder around his ankle.
He hands it to me.
“If we’re separated, use it on anyone who approaches you, even if they seem friendly. Even if it’s a little old lady, shoot that bitch between the eyes.”
I stare at him with my mouth hanging open and my eyes wide.
He sends me a mirthless smile. “At last. Silence.”
I can’t form words. This psychotic blue-eyed gangster has rendered me speechless.
When I finally manage to regain control of my tongue, I say, “How do you know I’m not going to shoot you?”
“Are you?”
I consider it. “Maybe.”
“Decide. We don’t have much time.”
“You’re insane, is that it?”
“Believe me, lass, I sometimes wonder.”
Pulling a beefy silver semi-automatic handgun from his waistband at the small of his back, he continues. “Things are going to get bad. We’re going to take fire. The car is armored, but if the tires are compromised, we have about eighty kilometers before they die.”
He stops and looks at me. “That’s roughly fifty miles.”
I see. He doesn’t think I’m brain damaged, he thinks I’m just plain stupid.
“I don’t give a shit about the tires. Rewind to the part about things getting bad and start over. What the hell is going on?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“If you can hand me a loaded gun and tell me to shoot an old lady between the eyes, you can tell me what’s happening. We’re past the honeymoon stage. Besides, I can handle it, no matter how bad it is. Spill.”
I could swear that flash in his eyes is admiration, but it’s probably just an urge to wrap his hands around my neck and choke me.
And not in the good way.
“War is what’s happening, Tinker Bell,” he says ominously. “War and all the bloody business that goes along with it.”
“Oh, swell. You’re being cryptic. I just love an incomprehensible Irishman. They’re my absolute favorite.”
“Careful. You’ll exhaust yourself using your entire vocabulary all at once.”
“Can you tell from my tone how much I want to smash the butt of this gun into your face?”
“Can you tell from my face how much I want to smash the palm of my hand into your butt?”
“That was stupid.”
“Says the girl who jumped from a speeding car.”
“I would’ve jumped from a skyscraper if it meant I wouldn’t have to be near you.”
“If I’d known that, I would’ve taken you straight to the top of the Hancock Tower.”
I roll my eyes. “Just tell me the truth. I swear I won’t burst into tears. The last time that happened was before I’d even gotten my first period.”
He pauses, his gaze assessing. “Tell me how it’s possible that you’re not scared of me, or of this situation, or of anything else as far as I can see, and I’ll tell you what’s happening.”
I give it serious thought for a moment. “Honestly? I’m just badass like that.”
After a short, disbelieving silence, Declan starts to laugh.
It’s a deep, rich, sexy sound, beautifully masculine. I hate myself for liking it. And for noticing what nice white teeth he has. And how strong his jaw is. And is that a dimple in his cheek?
He stops laughing abruptly, looking as disturbed by the unexpected outburst as I am. Guess he wasn’t expecting that, either.
“Got that out of your system?”
Glowering, he says, “Aye.”
“Good. So who’s going to be shooting at us?”
“MS-13.”
More gangsters. I’m in up to my eyeballs. “Because…?”
“They don’t like me.”
I stare at him with my lower lip pinched between my teeth.
He says drily, “Thank you for showing restraint. It must be incredibly difficult.”
“You have no idea.”
“There’s another reason they’re after me.”
When he only sits there gazing at me in inscrutable silence, I prompt, “Anytime you feel like enlightening me, I’m all ears.”
“You.”
Surprised, I blink. “Me?”
“Aye. You.”
“I don’t know any Salvadorans. Of the mobster variety, that is.”
“Did you think your abduction would go over well with your friend Mr. Portnov?”
He means Kage, my bestie’s man, who also happens to be top dog of the Russian mafia.
From what Stavros once told me, MS-13 is the fastest-growing gang in the Boston area. Kage must’ve made some kind of deal with them to try to rescue me as soon as I got off the plane. But how would he know where Declan took me after the parking garage or where we might ultimately be headed?
Or even if I’m dead or alive, for that matter? Declan could’ve slit my throat the moment he nabbed me.
Then it hits me: Natalie doesn’t know if I’m dead or alive, either.
I sit bolt upright on the seat and shout, “Oh my god, she’ll be so worried! Give me your cell phone.”
“I’m not giving you my cell phone.”
“I have to let my girlfriend know I’m alive.”
His pause seems loaded. “Ah.”
“What do you mean, ah?”
“You and your girlfriend.”
“What about us?”
“You’re very…close.”
“Of course we’re close. She’s been my best friend since…” I trail off, frowning at his expression. Then I sigh. “Oh, for fuck’s sake.”
“I’m not judging.”
“Will you shut up already? We’re not lesbians.”
He looks unconvinced. “You did say you couldn’t keep a boyfriend.”
“No, I said I don’t keep boyfriends. You totally missed the emphasis. Boyfriends are like koi fish: a time-consuming and boring hobby. I have no interest in that kind of commitment. Are you getting this?”
“You also seem like you really dislike the opposite sex.”
I smile at him. “Only a deserving few.”
He ignores that. “And there is the matter of the way you handle pressure.”
“What about it?”
“You’re almost as brave as a man.”
“What a coincidence, I was just thinking that about you.”
He exhales a short breath through his nose and shakes his head. He doesn’t know whether to laugh or clobber me. “You’re really something else, lass.”
“I keep telling you, gangster. I’m charming. By the time this is all over, you’ll be head over heels in love with me.”
Blue eyes burning, he opens his mouth to speak, but his words are lost in the sudden, deafening noise of a hailstorm of bullets bombarding the side of the car.
