Making the Rent the Hard Way - 49

I shut down the laptop then started to the door when my cell rang. The caller wasn't identified, but I answered anyway. I had a chilling feeling I knew who it was—and I was right.

"Come alone or he dies," Bracco said. "Bring any weapons, he dies."

"Let me talk to him," I replied, trying to keep fear out of my voice.

"I'm afraid that's not possible. He heavily sedated." Bracco's laugh before he continued sounded almost gleeful. "After all, I don't want him to teleport away before you get here. That would sort of defeat my reason for kidnapping him in the first place."

"If you've hurt him—" I didn't get to finish because he'd hung up.

I relayed what he'd said to the others. Orchid hugged me hard. "We'll be there for you and Luca and end this once and for all."

"Until the next of Farnham's bastards tries something," I spat out.

Rocky gripped my shoulder. "Think positive or this won't work. If you go in believing this is just the beginning, not the end, he'll use your fear against you."

I scowled. "Easy for you to say. It's not Orchid he's using as bait—and you're a shifter."

"Be that as it may, think about what I said on your way over there."

"I will," I replied, looking at my friends. "Thanks for…for being willing to help."

Before anyone could reply, I was out the door, on my way to my car—and my rendezvous with Bracco.

*****

I parked in front of Bracco's house, taking a deep breath as I replayed Rocky's words in my head for the hundredth time. Then I got out, striding up the path to the front door as if I was there for a social call, not to rescue the man I loved—if I could—without losing my life, or his, in the process.

The door swung open before I could raise my hand to knock. "Come in. Come in," Bracco said. "I've been expecting you."

I stood there momentarily—to give Orchid a chance to get a decent look at the area behind him—then stepped inside. The door slammed behind me, making me start in surprise.

Bracco chuckled. "There's nothing to be afraid of—yet." He gripped my bicep, steering me through the living room, then the kitchen to a flight of stairs leading down. "Wait here. If you move… If you try anything or make a sound…" The threat was implicit in the tone of his words so I did as he said, standing stock-still as he walked away. I had the feeling he was checking to make certain no one, no shifter, had followed me inside in the brief time it had taken to get to the stairs.

He returned, flipped a light switch then pointing wordlessly to the stairs, so I went down. I swear I could feel his hot breath on my neck as he followed. Impossible, given his size, but fear and imagination can do that to a guy.

At the bottom of the stairs, he gripped my arm again, walking me toward a door at the far end of the basement. "Open it," he ordered.

I did. The first thing I saw was Luca, lashed to a chair, his chin resting on his chest. The only clue that he was still alive was the barest movement of his naked chest as he breathed.