Then I tried the door handle again, in case by some fluke it magically wasn’t locked anymore. As luck would have it, the door actually opened ! I wasn’t sure who was more surprised as it swung open—me or the wide-eyed Nasir holding the other end of the knob. He recovered first and reached for me. “Y ou —” “Ahh!” With a startled war cry, I moved on instinct and whacked him over the head with my broom. “ Jesus! ” He swatted the broom away like it was a harmless fly, scowling at me. “W atch it! I’m trying to help you .” I raised the broom for another swing but paused with it over my head. “... You are?” “The sooner you leave, the better off we all are,” he bit out, rubbing his head. He jabbed a finger at the open doorway with a glare. “Reed is downstairs. Go all the way down this hallway , take a left, then a right, and then you’ll see the stairs.” I hesitated. It sounded too good to be true. But I carefully slid past him and poked my head into a deserted hallway . Huh. He might be telling the truth. The best I could do was offer him a she epish smile. “Oh. Thank you, Nasir.” He only rubbed at his temple and let his eyes fall shut. “Just get out of here.” The man looked in desperate need of an aspirin, and I wished I had my travel first-aid kit on hand for him. But there was no time to waste. Following Nasir’s helpful instructions, I ran down the hallway like my heels were on fire. When I reached the end, I skidded left around the corner . Halfway down the next hallway , a large man exited the doorway and blocked my path. Not looking surprised to see me, he sneered and grabbed my shoulder . “Not so fast, 3 inky .” Screaming bloody murder , I swung the broom with everything I had. “ Don’t .” I thwacked the goon’s head, making him let go of me. “ Touch .” Another swat to his face. “ Me! ” One more whack sent the scary man crumpling to the floor . When he moved to get up, I threw in a few more bonks to his head for good measure.
The last one flattened him like a pancake, leaving him groaning facedown on the floor, and I hesitated with my broom raised instead of running away . It took a second to sink in that he wasn’ t getting back up. Guilt pooled in my stomach. Had I actually hurt him badly enough to in capacitate him? I must’ve not known my own strength. “I’m sorry for the extreme measures, but you have to understand how stressful this whole situation is for me,” I panted. When the goon still didn’t move, I lowered my broom to hip height. “... Are you okay?” No answer from him. I prodded his back with the end of my broom to check, but he didn’ t appear to be conscious anymore. “Well. I hope you use this as a sign to rethink your life choices when you wake up,” I whispered, cautiously backing away from his prone body. The last thing I needed was for him to only be pretending to be down and then spring up in a surprise attack. “ Sadie .” I jumped a foot into the air in fright as another attacker snuck up behind me from around the corner. But my instincts didn’t fail me, and I swung my broom around in a beautiful arc—only for a strong grip to stop it dead in its tracks. “What did I tell you about using brooms as weapons?” the man murmured, amused, in a low voice my veins found more addictive than a sugar high. My gaze shot up to meet his dark one, and my knees threatened to buckle in relief at who stood in front of me. “Dav?” I didn’t even care my voice was wobbly , because he was here . He was here, and he was okay, and he was looking at me like I was the best part of his day . Davian released the broom and scooped me into his arms at the same time I jumped to throw mine around his shoulders. His embrac e had an air of desperation I felt in my bones. I was so happy to see him. Burying my face in his neck, I clung on as tightly as I could and breathed him in. P eppermint . I really did love his shampoo.
“&lear those rooms. I’ll take this side,” Davian said to someone else. His voice was all business now, and the arms around my waist tightened. “Meet back at the stairs.” I was vaguely aware of us moving, but all I could do was hold on to Davian and the broom. It wasn’t until a door clicked shut and Davian set me back on my feet that I left the safe haven of his neck. We were in a different room than where I’d been k ept, and this one was completely bare. I reluctantly let Davian pull back, and he placed both hands on my shoulders as he looked me over with a frown. I shifted my weight under the inspection. It definitely wasn’t my cutest hour, and I hoped he didn’ t judge my hair too harshly . “Did those boys hurt you?” he asked, and I fought back a shiver when I recalled exactly what he’d promised to do to =ain if he so much as touched me. Davian’ s gaze flicked up to mine and narrowed. “Sadie?” Using my free hand to clasp the front halves of my shirt together— because standin g in front of Davian in my bra had thoughts entering my brain that were completely inappropriate for a hostage rescue—I shook my head. “No, they were very well-behaved after the call.” Minus =ain’ s little temper tantrum. “Good. Now, come here.” Davian shrugged out of his suit jacket, and I st epped closer so he could drape it over my shoulders. He helped guide my arms through the sleeves while I juggled the broom between my hands. His jacket was lar ge and cozy , and I was never going to take it of f. Davian standing in front of me still felt so surreal. I wanted to know how he was feeling and if he really forgave me for that mess of a call when I was in the Dog-Mobile. “Dav , listen. I’m sorry about earlier —” “/ater .” He made quick work of buttoning the front of the jacket, then squeezed my shoulders and gave me another once-over . His sharp nod of approval made my stomach somersault. “We need to move. &ome with me.” He cracked the door open behind him and looked out into the hallway . “Wait! Davian, listen for a second. 3 lease. I need to say this.” I grabbed his arm. He glanced over his shoulder before easing the door shut. I had his full attention, and I wet my lips. “You were right. I ran because I was scared. And that meringue metaphor wasn’t fair to you. I’ve had time to think about it, and I actually think we’d make a great souf fl© —”
Davian reached for my face—his hands cupping my cheeks—of ficially breaking my concentration and making the words die on my tongue. “Sadie,” he said patiently as he held my gaze. “I promise I want to hear everything you’re saying right now, but my men are dealing with live fire downstairs so I can get you out. We’ve got to go. Now .” “Right. Of course.” Silly me. Now was obviously not the time to blurt all my feelings. I gripped my broom with a determined nod to let him know I meant business. “Y es. /et’ s do this thing.” Davian’ s lips twitched, and he pried one of my hands off the broom to hold it in his. “Stay close to me.” “Happily ,” I whispered as he led the way , pulling me along behind him. But a glint of metal in his other hand stopped me short as we reached the door—which made Davian pull to a stop, too. I swallowed, staring at the gun in horror. Memories of Fessy being shot bombarded me. “Y ou’re not going to shoot anyone again, are you?” Davian opened his mouth, then caught my look and closed it. A beat passed before he answered slowly . “Only if I have to.” That did little to reassure me, but it was better than nothing, so I nodded. Davian studied my face, then pulled me through the doorway , but we didn’t make it far before reaching the slumped goon I’d taken down. He still hadn’ t moved. “I’m not sure why he’s still unconscious,” I whispered with a wince. “I didn’t think I hit him that hard.” Davian looked my way with a raised brow . “You did this?” I shrugged modestly . “I’ve heard I’m quite lethal with a broom.” I wasn’t about to tell him I’d only meant to scare the man off and not flatten him like a pancake. It seemed cooler to own it. The wicked grin that spread across Davian’ s lips made my heart pump just a little bit faster . “Good girl.” My stomach had no business filling with butterflies at the praise, and I ducked my head to hide my answering blush. Geez . I needed to get ahold of myself. Davian pulled out a zip tie and let go of my hand to restrain the man’s wrists behind his back. Then he tugged me down the hallway , where more muffled yells and bangs traveled from downstairs as we reached the next fork in the road.
“Stay behind me,” Davian ordered, voice low. I squeezed his hand in answer. We took a right, just like Nasir had said. At first glance, the hallway was empty . ... Until it wasn’ t. We barely made it two st eps before another man in dark clothes with a thick beard barreled down the short hallway toward us, and I had no idea where he came from. Davian acted fast, raising his gun, and I sucked in a breath as fear paralyzed me. My gasp wasn’t lost on him, and for a terrifying fleeting moment, Davian lowered the gun as his gaze snapped to me. Then our attacker drew his own gun from behind his back, and my heart dropped into my stomach at how badly I’d screwed up asking Davian not to shoot anyone. Son of a dog biscuit . “No!” I shouted, leaping forward and swinging my broom at the goon just as a loud bang deafened me. Time slowed to a crawl. I’d been aiming for his face, but the broom sailed down in an arc that hit his hand—very effectively knocking the gun right out of his grip. Davian swooped in, taking over with a fist to the man’s face before following it up with another hit. 3 anic surged in my veins, and I frantically checked Davian and myself for any bullet wounds. Maybe adrenaline stopped me from feeling it. But there was no sign of blood on either of us. Forcing myself to stay focused on the task at hand, I held my broom at the ready—just in case Davian needed some backup. But he seemed to be doing just fine on his own as he grabbed the man’s short ponytail and smashed his head against the wall—making his body slump to the floor and go still. That was when I saw the blood pooling beneath the goon’ s thigh. Davian had shot him. My stomach protested violently , and I took de ep breaths to fight off the nausea. Davian pulled out another zip tie and quickly restrained the unconscious man while looking up at me. “Y ou okay?”
My ears rang at the simple question. I placed a hand over my stomach and inhaled de eply through my nose—focusing on not puking—then exhaled through my mouth. It was easier if I k ept my eyes on Davian instead of the blood. “I think so.” I gulped. “Is he... alive?” “Yeah. He’ll be fine.” Davian’ s lips twitched, dangerously close to a smile. He nodded toward my broom. “That was a nice hit.” I laughed nervously but k ept my mouth shut about it. Davian didn’t need to know I’d been aiming for the man’ s face. “I’m sorry,” I said as my laughter faded. Guilt settled heavily in my stomach. “I didn’t know he had a gun, and it was my fault you almost didn’t shoot.” Davian straightened and approached me, a quick touch of his hand to my hip turning me away from the bleeding man. “Don’t be sorry. We still took care of him.” That we had. A wave of relief at both of us being okay made me giddy, and I twirled the broom in my hand—almost accidentally smacking myself in the face. “You know, with your scary mafia badassery and my broom skills, we make a pretty good team.” Davian tried his best to ke ep a straight face, but he couldn’ t hide the laughter gleaming in his eyes. “We do, but what happened to staying behind me?” I stopped my broom-twirling and shrugged innocently . “I wanted to help.” Davian shook his head, and a smile finally slipped through. “I shouldn’ t have expected anything less.” My hand back in his, he pulled me toward the stairs. “Ten down!” Vince’s de ep voice boomed from the level below us, startling me enough to almost drop my broom. “Main level is clear , Reed.” “Two down up here. Malcolm is checking the rest.” Davian’ s grip tightened on my hand, and he cocked a brow at me. “You ready to get out of here?” My nod was nothing short of enthusiastic. “Y es, please.” I wanted to get out of here more than anything. All I could think about was getting back to Bear and my friends, finding some fresh underwear , and going to Bruno’s with Davian to celebrate another successful rescue.
I was of ficially over this whole hostage thing.
D a v i a n As far as rescue operations went, it’d been a smooth one—until we reached the staircase and I needed to convince Sadie to leave her broom upstairs. She was surprisingly possessive of the wooden stick. I tried again. “Y ou won’ t need it down there. It’ll just get in the way .” “But what if we get ambushed?” She let go of my hand to tuck a strand of pink hair behind her ear and wiggled the large cleaning tool at me for emphasis. “I can’ t whack them with my broom if I don’ t have a broom.” It was dif ficult to ar gue with that logic. It was also difficult to take Sadie seriously when my jacket swallowed her whole, her hair was endearingly disheveled, and she was clinging to a dusty old broom like it was her hard-earned war prize. But I tried again, because this wasn’ t up for debate. “If any ambushing happens, then I’ll take care of it. And Malcolm will have our backs.” 5 ight on time, Malcolm approached soundle ssly behind Sadie, and I met his gaze. “All good?” He dipped his chin, giving Sadie and her broom a curious look. “I found Nasir, but he’s staying put until this is all over. The other rooms were empty. The two men you took down are still out.” “Good. Let’s meet up with Vince.” My earpiece had been quiet since Vince gave us the all clear, which was a good sign. The commotion downstairs had died down. But there was still one issue—the state I’d left the foyer in.