Instead of raising his gun and taking a shot at Max, Michael Rossi raised his fist with his arm at a right angle, signaling. His gaze tracked slightly to Maxence’s left.
Rossi was looking right at Quentin Sault.
Betrayal.
Maxence snatched his phone out of his pocket and thumbed an app on the home screen. He pressed the phone into Dree’s hand and with every bit of strength he could put into his arms, shoved her away from himself and into a thick knot of people.“Run.”
Dree flew a short distance from him and then stumbled, but she looked back at him.
Maxence yelled at her,“Run!”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Kidnapped
Dree
They were dragging him away.They were dragging Max away!
She had to help him, and yet he’d told her to run.
The man who’d shot Nico had signaled to someone in Max’s security team. One of Max’s guys had double-crossed them.
This couldn’t be happening. She didn’t believe any of it.
Maxence roared at her,“Run!”
She clutched his phone and the little velvet box in her hands as she staggered to her feet. She didn’t even know where the exits were. There were no little red signs. There had to be little red signs.Why couldn’t she find any little red signs?
The crowd surged around her.
Dree ran with them so she wouldn’t get trampled.
At the door to the stairwell, the crowd bunched up.
More gunshots from below.
The phone in her hand squawked, and she raised it to her ear.
A man’s voice asked in a British accent, “Maxence? What’s happened?”
Bodies nudged and bumped Dree as she tried to press her way to the stairwell. “There’s been a shooting.”
“Who is this?”
“My name is Dree Clark. I’m Maxence’s”—she swallowed hard—“secretary. I’m his secretary. He’s been kidnapped. There was a terrorist attack,and he’s been kidnapped.”
Thumps rumbled in the background of the phone. “Where are you?”
“The Grimaldi Forum.”
“Dammit,Monaco.Why does heevergo back toMonaco?Tell me anything you can about what happened.”
The gunshots andNico dyingand blood on the ground and Maxence shoving her away jumbled up in her head. “I think his security double-crossed him. They killed his cousin. They dragged him away. They said there’s a helicopter on the roof.”
“Was he wearing—”
A hand swatted the phone away from Dree’s face and plucked the phone from her hand.“Hey!Give that back! I have to tell him what happened!”
