“Here we go,” Bobby mutters as the door shifts open.
I see the split of light and straighten my shoulders. “If this is goodbye, it’s been an honor.Voglio bene a tutti voi.”I love you all.
“Anch’io ti voglio bene,” grumbles Adriano, annoyed as ever by feelings.
“I love you,” Bobby says. “Even you Doc, you dumb bastard.”
“Fuck you, Bassilotta you Ohio-bred pig fucker.” Doc makes a face like he’s trying not to puke. “I…love you…too. Even Morelli, you greasy, 2000s-era Eurodouche.”
I grin as the door stretches wide. A lone man steps into the room. Backlit by the fluorescent hallway lights it’s impossible to see his face. I ball my hands into fists, ready to fight, cajole, negotiate, do anything and everything I can to get us free.
“Mr. Morelli? You alive?”
My brain sags. I have no idea who’s talking to me, let alone so politely.
Bobby’s quicker on the uptake. “Baskerville?”
“Sure is, Mr. Bassilotta. Are all you boys in here?”
My knees go slack. I grip my wrist shackles and fight to stay standing. “What are you doing here?”
Baskerville—I don’t know which twin—walks to Bobby, the closest, and holds a blue light to his chains. They slide open. “Gettin’ you out.”
Bobby hits the floor as Doc lets out a shocked laugh. Adriano gives a bearlike growl of victory.
“Who’s with you?” I ask in a daze, thinking he must’ve collected Sal and Gretzky and everyone from Velvet House.
“Archie and January,” he says.
My knees turn to Jell-O again. “January’s here?”
“You brought her?” Doc hisses, pulling at his chains like a rabid dog. “You and your dumbass brother brought a nineteen-year-old girl to the house of our abductor?”
The twin—Bill by process of elimination—holds up the blue scanner. “We’re herebecauseof her. She convinced us to come. Paid us actually.”
“Paid you?” I repeat.
“Yup.”
“You would have let us die?” Doc snarls. “The guys you’ve been working for all year.”
Bill shrugs. “Just tellin’ you how it is.”
“That’s fine,” I say, cutting across Doc’s furious response. If this event has shown anything, it’s that his lack of self-preservation and hatred for the Baskerville twins is without limits.
“Thank you for assisting, January,” I say. “I appreciate that you’re here and whatever January promised you, it will be tripled.”
Adriano collapses onto all fours when he’s released. He curls onto his side trying to stretch his back and wrists. Bill unlocks me next, and I manage to stay on my feet but barely. I lean against the wall, flexing my stiff fingers.
“Weapons,” Adriano calls from the floor. “Guns.”
“You got it.” Bill pulls off a rucksack and hands it to him before moving to Doc, the last person still chained to the wall. “We’re not gonna have a problem, are we?”
I watch powerful, contradictory emotions fight their way across Doc’s face, but sense wins out. “Not one. Just lemme get to January.”
Bill presses the metal bar to his chains, and they fall open.
“Thanks,” Doc mutters, rubbing his wrists. “What’s the gun situation, Adri?”
