My heart skitters in panic, my arms flailing as I fall, too close to the edge of the mattress. Lincoln grabs my wrist, painfully yanking me to safety and stuffing me behind his back. But Tank stalks across the room and latches onto my other wrist, pulling me the opposite way so hard, I fear the bone might simply snap.
“No!” Like a rabid animal, I kick and scream and fight his hold, scrambling back in search of safety. My pulse gallops, and my eyes sting, blurring from tears and exhaustion. When I blink them clear, I find myself looking straight down the barrel of a gun.
Lincoln’s gun.
He nudges it two inches to the right and points it directly at Tank’s face. “Release her.” He tightens his left hand, so I become a doll pinioned between the two. “Now.”
“You and her?” Tank’s devilish stare jumps from mine to Lincoln’s. “You turned, Castro?”
“You’re not taking her.” Caging his rage, he maintains his aim and his hold on me while climbing off the bed and finding his feet. He pulls me closer until my shoulder strains under the pressure of two powerful men. “I’ll kill you,” he seethes. “I’ll kill Aster. I’ll kill your fucking dog if you have one. You’re not taking her.”
Tank turns his amused gaze my way. “He turned for you?”
“No!”Save him. Spare him. “He just doesn’t like sharing. He wants to kill me himself.”
“Last chance,” Lincoln snarls. If he pulls the trigger, the entire household will be alerted tothis, anyway. “Release her and tell Aster she’s dead, or I’ll scramble your fucking brains and take her, anyway.”
“The code?—”
“She doesn’t know it. Destroying the coin meant destroying the code. It’s gone.” He wrenches me closer, and because Tank still holds me, his arm jerks forward with my movement.
For reasons I’ll never know, in a deliriousness I’ll never understand as two men play tug-of-war with my exhausted body, I drop my eyes to the ink decorating Tank’s forearm and study the ferocious lion roaring from his flesh. It has sharp, snapping teeth and a luscious, detailed mane. Deadly golden eyes. And amidst all that, a small, almost hidden compass.
It could be the concussion making me woozy, or maybe I’malready dead. Perhaps I’ve lost my fucking mind. But I twist free of Tank’s grip and lay my palm over his forearm instead.
Ridiculously, I stroke the compass.
The compass.
I’ve seen this compass before.
“Wait.” My stomach lurches. Confusion. Dread. Devastation. For just a moment, nothing makes sense, and yet, everything does. My body aches from the abuse I’ve sustained over the last few weeks. My legs are weak. My head swims. But through it all, I stare at his arm and think back to the last time I saw a tattoo like this.
Ryan.
His playful eyes, taunting me.
The compass on his arm. The one he had penned a few years back while I sat beside him in a tattoo parlor.
It was a promise that he’d always find his way home to me.
Tank’s lips curl into a devious grin. “Heads, I win.”
He releases me, so I stumble back with a gasp and crash into Lincoln’s broad chest, knocking his aim wide and forcing him to catch me as my knees give way.
But then Tank turns and removes a handgun from the holster at his side. “Tails, you lose. Follow me.”
“Woah!” Lincoln wraps his arm around my stomach, lifting me clear off my feet. “What the fuck?”
I drop my weight with a grunt and try to run. To chase. To trust. “He’s on our side. We have to follow him.”
“Myside?”
“Ryan’s side.” A wash of giddy hope fills my veins. “He’s… Oh, God. He’s here to help. Come on!” I try again to run. “Lincoln! Let me go. We have to?—”
“No,” he snarls. “Explain.” He tucks me behind his back and points his gun at Tank. “You’re on no one’s side except Aster’s. Your reputation precedes you.”
“Kinda like yours?” Tank stalks across the room and closes the splintered door. Turning, he leans against the wood and folds his arms, tipping his head back in an uncharacteristic show of exhaustion. “Only one of us is guilty of our crimes, Castro. Now, you get two minutes, then I’m walking out of this room. If you don’t do as I say, I’ll turn you over to Aster. If you do, I’ll get her to safety.”
