“Shit’s going down at Crystal’s right now. I need you,” he said to the lot of them.
The room exploded into activity. Within three minutes, the whole team was armed and loaded into Beckett’s SUV. Within four, they were on the road to Crystal’s.
“Call Jer and see what he’s hearing,” Shane said over his shoulder to Nick.
Rixey dialed immediately. “Jer? Put your phone up to the computer speaker,” he said in tight voice. A moment of silence passed, and then sounds poured out of Nick’s phone. Shouts. Crashes. Screams. Crying.
Nausea rolled through Shane’s gut. He couldn’t lose Crystal. He couldn’t go through that again.
Beckett drove like his house was on fire. The others checked and double-checked their weapons.
It was a fifteen-minute trip under the best of circumstances. Except, it was after three o’clock, and Crystal lived on the eastern side of the city. There was every likelihood they were going to run into some early-rush-hour interference. Sonofafuckingbitch.
Why the hell hadn’t he laid it all out there when he’d been with Crystal this morning? If he’d handled that conversation right, she and her sister would be with him right now. They’d be safe.
And Crystal would know that Shane loved her. That he was in love with her. The fact that she might never hear that from his lips—no. He couldn’t even entertain that possibility.
A yelp and a groan. A low, sadistic laugh.
Instead, one of them was being terrorized by a man Shane absolutely burned to kill with his bare hands. When he and Bruno finally met face-to-face, Shane was going to bathe in the bastard’s blood and dance on the dust of his bones.
Suddenly, the noise died down from Nick’s speaker. Shane turned in his seat. “Did you drop it?”
Pressing a button, Nick examined the screen and shook his head. “No, just got quiet there.”
And that’s when Shane heard words that turned his blood to ice. “Bring her. We’re gonna have a little fun.”
Chapter 19
Driving into her apartment complex, Crystal pressed the button on her phone to check the time. The clock on her truck’s dashboard had stopped long ago. Quarter ’til four. She should have just enough time to drop off Jenna’s prescription and the three bags of groceries, and to text Shane the pictures so she could delete them from her phone.
As she parked, scattered raindrops fell on her windshield. She peered up at the gray skies and hoped the rain held out long enough for her to get inside. Looping the bags over one wrist, Crystal grabbed the meds and her purse with the other and heaved out of the truck.
Times like this, she really wished they lived on the ground floor. She hefted her load up the steps and juggled everything as she worked to thread her key into the lock and push the door open with her foot.
“Hey, Jen, I’m home,” Crystal called. “I brought your medicine.” And just in time, too, since she only had one pill left.
Crystal rounded the door from the entranceway—and froze.
The apartment was a wreck.
“Jenna!” she screamed, dropping everything and sprinting through the debris covering the floor. Books. Broken glass. Soft pillows ripped open. “Jenna!” Something caught Crystal’s foot and she tripped into the doorway of her sister’s room.
Wreckage covered the floor there, too. A bookshelf had toppled over.
Oh, God, no. Oh, God. Oh, God, no.
Dizziness and nausea threatened, but Jenna wasn’t there. Crystal whirled into her own room. The damage was worse. Bedclothes scattered. Mattress tossed and torn. Every drawer overturned—though the dresser remained in place, her brain noted. Her closet almost emptied.
Still no Jenna.
Bruno. Bruno did this. She couldn’t possibly know that, but she did.
“Oh, God. What do I do? What do I do? Think,” she said to herself in a fast stream.
Shane. She needed Shane.
Blood rushed through her ears as she retraced her steps into the living room. Her purse lay amid the discarded bags of groceries. With shaking hands she opened it—wallet, iPhone, makeup, lip balm. Where was Shane’s phone? She sorted through the debris on the floor, but nothing.
Had she left it in the truck?
All at once, the image of the spilled contents of her purse on the floor of Bruno’s office flashed into her mind’s eye.
She gasped a hard breath, and goose bumps ripped across her skin. “Oh, no. No, no, no.” Crystal couldn’t be that unlucky, could she? She couldn’t have done something that led to this. But the more she thought about it, the more she worried she had—the more she knew she had. A sob tore up her throat, and Crystal smothered it with her hand, feeling streams of wetness on her face.
Footsteps.
Crystal’s gaze flew to the apartment door, still open a few inches from when she’d come in, her hands too full to close it.
Whispered voices. More footsteps. Multiple people. Coming closer.
Had Bruno been watching for her truck? Waiting for her to come home? Had he returned to finish what he’d started?
Crystal lunged toward the door just as movement passed behind it. With all her might, she slammed it closed, but something kept it from latching—a body pressing from the other side.
She cried out and dug her feet into the floor, pushing harder. The minute she let up, her opponent would come flying in. He’d be right on top of her.
“Crystal. Crystal? It’s Shane.”
The words drilled through the loud buzz in her ears. “Shane? Shane?” Heart thundering, she let go of the door and stepped back.
He was right there. With four other men, all of them armed, weapons drawn, expressions wary, braced for battle. His arms around her were too strong, too tight, absolutely perfect. “Jesus,” he said, pulling her to the side so the rest of the men could enter.
A sob ripped out of her, smothered against his chest. Movement and voices came from behind her, but Crystal couldn’t think about any of that. Shane’s heat, his scent, the cotton of his button-down against her face—that was the universe of information she could handle in that moment.
Jenna.
Crystal wrenched back. “Jenna’s gone,” she said, her voice warped by tears and fear and grief. “I think Bruno has her.”
Something terrifying appeared in Shane’s steel gray eyes. Sympathy. Regret. Confirmation. “He does,” Shane said in a low, cautious voice.
Confusion scattered her thoughts. “Wait,” she said. “How—”
“Clear,” came a male voice from the back of the apartment.
“Clear,” another man said.
“Clear,” came a third. “Apartment’s empty.”
“Wait!” she yelled as the men spoke.
Five pairs of male eyes swung to her, and the room went silent.
Shaking her head, Crystal met Shane’s gaze. “How do you know? How do you know he has her?” Shane heaved a breath and his shoulders fell. “How do you know?”
“I bugged your apartment. That first night I was here.”
The words came to her as if through a tunnel, distant and tinny. “What?” He’d been spying on her? She retreated a step, pulling herself away from his touch. Shane spied on her . . . just like Bruno. “You . . .” She shook her head again, her mind so badly wanting to reject what he’d said.
“This damage wasn’t quiet. A neighbor has got to have called the police,” the huge man said, looking from Shane to a dark-haired man she hadn’t met. Crystal couldn’t remember the big guy’s name, though they’d met at Confessions. “We should relocate this conversation.”