Page 37 of Courting Danger

Apparently, Valente was right. The Bianchi family were the ones trying to kill me.

I hadn’t believed it at first. The assassins from the aquarium claiming they shot their own employer had seemed like flimsy evidence. Not enough for me to make any accusations.

This, however, was much more damning.

Of all the possible suspects behind the attack on my life, the Bianchi family had been low on the list. I’d always gotten along with D’Angelo, but friendly acquaintances meant nothing between power hungry families.

That was one question solved. Now I just needed to survive long enough to do something about it.

Since my pursuers ran past, no one else had approached my hiding spot. This section of the construction site seemed empty. Even the noise of the city sounded distant.

What city was I even in?

It wasn’t anywhere in New Jersey.

Something else to figure out once I was safe.

Slipping out from under the bulldozer, I crept as quietly as I could toward the billboard. Advertisements like that were usually displayed on the front of construction sites so more people could see them. That meant the way out of the site had to be somewhere nearby.

Just as I passed a stack of plastic piping, I felt a prick in the side of my neck. My hand shot up, as I expected to slap away a mosquito. Instead, I pulled away a small dart.

“Fuck.”

The word barely left my mouth before my legs collapsed. I grabbed onto the stack of pipes, sending them clattering over the ground. It was no use. I couldn’t even see straight enough to know which way was forward.

Footsteps approached and hands grabbed my shoulders.

“That was too fuckin’ close,” someone grumbled as my hands were secured with more rope. “You fuckers need to pay attention.”

The man tying my feet paused mid-motion to argue. “Hey, don’t look at me. You said he’d be unconscious for at least another day.”

I kicked out at the man by my feet. “Let go.” I managed to strike the man’s shoulder, but the blow was barely hard enough to bruise.

For my effort, I earned a backhand across the face.

“Stop struggling, ya bastard.”

I had no choice but to comply. Whatever they’d drugged me with had already seized control of my muscles. I could barely keep my head off the ground, let alone raise my hands enough to fight back.

Trussed up even tighter than before, I was hauled off somewhere. My vision kept fading in and out, so I couldn’t tell if it was the same room or not.

This time, they didn’t bother to leave me on the floor. They carried me over to a large metal container and dropped me inside. A lid immediately covered the open top, trapping me in darkness.

In the small confines of the container, my harsh breathing sounded like a freight train. I flailed my bound fists, banging against the sides of my new prison, but it was useless. The metal was unforgiving and didn’t even dent.

The whole container shifted, and I was thrown against one wall. Just as I managed to right myself, it shifted again, tossing me in the other direction.

What was happening?

Were they moving me somewhere else?

The container tipped back and forth a few more times, before suddenly dropping. I hit the lid, then bounced off the floor, the impact knocking the air from my lungs.

I lay there, confused and disoriented as I gasped for breath. Everything was dark, but I couldn’t tell if that was from the container, or if my vision had failed. My confused thoughts slipped through my mind, haze around the edges like old photographs faded from time.

In my delirium, I thought I heard a soft sound like rain on a tin roof. It was almost soothing, until I realized what the sound meant.

The answer hit me with the force of a baseball bat to the chest.

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