Page 19 of Last Shot

Six hours after her release from prison, and she was right back where she started.

Max ripped open every cupboard, searching for weapons, for something she could use to blast out of her air-conditioned, artfully furnished cell. No way had the Giant decked this place out himself. There was a distinct female presence but strangely, no make-up or tampons in the bathroom cupboards. There was a purple can of hairspray through, which she tucked under her arm along with the lime green lighter she’d found in the bottom kitchen drawer. He hadn’t smelled like a smoker.

The kitchen knives were useless – hadn’t been sharpened in a while – but better than nothing. And they certainly looked more frightening than her tiny petrol-station army knife.

Max assembled her weapons on the speckled marble benchtop next to the Rolex Luca had forced upon Grey last night, still curled in its black box. She couldn’t picture it ticking away on the thick wrist of the violent caveman who’d threatened her with his gun and chased her down a trellis. Then flattened her into a frangipani bush.

It had been the first human contact she’d had in six months. Unless you counted that naked woman who’d smashed her head into the basin on her third night in Semperdon.

When she’d imagined the Barbarani security, she’d pictured Disney cut-out villains in ninja masks with knives sheathed in every orifice. She hadn’t expected someone so ...

Young?

Jeans-wearing?

Giant?

Speaking of jeans, she needed to find something to wear.

She’d found no bloodstained room filled with torture devices and partly dismembered enemies. Didn’t mean there wasn’t one, though, its entrance probably hidden in a dark crawl space with a dull lamp and a pinboard filled with red string connecting threats and aTo Be Killedlist.

There wasn’t one of those either.

But there was a bedroom. A normal bed – queen-sized, navy-blue duvet folded like an official government envelope. She didn’t pay too much attention to anything in that room – didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of acknowledging his human-like traits – even in his absence. But she needed coverage.

The white drawers were filled with clothing sorted like Schedule 8 medicines – this was a place where colour and fun came to die. The shirts were folded like sliced bread in a cupboard that also housed a black tuxedo, a khaki snow jacket and a pair of On Cloud sneakers. Max grabbed a shirt at random and tugged it on. It looked like a dress, but was probably a crop top onhim.

Its scent was distinctly devoid of blood and bleach. Perhaps he committed his billionaire-sanctioned crimes in the singlets she’d seen in the bottom drawer.

Back in the kitchen, she stood up on the island bench. Balancing one hand flat against the ceiling, she ran the other over the downlights, feeling for the ridge of a hidden camera. She’d be naïve to think Mr I-Keep-People-Like-You-Away-From-People-Like-the-Barbaranis didn’t have this place wired or bugged.

The cottage was cool, not as cold as outside, but the sweat patches under her arms and at the nape of her neck were drying. The tiny blue eye of a camera winked back at her from the rim of the middle light. She stuck up her middle finger and jumped down from the bench.

She had to get out.

And go where, Max?the scowling reflection in the microwave asked.Where the fuck do you have to go?

She needed to get to Giovanni. All she could see when she closed her eyes was the wine tycoon’s face. Right before it exploded, brain matter spattering onto the white walls of her mind. But now her grand plan to warn him about this attack was sinking beneath the waves before she’d even worked out how to drive the ship. In her feverish visions of launching herself at the masked shadow of Kaine Skinner as he raised a gun to Giovanni’s face, Max had never imagined she’d have the Barbaranis’ Fixer restraining her arms behind her back as she tried.

The incessant ticking of the Rolex reminded her she was running out of options.

Toilet. She hadn’t checked the—

A key scratched in the front door. Max grabbed the hairspray and flicked the lighter as a tall figure pushed into the kitchen.

It wasn’t Grey. This guy was tall, but his skin was dark with a familiar slash across his face that made her stomach twist uncomfortably. The driver.

Her grip tightened on her makeshift weapons, but she kept her hands below the bench. ‘Who are you?’ she said, going on the offensive. The giant wouldn’t have locked her in here if there was an easy way out the back door.

The intruder’s jaw slacked open – it worked. He seemed unsure whether to chase her out like a rat or apologise for barging in unannounced. He clearly didn’t recognise her. She wasn’t sure if this was going to work in her favour or not.

‘I’m Grey’s best friend. Jett Randall.’ He said it like it was as prestigious as being the King.

‘Right, well, I’m Grey’s hostage, Max.’

‘Hostage?’ The guy’s eyes bulged. Despite the scar, he was seriously good-looking. In fact, once you got past the initial shock, it actually made him more endearing. ‘I thought you were his ...?’

‘Does he normally keep one-night-stands locked up in his cottage?’

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