Page 87 of Covert Temptation

Please, Dante. Don’t let me be disposable.

SIXTEEN

The tires screamed as he took the turn too fast, but Dante didn’t ease off the gas. The narrow road snaked through a stretch of woods that broke open into frostbitten pastures.

On his screen, the tracker pulsed—one tiny dot surrounded by blank space. Whoever had taken Kennedy knew what they were doing. They’d selected the most remote spot in the valley.

He was nearly there.

The barn rose out of the valley like a ghost—gray and leaning hard to one side. Against the backdrop of bleak sky, it looked like something out of a horror movie.

His breath caught at the memory of her slipping that tracker into her boot, all to show him he could trust her.

Christ. Kennedy.

He didn’t know what he’d find. If she was alive…if she was already—

His fingers whitened on the wheel.Don’t think it. You don’t get to fall apart. Not now.

A half mile out, he killed the lights and let the vehicle roll to a quiet stop behind a row of leafless trees standing stark against the bleak sky.

Climbing out, he kept low, his weapon locked in his grip. The wind howled through the emptiness, but there were no other sounds—no voices, no movement. No vehicle was in sight, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t hidden behind the barn.

He approached the barn cautiously. Every breath he took felt too shallow, causing his heart rate to double. His muscles tightened with the anticipation of a gunshot or scream.

In a low crouch, he rushed to the structure and pitched up against the east side near a small, dirt-coated window. His heart thundered in his ears, but there was no quieting it, not when he had to look inside despite what he might see there.

Holding his breath, he pushed out of his crouch to peek through the window.

His breath slammed from his lungs.

Jesus, she was there. Kennedy.

She stood in the center of the room, bathed in a cone of yellow light from an overhead bulb. As he looked on, her captor pulled out a knife and slashed the zip-ties binding her wrists. Then he tore off her sweater in one sharp move.

Dante’s chest throbbed with fury. She was stripped to her underwear, bare feet on the rough wood floor, arms trembling at her sides.

Dante’s throat clogged when she twisted in her stiff dance to reveal tears streaking down her face. Her lips were quivering, not counting the steps she took.

But her eyes…they were what scared him shitless.

Her eyes were dead.

A man sat slouched on some low object against the wall. Once in a while, he reached into a can and tossed something that made a low clicking noise when it hit the wall.

He wasn’t watching Kennedy like she was desirable. In fact, he looked bored.

Rage detonated in Dante’s chest. His vision blurred, and he dropped into a crouch again, feeling like he’d just taken a hit to the heart. But it was still beating, hard and fast, drowning out the world.

He would kill that man.

He sucked in ice-cold air that tasted like rust…or blood.

His hands shook as he scanned the perimeter of the barn, searching desperately for a weak point—an entry that wouldn’t put Kennedy in the line of fire when he burst in with gun blazing.

But the barn was old and rotted. A stiff wind could probably blow it over. There were gaps between the wood siding, and as he stalked around the side, keeping to the wall, he heard the creak of the floorboards under Kennedy’s feet as she danced.

The main entry was a sliding metal sheet, partially rusted. No way to breach it quietly.

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