Page 73 of Montana Rain

Rayne pulled the flash drive out of her back pocket and handed it to him. “Here. Happy?”

He grabbed her shoulder and held her back from returning. “Not so fast, Miss Westerfield. You don’t mind if we check this, do you?”

The belittling, oily tone in his voice made me sick. My hands curled into fists. He had his hands on her. One of the other guys grabbed a laptop from the car and put it on the hood. Antonio walked her over to the computer and put in the flash drive. Everything hurt from the tension in my body, holding myself still.

He clicked a few times and turned to Rayne. “I thought I made myself clear.” His gun was out and pointed at her head in less than a second. “You weren’t to involve the FBI.”

Ava and her mother screamed, and I heard a rushing in my ears. It took everything in me not to run to her. She would be dead long before I reached her.

“We didn’t,” Rayne said. Her voice didn’t waver for a second. “But the real one is hidden. I’m the only one here who knows where it is. They don’t know, and I’ll only tell you once you let them go. All of them.”

“Rayne,” I called.

No. This couldn’t happen. If they took her, there was no guarantee I would ever see her again.

“And what makes you think I won’t just shoot you and then them?” Antonio asked. “If you’re the only one who knows where it is, then maybe it should stay lost.”

The gun touched her forehead. I was going to lose it, sprint for her, and damn the consequences. “I’m the only one here who knows where it is,” Rayne said.

She was so fucking smart, and if she got out of this alive, I was going to kill her. The one thing going for us was these guys clearly didn’t know we’d already turned over the real thing.

“Let them go,” Rayne said. “Or I’m not saying anything.”

Antonio narrowed his eyes. I saw the thoughts on his face, weighing his options. The drive, and his boss’s freedom, won. “Fine. But you’re going to tell me, Miss Westerfield. I don’t care if it has to be painful.”

He looked at us. “Get out of here.”

“Rayne, don’t do this,” I begged her. No way could I walk away from here without her by my side.

She turned, agony in her eyes. One of the men grabbed her arms, twisting them painfully behind her back. Red covered my vision, but as soon as I moved, they would put a bullet in her head.

“Take care of them and make sure they’re okay,” she said. Now her voice wavered, eyes flicking to her family and back to me. “I love you.”

My heart dropped out of my chest and shattered on the ground. I should have told her in the hotel room. And I couldn’t bear to say it for real now. But I did. “I love you.”

The words were low. No one could hear them but me. Still, she saw me say them, her shoulders slumping in relief.

Antonio pulled her away and put her in one of the cars. The other men retreated and followed, the squeal of tires echoing and fading into silence. I didn’t even realize my hand was gripping Ava’s wheelchair so tightly my knuckles were white until they were gone.

“Oh god,” Ava said, eyes teary. “Are they going to kill her? They’re going to kill her, aren’t they?”

“Not if I can help it,” I said. “Let’s get you guys out of here and safe.”

And once they were okay? I was going after Rayne.

I told Rayne I wasn’t a hero, and I wasn’t. But for her, I would be.

Because Antonio had just made me a villain, and he had no idea what was coming.

Chapter 30

Cole

I sat in a chair in the waiting room at the hospital. Ava and her mother were being looked over, and the hospital staff were suspicious about what brought them in at all. They were doing as well as they could be, getting checked out through their tears.

Not the circumstances I’d wanted to meet them under.

I hadn’t called anyone yet. The Bureau couldn’t know until I had more information. They would lock me out and not tell me what was happening. The cops too. If Antonio and the rest of Peretti’s men saw cops, Rayne was dead.

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