Page 13 of Silent Vendetta (Vendetta Duet)

But Rinaldi’s tight eyes looked skeptical.

“You said he wasn’t answering his calls,” Rinaldi argued, referencing my anxiety as I was being treated in the back of the ambulance. Then she turned her attention to Hunter. “If you were so worried about her safety, why didn’t you answer her calls or texts?”

“I’m embarrassed by my behavior.” Hunter’s voice was full of remorse. “When I found out she had been taken, I threw my cell phone at the wall. The thing broke.”

I wasn’t sure if Rinaldi believed him, but if she didn’t want to risk never going home to her child, she needed to back off. And order all the other cops to do the same.

It shouldn’t be too challenging. No one was hurt here. I was safe, Hunter was alive, and that was the threat I had been investigating.

But her face hadn’t softened.

My heart was a pendulum, swinging between terror and anger at Hunter.

“And your shirt?” she challenged, looking at my top.

“I was just changing out of my bloody, sweat-soaked clothes,” I recited, tossing a thumb over my shoulder. “When you pulled up.”

“I tried to call you back,” Rinaldi said to me.

“I’m sorry. We…we were just overwhelmed. Relieved, you know?”

Rinaldi’s eyes dropped to my wrists, which had red marks, but I’d been tied up by Franco earlier tonight.

Seriously. Who gets held hostage twice in one night?

She then looked past me, peering into the great room before returning her eyes back to us.

“If it’s all the same, I’d like to have a look around.” Rinaldi glared at Hunter. “Would you have a problem with that, Mr. Lockwood?”

CHAPTER9

Luna

Eight innocent people, not including myself, were in danger.

To anyone else, Hunter was merely smiling, but the slight stiffening of his muscles told me the prospect of the police poking around his house irritated him.

I doubt anyone suspected Hunter was the Windy City Vigilante, but the police had enough suspicion of something to want a look around.

“Of course.” He motioned past the foyer.

Staring at Hunter with tightened eyes that flirted with mistrust—her blonde bun as tight as her posture—Rinaldi stepped into the great room.

The space was a ghost to me, haunted by reminders of a star-crossed romance. The logs in the fireplace that had crackled and popped as we made love next to it now lay cold and gray—the faint scent of burning wood still lingering in the air. Every corner of the space, which once filled with our breathless sighs, echoed with the scuffle of boots on the polished floor, and the grand staircase, where our nude bodies had entwined, now seemed desolate and bare—its banister gleaming coldly as if tensing for a confrontation that could turn deadly.

“Start on the first floor,” she said to the officers.

My lips curled slightly, watching the police invade Hunter’s space, but fell with the chilling reminder their lives were at risk.

Rinaldi stared at me again, studying me with apprehension.

“I’m going to look around myself.”

Hunter’s smile wavered. “May I ask what you’re looking for?”

She looked from me to him again. “Mr. Lockwood, there was a threat against you tonight. Luna heard screams, and Franco’s still missing. We need to ensure you’re safe.”

She thinks Franco might be holding Hunter hostage.

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