Luke floundered in the alley. He hoped Dani was right about not being seen from the house, because his legs felt like rubber and his knees wouldn’t hold him anymore.

Somebody skipped leg day. Actually, there were no weights or anything in his prison to work his legs. He’d done crunches and sit-up and push-ups, but nothing for the leg muscles that had slowly begun to atrophy without something to keep them stimulated. It wasn’t that he missed squats. He needed aerobic activity, something to work the cardiovascular so his heart could pump the oxygen to his legs at the supply they needed.

He grabbed a dumpster and leaned on it, taking deep breaths. He forced his legs to move forward, promising them that the breakneck panic speed was over, and he would behave, walking like a nice boy. His legs didn’t exactly believe him, but he forced them along anyway, wondering just how long it took to get out of shape.

I used to be able to run for miles without stopping.

Yeah... since when? You haven’t gone jogging more than twice in the last three months.

By the time he got to the end of the alley he was walking more or less normally again, and his breath was no longer coming in short gasps. Vowing that if he got out of this alive, he’d go jogging at least six days a week for the rest of his life, he glanced around. Multi-million-dollar mansions on tree-lined streets, manicured lawns and fences that varied from boundary markers to great edifices of privacy, sporting signs threatening the fool that tried to breach them. The alley was for the little people: garbage collection, deliveries, stray dogs. Vital to those who needed such things (except for the stray dogs) but invisible, beneath notice, therefore unseen.

He came through the alley in jeans and t-shirt that had “SCREW IT” emblazoned above an enlarged cartoon wood screw and a plank of wood. Even if he’d been going to quirky or even mildly eccentric, he was woefully unprepared for a stroll in the wealthiest area of Atlanta. At the very least his jeans should have been designer. A haircut or even just a shave would have done wonders.

He appeared to not be unique in his assessment of his inability to blend in. He’d gotten a few blocks toward town when he saw a cruiser rolling toward him. Relieved because he’d been waiting for the thugs to come after him for the last ten minutes, he turned and waved them down. From their expressions, that was the last thing they had counted on.

“Can we help you?” the driver said, eyeing him as if he were last week’s leftovers.

“I’m Agent Luke McConnell, FBI. I work for Deputy Director Randy Addams.”

“What are you doing out here?” the other one asked, not looking like he believed him.

“We’re going to need to see some identification,” the driver added, making no move toward something helpful. Like his radio. Cell phone even? Anything?

“I don’t have any ID,” Luke said, with a sinking feeling that told him exactly how this was going to go down from here. “I just escaped. I was kidnapped.”

“I thought you said you were a fed.”

“I am.”

“You’re trying to tell us that someone kidnapped a fed?” The driver exchanged glances with his partner, who snorted and looked away. Hell, this was going on Facebook. Not in a good way.

“Look, just take me to the station; I need to check in...”

“We can’t do that,” the second guy said with a shake of his head.

“Why the hell not?”

“Not without proper ID.” He shot a look that clearly said, ‘This guy is crazy’ to the driver, who nodded.

“I don’t have any ID.”

“No money either, I suppose?”

“No, why?”

“That’s vagrancy,” the driver said, seizing on the thing he did know how to process. “You need to move along now.”

“I’m trying to tell you that is what I want to do!”

“Don’t get argumentative, buddy,” the passenger warned. “You don’t want us to haul you in.”

“Yes,” Luke nodded his entire torso. “Yes, that is exactly what I want. Haul me in!”

“Not without the proper ID!” the driver said, and shook his head. “There’s paperwork.”

“WHAT?”

“Hey, look at it from our perspective: you claim to be a fed, but you don’t have any ID...”

“I am a federal agent. I’m stationed in D.C., on assignment here in Atlanta!”

“...you don’t have a badge, you don’t have ID. You could be a crazed vagrant, for all we know.”

Luke dropped his head and counted to ten. He looked at the two policemen and sighed. He held up his index finger to signal them to wait a moment and backed off from the cruiser, onto the sidewalk and over the edge of someone’s lawn. He signaled them to wait again, unzipped his fly, and pulled out his cock and began watering the grass.

“HEY!” the cops yelled in unison, and clamored out of the car. One of them, Luke thought it had been the guy from the passenger side, grabbed Luke’s left wrist and slapped a pair of cuffs on him. He reached for the right one.

“Mind if I shake it first?” Luke asked, trying to be polite.

“Put it away,” the cop growled, and waited until Luke was decent again, then force-marched him to the car. His partner opened the door and they crammed him inside.

“You’re under arrest,” the passenger said, pulling a small card from his pocket. “You have the right to remain silent, anything you say and will be used against you. You have...”

Thank freakin’ goodness.

Luke tuned him out, making affirmative noises at the right points, just thankful to be out of there. Even Uncle Benny couldn’t get to him here. At least he didn’t think so. There was always the chance that Benny had certain cops on the payroll, but Laurel and Hardy, here, were hardly likely candidates.

In short, he was safe.

But what about Dani?

Luke watched the streets disappear behind him as the car pulled out, headed downtown he supposed. He may have gotten out in one piece, but in order to do so he’d had to leave Dani behind, and no matter how he tried to justify it out it never felt right. At least Benny wouldn’t hurt her; she was his niece in practice if not in fact. He gave her candy... he loved her.

Do you really believe that? Benny is one of the most dangerous mobsters in the country. You seriously think that there isn’t a person in the organization who isn’t expendable to him?

David... maybe he shouldn’t have been so hard on him last night, but he had to admit that the boy setting off alarms to piss through a third-story window had been hilarious. Was that where Dani had gotten the idea? He looked back toward the house, now barely visible over the wall behind him as the cruiser slipped through the streets into less-elegant surroundings.

Please be safe. Please. Your uncle is a madman, and your brother is every bit as insane. Please, please be safe, hold on as best you can. I’ll come back with help. I’ll get every cop in Atlanta to come with me.

“SIR!” the passenger cop yelled. “DO YOU UNDERSTAND THESE RIGHTS AS I HAVE READ THEM TO YOU?”

“Yes,” Luke said. Every cop except these two. The rest, those I will bring, I swear it.

“What’s your name?” The passenger was taking notes for the endless pile of paperwork that followed any arrest, even for pissing in public.

“Luke McConnell.”

“Occupation?”

Luke looked at him, raised an eyebrow. He was suddenly curious how far he could take this. “I’m a federal agent. Would it help if I gave you my badge number?”

The two cops looked at each other and the driver sighed. “Very funny, Mr. McConnell,” the passenger said. “Now tell us your real occupation.”

“I’m a flamenco dancer.”

“Like the bird?”

Luke sighed and watched the view through the car window. He let the cop ask the same question over and over, getting louder each time. It didn’t matter; it passed the time on the trip, and there was no point in answering if they weren’t going to listen to the answers.

He was processed and fingerprinted before he saw someone he recognized. When his identity was confirmed by a captain who’d shown up when he heard he was about to be escorted to debriefing, the two cops who arrested him suddenly seemed at a loss for words.

“Sir... uh... about that...”

“Listen,” Luke said with a grin. “I know, in that neighborhood, you have to be very particular about everything. Of course, in a place like that, it’s hard to call attention to your abilities, too. Let me see if I can help you boys out. Maybe I can get you transferred to someplace your abilities will be noticed and appreciated.” He paused for effect. “How about Grant Park?” he said cheerfully. Both their faces drained of blood.

“We’re fine,” one said.

“Thanks anyway, sir...” the other chimed in.

“We should get back...”

“Yeah, if there’s anything we can do...”

“There is,” Luke said. “Give me back that damn USB stick.” He held out his hand. It had been the only thing in his possession, and had been taken from him upon processing.

“LUKE!”

He knew that yell anywhere. Luke shot a glance to the agent that had come to escort him from the interrogation room. If anything, the agent, a man who looked too young to be out of high school, looked a little pale.

The patrolman dropped the stick in Luke’s palm and ran.

“Randy’s here?”

“He commandeered the chief’s office, sir.”

“I imagine the chief must be appreciative.”

The agent winced. “You don’t know the half of it, sir.”

“LUKE, GET YOUR ASS OUT HERE! I WANT YOU IN MY OFFICE! NOW!”

Out of the frying pan...

***

“HOW THE HELL DID YOU wind up here?” The deputy director glared at him from across the desk.

“Happy to see you, too, boss.” Luke slumped into a chair and took a deep breath. He was wiped. Mentally and physically. But it felt good to be back in familiar places. Even the soul-destroying furniture, government- issued, the same in every department across the country, was a welcome distraction.

“Just tell me how you got here,” Randy snapped.

“I bummed a ride with two of the city’s finest.” Luke waved in the direction of the squad room. “As for how I got out, Dani got me out during a distraction. I bolted and came here. Had to water someone’s yard to get a ride. But...” Luke waved that away as a minor detail, “I’m sure it will be in the arrest report.”

“Fine.” Randy propped his feet against the desk, sending his chair creaking far enough backward that it was a wonder it didn’t break outright. “I think I’d rather not know.” He stared at Luke a long moment and sighed. “You all right?”

He looked concerned. Like he even meant it. Luke nodded, though it took some effort not to look surprised. He stretched, folding his arms behind his head. Damn, it felt good to be out. “Yeah. A little in need of a good pizza and some beer, but otherwise okay. The cell was a five-star, but the guards were your general mouth-breathing knuckle-draggers.”

“So where did you stash the girl?” Randy reached for a pad and pen.

“That’s a rather personal question, isn’t it, Randy?”

Randy gave him a very dirty look and sighed. “Don’t give me shit, not today. Just tell me where the girl is.”

Luke shrugged. “She’s still back there, far as I know. I tried to get her out, but she wouldn’t come.”

The pad dropped from Randy’s fingers. He whistled slowly. “How long ago did you get out?”

Luke sat up straight. Something in the question didn’t set well, and the gas in his belly suddenly wasn’t just from his body trying to eat itself for nourishment. “Uh... figure a twenty-minute ride in the police academy car, another ten to convince them to drive me down here, time lost in the system till you found me... maybe an hour or two total.”

“He must have found you missing as soon as you left,” Randy said, shaking his head. “When I got the word, I thought maybe he...” Randy stood and walked around to the chair behind the desk. He sat down and leaned back. “He put out a word this morning. ‘She marries or dies.’ I got it about five minutes ago. I thought it was meant for her father, now I’m not so sure.” Randy laced his hands together over his belly and regarded Luke soberly.

Something didn’t sit right. Sure, Randy had informants, but it all seemed a little too neat. “You got word awfully fast.”

Randy shrugged. “Even drug-addicts and pimps like gossip. For a month or so, the only word on the street was about Beyoncé. Hell, you needed to update your connection on Jay Z just to score.”

“No, I’m familiar with the distribution.” Luke waved him off, “I mean you. You got word pretty fast.”

Randy looked at him with a quelling stare. “I’m deeply invested,” he murmured finally. “Have been for years.”

“So then why the hell do you need a guest list?”

Randy sighed, and rubbed his forehead. “Because, by tomorrow, ‘word on the street’ will have it that she married and then Benny killed her, or that she was forced to marry and then he killed the groom, or both, or that he forced her to marry a corpse. You can’t exactly do a fact check on this, you know?” He shook his head. “I’m hearing about every name in the book being brought out here. Hell, half the names I’ve gotten aren’t even alive anymore. So, unless zombies start parading down the streets of Atlanta, all wearing fedoras and cheap suits, I gotta know who’s really gonna be there! It might be the one chance we have to snag everyone.”

“For attending a wedding?”

“Either you think I’m stupid or you really are!” Randy sat up fast and smacked his hand on the desk. “Some of the rumors have people who have been hiding off-grid, or been underground so long we’ve quit looking for them. Some even who fled the country are coming back, so I have to know who so the DA’s office can get their shit together and get the paperwork done. I need extradition,” he began ticking off on his fingers, “writs, warrants, searches, manpower!”

Luke had stopped listening. He got it; Randy didn’t need to drive it into his head. The shit was about to hit the fan even harder. Fine, he could deal with that.

But a bigger problem remained.

It seemed every decision he made anymore was between Dani and his career. He’d fled because he needed to report in, because he’d been left there by his support, and now she would die because he ran away? Damn the girl for not running with him. Damn her stubborn blind loyalty to a brother who was one step away from being in one of those movies where the deranged backwoods simpleton chases teenage girls with a chainsaw. She’d stayed so nothing would happen to David. Luke still doubted that anything would; Benny was keeping him as a pet. Once Edwin Rineheart, David’s father and the cause of this entire disaster left, David had collapsed.

Which had been interesting in and of itself. From all he’d known about David the man was used to working a plan, and always had something going. His father leaving like that had caught him with his pants down. David had been arrogant, dangerous, and self-absorbed, but he’d had the attitude of someone who was cock-sure and aggressive. Benny comes along, and suddenly David was playing Igor to his Dr. Frankenstein? The man wasn’t sane, and had fallen apart completely in a matter of days. And Benny not only coddled him, but seemed to be ignoring completely that the kid was just this side of a psychotic wreck.

And to top it off, Dani still threw herself in front of whatever bullets had headed his way. And there were plenty of those.

But this wasn’t about David. It wasn’t about Dani. This was about Luke. He’d been abandoned by the FBI, and everything was suddenly about poor him. Luke the victim. Luke the... well, some things were better off not said.

I just wish that underground gossip would work both ways. Maybe if I had a better picture of what was happening...

He shook his head. No, that didn’t fit. The thing that had thrown him into a knot was simple. It was that recording. The fact that his privacy had been violated. That was supposed to have been a night of passion and lust and, yes, yes, love... he loved her. He loved her, and that love had been taken from the careful box that separated Dani from duty, the divider that let him believe he didn’t have to make the choice, not yet.

Benny had taken that comfortable separation away and laid it out, dirty and sweaty on the breakfast table, and he’d laughed at Luke, ridiculed the tender part of him that he’d always kept hidden at work.

That was why he’d run.

“I have to go back,” he said suddenly, interrupting Randy mid-tirade with no idea what the other man had been saying. “I have to get out of here.” He was on his feet and halfway to the door before he even realized he was in motion.

“What?” Randy grabbed his arm and spun him back around to face. “It’s over! You’re compromised. In case you don’t recall, we’ve had this conversation before. And you still went back. And were captured for your troubles. Compromised means out, Luke. When are you going to get that through your head?”

“You said it yourself: They’re going to kill Dani. I’m not sitting out while they take away the only—” Luke swallowed hard. That wasn’t for Randy’s ears.

“So what are you gonna do? Waltz right back in there and pick up where you left off?”

“If I must, YES!”

Randy dug around in his pocket and came up with a cigarette, which he fumbled with and wound up shoving back into the pack when he realized he was in a government building and couldn’t smoke. “You’re going to be the death of me, you know that?” He paced around the room, keeping a wary eye on Luke like he expected him to bolt at any second. “Look, even if you did go back, he’s not going to give you enough freedom to run again. You won’t be able to get the list out anyway. You’re done! And if you think you’re somehow going to be able to save your damsel in distress, then you’ve got another think coming. You don’t think you’ll be under twice the guard if you go back there? You’re both going to wind up dead.” He threw himself into the chair which creaked in protest. “I understand your position, Luke. But speaking as your friend—not your boss, but your friend—there’s nothing you can do. Best we can do is put plan B into motion.”

“And that is?”

There was a long silence. “We’re working on it.”

“Working on it.” Luke shoved a hand through his hair, about ready to pull it out in frustration. “Yeah. I’m reassured. For shit’s sake, Randy, listen to yourself...”

“Maybe you need to listen to you. You think you can bust into a mob strong house and save some mafia princess before her old man comes in there to blow the whole thing up?”

Luke was silent a long moment, while he counted to ten. “I’m going to pretend you didn’t just say that, Randy. You know as well as I do that that girl is no mafia princess. She’s had more training than that comedy sideshow that brought me in here today. Second, yeah, I do. I’m going to bust right in there, get the girl, and together we’re going to bust out of there before her old man comes in there to blow the whole thing up.” He paused. “I only need a hundred dollars.”

“What the f—? Seriously?”

“Randy, you’ve been my boss for how long now? Four...five years? We’ve gotten to be friends, right?”

“And you think I’m going to give you a hundred dollars.”

“Come on, biggest sting in history for a hundred. That’s a steal!”

Randy’s eyes rolled. He took a long, deep breath. With shaking hands he found the packet of cigarettes and worked one free. “You’re crazy.”

“You’re even crazier if you think you’re going to get away with lighting that thing in here.”

“The hell with regulations.” Randy lit the thing and took a long drag. His face relaxed. Hell, his entire body relaxed. “And you’ll get me the list?”

“You seem to think I’m staying for the wedding.”

“You go back in, you sure as hell are staying for the wedding. I’m not wasting this much effort on a half- dozen candy asses I could have picked up off any street corner.”

“You have such a way with words, Randy.”

“Wedding or no deal.”

It was Luke’s turn to pace. “Yeah, fine, whatever.” He turned to face Randy, arms crossed. “Do I get the hundred or not? I don’t have any cash on me, and my cards are... well, nowhere to be seen. My wallet seems to have gone missing. “

Randy took a long drag on his cigarette as he thought this over. “Where’s the stick?”

Luke’s hand twitched. He almost dug into his pocket out of reflex. “I couldn’t get it,” he heard himself saying. “I had to move too fast. I’ll....” He waved his hand, rubbing the thumb over the palm in the age-old tradition of needed the palm greased. “I’ll bring it with the guest list.”

“What’s the hundred for?”

Luke slapped his thigh and he held it out again. “Lunch, okay? Come on!”

Randy shot to his feet and dug into his wallet, pulling out four twenties. Luke grabbed them, and the one Randy tried to put back. “I should send my mother a present.”

“And how the hell am I supposed to pay for my own lunch?”

“Maybe the chief will take you out. You and he seem to be getting along so well.” Luke nodded behind him at the guy clearly seen through the glass in the door, who was glowering just outside, his mustache quivering with suppressed rage.

He left before Randy could swallow his cigarette.

Luke flung the door open and was halfway through the office before Randy could even frame a response. Somewhere behind him he heard shouting. All four-letter words. Luke didn’t so much as pause. He careened down the steps and found the officer who had processed him in. “You!”

“Yes, sir?” The policeman had that reserve between respect and anger that most did when told that the FBI has moved into their town and you’ll be kowtowing to us from now on, thank you. Knowing Randy’s charm and diplomatic skills, he’d probably offended half the force by now. There wasn’t an officer in the place who wasn’t ready to see him leave.

“Those two cops who brought me in?”

“Yes, sir, James and Hardy.”

Luke blinked. “Really? Damn, that’s so close. Get them back here for me, would you? Tell them all possible speed.”

“Yes, sir.” The man looked confused, but Randy had done one thing: He’d asserted that the Bureau was in charge. This poor man was already paging the officers in question.

“Oh! One other thing. I need to go to a Hallmark store, where’s the closest?” The man stared at him so long, Luke just waved him off. “Never mind. Get James and Hardy. I’ll meet them out front.”