My head is pounding fit to burst, and shivers wrack me. What the hell’s happening to me? I feel like fucking roadkill, and the meeting with my parents—if you want to call it that, call them my parents—fucked me over, even if I don’t want to admit it.

They fucking hate me. They had us brought here, probably sent that guard to rough me up. They’re ready to kill me. I’d known it, in theory, but like with everything, seeing it is a different matter. It wouldn’t surprise me if they thought about killing me a thousand times. About offing the Cronin heir, offing Cronin, taking his place.

But Cronin kept them in line.

Until now.

Goddammit, we’re caught in a feud between the Carters and Cronin, when both sides should be in prison, locked up in a steel cage with the key thrown into the ocean. When all I wanna do is grab my girl and hole up somewhere where nobody can find us, where I can spend my days and nights buried inside her, kissing her and touching her, and learning her body, and her mind. That fiery spirit, that insolence, that independence and humor I caught glimpses of over the weeks, and especially over the past few days.

Mine…

“Rook.” She bumps her shoulder against mine, and I blink blearily. “Hey, you awake? Did you hear me?”

“Hear what?” I grumble. There’s an ice pick hammering into the back of my eyeballs, and my heart is pounding so hard it feels like it’s trying to jump out of my chest.

“The door.”

The heavy bolt outside is opening, metal dragging on metal, setting my fucking teeth on edge.

“Ready?” she asks.

For what? There’s a heavy haze over my thoughts, over my eyes. My back is burning up, the fire sinking into my bones, making them ache. Footsteps approach, and the floor seems to tilt slightly as a pair of black boots make their appearance.

Sudden pain flares in my ribs, and I’m falling, the floor coming up to smash against the side of my face.

Ow fuck. Black spots dance in my vision. Darkness sweeps over my eyes, and I panic, but it’s just a guy’s shadow falling over me.

Another spot of bright pain blooms in my ribs, and I grunt, no air left in my lungs. Yeah, pain is good, but getting beaten to death not so much.

At least, the sharp burn in my side clears my head a little, and yeah, we’re in a warehouse, kidnapped to be used against Cronin and…

Someone is shouting my name. Mia, I think.

I struggle up to my knees, another wave of blackness passing over my eyes, and this time it resolves into a body dropping right in front of me, missing me by an inch.

Whoa.

“Keep him down, keep the guard down!” Mia shouts, close enough to my ear to make my eardrum bleed. “Rook!”

Fuck. Okay, okay. There was a plan, right? Christ.

With a groan that turns into a shout of pain, I let myself fall on top of the guard. My ribs scream at me, my back feels like it’s cut open, white-hot pokers of fire stab through my chest, and then the guard twists and grabs me around the neck, squeezing.

Not much you can do with your hands tied and no air entering your lungs. He growls something unintelligible, squeezes harder, and my voice goes together with my fucking breath. The warehouse swims in my eyes.

Fucking hell.

I hear Mia yell something, and I try to see her, see if she’s okay, stave off the darkness I feel coming, the real, solid kind that reeks of nightmares—but it’s no use. My face is too warm, my lungs bursting without air, my heart hammering, and the light is dimming.

Mia! I think, struggling to move one last time, break the hold, find her. I’m so fucking scared for her, and it’s my fault she’s here. My mistakes, my hesitation, my fucking family.

But before I even see her, my mind goes out like a light, and I freefall into the void.

* * *

“Wake up. Wake up. Come on, Rook. Wake up.”

The insistent little voice is fucking with the quiet inside my head and jumpstarting the pounding pain in my temples that had faded for a while.

The voice is soft and familiar, but I don’t want to resurface. I have a feeling I won’t fucking like what I find waiting for me.

A hand shakes my shoulder, and yeah, no choice. Time to face the music, and if it’s anything like the pounding inside my head, this will be so much fucking fun.

“What?” I hiss as I pry my eyes open, the light stabbing straight into my brain. “Ow, holy fucking shit.”

My head is a giant throb of pain, the agony echoing in my back and ribs. Reality really sucks hairy fucking balls.

“Come on,” she says. “I got his phone, but I need you to move so I can free your hands.”

She’s peering down at me, those pretty eyes huge and brilliant in her small face, and I’d grin up at her and lick my lips—only trying to move is making me wanna puke.

The fuck’s wrong with me?

She rolls me completely on my side and is doing something I can’t feel. I can’t feel my arms, or hands. Besides, all my focus is on not puking, despite the bile rising in my throat. I swallow convulsively, closing my eyes and trying to keep it together.

Not the time to lose your shit, Rook. Or your lunch. Dinner. Whatever it was, ah fuck…

“Done.” She’s kneeling beside me, tugging on me to get me to sit up. Tugging on my arm, I realize, but I feel nothing but a bit of pressure. “Come on, work with me, Rook.”

Yeah, Rook. Come on.

I manage to sit up, even manage not to throw up all over her, when the pain hits in my arms. Pins and needles? Hell, this is red-hot pins and the Devil’s needles straight out of hell.

You like pain, buddy? Careful what you’re wishing for.

“Give it some time,” she says. “My hands burned like fire at the beginning.”

She’s putting me to shame. She’s a superwoman, my FBI agent girl.

“I’m fine,” I tell her, and frown when the words don’t come out quite right. A shiver shakes me.

Dammit. Something’s definitely fucking wrong. I’m a big boy. I can take pain. Lots more pain than most people I know. So why is it hitting me so hard tonight of all days?

Ironic, isn’t it? The king of pain brought to his knees in a dirty warehouse.

Such shitty timing. That has always been my bane, since I was a kid, or I wouldn’t have soaked in the dark until it seeps out of me instead of blood.

“The guard is out. I kicked him in the head, but I don’t know how long he will stay out. Used his thumb to access the phone, but it’s not working. Must have taken a hit when he dropped down that damaged it.”

“Motherfuckers,” I breathe, and sway where I’m kneeling.

“Rook—”

“Gimme the cell.”

Her worried gaze meets mine, and I look down at the cell to avoid it, focus on the screen. Try to focus on the screen.

Fuck. It’s blurry. My eyes are blurry. I drag my finger over the screen, but she’s right. It’s all frozen.

Fuck this shit. “We break the door down,” I mutter. “Hold the guy hostage. We’ll find a way, kitten.”

“Rook… You don’t look so good.” Her voice is choked. “Where does it hurt? Let me have a look.”

It hurts all over. Inside and out. I don’t know where the pain starts and where it ends. “Don’t worry about me.” I struggle to get up. She helps me, and together we stumble toward the metal door. “This is my fault.”

“No, it isn’t. If anything, it’s mine. I’m FBI. You’re a civilian. I’m supposed to protect you.”

So fierce. “You got caught up in my family’s mess.”

“So were you.”

No arguing with that. I stumble, and she huffs as she straightens me, shoving her small, curvy body against mine. Despite the dizziness, it feels good.

“I hope you get paid extra for this job,” I mutter. “Do you get a good salary? I could use a bodyguard like you.”

“Are you offering me a job?”

“I’m offering you my heart, kitten, but I’ll take you on your terms, whatever they are.”

We stop. At first I think it’s me, but then I realize she’s staring up at me, her eyes wide. “You’re feverish,” she whispers in a small voice. “You keep saying these things, and I’m sure…”

“You’re sure what?”

“That once we’re out of here, you won’t even remember my name. But after this mess I put you in…” She sighs. “It would only be fair.”

“No.” I haul her against me despite the pain, breathe her in. She smells sweet even in this cold, dark place. “There’s nothing fair about love. Nothing calculating. I want you. I need you. Love is selfish.”

She shakes her head, but a smile tugs at her mouth. “Not if I feel the same way, it isn’t.”

Holy shit, all my smartass replies fail me. I turn fully to take her face in my shaking hands. “Christ, Mia, don’t play with me. I’ve never done this with any girl before.”

I’m new to love. I just know she’s the one for me, the one who makes me happy.

“I just wish…” she starts, her lashes lowered—but I never find out what.

Because just then the door explodes inward, the deafening crash sending us both a step back.

A small army all in black steps inside.

And they have their guns trained on us.

* * *

“Well, well. Roderick. Long time no see. In person, that is. Saw you plenty on my security cameras, sneaking around my hotel.”

“Ian Cronin,” I rasp.

Mia gasps, and I tuck her firmly under my arm. To get her, he’ll have to go through me. Though why he’d want her is unclear to my fuzzy, bleary mind. Nobody knows they kidnapped an agent with me. They thought they caught me together with a maid. She’s collateral damage.

No way am I letting her get hurt.

He steps inside, flanked by his bodyguards, in his immaculate, thousand-dollar gray suit, his hair swept back, his eyes dark.

So similar to mine.

Seeing him in the flesh is a fucking revelation. If I harbored any doubts before about him being related to me, they’re gone now.

Two of his men carry the guard Mia knocked out away, Cronin watching them with coldness in his gaze.

“You should have stayed out of this,” he says to us, casually, as if we’re discussing the weather. “This had nothing to do with you.”

“This has everything to do with me,” I grind out. “Besides, I’m not exactly here by choice. The people you sent me to live with decided I’d make a good bargaining chip against you. I wonder…” I squint at him. “Did it work? Did you get worried at all when they told you they had me, Dad?”

“Not for a second.” He shoves his hands into his pockets, the very picture of arrogance. “The Carters are stupid, thinking they could stand against me. There was never a doubt about the outcome of their little rebellion.”

“They thought you’d off them.”

“They thought right.”

A chill goes through me, different from the shivers that won’t quit since I woke up in this fucking warehouse. “And you didn’t think that by barging in here you could have gotten me killed? Did that bother you at all?”

“The Carters wouldn’t kill you. They know if they did they’d pay dearly.”

“You took a gamble. With me.”

He raises a brow. “Sentimental, are we? This isn’t some soap opera, Roderick. This is business.”

“Rook. That’s what my family calls me.”

I don’t even know why I’m telling him this. Why I’m waiting for him to acknowledge he feels anything about me, his only son. After my adopted parents showed me so clearly they don’t give a fuck, I guess deep inside I’d hoped that this man who created me would be… warmer. That I’d see a spark of emotion in his eyes upon finding me here, battered and bloody, because of his machinations. Because of his business.

Why the fuck do I care, anyway? Nothing has changed.

Nothing.

And everything.

Ian Cronin is studying me as if I’m a bug he found under his microscope. “I don’t care what others call you. Roderick is your given name.”

“And you are my father, but that didn’t stop you from giving me away.”

“It was to protect you.”

“From the murders and the corpses you walk over to conduct your fucking business?”

He cocks his head to the side, like a bird, considering me. “Do you think I care about you, boy? Because if you do, you’re sorely mistaken. Do you know who your mother was?”

Was. Somehow my heart sinks at the sound of this. I barely feel Mia squeezing my hand. “Should I?”

“Not really. She was nobody important. I paid her well to have you. I believe she was from Italy. A good family. Good genes. I wanted an heir, not a son. I’m not cut out to be a parent. I have no patience, and no need for it.”

“Then why?” I clamp my teeth down before I ask anything more.

Business. That’s the answer.

“I thought it was a good idea, back then. Someone to take over from me when I grow older. Someone related to me that I can trust.” He smirks ruefully. “Looks like the latter isn’t in the cards, though.”

“You got that right.”

He observes me for a long moment, and I do my best to hold his gaze, despite how light my head feels and how blackness edges my vision. Keep your attention on me, motherfucker. Ignore my girl.

But he does look at her, and my hackles rise. “Who is this, then? I’ve seen you around my hotel.”

“Don’t even look at her, you sick fuck.” I realize I’m dragging Mia backward, my fist curling, readying to punch him in his smug face, when he turns his back to us.

What now?

A commotion outside the door reaches my ears. Two people are brought forward.

Abraham and Bella Carter. Escorted by Cronin’s guards, they glare daggers at me, as if I’m the one to blame for this fuck-up.

Exhaustion washes over me. Keeping my knees from buckling is a struggle, and I lean onto Mia, even if I try not to. “Hell.”

Voices sound from outside the still open door, shouts, and Cronin sighs. “What’s going on? You and you,” he points at two of his guards, “go take a look. Get on with it, go on!”

The men scurry out, guns at the ready, and the Carters shoot me death glares from across the dirty floor expanse of the warehouse.

There’s a feeling of weird disconnect. My parents. My kidnappers. My father. My nemesis. “What are you planning to do?” I whisper.

Cronin turns back to us. “That’s none of your business anymore, boy. Not after sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong. It’s time you learned a lesson.”

Suddenly Mia steps forward, leaving my side cold. “Let us go. Let him go. You got what you wanted. The Carters. You stopped them, in your precious scheme of things. Your son is badly hurt. He needs a doctor.”

I do?

Truth is, the pain that has been eating me up from the inside is getting harder to ignore, but dammit, what is she doing, drawing attention to herself again? How can I protect her when I can barely stand?

“Interesting,” Cronin mutters, his voice coming and going in my ears, like the colors in my vision. I rub at my eyes to clear them, but it makes no difference. Everything’s still blurry.

Which is why it takes me a few precious seconds to realize who just stepped inside, guards on either side, guns pointed.

Storm.

And Hawk.

More people follow them. They didn’t come alone, but just the same… no.

No fucking way.

No. Fucking. Way.

I’m in hell.

* * *

“Rook,” Mia says, her arms tight around my waist. “Stay awake.”

Awake? I’m standing in the middle of the warehouse—but I feel like I’ve skipped time. When did she wrap her arms around me again?

“What’s going on?” Storm says, starting toward me, but a guard grabs his arm and hauls him back. “What’s wrong with Rook?”

“He’s hurt,” Mia says.

She keeps saying that, but I don’t seem to be bleeding anywhere.

“How about you let Rook go” Hawk says, turning to Cronin. “You’ve had your fun. The police are on their way. Better let us all go before they arrive.”

“Yeah? And why aren’t the cops with you?” Cronin smirks. “You’re bluffing. How I know? Because it’s what I do. I bluff. And I win. You came here, thinking you might find your friend, but didn’t think I’d be here with my guards. You lose, boys.”

Fuck, they did, didn’t they? They were just checking places where I could be, and didn’t bring back-up.

How many people are going to die tonight because I fucked up?

I take a deep breath, and let it out. “Let them go.”

“Did you say something?” Cronin’s smirk turns into a grin. “Oh, I see. You think you have a say in this. That you have a choice.”

“Fuck you.”

He shrugs. “Okay, I’ll humor you, junior. Choose.”

Funny, to be called that. I’ve always been the oldest.

Wait a sec… “What?”

“Choose. Between the Carters who raised you, and your friends who came to save you. Go on. Exercise your free will.” He throws his hands up in the air. “Make a choice.”

“Choose, or else? What are you implying?”

“Implying? I’m not implying anything, Roderick. Those who cross me die, simple as that. It’s a lesson everyone around me learns sooner or later. Might as well start now.”

Shit. Mia is hanging on to me, whispering something, but I can’t hear her over the roaring in my ears. I shove her back, hopefully out of harm’s way, as I step toward him.

At a nod from Cronin, the guards push my brothers, my best friends forward, the guards at the other side of me doing the same with the Carters. The guns rise, line up, point at them.

An execution squad.

Son of a bitch. “Don’t.” My ragged whisper probably doesn’t even reach Cronin’s ears. “Don’t!”

He nods at the guards, and they take aim, sighting down the barrels of their guns.

Fuck… Who do I save? My bastardly, adopted parents, or my adopted brothers?

The answer should be simple. Yet somehow I hesitate.

Even if the Carters had me kidnapped and beaten. Even if they only took me in to please their fearless leader. Even if I was a job to them.

Storm and Hawk, they never betrayed me. They chose me to be their brother. I’m not even their cousin, as it turns out, not even blood. But they’re here, putting their lives on the line—nice, cozy lives with their girls and babies, to save me.

Stumbling forward, I step in front of Storm and Hawk. “No.”

“You heard him.” Cronin lifts a hand imperiously. “The Carters it is.”

I barely have time to take a staggering step forward, a shout clawing its way up my throat—No! Christ, no!—when the boom of the guns going off hits me.

Another wave of heat and cold rushes over me, this time sending me to my fucking knees.

And this time I don’t get up.