Page 120 of A Captive Situation

Jake

The coordinates he sent were for a warehouse. The door was left wide open so I drove right in.

Lane wouldn’t be alone. He’d have men, a multitude of men with him. I was a good shot, but I wouldn’t be able to get all of his men before one of them got me. I’d have to make my shots count, but it was really only one bullet I needed. Just one.

Two of his men opened my door for me and jerked me out of it.

“Hands up,” one growled.

I knew the deal.

He was searching for that gun on me.

I lifted my hands in the air, spread my legs, and he patted me down. Ignoring him and his buddy, who had an assault rifle pointed at me, I glared across the warehouse to where Lane was standing.

I had a file on him. I’d read everything compiled from my previous colleagues already. Read the file that Ashton sent me too. His was more in depth, but I called in a favor and the file from the unit that was assigned to Lane solely was better. How he moved, how he operatedwere the actions of an older man. Not the twenty-eight years that his file said he was.

He was seven years younger than me.

Dressed in a black Henley, black jeans, black boots, he looked nothing like the criminal mastermind he was. His face was one my previous colleagues would’ve laughed about. He was too pretty to be who he was. Short black hair, a little more on top that looked like he ran his hand through it often. I wondered if that was a tell of his. I’d look out for it, but I cataloged the rest of him. Gray eyes. Tan skin. Caucasian. No distinguishable tattoos, which I had to assume was by design because a guy in his life, they were covered with them. It’s how stories were told on their bodies. It’s how they were identified, how their rank was known, what they’ve done in their service to whichever family they vowed their life to. If the police raided this warehouse right now, he could simply walk out with a backpack on him and a baseball cap. He would’ve looked like a normal college kid. He was tall, with broad shoulders, and had a lean build. Maybe a preppy college kid, but he would’ve blended.

Thatwas done by design.

There was no backpack, though. No baseball cap. Instead, he had men with guns and that, no matter how young his face looked, those eyes gave him away. Always had to look in the eyes. That’s where you’d find anything you needed to know about someone. Eyes could be masked, yeah, but at some point, the mask would fall and you’d get the window you needed.

My cousin had my mother’s eyes.

I fucking hated that. “I never knew your mother.”

His two men finished searching me and shoved me forward. One held back, looking into my truck. “Blake’s not here.”

His man used her first name and Lane barely paid him attention. His focus was on me. That also told me his men were familiar with her, familiar enough to be comfortable using her first name.

Lane gave a slight nod and his other man started walking me toward him. I caught him by surprise with what I’d said. He hadn’t been expecting it.

How much did he wonder about his family? Did he at all?

I was jerked to a stop a few yards away and lowered my hands, my one hand itching to grab my gun and get this done. I’d be killed, but it wouldn’t matter. Sawyer would be safe. EJ would be safe. I’d be with my brother.

It was a win, win, win.

Justin . . .

“What do you remember about your mom?” A part of me wanted to know. Hewasmy cousin. “Your mom ran away when she was a teenager, from what I grew up knowing about her. They never talked about her.” My gut shifted. There would’ve been a reason. A reason why she left, a reason they didn’t talk about her, a reason why no one went after her.

I frowned, thinking about that now as an adult.

Lane’s eyes narrowed, but he was letting me talk. His face was blank. He wasn’t letting me read him. There was no flicker of life in those eyes of his.

Justin’s same eyes.

“She was a whore, used up by the Santorinis. They hooked her on drugs and sold her body every night. I was taken away from her in the hospital, maybe the one good decision she made when she gave birth.”

He was right. If she’d had him in a hotel room or on the street, he would’ve either been tossed in a dumpster or sold.

“The Santorinis are no longer in business, from what I know.”

“They shouldn’t be. I killed them all.” There was still no emotion shown from him. Murdering an entire family was like taking out the trash to him. It was just something he did so the stink wouldn’t build up. “It was the least I could do for what they did to my mother. Don’t you agree?”

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