Page 103 of Erik's Salvation
Apparently, he’d made it out of the building, and when the police checked his room, there was an overnight bag but that was it. The painting wasn’t there. She almost hoped the thugsdidcatch him after everything he’d done.
“Your place or mine?” she asked quietly.
“Mine. More security.”
He was right. And after tonight, she needed all the security she could get. “Will you call Angelo?”
“Yes.” His answer was immediate.
Good. And this would finally be over.
He pulled into his garage, and they moved into the house, but when he went for the stairs, she went toward the front door. “I’m just going to run home and grab some more insulin and an overnight bag.”
He snagged her wrist and tugged her back. “I’ll come.”
She was about to argue that she’d be quick, but one look into his steely gaze and she knew she wouldn’t win that one. So she slipped her hand into his and headed out the front door. They’d just reached her house when Erik’s phone rang.
He tugged it out and checked the screen. “I’ll wait here for you, but leave the door open. Don’t take long.” He pressed a quick kiss to her cheek before answering the call.
Quickly, she raced through her house to the bedroom.
She’d just turned on the light when a hand slipped over her mouth, followed by a voice in her ear.
“I have a man out front. Make a noise, and they shoot Erik.”
Marco.
Fear and panic swirled together in her chest, creating a deadly concoction. She worked hard to control her breathing, but it was almost impossible.
“Unfortunately,cara, you’ve pissed off the wrong person.”
She frowned. Was he saying…she was ajob? God, had someone hired him to kill her?
“My job tonight is to retrieve either a stolen piece of art, or you,” he said, as if reading her thoughts.
The painting? Oh God, this was Angelo’s doing? But he’d said she had twenty-four hours!
“Do you have the painting,cara?”
At the small shake of her head, he began to drag her from the room. She made a noise from the back of her throat, and he stopped, fingers tightening. “Remember what I said about the shooter?”
She pulled at his hands, begging the man without words to let her speak.
“Make enough sound for him to hear you,” he whispered. “And you both die.”
When the hand finally left her mouth, she sucked in a deep breath, then whispered, “I was set up! I don’t have the painting. But I have a recording of another person admitting to taking it.”
“Something you can share with Bonetti when we get to him. Now, let’s move quietly to the car. It’s on the other side of the woods.”
He tugged her toward the bedroom door, and her throat closed. He was going to take her, and if she alerted Erik, he’d die.
Her mind moved a million miles a minute. She couldn’t let him get her into a car. He said he was taking her to Angelo, but what if Angelo ignored her pleas of innocence again? She didn’t have the recording with her!
“Wait!” she whispered. “I need my insulin.”
He stopped and his brows flickered. “What?”
“I’ll need to take it in an hour. If I don’t, I pass out, and then I won’t be any help to Angelo.” She breathed through her lie. “Angelo wants me awake to answer questions, doesn’t he?” She’d taken her dose in the car when they’d gotten drive-thru burgers, but he didn’t know that. “It’s right here in my bedside table.”
