“Oh, my god.”
“What is it?” Christian looked over his shoulder.
Surrounded by the entire team, Brody enlarged the image to see it more clearly. The first one showed an unconscious Ro. Her forehead was bloody and bruised and she appeared to be lying in some sort of metal storage trunk.
It reminded him of the one he had in the bed of his own pickup, only his wasn’t metal. It was plastic.
“Ah, fuck.” Brody opened the other image. Surely Ainsworth hadn’t…
But he had.
The second image showed the metal trunk from a distance. It appeared to be in the middle of a large room in what he assumed was an abandoned building, and its lid had been shut and padlocked.
On both sides, set back several yards, were two tri-pod work lights. Same kind he had in his own garage. They were positioned in such a way, their glow illuminated the trunk as if it were on display.
That’s because the bastard put it on display just for you.
“Jesus Christ.” Christian spun away from the images. “So Ro’s in there right now? Is that what he’s saying?”
“Yeah.” Brody’s voice sounded wooden, even to him. “That’s what he’s fucking saying.
Your girl’s only got about two-and-a-half, maybe three hours of oxygen left. After that…
He looked at his watch, his pulse racing with terror. “He said she’d been in their thirty minutes. That was almost ten minutes ago, which means she’s been locked in that fucking thing for forty.” And that was assuming Ainsworth had been telling the truth. “That means Ro has, at most, an hour and a half of oxygen left.”
“At most.” Christian nodded.
Rocky’s face fell with the gravity of the situation. “And we have no idea where to eve start looking.”
No, they sure as hell didn’t.
“Fuck!”Brody slammed a palm against one of his cabinet doors. The damn thing cracked down the center from the blow.
“We’re going to find her, Brody.” Christian promised again. “We will. We just have to give Liam some more time to—”
“Ro doesn’t have time,” he cut his friend off short.
“Actually…” Liam inserted himself back into the conversation. “I think I might have a way to determine where she is.”
All eyes went to Liam, who was staring back at Brody with an outstretched hand. “I have a program I can use to do a reverse image search.”
“A what?” Brody handed his teammate the cell.
“Basically, I can use lighting, structure, and angles from the images he sent to triangulate possible locations here in the city. Assuming he’s still here.”
“He is.” Brody felt confident in that. “One, it hasn’t been that long since he took her, and two…he wants me to find her. Not in time to save her, I’m guessing. But Ainsworth wants me to get there. To see what my perceived betrayal to him cost. That’s why he’s doing this. He thinks I took everything from him, so he’s going to try to take everything from me.”
“Everything?” Rocky tilted his head with a searching gaze. “I thought you said you and Ro were just—”
“We were.” Brody looked the man square in the eyes. “Now we’re more.”
“Hell yeah, you are.” Christian actually grinned half-a-breath before taking on the role of Delta’s leader. “All right, boys. It’s game time, and Ro’s life is the prize wehaveto win. Brody, why don’t you and Cade grab some extra ammo. Just in case. In the meantime, we’ll help Liam with whatever he needs to move the process along.”
He wanted to argue, but working on a task—even one as mindless as grabbing some boxes of bullets—may just be the thing he needed to wake his ass up and clear his mind.
Because right now, his one and only thought was Ro. Sweet, passionate, funny Ro who’d blown his mind in bed and taken over control of his heart. And if he lost her now…
I won’t lose you, Princess. We’re coming for you, so please. Just hold on a little bit longer.