DISCOVERED

DISCOVERED


Silvio's POV

Morgan flicked his head once, hard and silent. A signal. Immediate. The kind you never overlooked if you didn't require a bullet in the brain. The goons closed in seconds. Ham-fisted fists pushed me back against the black SUV, my cheek scraping against metal. One jammed my arms behind me and another began patting me down.

Too invasive.

They weren't looking for guns. They knew I was unarmed—that was part of the rules. No weapons. No guards. No tricks.

With one exception.

My breathing caught when the man's hand brushed against the buckle on my belt. He paused, fingers against the cold metal. He glanced up, eyes sliding toward Morgan, standing watchfully silent.

Their eyes met. A question passed, unspoken.

Morgan nodded once. Slow. Deadly.

The thug unfastened the buckle and pulled behind it, revealing the hidden microphone implanted inside my pants.

I grind through my teeth. "Stealing my microphone, then. You do want to kill me, don't you."

Morgan laughed harshly. It cracked across the deserted lot like a whip. "You've been listening in on our conversation, Silvio. Bad boy."

The thug passed Morgan the gadget. He looked at it like it was a bug. And then, no words, flung it on the cracked pavement beneath his boot and crushed it.

Metal crunching. A small click, and then nothing.

But he wasn't done.

He motioned to another guy, who produced an unopened bottle of water and handed it over. Morgan unscrewed the cap, tilted the bottle down, and poured it directly onto the mangled mic.

The sparks were small at first, then more and more ferocious. The water sizzled. Smoke rose up. The wire thrashed like it was dying.

Well, that did it for that million-dollar mic.

"You thought you were clever," Morgan moved around in front of me. "But that cleverness is going to kill you."

I didn't reply. Not out loud.

I glared at him, ice in my eyes, shoulders rigid. You don't show vulnerability in front of Morgan Wellington. You bare teeth. Even if you're already hurt.

He cracked his wrist again.

A blindfold—sack—was put over my head before I could ready myself. It was all dark, muffled. I had their hands again, shoving me into another automobile. It was not the SUV I'd driven myself in.

My legs gave way as they shoved me into the backseat. Someone handcuffed my wrists with thick metal. The car door closed, and the engine growled to life.

We were moving.

I didn't know where.

Martina's POV

The red dot kept moving.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

I sat in front of the screen, my gaze following it as it crawled from corner to corner of the map. Every blink, a pulse. Every blink, the reminder Silvio was alive.

"You've got the stupid toothpick again," I muttered at Knight without looking away.

He grinned to my left, pushing it to the other side of his mouth. "Cools my nerves."

"Try not having any nerves at all, then," I barked.

Knight remained silent. He didn't have to. The space between us was heavy, full of tension.
Because we knew it all.

Until they found the wire.

The noise of the mic when we wrecked it was so loud it nearly burst my eardrums. I'd ripped the headset off just in time, but the sound still reverberated in my mind.

Only the red dot remained now. The tracker. Taped to Silvio's belt buckle. Hidden beneath leather.

He was gone.

Kidnapped.

"Fuck," I gasped, driving the heel of my hands into my eyes. "I knew it was a trap. I knew it."

Knight's voice was low. Too low.
"He wanted to go. You know that."

"I should've stopped him."

"He wouldn't have let you."

"I could've tried."

The guilt burned in my throat.

"What about Layla?" I asked, finally raising my head.

Knight nodded toward another screen. "Still inside Marcello's complex. She hasn't moved in hours. Maybe he's keeping her hidden, maybe he's protecting her. Either way, she's not one of them."

"And Silvio?"

Knight nodded toward the flashing dot.

"We follow it until it vanishes. And then we incinerate the entire structure."

I didn't say anything.

Because that's exactly what I had planned to do.

Silvio's POV

I had no idea where I was.

The ride never ended, a whirl of turns and terrain shifts, but I was alert. Blindfolded, I was able to chart the tug of gravity, the direction of the bump and the stops. But the car abruptly stopped, and the door swung open.

Rough hands grasped my arms. I was pulled out abruptly, boots scraping against gravel as they hauled me. My feet kicked, seeking purchase, and the wind burned my naked face. I tasted the night air—moist, chilly, metallic-flavored with a whiff of engine grease.

Then the real terror began.

"Undress him," Morgan's voice grated. Unfeeling. Frigid. Commanding.

"What the fuck—" I cried out, but a gloved hand clapped across the side of my face.

Two men grabbed my jacket and yanked it down with greater force than necessary, almost dislocating my shoulders. Buttons burst. Fabric ripped.

A great, sharp whistle of appreciation rang out when they reached my shirt—one of the men saying, "Rich bastard wears silk under a bulletproof vest."

The vest came next. They cut it off with a knife. I was frozen, breathing in through my nose, out through my mouth. I had to focus.

The belt. The damn belt.

It was still cinched tight against my hips, the black leather appearing to the naked eye to be nothing more than an ordinary buckle. It wasn't. Within the buckle was a modified tracker with a mini-trigger. A trigger that only responded to blunt impact. One punch and it would activate the decoy protocol.

I clenched my teeth.

And then there it was—one of the thugs pulled on the belt and, disregarding the buckle, tore it loose from around my waist with brute force and tossed it with abandon onto the sidewalk.

The moment it hit—bam—a soft thud, followed by a sudden, mechanical click.

Morgan hesitated. He turned slowly, his eyes glinting at the shaking belt now on the ground where it had dropped.

A second passed.

Then smoke bubbled from the crevices, curling upward in fingers of mist. The men sprang back. The smoke churned, grey and dense, with a harsh smell of metal.

"What the devil is that?" one of them roared, bracing his rifle.

Morgan's eyes darted to the belt. His face twisted in understanding. "Burn it," he growled, his voice low and deadly. "NOW."

Another fellow came running up, boot heel stomping down on it. The buckle creaked.

A second fellow grabbed a metal rod and hammered at it again and again. Then a bottle of water was flung over, and one of the bastards poured the whole contents over the hot belt.

The hissing ceased. A few sparks fluttered like fireflies before dying out.

And so suddenly, the line went dead.

I winced. Not with violence or cold. But because I knew—Martina and Leonardo simply lost touch. The belt was our only indication. Our lifeline.

And now I was blind, and they were silent.

"Fuck," I swore to myself.

Morgan walked over to where the mangled remains of the belt were and looked at it with amusement. He kicked it once, then faced me.

"Cute little trick," he told me. "Too bad it didn't succeed."

I did not answer. I merely glared.

"Get him dressed," he snarled at his men.

They threw a fresh set of clothes at me—loose, worn linen. No pockets. No protection. A simple grey shirt and pants. Prison clothes.

I stood stock still, not moving. One of the men shoved me against the van's side, forcing my arm into the sleeve.

"You're wasting your time," I told him, clenching out a smile. "If you'd wanted to murder me, I'd not be standing here conversing with you."

Morgan remained silent. He took out a water bottle and drank from it, the plastic crunching loudly in the evening. He wiped his mouth, then addressed the driver.

"Put him back in."

I was shoved back into the vehicle, newly dressed, wrists now cuffed in front of me with plastic zip-ties. My blindfold returned—tight, coarse, suffocating.

The van door shut.

The engine roared.

And we departed.

The silence thereafter was thicker. More foreboding. They'd turned off the belt. The wire was gone. I was officially cut off.

But what they had no clue about?

Leonardo had already been tracking me. And Knight had Martina observing that red dot. They noticed the moment the signal went off. That would be the first indication that something was amiss.

I just had to live long enough for them to track the scent.

Because no matter where they dragged me.
Hell was coming along with them.