Superb and Sexy (Sky High Air #3)(74)

They hadn’t spoken much more than a few words to each other on the flight to Florida then on to Nassau and now here. Actually, Maddie hadn’t spoken to him.

He’d pretty much opened up his chest, exposed his heart, and let her run it over with a steamroller a few times, and she’d gone mute.

She stepped off the charter with absolutely no expression on her face. He had no idea what she was feeling because she’d been careful not to show anything, which pissed him off. A guy says I love you, the least a girl could do is react one way or another.

But she’d retreated within herself, and he realized she probably wasn’t even thinking about him, but looking ahead to what they were going to face.

He got that, he really did, but it’d have been nice to factor in her thoughts as well.

Tiny Tim got out of the Jeep waiting there for them. “Took you long enough.” He eyed Brody before looking at Maddie. “So you’re the one who got married? You cost me five hundred bucks in the pool.”

“Ah, that’s a damn shame because I’m easily worth a thousand.”

Tiny Tim’s eyes darkened. “You’re definitely Maddie.”

“Most definitely,” Maddie agreed.

At her attitude-ridden tone, Tiny Tim’s jaw tightened, and Brody got a very bad feeling. Damn it, a showdown.

But after a second, Tiny Tim jerked his head toward the Jeep, indicating that they should get in.

Maddie didn’t move. “Where’s Leena?”

“Waiting for you.”

Maddie looked at Brody, and they exchanged an unsettled gaze, but Maddie shrugged and got in the Jeep.

What choice did they have?

Brody followed, and then they were being driven along the pristine white beach, all too quickly turning up the road toward the compound.

There’d been another storm, which had left the sand churned up. In the Jeep, they were knocked around a bit by the bumpy ride, and Brody’s shoulder brushed Maddie’s.

She looked over at him.

Her eyes were unreadable, her mouth tight. And given how they’d spent the past hours, which was mostly in silence, what she did next shocked him to the core.

She took his hand in hers and squeezed. He stared down at their joined fingers, hers narrow and smooth and capable, his big and work-roughened and just as capable, and squeezed back. Lifting his head, he met her gaze.

One corner of her mouth turned up, and leaning in, she set her head on his shoulder.

He hugged her close, offering comfort, offering whatever she needed, but it turned out she needed nothing.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she whispered. “Damn it, you really shouldn’t be here.”

“That makes two of us.”

She sat back, looking frustrated and just scared enough to unnerve him, a feeling that intensified when they were brought into the house where instead of being taken to Rick or even to Maddie’s room, they were immediately brought to the cellar workroom.

And shoved inside.

The ensuing click of the lock indicated that yeah, they weren’t attending any family reunion.





Chapter 28


A s the echo of the lock died away, Maddie sighed, her voice cutting through the pitch black cellar. “This isn’t good.”

With the lights out and no windows, Brody couldn’t see his own hand in front of his face. “Not good at all,” he agreed tightly.

“Okay, any time now.”

“Any time now what?”

“You can say I told you so.”

Goddamn this dark. Reaching out in front of him, he tried to get his bearings but felt nothing. “How about I save the I-told-you-so for when it’s more satisfying to be right. Like when we’re out of here. Where the hell are you?”

“Here.” Her voice sounded lower now, as if she’d sat on the ground.

“Where the hell is ‘here,’ and what are you doing?”

“Taking off my boot.”

For her knife, no doubt. “You don’t have two of those things, do you?”

“No. Listen, I don’t want to freak you out…”

“Oh, I’m not freaked. I’m as calm as Zen. I’m a fricking Buddha. What is Rick up to do you suppose?”

“I’m not sure. People who cross him, they tend to…”

“What?”

“Pay.”

“Pay as in found in the bottom of a lake with concrete shoes pay?”

When she didn’t answer, he let out a breath. Yeah, concrete shoes. He was so happy he’d asked. “You do realize this is like a bad seventies flick, right? The family patriarch who coerces his helpless nieces into doing his bidding—”

“Niece.”

“Excuse me?”

“Niece as in singular. Leena did his bidding, not me.”

He heard her going through what sounded like drawers. “What are you doing now?”

“Looking for something, anything.”

“Another knife would be nice. Or a gun.”

More rustling. “You don’t know how to shoot.”

“Under these circumstances, I think I’d pick it up pretty quickly.”

She let out a huffing laugh that didn’t sound at all full of amusement, and then suddenly, she was back at his side. How the hell she’d been able to maneuver around in the utterly complete dark, he had no clue. Just another secret to the life of Maddie Stone.