The Beautiful Thief (Stolen Hearts #2)(47)

Creative.... Adam remembered that. He’d had to listen to Forbes talk about all the creative ways he wanted to pass the time with Melody back when they’d first kidnapped her. Now that he was this angry, Adam didn’t want to think about what would happen if he got his hands on her again.

He glanced at the three goons Forbes had shadowing him. Four against one was tough. Four trained military guys? He would never make it. But if he could take down Forbes, it was worth the chance. He lunged for Forbes and landed in one solid punch to the face. He tried to get his arm around Forbes’s neck, but even a half-dazed Forbes was dangerous.

Forbes already had a knife pulled and stabbed Adam in the forearm before Adam could get the leverage needed to snap Forbes’s spine. After the shock of the pain, Adam went a different route and tightened his grip. Even though he was cutting off Forbes’s air, the knife was still in his arm. Which meant Forbes could still reach it. They both went for the blade at the same time, but by now Adam had more to deal with.

The three goons were surrounding him and had their weapons drawn. Adam angled Forbes to cover as much of his body as possible, but at this close range, anyone with decent knowledge of firearms could hit him and avoid Forbes. He tightened his grip once more. Damn it; this was his only chance.

Except then he heard the sound of a round being loaded into a chamber and, even while keeping Forbes in his grip, he closed his eyes and waited for the shot.

When the gunshot rang through the small bar, it didn’t hit him. He opened his eyes to see the drunk holding a Glock 17 in his very steady hand. “Step away slowly,” he said.

The goons seemed to be recalculating the risk factors now that there was someone else in the mix, but their guns were all still pointed right at him.

“Don’t you let him go,” wheezed out Forbes.

“Do the math,” said the not-so-drunk guy. “You can start shooting now, but your boss and probably one of you will end up dead. Or we can call this a draw and live to have a Mexican standoff another day.”

“I don’t need to survive,” said Adam. “I just need to live long enough to finish this.” He started to cut off Forbes’s air again, but that seemed to make up the goons’ minds as they tensed and aimed the guns at him again.

“And you won’t live long enough to give him a headache. Let’s go.”

Adam reached down with the arm not around Forbes’s throat and picked the gun out of his side holster.

“Smith,” warned the other guy. “Live to fight another day.”

Adam released Forbes and tossed him away. “This isn’t over,” he warned. He walked away, fully aware that there could be a bullet in his back any second as the not-drunk guy kept his Glock trained on the four.

As soon as they were out, the guy lowered his gun and ran for a shiny black sedan. Since he was in a fuck-it mode, Adam followed and got in the passenger seat right as the car peeled off.

“You’re a fake drinker,” said Adam as soon as he knew they were out of shooting range.

“Trust me, it was real drinking. I have an astronomical tolerance. Want to tell me why you didn’t shoot that guy in the face? I didn’t think anything would get you out of there alive.”

Adam held up the gun. “Not loaded.” He ejected the empty clip and pulled back the slide to reveal nothing was there.

“You could tell by the weight?”

“I know my guns. Now do you want to tell me who the hell you are?”

“My name is Scott Hart. And if you have a death wish, I might have a better use for you.”





Melody crumpled up the paper and threw it into the trash. “This is pointless.” She and Toni had been through about a hundred different scenarios, but there was no trap they could think of for Forbes.

That was wrong. There were plenty of traps. But every single plan they thought of ended up with all of them dead. Forbes had an entire police force after her, ready to shoot to kill.

“Don’t sound so defeated.” Toni’s fingers worked rapidly over the keyboard of her laptop.

“Why? Do you have any better ideas?”

Toni didn’t get the cocky smile she got whenever she used her skills to solve some puzzle, so Melody knew the answer already. “You know this town better than me,” she said. “Isn’t there somewhere we can trap or corner Forbes?”

“Nowhere private. There are abandoned factories and warehouses all over, but they’re all wide open spaces.”

Toni pulled the hair tie out of her braid and pulled at the strands of hair. A nervous habit that Melody recognized. Toni had only put her hair in the braid about twenty minutes ago. She’d probably wear it down for half an hour before doing something else with it. “Jennifer and Austin are just—”

“No,” said Melody, making sure her tone conveyed exactly how strongly she felt about it. “Forbes knows what they look like. The officers at the roadblocks have to have their pictures. I’m not going to put Jennifer at risk for this. If we have to get our revenge later, we will.”

There was a knock on the door. Toni jumped off the bed, perfectly balancing her laptop and power cord before Melody could even move. “That had better be Scott. That stupid cop should’ve been here hours ago.”

Melody stayed in the chair as Toni ran to the door. It seemed as if she was jumpy but considering the circumstances, it was understandable. Toni checked the peephole before she pulled the door open. “What the hell, Hart? What took you so long and who is this?”