Unshackle (Deliver 7)

“Yes, we’ve taken that into account. This is why your assistant is still alive. Once you’ve answered our questions, your property will be returned to you, and your life will resume unmolested.”

“I don’t owe you a goddamn thing.” Fury flushed through his body, hardening his muscles. “Release her.”

“Who do you work for?”

“Myself.”

“What is your business?”

“None of your fucking business.”

“Mr. Smith.” Silvia sidled up beside him and stroked his arm. “You can tell us the easy way. Or we can force you the hard way.”

“You think I would choose a girl over the critical confidentiality of my business?”

“A girl you paid three mil for?” Silvia narrowed her eyes. “That’s the question, isn’t it?”

“You’ve threatened me, and now it’s my turn.” He directed his gaze over her head and met Marco’s eyes. “You can apologize and escort me and my purchase directly to my plane. Or you can suffer the backlash of my exceptionally powerful and ruthless business partners. I’m connected, Marco, deeply and dangerously, and I will turn every magnate within my far-reaching circle against your cartel. You are fucking with the wrong man.”

That much was true. Between Van Quiso, Tiago Badell, and Matias Restrepo, Luke had some brutally violent allies. Add Cole Hartman into the mix, and they were ingloriously, terrifyingly unstoppable. Whether or not he and Vera died tonight, La Rocha would be annihilated. There was no doubt.

Marco stood so still he didn’t seem to be breathing. Only his eyes moved, scouring Luke’s blank expression. Without looking away, he slowly raised an arm and snapped his fingers.

For an asinine moment, Luke thought he’d won.

Until the man in the kayak tossed a lid off a large container and poured the contents atop the dome on Vera’s head.

Luke lost his mind as a cascade of teeming, shiny black bodies glimmered in the spotlight, tumbling down the mesh sides and hitting the water. Vera’s face froze in a silent scream and quickly vanished behind a writhing wall of spiders as they raced back up the dome, climbing over one another to safety.

The kayak jostled, rocking wildly beneath the man’s sudden and frantic attempt to paddle away. The oar whirled around him as if he were fighting off an invisible monster. Within seconds, he was beached on the shore and running, shouting in Spanish, and slapping at his arms.

“Black widows don’t like water.” Miguel’s amused voice penetrated the panic that lay siege to Luke’s mind. “Eventually, they’ll find their way into her hair and slip under the net. Once they start biting, the venom will attack her nervous system. With her diaphragm in paralysis, she’ll struggle to breathe. Severe abdominal pain will set in, along with tremors in her legs, vomiting, profuse sweating, and swollen eyelids. The number of bites and the depth of the punctures will determine how quickly she dies. That’s if she doesn’t drown first.”

Fear was a vicious, quivering entity inside him. Tunnel vision invaded, and light-headedness crippled him with an overwhelming need to sit down before he fell down. But more than that, he was ruled by the savage, reckless urge to run to her. His legs contracted and burned to go, go, go. Now!

That was what they wanted.

This was the test.

Dozens of eyes watched him from all directions, waiting for him to strip his disguise and rescue the girl.

A slave buyer wouldn’t dare dirty his expensive suit to save the life of a whore. But a cartel sicario or teniente would endure torture and take a bullet before returning to his jefe empty-handed. That would be career-ending. Life-ending. The ultimate disgrace.

To survive this, he had to prove to them that he wasn’t with an enemy cartel. He was John Smith, shrewd businessman and unfeeling slave owner.

He stood motionless, ice-cold and dead inside, calling their bluff.

Seconds stretched. Spiders swarmed. His lungs refused air.

The longer he waited, the more deadly Vera’s predicament became.

Seeing her smothered beneath a blanket of black widows burned away the lining of his stomach and turned his guts inside out. There was only so much stress a body could bear—hers and his.

With her mouth forced open, her limbs restrained in murky water, and her head enveloped by a hood of venomous spiders, her panic would’ve exceeded volcanic by now.

Long black hair floated around her, skimming the surface and providing a landing place for clinging legs. Were they swimming beneath the dome? Sinking fangs into her tender skin? Injecting her with venom?

Enough.

Everything inside him switched gears. Tendons turned to steel. Muscles flexed around fortifying joints. Adrenaline spiked, and his mind cleared.

He would die for her.

He didn’t remember removing his suit, but by the time he reached the pond’s edge, every stitch of clothing was gone except his pants and shoes. He toed off the latter and scooped them up to use as weapons against the spiders. Then he calmly waded into the chilly water.