Maniacs (Depraved Sinners 4)

I jump down off the counter, my eyes wide as I walk over to Roman, needing to be closer as if that’s going to somehow help me hear the conversation clearer. “I’m sending you a video now,” Mick says, his voice filled with a strange emotion that I can’t read. “Gia sent this through to your father.”

My chest heaves with heavy, frantic breaths as Roman’s phone dings with an incoming video text. Marcus steps into my side just as Roman opens the video. He adjusts his position so that we can all see the screen, and the second the video begins to play, my knees fall out from under me.

Marcus grips my elbow, keeping me up as we watch Levi on the screen, his wrists cuffed and held by heavy, thick chains above his head. His feet barely touch the ground as his beautiful head hangs forward, already exhausted and ready to give up.

“Shit,” Marcus says, his other hand falling to my hip as he moves in closer to me.

Tears fill my eyes, and I take the phone out of Roman’s hands, holding it closer, studying every inch of his skin that I can make out in the darkened room. It doesn’t look like a cell. It’s more open than that, but it’s definitely not the five-star castle I lived in while being held captive.

Roman’s hands knot into his hair, his eyes darkening as he begins to pace across the narrow walkway between the kitchen island and the cabinetry behind it. “Tell me you didn’t forward that video to my father.”

“No, I didn’t,” Mick says, reminding me that he’s still on the line as my eyes remain glued to the screen, watching Levi dangling by his chains. “Figured you’d want to keep it private. It came through a minute ago and I called you straight away.”

“Did you get anything from it?” Roman says as a man steps into the frame, his face covered by a black mask. My back straightens as I suck in a terrified gasp, the sound bringing Roman to a stop at my side, peering over my shoulder at the screen again.

“Yeah, my team is working on it now,” Mick says, unaware of the horrors overwhelming my heart, making it nearly impossible to breathe. “We’ve managed to open a back door into the Moretti surveillance system. We might be able to get a live feed set up, but it’s not going to be easy. Whoever she has working her tech is good, but not better than me.”

“Good,” Roman snaps, his eyes glued to the screen. The masked man moves toward Levi with a whip in hand, and like lightning, strikes out at him, leaving a red, bloodied mark right across his chest, the sharp snap cracking through the phone speaker. Levi cries out, his head throwing back in agony as the sound paralyzes me. “Get it done.”

My hand slaps over my mouth, trying to stifle the gasps that tear through the back of my throat, unable to pull my gaze away from the video. The masked fuckhead strikes him again, and I crumble back into Marcus’ chest, barely holding myself together. Tears swarm my eyes watching Levi’s anguish and hating the torment that must plague him right now.

Marcus lets out a soft curse, his fingers digging painfully into my hip as he watches his brother go through hell. “Levi is strong,” I whisper, unsure who I’m trying to convince. “He can make it through this.”

Who am I kidding? He’s just been through hell, just watched his brother almost die. How much more of this can we all take? This isn’t Gia’s first rodeo, and I don’t doubt that she has broken men much worse than Levi. He’s not in the right headspace, his body is already broken, and judging by the angry red markings on his tanned skin and the dried blood coating his body, he’s already been through a world of hell before this video was taken.

Gia isn’t going to make this easy, and what’s worse—the bitch is baiting us. She’s drawing us out and she knows it’s going to work. She has all her fucking ducks in a row, and we’re going to storm in there with targets on our backs.

We’re fucked.

Levi is fucked.

We can’t save him. But I’ll fucking die trying.

“Roman?” Mick says, his tone lowering with unease and something a little darker, something filled with nerves and horror. “We might have a location. We’re still waiting on confirmation, but I think it’s time you start making your way back here.”

“You’ve got two hours,” Roman snaps down the line. “You better have something solid.”

He ends the call without so much as a goodbye, and within moments, we’re breaking out into torrential rain, more than ready to leave this hellhole behind. Storms have wreaked havoc over these mountains for the past few days, and I can’t help but feel as though the fucking sky is in tune with my shattered soul. It’s like a sick fucking joke, but at some point, there has to be blue skies.

Dill and Doe bound down the stairs, passing us in no time. The rain glues my hair to my face, but nothing matters to me except getting into that Escalade and flying down the fucking road, one step closer to getting him back.

We pile into the SUV, and before the door has even closed behind me, Roman’s foot slams down on the gas. We fly back out through the destroyed property, each of us in a deathly silence. My mind replays the video over and over like some sickening way of torturing myself.

No one says a damn word, and before I know it, we’re pulling into the familiar streets of the city. The past two hours have both flown by while also feeling like a lifetime. Every minute that Levi is left in her hands is another minute of me clawing at my own skin. But it’s almost over, it has to be.

It won’t be long before she realizes that Giovanni isn’t going to respond to her efforts, and soon enough, she’ll tire of the game.

We’re only a few streets away from the main warehouse when my back stiffens and my head snaps up, meeting Roman’s sharp gaze through the rearview mirror. “What is it?” he says, recognizing the fear in my eyes and spitting the words out before I can even articulate my thoughts.

“Gia knew exactly where to find us,” I say. “On the one night where we were out in the open with no extra protection. Is that not too coincidental?”

Marcus turns in his seat, looking back at me, his brows furrowed as he thinks it over. “She would have been tracking your movements since the second you left her home.”

“But how?” I question. “I ditched her guards at a mall parking lot. They didn’t see me leave, didn’t see the car I was in or where I was headed.”

“Maybe she’s got men on the inside. My father goes through guards like he goes through toilet paper. Any one of them could have come right out of Gia’s pocket. He could have led her right to us.”

“How could he have led her to us if your father doesn’t even know where we are? Don’t you think he would have come for us if he knew where we were?” I shake my head. “Your father doesn’t know, so Gia couldn’t have known either.”