Page 37 of Some Like It Hot

“Get on the floor.”

Riley hesitated, and Assassin turned his gun on Larke. Riley got down on his knees, hands up. “C’mon—”

“All the way down, hotshot.”

Riley lowered himself to the floor.

“Hands behind your back.”

“He has a bad shoulder,” Larke said, and Riley wanted to shush her even as he fought to hide his wince.

“There’s some duct tape in the back,” he said, clearly to Larke. “Get it.”

She was nodding, her face pale.

“Hands up, sweetheart,” he said as she moved through the kitchen. “And just the duct tape. Nothing else.”

Assassin put his foot on Riley’s neck, and Riley sucked in a groan as his collarbone pressed against the floor. The man was probably reopening his stitches.

So maybe he wasn’t quite as ready as he thought to join the line. But he couldn’t sit in that hospital one more minute watching that cloud billow over the park.

Larke returned.

“Tie him up. I’m watching.”

Riley heard the sound of tape stretching, and he put his wrists together, side by side to keep it loose.

“Tighter,” the man said and then crouched beside Riley’s head. “Tighter.”

Riley moved his hands, pressed them together, and Larke bound them. He’d stopped caring about his shoulder, his collarbone, just the fact that somehow he’d ended up on the ground, helpless.

He closed his eyes, fought a wave of panic.

Larke got up.

“Your turn,” Assassin said.

“C’mon, man. We’re no threat,” Riley said, but the man ignored him. He made Larke turn against the wall, her hands behind her back.

Now. Because the man had to put the gun down to tape her and the moment he did, Riley was on his knees and charging. He hit the man hard with his good shoulder, slammed him away from Larke and onto the floor, falling on top of him.

“Run, Larke!”

But she didn’t run. She turned, and bless her former soldier’s heart, she reacted like she’d aced SERE school—swept up the gun and pointed it at the man now shoving Riley off him.

Assassin kneed him in the gut, then slammed a fist into his shoulder.

Riley howled.

“Get off him!” Larke shot out a kick at the man.

He grabbed her foot and Riley watched in a haze of pain and horror as Assassin yanked her down. He launched himself at Larke, and it was then Riley placed him.

The man at the Midnight Sun who’d talked to Skye.

What—?

The man cuffed Larke, and Riley wanted to let out another howl. She grunted, but champion that she was, she held onto the gun.