Page 20 of One Last Stand
I bet you did.
And London didn’t know why—because really, she had no business saying it, but she couldn’t help the words. “No. Shep and I are soulmates. Always have been, always will be.”
Because it was always better to hold on to a piece of truth.
She let Jasmine out, then locked the door and pulled out her phone.
Her voice shook just a little as Ziggy answered.
“Yes,” Ziggy said without greeting, blowing apart London’s world. “Tomas is alive. And he has Shep. And if you want him back, you’ll need to break into Pike’s office and get that card key.”
She closed her eyes. So much for saying goodbye to Laney Steele.
CHAPTER3
The place had one window, sunlight slanting in through shuttered blinds, the smell of bacon frying, and as Shep opened his eyes, following the stripes of light on the wooden floor, he spotted a man in a tiny L-shaped kitchen.
His captor. Maybe. Possibly.
Weirdly. Because the man wasn’t dressed like a thug—he wore a pair of snow pants, a black turtleneck under a patterned ski sweater, a wool hat, and insulated hiking boots. A down jacket hung on a hook by the door. He hummed as he cracked a couple eggs into a cast-iron pan.
So, what, his host was Ken the Mountaineer?
Except the jangle of a cuff around Shep’s wrist, securing him to the arm of a sofa, suggested something not quite so convivial.
His eyes burned, and a scratch roughened his throat from the acid of the bear spray. Or maybe the residue of his attacker’s arm around his throat. Hard to believe the lean guy—maybe five foot ten, a hundred sixty pounds soaking wet—could so easily wrestle him to the ground.
Hence, the bear spray.
The room held sparse wooden furniture with homemade cushions, and a tiny Formica-topped metal table pushed against the wall in the kitchen.
He glanced at his wrist and put his other hand on the clasp, just to see if he could move it.
The sound of his movement turned the man at the stove. “Ah, you’re awake. I feared I’d doused you with too bloody much . . . but you kept breathing, so that boded well.” He spoke with a hint of a European accent. Sounded almost Russian, without the brr of the vowels, but his English bore a hint of a British accent—although most second-language English speakers in Europe spoke the King’s English
“Boded well?” His voice sounded raked. “Who are you? And more importantly, where is mydog?” He didn’t know why Caspian came to mind, as if sitting right there in the forefront. Maybe because his last clear memory included poor Caspian crying out. “You didn’t have to hurt him.”
“He’s fine.” The man picked up a towel and wiped his hands while eggs sizzled and popped behind him on the gas range. “I let him out of the garage before I closed it.”
“It gets below freezing at night!”
“He’s a dog. How do you like your eggs?”
Shep’s mouth opened.
“No preference? Okay, then I’m going to scramble them.” He turned back to the stove.
“What is going on?” He worked the cuff again. “Why?—”
“We’ll get it sorted.” The man scooped the eggs out and put them in a bowl. Added a scrap of bacon. “Sorry, no coffee. I could offer you a cuppa.”
Tea? What?—
The man walked over and set the bowl at the edge of the sofa, just within Shep’s reach if he extended his hand. His stomach decided to betray him and growled.
“What time is it?” Shep asked.
“Nearly noon. I expect to hear from Laney by tonight, so don’t fuss. Cooperate and you’ll be back home in a few hours.”