Page 19 of Stolen Faith

Rowan needed to pull their attention, and their blows, off his future husband and wife.

He stopped abruptly and spun on his heel, bending as he moved. His shoulder punched the man who’d been walking behind him, right in the stomach. Rowan had known someone was behind him from the sound of breathing. Now that he knew for sure it wasn’t Brennon—the other man’s voice had come from in front of Rowan—he decided to make a move.

Rowan had a plan—knock the wind out of the guy in front of him. A quick roll to get the hood off his head, and while he was down there, sweep out the legs of the guy with the accent. Hopefully Izabel or Brennon could grab cuff keys. Rowan’s hands were cuffed behind his back, with a chain leading from those to his ankle cuffs.

He managed to take down one guard, rolled across the floor to shed his hood, looked up…and realized how fucked they were.

The shocked pause was a mistake. Two men in camo raced down a massive, elegant staircase, yelling and brandishing weapons. Rowan had known from the sound of the footsteps that they were in a large space with a hard floor. He’d assumed a warehouse of some kind.

Instead, he was kneeling in the massive foyer of an opulent mansion.

A second-floor balcony looked down on the foyer. A mercenary in all black stood at the top of the stairs, eyes tracking Rowan. A second man in black stood by the front door, which was temptingly close. They hadn’t come in that way. They must have come in via the long hall to the left, which probably led to a garage. Rowan had thought he heard a garage door opening during the time they’d been in the back of a vehicle.

Izabel and Brennon were on his right, their hands cuffed together in front of them, hoods over their heads. Both had turned blindly toward the sounds of the scuffle, and Brennon took a hesitant step forward.

The man Rowan had winded was on his ass on the floor. Two other men stood beside Brennon and Izabel. Three escorts, plus the two idiots running down the stairs, and two mercenaries who’d remained at their stations.

There’d been five at Izabel’s condo. Some of those initial assailants could be the same as the current escorts, but up on the balcony, more pseudo-military-looking morons were emerging.

How many fucking people were involved in this?

Whatever this was.

A booted foot caught him in the ribs. Rowan’s breath left him in a rush, and then the black hood was yanked down over his face once more.

His shoulder joints protested when he was yanked to his feet by his arms because there wasn’t enough slack between his ankles for him to get one foot down to help himself stand.

When they finally had him up, a hand clamped on his shoulder and something hard pressed against the back of his head, forcing his chin down to his chest.

Gun to his head.

Rowan forced his tight muscles to relax to conserve his strength and energy.

They walked through the foyer into a smaller area—the echoes changed—and finally into a room. He knew because this time when someone kicked his knees from behind and Rowan hit the floor, there was carpet.

“Leave him. Bear— The general wants him.”

Bear? It sounded like the speaker had tried to correct himself, so was Bear a name?

The door closed.

“Rowan?” Izabel asked.

“I’m here.” Rowan bent over, shaking his head until the hood fell off. Brennon and Izabel stood awkwardly in the middle of a large empty room. It had probably been a bedroom at one point, and an elegant one at that, wainscoting with hunter-green paint above and plush carpet.

A piece of plywood had been nailed to the wall, probably covering the window.

A makeshift holding cell in a mansion.

“Are you okay?” Brennon asked, hooded head turning toward the sound of his voice.

“Yes.” Actually, Rowan was hurting in quite a few places, and he still felt a little fuzzy around the edges from the drug. When that wore all the way off, he’d probably hurt a lot more.

Rowan knee-walked to a wall, then turned and sat with his back against it. He couldn’t put one foot on the floor to stand up because of the hobble, but with his back against the wall he could push himself up, walking his feet back little by little. It hurt his hands and wrists, but he wanted to be on his feet.

Once he was standing, he walked over to his fiancés.

“Why are you still wearing the hoods?” Rowan asked.