Crossfire (Cross Duet #1)

31. GRAYSON

31

GRAYSON

“Is your line secure?” I asked.

My brother was silent for two seconds.

“What?” Hunter’s rough voice dragged his words out slowly.

“Is your line secure?”

The groan of a bed proceeded to floorboards creaking with his steps, followed by the soft moan of an aging door hinge, and the click of its latch.

“The fuck kind of question is that?”

Hunter had always been a nightmare to deal with when woken from a sound sleep.

“One that I need answered.” I pressed the crease between my eyebrows. “Is it secure?”

“What the hell is going on, Grayson?”

“I’ll take that as a yes,” I said. “I need your help.”

“Where have you been?” Hunter demanded since I hadn’t talked to him in weeks.

“I’m going to send you an address, and you need to meet me here right away.”

I could imagine the irritation that must be rolling across my brother’s features as he said, “It’s three o’clock in the morning.”

“I’m aware.”

“Tell me what is going on.”

Goddammit. So much for hoping he would come the moment I told him I needed help.

“I haven’t heard from you since you left me at that bar and left me with the impression I might never see you again,” Hunter growled. “And now, you’re calling me out of the blue, asking me to meet you in the middle of the night?”

“How soon can you leave?” I couldn’t contain the impatience in my tone this time.

When Hunter gave one of his long sighs, frustration crept into my chest. Maybe it wasn’t fair to ask him to come without any explanation, but had he forgotten what happened between us recently?

“When you called me”—I pressed the phone harder against my ear—“I showed up, did I not?”

Silence.

“I need you to come over here right now. And I need you to be discreet. Make sure no one follows you.”

As a criminal lawyer, my brother was probably pinching his nose right now, but he couldn’t exactly push back on me, could he? Not with all his dark secrets that I helped him bury.

“Where?” Hunter asked.

My shoulders relaxed for the first time this evening.

“I’ll text you the address. There’s an alley in the back. Park there, no headlights. Oh, and, Hunter? Don’t bring your main vehicle.”

I vaguely heard my brother cursing just before I disconnected the call.

While I waited for him to show, I packed Ivy a small bag. Whether we needed any of its belongings depended on how the next phase of my plan went…

Thirty minutes later, when the soft groan of an engine pulled into the back alley, my brother’s silhouette emerged from his sedan and glanced to his left and right before walking up to the door.

I opened it without saying a word and motioned for him to come inside.

Once the door was safely latched behind him, I faced my brother in the small kitchen, where the muted ticking of a wall clock echoed through the space. His dark hair looked like he’d barely taken the time to run his fingers through it, and in the limited lighting from a soft lamp I’d turned on in the next room, his eyes looked almost silver from exhaustion.

“What’s going on?” Hunter asked. “Whose place is this?”

“Does anyone know you’re here?” I asked.

“No.”

“Not even Luna?”

“She was still sleeping. I left her a note in case she woke up. Let’s hope she doesn’t wake up, or she might ask questions. Like the million I’m having right now.”

“I need a favor,” I started. “This is a no questions asked kind of a favor. I can’t tell you what’s going on, you can’t tell anyone about it, and what I’m about to ask you to do is illegal.”

Shadows clung to every corner of the room, swallowing my brother’s expression as he swept his thumb over his lower lip.

“Will you help me?” I asked.

With a sigh that carried years of brotherly battles and begrudging assistance, Hunter’s hand fell to his side in a gesture of reluctant participation.

“What do you need?”

I tossed my mask to him. “Put this on and disguise your voice.”

He hesitated, his leer attempting to electrocute the shit out of me with a look that said, What the hell?

I shot him back a silent, Need I remind you of the man I killed and dumped into the lake for you?

I guess that did the trick, because after a few seconds, he put the mask on as he grumbled, “I should’ve known better than to expect a normal favor from you.”

I guided him through the living room, around the corner, down the hallway, and into the back bedroom.

The dim glow of a night-light softly illuminated Ivy lying on the bed with her hands bound behind her back, duct tape over her mouth, and her ankles tied together so she couldn’t kick me any more than she already had.

The girl loved to kick.

“Jesus, Grayson, what the fuck?” Hunter snapped.

Ivy’s eyes widened as she stared up at two men hovering over her.

Funny, how quickly she could go from looking like a seasoned predator capable of cutting my balls off to a wide-eyed, innocent prey.

“No questions,” I reminded him, grateful he’d heeded my warning by altering his voice.

“Pretty convenient to make me promise that before you showed me this.” Hunter motioned toward her.

The air in the room felt unnaturally cool, a chill that seeped into my bones, mirroring the icy knot of tension between us.

“We don’t have much time,” I stressed, running a hand through my hair. “We have to hurry.”

“Please tell me you’re not some kind of serial rapist or something?” Hunter’s voice was laced with anger.

I tried to murder him with my glare. “You know me better than that,” I scoffed.

“You have a girl tied up on a bed. It’s a reasonable question, given the circumstances.”

“If I was a rapist, you think I would call you at three in the morning to do, what, join me?” I snapped back, my patience wearing thin.

My brother’s jaw clenched. I could imagine the millions of questions in his head and how much he was probably regretting coming here right now. But what choice did he have? After everything I had done for him, he owed me. Big time.

“Grayson, I always suspected you were into some dark shit,” Hunter spat, his hands balled into fists at his sides. “But nothing like this.”

I rolled my eyes. Did he seriously think I was a sexual predator? How insulting.

His voice dropped to a dangerous growl as he said, “At least tell me you’re not involved in human trafficking or something.”

“It’s nothing like that,” I snapped back. “This is the last time I’ll say it. No more questions. I need your help, so will you give it to me or not?”

Hunter looked at Ivy for several long seconds, then swept his focus back to me.

“What the hell do you want me to do?” His tone was a mixture of apprehension and irritation.

Finally.

“I need you to watch her. Make sure she doesn’t escape.”

“What?” Hunter clenched his teeth.

“I have to go meet someone and find out what is going on, but I can’t leave her alone, or she’ll escape.”

“You want me to hold her hostage.” Annoyance, anger, and shock all wove through his words.

“I need you to take us to my place. I can’t risk anyone showing up here while she’s confined . And I need you to stay there with her, make sure she doesn’t escape, until I get back from my meeting.”

Hunter’s lips thinned as he shook his head angrily. “I swear to hell, Grayson, if you?—”

“We need to hurry.”

Hunter stared at me, and then he put his hands on his hips and looked down at Ivy’s seemingly innocent face as she stared up at him with this expression of fear, mixed with hope.

Would Hunter go along with my plan? Or would he become her savior and sentence me to my demise?