The scullery door’s ajar.

Fuck. Maybe this is how they got into the house. I gulp down a steadying breath, my heart hammering, and gently push open the door and creep in. The adrenaline has sharpened my senses. My breathing is deafening.

Quiet. Be fucking quiet.

There’s shouting. Upstairs.

No. No. No.

If they touch one hair of her head, I will murder them. I turn to the gun cabinet high on the wall and unlock it. I’d stashed my shotguns there yesterday before Alessia and I went for a walk on the beach. Trying to remain calm, I concentrate on removing one of the Purdeys as quietly as I can. With smooth and deliberate movements, I lift it out, open up the barrel, and load two cartridges. I put four more into my coat pocket. I have never been so grateful as I am right now that my father taught me how to shoot.

Keep calm. You will only have a chance to save her if you keep calm.

I repeat this mantra in my head. Releasing the safety, I brace the gun against my shoulder and sneak into the main room. There’s no sign of anyone downstairs, but I hear an almighty crash from upstairs, followed by shouting in a foreign tongue.

Alessia screams.

* * *

Alessia shrieks as the door gives way, and she’s flung across the bathroom floor. Dante almost falls into the room. She curls up into a ball, sobbing, as fear paralyzes her body. Her bladder fails, and the telltale wetness seeps down her legs and into her new jeans.

Her fate is sealed.

She’s breathing in short, shallow gasps as her throat constricts. She’s dizzy. Dizzy with fear.

“There you are, you fucking bitch.” He grabs her hair, pulling her head up.

Alessia cries out, and he slaps her hard across her face.

“Do you know how much you’ve cost me, you fucking whore? You’re going to pay every fucking penny back to me with your body.” His face is inches from hers. His eyes dark and feral and full of rage. Alessia gags. His breath is rank, as if something died on his tongue, and his body odor washes over her in a haze of squalor.

He slaps her hard again and drags her to her feet by her hair. The pain is indescribable—as though her scalp is being torn from her head.

“Dante! No! No!” she wails.

“Stop fucking sniveling, you filthy whore, and move!” He shakes her hard and throws her into the bedroom, where Ylli is waiting. She lands on the floor, sprawling out like a starfish. She curls up quickly.

This can’t be happening.

She screws her eyes shut, waiting for the inevitable blows.

Just kill me. Just kill me. She wants to die.

“And you’ve pissed yourself. You dirty pi?ka. I’m going to fuck you up.” Dante swaggers around her and kicks her hard in her belly.

She screams as pain shoots through her body, leaving her gasping for air.

“Step away from her, you fucking piece of shit!” Maxim’s voice bellows through the room.

What?

Alessia opens bleary eyes. He’s here.

Maxim is standing on the threshold, shrouded in his dark coat like an avenging archangel, his eyes flashing a deadly green, and he’s brandishing his double-barreled shotgun.

He’s here. With his gun.

* * *

The evil fucker whirls around to face me. He blanches in shock and jumps back, gaping at me, sweat beading on his pale bald pate. His thin-faced friend also steps back and holds up his hands, his lips twitching. He looks like a fucking rodent, drowning in his oversize parka. The urge to pull the trigger is overwhelming. I have to fight every instinct to stop myself. Baldy is watching me, his eyes focused, weighing me up. Will I shoot? Do I have the balls?

“Don’t fucking tempt me!” I roar. “Keep your hands up or I’ll fucking end you. Step away from the girl. Now!”

He takes another cautious step back, his eyes flying from me to Alessia as he considers his options.

He has none.

Fucker.

“Alessia. Get up. Now. Move!” I bark, as she’s still within his reach. She scrambles to her feet. Her face is red on one side where the cunt must have hit her. I fight the compulsion to blast his head off. “Get behind me,” I say through gritted teeth.

She slips around me, and I hear her panting with fear. “Both of you. On the floor, on your knees!” I shout. “NOW! And not a fucking word from either of you.”

They exchange a quick look.

And I brace my finger on the trigger. “Two barrels. Both primed. I can take you both down. I will blow your fucking balls off.” And I aim for Baldy’s crotch.

His eyebrows shoot up his ashen forehead, and both men sink to their knees.

“Hands behind your heads.”

They do as they’re told. But I have nothing to restrain them with.

Bollocks.

“Alessia, are you okay?”

“Yes.”

My phone starts buzzing in my pocket. Shit. I bet it’s Oliver.

“Can you take the phone out of the back pocket of my jeans?” I ask Alessia while keeping my aim on the two gangsters. Deftly, she does. “Answer it.” I can’t see what she’s doing, but after a moment I hear her.

“Hello?” she says, and there’s a pause before she speaks again, in a hushed voice choked with fear. “I am Mister Maxim’s cleaner.”

Jesus. She’s so much more than that.

Baldy spits words at his rat-faced colleague. “?sht? pastruesja e tij. N?se me pastruese do t? thuash konkubin?.”

“Ajo nuk vlen asgj?. Grueja asht shakull p?r me bajt,” Ratface replies.

“Shut the fuck up!” I roar at the two of them. “Who is it?” I ask Alessia.

“He says his name is Oliver.”

“Tell him we’ve captured two intruders at the Hideout and to call the police. Now. Tell him to call Danny and ask her to send Jenkins here right away.”

Haltingly, she does.

“Tell him I will explain later.”

She repeats what I’ve said. “Mr. Oliver says he is doing it….Good-bye.” She hangs up.

“Lie down, both of you. On your front. Hands behind your back.” Baldy gives Ratface a quick look. Is he going to try something? I step forward and lower the barrel, aiming for his head.

“Hello!” A voice from downstairs calls up. It’s Danny. Already? That makes no sense.

“Upstairs, Danny!” I shout, not taking my eyes off the two lowlifes. I motion with the gun. Fucking lie down. They comply, and I approach the two prone figures on the bedroom floor. “Don’t move a muscle.” I press the muzzle of the gun into Baldy’s back. “Try me. The shot will break your spine and enter your stomach, and you’ll die a slow, agonizing death—which is more than you deserve, you fucking animal.”

“No. No. Please,” he whimpers like a beaten dog in his thick accent.

“Shut up and keep still. Do you understand? Nod if you do.”

Both men give me quick, furious nods, and I chance a glance at Alessia who is wide-eyed, pale, and hugging herself in the doorway. Behind her, Danny appears—and Jenkins behind Danny.

“Oh, my God.” Danny’s hand goes to her mouth. “What’s happening here?”

“Did Oliver reach you?”

“No, milord. We followed you after you leapt up from the breakfast table. We knew something was wrong….”

Jenkins hovers in the background.

“These two kidnappers broke into the house. They were after Alessia.” I press the barrel into Baldy’s back.

“Do you have anything I can restrain them with?” I ask Jenkins, keeping my eyes trained on the men on the floor.

“I’ve some baling twine in the back of the Land Rover.” He turns and hurries back down the stairs.

“Danny, take Alessia back to the Hall, please.”

“No,” Alessia protests.

“Go. You cannot be here when the police arrive. I’ll be with you as soon as I can. You’ll be safe with Danny.”

“Come on, child,” Danny says.

“I need a change of clothes,” Alessia mumbles.

I frown. Why?

Alessia dashes into the walk-in wardrobe and comes out a few moments later carrying one of the bags from our shopping the other day. With one unreadable glance at me, she follows Danny down the stairs.

* * *

Alessia stares, unseeing, out the windshield, her hands wrapped around her body as the old woman named Danny drives the large, rattling car down a country lane.

Where are we going?

Her head aches, her scalp and face are throbbing. It also hurts her side when she takes a breath. She tries to keep her breathing shallow.

Danny has wrapped her in a blanket that she took from the sofa in the holiday house.

“We don’t want you catching cold, dear,” she’d said.

She has a kind, gentle voice with an accent that Alessia cannot place. She must be a good friend to Mister Maxim to take such care of her.

Maxim.

She would never forget how he looked when he saved her, in his long coat, brandishing a shotgun like a hero from an old American movie.

And she had thought he would be at their mercy.

Her stomach roils.

She’s going to be sick.

“Please stop the car.”

Danny pulls to a stop, and Alessia almost falls out of the vehicle. She doubles over, retching on the side of the road, losing her breakfast.