As they walked, Aidan registered a loud thump from the floor above them. “We’re gonna have company in a minute.”
“Then hurry.”
Greg – bless his stupid, mildly-evil dead heart – had told them the truth. They found the closet, and the door within it. Fox slid the card through, and the lock flashed a green light and beeped. Disengaged.
“Thank fuck,” Carter muttered.
The door swung inward, and cold, damp air rushed toward them. A steep set of concrete stairs led downward, bare bulbs in cages providing overhead illumination.
“Shit, it’s like out of a movie,” Fox muttered.
Before they could head down, Aidan heard the sounds of pursuit: thundering footsteps, alarmed shouts. The bodies had been found, obviously.
Aidan started to turn back the way they’d come, and Fox laid a hand on his shoulder. “Go get your mate.” His face was absolute granite. “I’ve got this.”
“Charlie–” Aidan started.
“Go!”
Shit…but he couldn’t argue. “You heard him,” Ian snapped, and he plunged down the stairs, the other two chasing at his heels.
They encountered a man halfway down, another black-dressed goon. “What the–”
Aidan shot him in the face, felt the hot splash of blood on his own. The man fell backward and slid down the stairs, thump-thump-thump, his head sounding like a hollow melon as it struck each tread.
He slumped at a sick angle when they hit the bottom. Aidan leapt over him, and found himself in the middle of a nightmare.
Cells. Like prison cells, with iron bars, overhead tube lights, stainless toilets and rock-hard cots. Three of them, stretched out before him. And in the first…
“Oh shit,” he whispered, surging forward, wrapping his hands around the bars. “Tango? Kev!”
His best friend looked small and frail, crumpled in a heap against the far right wall of his cell. His clothes were filthy and torn, his jeans hanging off his bony hips. His hair lay flat, dingy as straw on top of his head. And his face had been beaten badly…so badly. He would have been unrecognizable if not for the tattoos on his hands, and Aidan’s innate sense that this was one of his favorite people in the world.
Ian came to stand beside him, breath catching audibly. “Oh, Jesus…”
“Kev,” Aidan called again, and that was when he noticed there was someone in the next cell. Someone who was, best as he could tell, resting a tiny hand on Kev’s shoulder, through the bars. “Hey, who are you?” he called. Over his shoulder: “Carter, go back and try to find keys off that asshole I shot.”
“Got it.”
Aidan prowled down to the front of the next cell, and got a look at whoever was touching Kev.
It was a girl, a small, trembling, dark-haired girl who didn’t look like she was out of high school.
Aidan sighed and forced himself to calm. He could hear gunshots overhead, and he was panicking about Fox…but he had to be the good guy here. “Hey,” he said, softly. “Who are you?”
She lifted her chin in defiance, but said nothing.
He heard Carter coming up behind him, the rattle of keys the most beautiful sound in the world. “Sweetheart,” he said, even more gently. “My name’s Aidan, and I’m a Lean Dog, like Kev.” He was betting, given the way she crouched over him, that the two had shared personal details. “He’s my very best friend, and I’m here to take him home.”
“Aidan?” Her expression changed, stark fear bleeding through the defensive mask. “Oh God. Really? He said…” Tears filled her eyes and she pressed her lips together.
“Aidan?” Tango’s croaky, but unmistakable voice asked. “You’re there?”
“I’m here.” He took the keys from Carter and tried one, the next… “I’m here, I’m here.” Ah, that one worked. The door slid back on oiled rollers and Aidan charged into the cell.
Tried to. Ian crowded him, attempted to get in first. Aidan elbowed him roughly. “Stay back, asshole. He doesn’t need your shit right now.”
A long-fingered hand clamped on his arm and he shook it off. “Carter, if that English prick touches me again, shoot him.”
