The memory of being followed came to mind. “Now that you mention it, last night when I got out of my car near the club, it seemed like someone was following me.”
“What did you notice exactly?” Gabriel asked.
She quickly told them about the incident with the sedan. When she was done, her teeth worried her bottom lip. Should she tell them about Stefano Moretti’s visit to Caleb’s apartment the other day?
Unsure, she looked at the four men scattered throughout the room. Then looked closer. Gabriel was angry. But he didn’t seem surprised by any of this. None of them did, she realized as she looked at Jak and Quan and then at Alek, who was now leaning his shoulder into the wall behind her.
The average person would at least have given her a holy shit. “Gabriel?”
With a sigh that was nothing short of resigned, he took her arm and led her to the sofa just as her phone rang. Not Caleb’s text greeting this time but The Office theme she had set as her ringtone. Thinking Nika was finally returning her call, she withdrew her arm from Gabriel’s grasp and snagged her phone from the table, just as Gabriel’s cell started to ring. They both answered at the same time.
“Yeah.” He barked his usual greeting.
“Hello?” she said, rubbing her temple. God, she felt like she was being pulled in ten different directions all at the same time.
“What?” Gabriel snapped. “How?”
Nothing but harsh breathing sounded in her own ear as a fiercely whispered conversation began behind her between Gabriel and his friends. “Hello?” she repeated. “Nika? Is that you?”
“Shoulda listened to me, kitty. Couldn’t stay away though, could ya?” said the man who’d broken into her house. “Now I get to play. When I find you, I’m gonna make you screa—”
The phone fell through her fingers as panic flooded her system. In a far-off corner of her mind, Gabriel’s voice registered as he asked which hospital someone’s brother was being transported to, but she couldn’t organize her thoughts enough to care. A shadow suddenly crossed over her—Gabriel’s—and bent to pick her phone up from where it had landed on the floor.
“Who was it?” he demanded.
“It w-w-was h-him,” she mouthed as she tried to breathe around the black spots dancing in her vision. His big hands reached for her. But she was done. Limit reached.
She was going to the police.
Ducking under his arm, she ran for the door, too terrified to think of anything other than getting the hell away from this man and his scary-ass friends. Or enemies. She didn’t know which. But she did know he was deeply involved in all of this insanity.
Her hand was an inch from freedom when a strong arm snaked around her waist and pulled her back into a solid wall of muscle. Gabriel’s fingers dug into her flesh as her feet were plucked right off the floor.
“I can’t let you do that, sweetheart,” he said into her ear, his voice dark and hushed.
She went crazy, thrashing wildly, kicking, slapping, and clawing at his arm, trying anything to get free. “Let go of me!” she screamed, her terror rising when he turned with her and began shepherding her toward the bedroom. “No! Nooo!”
“G!” Alek called.
“Get out,” Gabriel ordered as he silenced her by covering her mouth with his hand—a hand she immediately tried to bite. He pressed down harder, and whimpering, her vision blurring with hot tears, she continued to struggle to no avail. She was powerless against his strength and the infallible hold he had on her.
She met Alek’s stare and then Quan’s and Jak’s as they passed by them, her eyes imploring them to help her.
“G, let me talk to her.”
Her eyes widened in alarm. Alek’s voice was so ridiculously calm it scared her more than if he’d put a knife to her throat. Could they be so blasé about this because holding a hysterical woman against her will was a common occurrence for them?
“I got this.” Gabriel sidestepped another of her kicks. “Calm down, Eva. No one’s going to hurt you.”
He was lying. She heard it plainly in his voice, that trace of but-I-have-no-choice. She doubled her efforts, twisting and squirming wildly, which only made him grip her harder, squeezing until she could barely breathe. Little fireworks went off in her periphery from lack of blood or oxygen. Who knew which?
“I’m out of here,” she heard Quan announce. “I can’t watch this.”