Not Mine to Keep (The Costa Family)

Unknown Location

I lifted my chin, flashing Rocco a dark smile, but it took all my energy to do so.

My brothers and I had been trained by the best of the best years ago to withstand torture and interrogation without giving up intel. Rocco couldn’t break Constantine, and he wouldn’t break me when he tried now.

It was my first time seeing him since he’d drugged and dragged me out of the tunnels. He’d had his men watching over me while he was off doing whatever the fuck it was, and I sure as hell hadn’t missed the bastard. But I was starting to lose track of time. Had it been five days or seven since he’d had his men tie me up in an empty basement somewhere?

“Go fuck yourself,” I finally said in response to the question he’d asked me three times and I’d yet to answer.

“How about I fuck you instead?” Rocco crouched in front of me and set a hand on my knee. “Too bad your wife is my type.” He patted my thigh. “Bet my cock would feel great in both her pussy and ass. Mmm, in her mouth, too.”

I kept quiet, knowing that’d irritate him even more. He wanted me to lash out, but there wasn’t a chance I’d let him near Calliope, which meant she’d be safe from this asshole.

“I suppose if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.” He yelled out in Russian instead of his native Italian tongue, and one of the four men who’d been trying to wear me down appeared at the bottom of the staircase.

They exchanged a few heated words. Reprimands, from the sounds of it, since his guys had been unsuccessful in beating me down to the point of submission for Rocco.

Starvation. Hosed. Waterboarding. Nothing I couldn’t handle that those fuckers had brought to the table.

But Rocco? He was on another level of fuck-around-and-find-out when it came to torture, and I hated to admit I was so worn out I could barely hold up my head.

Rocco knew people were hunting him, so whatever money and other assets he’d presumably been securing while gone that week would get him only so far. Keeping me alive was his insurance policy.

Rocco snickered at something the Russian said, but I’d roughly translated that last directive to him, and it goddamn terrified me.

Drugs. He’d ordered him to grab the drugs. My weakness. My fucking kryptonite. It was how he’d gotten Calliope’s new cell number from me after he’d taken a video. I barely remembered being carted away and tossed into the bed of a truck before waking in this basement.

Rocco removed his jacket and began working up his sleeves, revealing snake tattoos on both arms.

The Russian returned a moment later with a syringe, and I offered the man a chance to switch sides again, same as I’d been doing all week. “Stick with him, and he’ll get you killed. Ransom me for millions and pocket the cash instead,” I proposed, but same as before, he rejected me. So even as tired as I was, I couldn’t give up, and I switched targets to Rocco. “Your dad is locked up or dead. And all you were to him was a soldier. Not the brains behind any op. Just a killer. You won’t be able to survive without him.”

Rocco traced his fingertip down my chest, and if I’d had food in me, I would’ve puked on him for setting a hand on me.

“I’m your only leverage. Your ticket to freedom,” I added, doing my best to suck it up and keep going.

“You’re worth more to me alive than dead. But you know I don’t want you for money. When the time comes, you’ll be useful to me. For now, I’ll do what these men couldn’t and break you.” His hand went to my forearm, and he rested the tip of the needle there.

“My brothers won’t stop looking for me.”

“I’m going to screw your wife right in front of you,” he said with a sadistic smile, then pushed the tip of the needle down against the vein inside my arm, breaking the skin. He held off on emptying the fuckery into my bloodstream, though. “Spread her cunt open with my tongue. Lick her from asshole to slit. Shove my cock in her mouth. And you’re going to get off watching me fuck every one of her holes. You won’t be able to help it.”

My hands were bound together behind the chair, and on reflex, I tried to break free—forgetting this was part of his game, letting him win.

Then my eyes rolled up and my head lolled forward, body feeling like deadweight, and gravity pulled me down.

All I could see were his shoes where he stood before me while chucking the needle on the concrete floor.

“So as I was asking—” He stopped talking for some reason.

Maybe I just stopped listening.

But there was sound coming from somewhere.

What was that?

Russian being yelled now. Well, maybe.

I could’ve been hallucinating.

Then came the gunfire—a welcome sound right now, even if I’d lost my mind and was imagining everything.

I forced open my eyes and looked up, not realizing they’d even closed at some point. The drugs were too strong, defeating me from the inside out.

“Seems your brothers want to play, too,” was all I heard Rocco say before my eyes closed again, and my head lolled forward, too heavy to keep up.

I wasn’t sure how much time had passed between the shots being fired and the grunts and movements that seemed to echo all around me before I heard, “Alessandro, it’s us.”

My hands . . . are they being untied? My eyes closed. Opened. Closed again. Fuck this drug.

“Take this.” Was that Hudson?

A Glock now rested on my palm as someone started to help me up. I looked over to see two men tumbling down the stairs. One of them . . . was that Constantine? The other—Rocco fucking Barone.

Hudson let go of me to go to my brother, and I fell to my knees, dropping the Glock.

Get up. Get the fuck up. I shook my head, trying to override the drugs flooding my system.

I slowly lifted my head, trying to make sense of my surroundings and that Constantine was in the middle of a fistfight with Rocco while Hudson killed one of the Russians who’d waterboarded me all week.

Groggy, I snatched the Glock where it rested near my hand and shifted back to a seated position on the concrete, sitting on my ankles.

At the sound of more steps from somewhere, I discovered Enzo with us.

This isn’t a dream. It’s real, isn’t it?

“He’s been drugged,” Hudson told him. “Is the rest of the house secure?”

“All tangos down aside from Barone, but Constantine wants to finish him,” Enzo confirmed, kneeling alongside me to hook his arm around mine. “Keep an eye on them while I get my brother up.”

Hudson focused on me, then back at the brawl happening before me.

Constantine was getting his revenge against the man who’d tortured him all those years ago, and he was most likely assuming the prick had done the same to me this week. But no, I’d been spared that fate.

Somehow, Enzo managed to get me back on the chair, and he removed the Glock I weakly clutched. “Is Calliope okay?” I whispered, hating how fucked up I was.

“She’s fine,” Enzo reassured me, wrapping a hand over my shoulder as the three of us waited for Constantine to finish the job so we could exfil.

And I was ready to do exactly that. Ready to get the hell out of there and to my wife.

“Knife,” Hudson warned a moment later, and I witnessed my brother narrowly dodging the blade from Rocco only to take it from him.

“Go to hell, where you fucking belong,” Constantine rasped, just before sliding the blade across Rocco’s throat.

At that, my eyes fell closed again. The drugs were too powerful, and I welcomed the rush of warmth flowing through my body, allowing thoughts of my gorgeous wife to besiege me, hoping this was all real and that I’d see her soon.