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N ate stepped out of the elevator and dropped his phone into his back pocket.

He scanned the main floor for Ashley’s short raven-headed form.

Where the hell had she gone? Only a few people meandered around the deck; everyone had probably gotten off an hour ago when they’d docked.

He bit his teeth into the side of his cheek.

Maddie had tried to get ahold of him this morning and he’d been too damn hungover to hear his phone.

The memories from last night still set fire to his veins but at the end of the day, she wasn’t safe until this case was done.

A dull throb had started across his forehead. He hated not knowing where Maddie was, and the fact that he’d been wallowing in self-pity made it worse. Dylan and Ashley would have kept sharp tabs on her though.

He needed caffeine like a motherfucker. Screw it, he’d get his own coffee and call Ashley. Maybe she’d forgotten something and had gone back upstairs. A hand closed around his elbow, whipping him to the side. He turned and dropped his gaze.

Ashley’s face was as white as a sheet, her brown eyes dark with panic. “She’s gone, Nate!”

His pulse slowed to a dull roar.

Maddie.

His forearm bunched and he ripped out of her hold. He snagged her shoulder in his fist.

“What happened?”

Her lips trembled. “Dylan just called. He was tailing them and someone pulled her into a van. He said it happened so fast—he’s trying to locate the vehicle now.”

His blood drained to his feet. A dark mist closed around his vision, making his head swim. Carlos had been playing them. He’d known she was an informant and now he was going to kill her. Or worse.

Cold sweat collected at the back of his neck and his hands closed into hammer-like fists at his sides. When he got a hold of that sonofabitch, he was going to break every bone in his face. If he so much as touched a hair on her head…

He forced away the quicksand of panic that threatened to swallow him up. He couldn’t crumble now. He towed Ashley back into the elevator and jabbed Dylan’s floor number. They had to find her. He pulled his phone back out of his pocket and dialed Dylan.

He answered on the second ring. “Hello?” Hesitation laced Dylan’s voice.

Nate’s hand tightened on the phone. He could count on one hand how many times Dylan had been rattled. “Where are you?” His words came out clipped.

Part of him wanted to lay into Dylan, but that wouldn’t do Maddie any good. Later, after they found her, he could kill him. It wasn’t all Dylan’s fault. If he hadn’t licked his wounds last night, if he had woken up on time, this never would have happened.

Dylan gave his location. “I wasn’t far when they snatched her, but the streets are so crowded I couldn’t catch up. I’m trolling the area now, but there’s so many fucking white vans.”

The elevator stopped and the doors glided open. “I put a tracking device in her encrypted phone a while ago. You’ll have to walk me through using the system so I can locate her.”

He’d be able to figure it out himself, but Dylan was much faster and it would save time for him to help. “Did you catch a plate number?”

Ashley pulled the key to Dylan’s room out of her purse and slid it in the lock. She shoved the door open and he followed her inside. Some kind of air freshener hit him in the face and stung his nostrils. One glance around showed Dylan had cleaned up.

He slanted a glance at Ashley—she wouldn’t pick up after Dylan. He must have been so morbidly embarrassed by the slop lying around that he’d picked up when she was here.

“I couldn’t make out the middle letter, but I got the rest.”

“Call it in when we’re done.” It would be a long shot that the plate was traceable, but a necessary step. When people got desperate, they got sloppy. He went right to the computers humming on the dining room table and pulled out a chair. Ashley hovered behind him as he put his phone on speaker.

“Will do,” he said solemnly. “Are you at my computer?”

Nate tapped the space bar to bring it to life and a password box popped up. “Yeah, what’s your password?”

Dylan spelled it out, Nate punched it in and the screen came to life. “I just opened the program—how do I select the device to locate?”

Dylan gave him the next steps, his tone even and subdued. Nate selected the phone number of her encrypted phone and a map filled the screen with the words ‘One moment, we’re working on it.’

He sat back. There was no reason for her not to have her phone.

She’d been careful with it, hiding it in the lining of her purse.

He couldn’t see her leaving it behind on a day like today.

Once the location popped up, they could swoop in, save Maddie, and arrest the sonofabitch.

The message disappeared and a soft ping sounded from the speakers.

Device not found.

Nate froze, his gaze riveted to the screen. Terror nipped at him and his vision wavered. Ashley’s sharp intake of breath was the only sound.

What? How could that be? He’d put the device in when he’d given it to her. Dylan had tested it out and it had worked.

Ashley’s hand curled on his shoulder.

He didn’t look at her.

“What’s happened?” Dylan asked.

Nate moved his tongue, but no words formed. He pressed his fingers to the mousepad to try it again.

Ashley cleared her throat. “It couldn’t be found, we’re trying it again.

Enter Carlos’s number after that. We should be able to locate that too.

” She leaned across Nate and lifted the phone, took it off speaker and pressed it to her ear.

They had a tracker on Carlos’s phone, but since they’d been on the ship hadn’t had the need to use it.

“Get on that license plate now. Did the warrant come through for Carlos’s yacht company?” She paused, listening to Dylan. “Excellent.” She disappeared into the office and came out with the warrant papers in her hand.

She came back to Nate’s side just as he finished entering her phone number and hit the search button. Again, the working message popped up. He rubbed the inside of his fingers over his jaw. His stubble made a scratching noise over his callouses, but it barely penetrated his concentration.

Please, locate her. Please God.

A lead weight settled in his stomach. The only reason for the tracker to not locate her was if it was way out of range or the device had been damaged. His muscles tensed. If Carlos had found the encrypted phone, she was as good as dead.

“Park somewhere you won’t be seen and watch. If it wasn’t Carlos that snatched her, someone must have done it for him. If he suspects her at all, he’ll want to question her. In the meantime, we’ll search his business.”

Disgust formed in his stomach. Yeah, he’d want to be there all right, to make her suffer for betraying him. He squeezed his eyes shut, pushing the rest of Ashley’s conversation with Dylan away. A soft ping from the computer snapped his eyelids open.

Device not found.

He typed Carlos’s number in.

Device not found.

The air leaked out of his lungs with the force of a boulder dropping on his chest. Pain exploded through his heart and he curled his fist over his jaw.

Every cell in his body told him to move, to run, to hunt, and drag everyone off the street until he found her…

but he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the screen.

All he’d cared about from the moment Maddie called him more than a month ago was to keep her safe. He’d known she was playing with fire, that she wouldn’t stop until she had Carlos behind bars. She was dangerous and fearless, and stupidly, he’d thought he could keep her under control.

He snorted. He’d done nothing but get himself caught up in her hurricane of a life, and this time, Maddie—and his heart—would be destroyed.

It was all his fault. Maddie would die because of him and there was nothing he could do, no way he could locate her.

Jesus Christ. What had he done?

***

“Drive.” He motioned Ashley toward the truck he’d just hijacked and climbed in the passenger seat.

He couldn’t sit idly. Helplessness curled its icy hand around his soul, taking his life one second at a time.

If he kept moving, he could hold on to the hope of finding her.

He’d come across Carlos again, and when he did he’d have his own interrogation tactics that would rival those Carlos was known for.

“We’ll search his family’s yacht company first.” Ashley punched the address in the GPS and eased into traffic. Carlos wouldn’t be stupid enough to take her there. Especially if he knew she was an informant. But they had to rule it out, and maybe, just maybe, they’d find a clue to another location.

He scrubbed his hands over his face as the late afternoon sun dipped low in the sky. Ashley’s voice droned on but he couldn’t focus on anything she said.

“Nate,” she growled, snapping his attention from the skin at his palms. “Get your shit together and think. Hadn’t Maddie hinted to you that she suspected Carlos owned another business in the city?”

He dropped his hands to his lap, but tension turned his veins to lead. “Yeah, she thought maybe he has a nightclub here like the one in Miami.”

And that whoever had made the cocaine deal with him could be involved in the nightclub as a partner. But Nate had come up empty handed with any other business in Carlos’s name, and he still hadn’t heard from Josh.

Her mouth set into a grim line. “And I take it that was a dead end?”

He nodded. “So far.”

“Well he had to take her somewhere. We need to look at properties his family owns, or…”

“Done all that.” He pressed the knuckles of his closed fist to his forehead. The air inside the vehicle was oppressive, and sweat layered on top of the sheen that was already pasted to his body.