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“What the fuck, Cal?” Julius yelled. “You were supposed to keep him safe.”
“Where were you during all this?” I asked, glaring at Julius, my hands still balled into fists and rage coursing through my veins, begging me to rip something apart.
Our youngest brother hung his head too. “I fell asleep, but I called you the second I woke up and saw the note. I had no idea they left.”
Quin still had his hands on my chest. “Nero, breathe. This is bad, but killing Cal won’t help us find Felix. And I really hate tobe the one to say this, but Felix is a grown man. Cal didn’t kidnap him and make him go back to his apartment.”
“No, he just let my mate get taken.”
I pushed forward, lunging for Cal again, but Quin held me back, and for a second, I was shocked at his strength. He was holding me back all on his own.
“I know. He’s also going to help us get him back. I know you’re beyond pissed right now, but I’m going to need you to pull it together so we can find Felix.”
Quin’s words poked the smallest hole in the bubble of rage that was filling my chest, and I deflated a little. The important thing was finding Felix. If we didn’t, or if it was too late to save him, I could kill him then. Quin was right. For now, I needed Cal.
I pulled a breath into my lungs through clenched teeth. “Fine. But I swear on everything you hold dear, Caligula, if he’s hurt, I’ll pay you back in kind tenfold.”
Cal’s head snapped up at the use of his full name, and it spoke to his level of remorse for the role he played in my mate’s kidnapping that he didn’t say anything about it.
Good.
He should feel like shit.
I felt like shit.
I felt ready to burn down the world until I found him. Maybe my grandmother’s choice to name me Nero was fitting after all. If I had to burn all of Seattle to ash to find Felix, I would, and until he was safe in my arms again, I wouldn’t care about any collateral damage. Felix was the only thing that mattered.
“What do you know? Do you have anything I can work with?” Julius asked.
“I’ve got this.” He held up a blue-and-red jump drive capped with a stylized Spider-Man head.
“What’s that?” Quin asked.
“It’s the thing we went back to Felix’s for. He said he needed it. After I chased his kidnappers down the street, I went back inside to make sure they hadn’t left anything behind, and I saw this on the floor in the living room. Felix had told me we were looking for a Spider-Man flash drive. That’s what this is, right? Figured I’d better grab it before they figured out he didn’t have it on him.”
Julius snatched the drive from Cal’s fingers. “Smart. I’ll get to work on this ASAP, but I doubt it’s going to help us find Felix. Anything else?”
“How about a plate number?”
“That’ll do. You come with me. Quin, you make Nero some tea or some shit.” Julius grabbed Cal’s arm before he could protest and pulled him down the hall.
“Guess it’s just us.” Quin lowered his hands from my chest and took a step back. “I’ve got something a hell of a lot better than tea. Come on.”
Quin headed past the stairs and into the room he’d converted into his study. The space was all dark wood and floor-to-ceiling bookshelves filled with antique books and airport paperbacks. Quin’s tastes in reading were eclectic. On the opposite wall, he had an array of fancy bottles of bourbon, whiskey, and scotch. He rarely let us sample from his private collection, but he grabbed a bottle with an old man on the label.
“This is some of the best and most expensive bourbon on the market. If I give you some of this, do you promise to sip it like a gentleman instead of chugging it like a Neanderthal?”
I knew shit all about the fancy stuff he drank, but I had a feeling a little alcohol might take the edge off my anxiety over Felix, so I nodded. Hopefully, the plate number Cal had managed to get would give us something to go on. If not, I was ready to search every inch of the city until I found my mate. Quin’s suggestion to sip the amber liquid in the glass he handedme made sense. If I was going after whoever had taken Felix, I needed a clear head. Not that a single glass of bourbon, even if it had been the cheap stuff, would have done much to impair my judgment. Hell, I could probably drink a bottle of bourbon on my own and not feel anything more than a slight buzz. Sometimes shifter metabolism was a pain in the ass.
Quin settled into one of the high-backed leather armchairs he’d positioned near the gas fireplace and nodded for me to take the other. I didn’t want to be still. I wanted to be out looking for Felix.
“Sit, Nero. Seattle is too big for you to tear apart brick by brick on your own. We need more information so we can target our search and bring Felix home.”
Reluctantly, I let my ass hit the chair.
“Can you feel him through your mate bond?” Quin lifted his glass and took a sip, sighing and closing his eyes.
I’d been trying since I’d gotten the call from Cal that Felix had been taken, but everything felt fuzzy like it did when Felix was asleep. Cal had said he was unconscious when the assholes who’d kidnapped him fled, so maybe he was still out.
