Total pages in book: 48
Estimated words: 45785 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 229(@200wpm)___ 183(@250wpm)___ 153(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 45785 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 229(@200wpm)___ 183(@250wpm)___ 153(@300wpm)
“Code to the safe, Jones!” Reese roared.
“788256!” I yelled. Just before someone took aim at Ortega, I shot the motherfucker in the head. “Get outta here!” I shouted at Madison. “Where’s Toby?”
“I don’t know!” she sobbed. “They ran to the front—” A gunshot blasted through the air, and she screamed and fell over.
I sucked in a breath, noticing the blood gushing out of her shoulder, then hurriedly located the shooter running away to the north.
I aimed at him and fired. He went down.
The attackers were scattering, running in all directions.
“Run after!” I heard Dante yell somewhere. On the other side of the house, maybe.
Crew and I jumped into action; we couldn’t enter through the patio doors, so we ran around the house. We reached the front just as Reese stormed out with a gun in his hand, and we followed. We fucking bolted down the hill as it dawned on me that whoever was behind this attack wasn’t leaving empty-handed. Two additional vans were driving down toward the main road.
“They have Shay,” Reese growled.
“Fuck,” Crew panted.
I sprinted for all I was worth, but the chances of us catching up were zero. But all of a sudden, the back doors of the last van flew open, and a man was literally kicked out.
“Shay!” Reese yelled.
The doors thumped closed once more before the van sped up. I read the license plate and automatically began compiling a list of things to do when the chase was over.
“Keep running!” I barked out, coming to a screeching halt in front of the man on the road. Panting and sweating, I squatted down and rolled the man over. How many cartel members had I pissed off over the years? The shock-and-awe attack, the military-grade weapons, and the number of people they’d sent screamed cartel.
This guy wasn’t old. Maybe thirty. His neck… Shit, was broken. His head was twisted awkwardly, eyes still open. Holy fuck. The work of Shay. It had to be. Reese had told me his boy was some martial arts champion, one hell of a fighter.
Keep fighting, son. We’re coming for you.
I started running back, because I had to find out who else had been taken.
“Give me a fucking minute,” I growled. “I gotta think.”
I walked away from Piper; I couldn’t hear another second of her gut-wrenching sobs, and I stalked over to the pool area. Gather the weapons, get to a safehouse, pick up the trails before they turn cold. Oh God, I almost threw up right there. Head pounding, pains making themselves known after the worst of the adrenaline rush was over, grief…
“Perimeter secure for now!” I heard Gray yell.
I clung desperately to the fury. It would at least keep me productive.
Darius jogged over to me.
I drew a ragged breath. The breeze carried the stench of what was left of the patio, burned wood soaked in water and foam.
Sweet Blake. We’ll find you, darling.
Tariq—fucking Tariq was dead. Toby too. I didn’t know how to control myself; I could only pace and curse. They’d kidnapped Blake, Shay, and Marisa. My skin prickled uncomfortably, and I was sticky with sweat and dried blood. All I wanted was to pull the trigger on those sons of bitches who’d attacked us.
“What’s your ghost protocol?” Darius asked. “We gotta hurry. River and Reese just took off in your truck, and Dante needs to go to a hospital ASAP.”
I nodded jerkily and scrubbed my hands over my face. Fucking think. We had maybe ten minutes before law enforcement arrived. Someone would’ve called 9-1-1. Either they saw the explosion from the main road, or one of my neighbors heard the gunfire.
“A few of us gotta stay behind,” I said.
Darius nodded with a dip of his chin. “I suggest Gray and me. I’ve done this before, and we can rejoin you when the coast is clear.”
I nodded again, his suggestion kick-starting my brain, at long last. “We’ll, uh… Okay, so I wasn’t here. Crew, me—”
“Joel’s back!” Piper croaked.
Right. I’d told her to get him back here. I didn’t have a choice. We might need him.
“Joel, Ortega, Crew, and me,” I said. “We were never here. You’re gonna have to come up with a cover real quick. You borrowed my house or whatever—I don’t know. Had some friends over. I’m away on work. They attacked the wrong target. Piper can put her car in my garage and say she was borrowing Joel’s. Maybe I was fixing something on hers—”
“I’ll think of something. Like I said, ain’t our first rodeo.”
Painfully true.
“All right, we’ll head to—you remember Tariq’s safehouse outside Dulzura?” It was less than an hour away, and we’d recently remodeled and upgraded it. On the outside, it was nothing more than a demolition-ready shack of a house. But it had a basement with everything we needed.
“Of course,” Darius replied.
“Warn the twins. Give them the address to the safehouse and tell them to stay away from this house,” I said. I understood why they’d taken off, but they weren’t gonna find Shay tonight.