Carver punched him in the arm, but he was grinning. “You’re funny.”
“I know,” Tex said, rubbing his bicep. Carver had punched him hard enough to bruise—not that it would last more than a few minutes.
Looking down at his phone, Carver frowned. “He should be home by now. I’m going to call the coffee shop.”
“Good idea,” Tex said, secretly sharing Carver’s worry. Peter was free to stay out as long as he wanted—Carver and Tex weren’t his jailors—but he would have called them if he changed his plans and decided to come home later.
Tex listened as Carver called the coffee shop, the two of them sharing a frown when Peter’s manager informed them that he had left the coffee shop when his shift ended.
“Fuck it, let’s go look for him,” Tex said. They could finish cleaning out the basement later.
Carver was up the stairs before Tex had even finished talking.
Brushing the dust off his shirt, Tex followed Carver up to the first floor and out to the garage. He grabbed his coat, taking the keys to his truck and getting behind the wheel while Carver got into the seat next to him.
He was just pulling out of the garage when Carver got a text. He watched out of the corner of his eye as Carver pulled his phone out of his pocket, opening it up and reading the message.
“What the fuck?” Carver growled, his nails lengthening into claws and his eyes turning red. It was a loss of control unlike anything Tex had ever seen. Carver turned to Tex with his teeth bared in a vicious snarl. “Peter’s been kidnapped.”
Tex brought the car to an abrupt halt, chest vibrating with a growl as he felt his own change threatening to overtake him. It took a conscious effort to retract his teeth and claws.
“Are you sure?” he asked, heart beating fast and his wolf demanding the blood of whoever was stupid enough to take his omega.
Carver practically threw the phone at him, jumping out of the truck and pacing back and forth. He threw back his head and roared, face distorted as he fought the change.
Their instincts were telling them to shift so that they could track their omega and reclaim him, but right now, that was counterproductive. They couldn’t save Peter if they didn’t know where he was, and there was no way they could effectively track him by scent like their instincts were pushing them to.
The message on Carver’s phone was simple.
I have Peter. Send 400k and I let him go.
Another text followed the message with instructions on how to make a Bitcoin payment.
Tex felt his canine teeth press against his lower lip, sharp and eager for blood. Focusing on staying human, he texted back a demand for proof that Peter was alive and in the kidnapper’s custody.
He got back a picture of Peter, in a warehouse somewhere, tied to a chair. Zooming in on Peter’s background, Tex recognized the boarded-up windows on the wall behind Peter. They were high up on the ceiling, small and narrow, and the only place that had warehouses in that style that Tex knew of were south of the city in the old warehouse district.
“Carver, get in the truck!” he growled. Carver snapped to attention and obeyed instantly. He climbed back into the truck, Tex speeding down the driveway before he’d even managed to close the door.
“Where are we going?” Carver asked, fists clenched and staring intently ahead.
“Warehouse district. We park on Ninety-eighth Street and change and then work our way west until we catch his scent.”
Carver nodded. “How do you know he’s there?”
Tex tossed him the phone. “I recognize the background.”
He would have found the sheer ineptitude of the kidnapper funny if it hadn’t been Peter who had been taken.
“You think it’s his uncle?” Carver asked. He was clenching his fists so hard that his claws were digging into his palm and making him bleed. The scent of blood filled Tex’s nose and he reached out to grab Carver’s wrist to make him stop.
It wasn’t Carver’s blood Tex wanted.
“Whoever it is, we’ll make them pay,” Tex assured him.
“He gave them the fucking password,” Carver said, punching the dashboard. “What the fuck?”
“He gave his sister the password,” Tex corrected. “She might have taken the money and run.”
