“What is it, Paulette? Can’t you see I’m busy catching up with my daughter?”
I roll my eyes at her use of that word. I have no mother, so she has no daughter.
Paulette reaches her, signaling for her to lean forward. She whispers something into Seline’s ears, causing her to whip her gaze up to Paulette. Seline quickly turns in my direction as she jumps down from the table and yells, “For fuck’s sake! Can no one do anything around here?”
She’s stomping toward the door when I hear someone shout, “Seline, where are you, you traitorous bitch?”
And for the second time today, my body freezes at the sound of a voice so familiar I’d know it anywhere.
“Dad?”
10
WYATT
Sam’s finally done something for the greater good for once in her life. She went and got herself kidnapped.
The Filiae Bellonae are either incredibly cocky or stupid. I haven’t made my final assessment on whether it’s the former or the latter. Lev upped our technology after Ariah was taken, and her chip went offline. Once the girls were selected, they’re required to wear pins at all times. We replaced those pins with new ones that contain GPS locator chips, so even if they were sunk to the bottom of the ocean, we’d still find their body’s location.
It was too late for Ariah, but once she’s home, I’m super gluing her to my side. She’s lucky I can’t find someone to make us one person.
When they took Sam, they led us right to them. It took a couple of days to work through some encryptions that initially blocked the GPS coordinates, bouncing them all over the world, making us think we were fucked again, but Lev called ten minutes ago saying he had confirmed the location with satellite and drone images.
“Are you ready?” Wes asks, suited up in tactical gear.
We could’ve let Thomas and his team go in alone, but a snowball has a better chance in hell than they would’ve in convincing any of us, especially me, to stay behind.
Turning to him, I nod. “I’ve never been more ready in my life. Let’s play Catch or Kill. The person with the highest kill count gets to torture and kill Seline Bishop, and the person with the highest catches gets to have the Madeline skank.”
It might as well be a game because there’s no way this doesn’t end with the streets of Lincolnville running crimson.
I grind my teeth at the knowledge of her location. She was so close. I should’ve felt her.
“Get your fucking head out of your ass, Grant, or you’ll be left behind,” Sebastian orders, and I immediately focus, clearing my thoughts of the guilt I feel for not being there to stop this or find her sooner from eating me alive. I’ll never let her go again. Death himself would have to come for me, and I’d kill him too if he was in the way.
“Okay, there are over three dozen people on the property. We know Ariah is somewhere on or below the basement level, which is why we can’t get the signal from her chip. Sam’s chip is shown to be on level four, right above the basement in this corner left room,” Thomas explains, pointing to the 3D image of the inconspicuous building.
The top ten floors make it look like a typical corporate office. The off-book blueprint we’re looking at now tells the truth. Below the ten-story building are four floors, a basement, and a sub-basement.
Thomas stands, bending to strap his holster to his thigh. Once his gun and knife are positioned, he rights himself and continues, “By the time we arrive, we’ll have all roads leading to and from LockCore Inc. under our control. The plan is to send in the Gamma and Sigma teams to secure the upper levels while the Beta and Delta teams secure the lower levels, clearing the way for Alpha team to breach the two levels on which Ariah may be held.”
With the instructions provided and our plan laid out, we finish gearing up.
“Let’s go bring our girl back,” I state and head for the door, not waiting for the rebuff or concurring of any of the guys. She’s ours. Some of us are just further along in our acceptance and devotion to the fact.
“I’ve never been so ready to unleash pain on someone as I am right now,” Owen says as he steps up to the truck. He’s decked out in more knives than I even knew he owned. Lola sits on his hip, but the long-bladed machete sitting past mid-thigh and push dagger are two new additions.
“Try to remember the objective is to bring both girls home. Even if one of them is a raging bitch, we can’t leave her behind,” Sebastian reminds us.
Lev rolls his eyes and mumbles, “I wouldn’t be surprised if the bitch was part of this and planned it all from the beginning.”
Laughing, I nod in agreement. “Samantha Davenport is exactly the type of crazy to stage her own kidnapping so that everyone will pay attention to her.”
A derisive snort comes from the driver’s seat. Erik doesn’t seem to agree.
“You think she’d really kidnap herself for attention?” he asks.
“Have you met the girl?” Wes quips back.
