Victor hoisted me up and even though my feet felt like jelly I focused on the man aiming a gun at me.
Dare.
Dare was here. He had followed me. He was here.
My insides flared at the sight of him. I wanted nothing more than to run to him. To tell him what a mistake I'd made. To beg for his forgiveness and have him kiss me and hug me.
But I couldn’t help but be pissed.
Why had he followed me? I'd left for a reason. A perfectly good reason. A very reasonable reason that I might not be able to remember right that moment, but it had been an extremely good reason at the time.
"Are you okay?" he asked me.
Before I could even utter a word or nod my head, Victor pressed something on my temple.
"Take one fucking step and I blow his head off, you hear me?" he shouted.
Another cold chill ran through my spine, yet this one had nothing to do with my soaked clothes, or the horrible heavy rain.
Dare put his hands up. My head throbbed. My lips curled inwards as if that would stop what was going to happen.
I'd been a fool. I'd been such a fool. Such a big fucking fool to think leaving everything and everyone I loved behind would achieve anything. Dare was still going to get hurt, and me? I was likely going to die.
Well done, Zach. You've made everything worse. So much worse.
Victor dragged me backwards behind the tree we'd crashed into and pulled me even further into the woods. Everything started spinning until it was all hazy and grim, like my soul.
THIRTY-ONE
DARE
He was so close, yet so far away.
He looked at me in disbelief and something else. Something hidden behind those big, dark eyes that most people wouldn't be able to interpret but I knew it for what it was. Fear.
As soon as I dropped my handgun to the ground, Victor was on the move, dragging Zach into the woods where there was cover.
I watched him disappear again. My guts twisted. I bit down hard on my lip trying to tame the anger.
I couldn't stand the sight of him leaving me again. The idea of him going back into danger, back in Victor's murderous hands, made me sick.
It was one thing imagining him in the lion’s den, it was another thing seeing him there a moment before getting eaten alive.
I should have listened to Slade. I should have waited for backup. I'd been out of the game too long. I'd forgotten how fragilesituations like this were. How one wrong move could result in catastrophe.
"Fuck," I spat and bent down to pick up my gun before following them into the woods.
I could regret my choices later, when Zach was safely in my arms and Victor was a thing of the past. Now I had to act and act fast before anything bad happened. Anything I couldn't undo.
Besides, Slade had already helped enough. If it weren't for him, I wouldn't have found them so quickly and if it weren't for Warren and his contacts, A6 wouldn't be shut down. They’d be halfway to New York already and I wouldn’t have caught up with them. The further away from home Zach was, the more impossible it'd be to find him.
I might not have physical backup, but I had them with me in spirit along with years of knowledge and tactical training. This should be a piece of cake.
Should being the operative word.
A lot of my training had gone out the window as soon as I saw Victor put a gun to Zach's head and threaten his life. Because it was different when your loved one was in danger. I'd experienced that to a degree with Wyatt. I'd been with him on missions I had no business being on. I'd felt my heart in my throat when something went awry, but I also knew he could take care of himself. I could keep on going knowing we had a whole unit behind us that could take care of business.
I had no such luxuries here.
