Chapter
Twenty
January 16th
9:04 A.M.
Another twelve hours gone.
No closer to finding Whitney than they’d been before.
With each passing second, it felt like she was slipping further out of his reach.
How was he supposed to find her and bring her home when they couldn’t get a single actionable piece of intel?
Knowing she was out there, alone and scared, most likely hurt, wondering why he hadn't come for her was killing him.
Slowly but surely.
Blade had already peeled off the top layer of skin on both his forearms. They were the easiest to access, but he was going to move on to his legs now, start peeling skin from his thighs, making his way down toward his feet. It was only fitting that he suffer right along with Whitney.
For failing her, he deserved a whole lot worse.
If he got her back alive and in one piece, he would offer her his heart on a platter if that was what it took to earn her forgiveness, even if he wouldn't be there to enjoy it.
“Cut that out,” Dragon’s voice ordered, and there was an accompanying slap to the back of his head that made him growl.
“No,” he snapped, knowing that he sounded like a petulant child and not caring in the least. Dragon had gotten Cassandra back mostly unharmed after he’d thought he lost her in the explosion, and Steel had gotten Rose back after their plan to lure her brother into a trap failed.
They didn't understand.
They didn't know what this cloying fear felt like.
When it had been Rose in danger, she’d been alone with her brother only long enough for them to drive off and then crash. And Cassandra hadn't been alone with the bounty hunter for more than thirty minutes or so at the most.
It had been almost twenty hours since Whitney walked away from them to go to the park bench, and he’d been forced to let her. Before he knew it, it would be twenty-four hours, a whole day since she’d disappeared. One day would quickly become two, and then it would be a week. A week would turn into a month in the blink of an eye, and then she could be gone for good.
How she’d managed to make such an impact on him in just a matter of days should be impossible, but it wasn't, and he would be eternally grateful for those days he’d had her as his, even if he would never forgive himself for losing her.
“That isn’t going to bring her back,” Dragon said, setting food down on the small table in their hotel suite.
“Neither is anything else we’ve been doing,” he shot back.
They had a list now of every one of the men who had been in the forest the day he and Whitney had left the farmhouse. Snapping pictures of each of the dead men before they left had let Prey identify all of them. They had the name of the manwho had abducted Whitney and shot the cop, and they had all the intel she’d given them. Names, dates, locations, you’d think enough to dismantle the entire operation.
But Whitney had been right when she said that Dr. Gardner moved labs regularly. Prey had sent out other teams to the locations on the list and found them all either abandoned or sold and now run by other companies. One had even been turned into a pet store selling a huge range of products for everything from dogs and cats to reptiles and exotic fish.
“We’re building a lot of evidence against these people,” Thunder reminded him as the rest of the guys began to trail into the room.
“Don’t care about convicting them, that was never our plan. We wanted Dr. Gardner dead, and as badly as I still want that, I would spare his life if it meant getting Whitney back alive,” Blade said, never more sure of anything in his life.
For the last decade, all he’d cared about was revenge. It had fueled him, got him through the dark days when anger and suicidal thoughts seemed to consume him. It had been all he’d wanted, and he’d believed that once they had it, they would finally be free.
Only he’d already found freedom.
A different kind than he’d been expecting. This freedom brought with it peace that had been so desperately lacking, a quietness that, after ten years of hearing every single little sound, was refreshing. It brought hope for the future and a desire to be something more than a man who had been genetically altered to have enhanced skills and stamina.
If he had a chance to give up revenge for hope, he’d do it in a heartbeat.
