Chapter Nine
Reaper was halfwayacross town when his phone rang.He didn’t need to look at the screen to know something was wrong.
He answered it immediately.“Yeah?”
“R-Reaper.”Rook’s voice cracked, breath coming fast and uneven.“I-I screwed up.They took her.I tried—”
Reaper’s vision tunneled.The world narrowed to the sound of blood in his ears and the white-hot spike of rage that slammed through his chest.He stopped the bike.
“What happened?”he demanded.
“It happened at the hospital back exit,” Rook said quickly.“Cartel, there were two men.I think one of them was Cruz.I recognized him from one of our files on the cartel.I got a shot off but—” He sucked in a breath, and the prospect sounded in pain.“I’m hit.Shoulder.”
For a split second, Reaper wanted to tear into Rook.He wanted to demand how the hell he’d let it happen.Then he took deep breaths and forced himself to calm down.He had heard the panic in Rook’s voice and the fear.Rook was just a prospect and he was probably in pain, but still, Elena was gone, taken on the one day he wasn’t there to keep an eye on her.
Reaper forced his teeth to unclench.
“Listen to me,” he said, voice dropping into iron calm.“You did your job.You slowed them down and you warned me right away.”
“I should’ve...”Rook began.
“No.”Reaper cut him off.“You’re hurt.Get yourself checked in.Now.I’ll handle the rest.”
There was a pause.“You’re not mad?”
Reaper swallowed the rage burning his throat.“We’ll talk later.Let someone look at that shoulder.That’s an order.”
He ended the call before Rook could say anything else.
Silence rushed in.Then Reaper saw it.The SOS text from Elena.It was sent only a few minutes ago.The hell?His chest constricted.A low, animal sound ripped from his throat.
“Fuck.”
Reaper tightened his hold on the handlebars until they turned white.He dragged in a breath, forced his mind to work past the red haze.Find her, he told himself.He remembered telling Elena it would be better if he could track her phone and she had agreed eventually.He took his phone out, accessed the secure app, and synced to her device.
A blinking dot appeared on the map.It moved, then it slowed, moved again then finally stopped.It was a house located on the edge of town.An abandoned neighborhood riddled with boarded windows and forgotten streets.
Of course, Cruz would take her to a place like that.Somewhere remote and where he thought no one would find them.Reaper stared at the screen, jaw flexing.Every instinct screamed at him to ride.To tear through the town like a bullet and burn the place down alone if he had to.
He forced himself not to.Instead, he hit King’s number.
King answered on the second ring.“Reaper.”
“He took her.Elena,” Reaper said.“Cruz.”
The pause on the other end was brief but loaded.“Where?”King demanded.
Reaper rattled off the location.“I want a crew.Now.”
King exhaled slowly.“You know what you’re asking.”
“I know exactly what I’m asking,” Reaper shot back.“And I’m going either way.”
Another pause.Reaper imagined King rubbing his temples, weighing fallout, bloodshed, territory lines.
Then, “You’ll have three,” King said.“Best I can do fast.I’m making calls.”
Relief slammed into Reaper hard enough to make his hands shake.
