Chapter 25
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“There’s no one downthere.” Derek stormed up the basement steps. “Just a bedroom and a small bathroom, but they’re empty. Bed was made, but the covers were messed up like someone’s been lyin’ on top of them.” His teeth ground together. “There’s another door at the bottom of the stairs. It was open, but there was a padlock on it.”
Facing him, Jake said what he already knew. “He was keeping her down there.”
Derek nodded, trying not to think about Charlie lying on that bed, hurting and alone.
“Upstairs is clear,” Coop hollered as he and Mac jogged back down to them.
Eric and York came in through the front door, both slightly breathless. “Perimeter’s clean.”
With a gun in each person’s hand, the group stood in the open area between the living and dining rooms, trying to determine their next move.
“She obviously fought back.” Trevor nodded toward the mess in the dining room.
Derek’s gaze followed Trevor’s line of sight. Broken glass and strewn flowers lay in a puddle of water on the wooden floor. In the center was a small puddle of blood.
Terror gripped its meaty claws around his heart. Hanging on by a thread, he looked to his friends. “Where the hell are they?”
Coop pointed a thumb over his shoulder. “The car’s still in the driveway.”
“There’s only one place they could’ve gone.” Eric looked at Derek somberly.
Mac, Coop, and Trevor all spoke in unison. “The woods.”
“Those trees go on for miles,” York stated, sounding slightly defeated. “If she’s out there, it’s hard telling how far she’s gotten.”
Trevor walked over to the table. With a flattened palm over one of the serving bowls, he shook his head. “Food’s still warm.” His dark eyes found Derek’s. “We just missed them.”
Jake nodded. “Then they couldn’t have gotten too far.”
The muscles in Derek’s jaw bulged. If Charlie fought Caleb off and ran—and all the evidence pointed to that being the case—God only knows what he’d do once he caught up to her.
“She would’ve run straight ahead as fast as she could,” Mac surmised.
York’s dark brows turned inward. “How do you know that?”
Mac shrugged. “It’s what I would have done.”
Derek prayed his teammate was right. It would be dark soon, and his gut told him Charlie’s time was running out.
“Let’s go.” He turned for the door and ran.
Jake began giving orders as he and the others followed.
“Spread out. D and I will go center. Mac, you and York flank us to the east. Trev, you and Eric take the west.”
“And move as quickly and quietly as you can,” Derek added. “I don’t want Porter to know we’re on him until I’m shoving my fist down his fuckin’ throat.”
Without any further instruction, the group of deadly warriors got into position and headed toward the trees.
