Chapter 8
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“Turn left up here!”Derek West instructed Eric from the back seat.
Driving like a bat out of hell, Eric followed his brother’s order and prepared to turn.
The son of a bitch had taken Maggie. Was doing God only knows what to her. And he was afraid they were going to be too late.
“There!” D nearly screamed in Eric’s ear. “Take this road!”
Sitting beside him in the passenger seat, Riley braced herself by putting one hand on the dashboard in front of her, and the other on his leg.
All three occupants tilted to the right as the car’s tires squealed along the rough pavement.
“Jesus, man.” Derek grumbled, his drawl thickening with the same fear they all felt. “We won’t be any good to your friend if we’re lyin’ in a ditch somewhere.”
Riley spoke up on his behalf, covering his back, as always. “Eric knows what he’s doing, Derek.”
“Sure as hell hope so. Otherwise, Charlie’s gonna kickbothour asses if I get hurt.”
At the mention of his sister-in-law’s name, Eric thought back to when he, Riley, and Derek were racing to find her, too.
Like then, Eric felt a gambit of emotions. Adrenaline, fear...a murderous rage toward the man behind it all.
But he pushed it all away and focused on the only thing that mattered. Finding Maggie and getting her home, safe.
“Are the other’s keeping up?” Riley checked the side mirror before swinging her head around to look through the car’s back window.
Luke and Brooke were in one car, while Aaron and Parker were in another. Behind them was Agent Killion, driving the non-descript black SUV the Feds provided.
Eric couldn’t quite understand it, given that they’d all just met, but when he told Noah that Maggie had been taken by their unsub—or unknown subject—he thought the guy was going to lose his shit.
Now he was back there joining the fight—theirfight—with the same intense urgency as the rest of them.
Okay, maybe Riley was right. Maybe the guy wasn’t as big of an asshole as I thought.
The jury was still out on that one, though. So for now, Eric was perfectly content keeping his distance with the Special Agent.
“What if she’s not there, Eric?” Riley’s trembling voice broke through his thoughts. The fear she felt for Maggie was impossible to miss.
I feel it, too, baby.
“What if this is just a wild goose chase?” She looked over at him. “You heard what he said. He knew we were tracing the call.”
“Or, he took a wild guess that we were.” His lame attempt at reassurance. “It wouldn’t be much of a stretch for someone as smart as he is. Either way, we can’t run the risk of her not being in the location Derek pinged.”
“The guy was definitely there when he called you, Riley,” Derek assured her. “The system I use is the best one on the market. And I should know...I designed it.”
“Of course, you did,” Eric and Riley spoke in unison.
He would’ve laughed if the situation weren’t so dire.
“It could be a set-up,” Riley commented a minute later. “We could be walking into a trap. He could’ve set something up to—”
“Take a breath, baby.” He covered her hand with his and gave it a squeeze. “One step at a time, yeah?”
“Baby?”
