Traded (Blood Ties Book 5)

Agony radiated through my head. I blinked, unleashed a low moan, and tried to open my eyes. Then the jackhammer started, tearing through my goddamn skull. The fighter in me forced me to shove against the floor and slowly stand.

“Motherfucker,” I whispered as I touched the back of my head and my fingers came away wet.

Lights shone. At first, I thought it was behind my eyes, until it came again.

My phone lay face down, the screen’s light smothered. I ground my teeth and bent to grab the damn thing.

Wildcat: I need you.

Fear kicked me hard, driving the agony away. I looked around, trying to remember where the hell I was and stared at the tiny inside of…a boat?

In a second, it all came rushing back to me. The guard. The tracker…the image of Jack Castlemaine’s clothes discarded.

Nighty night.

The throaty female tone rushed back. My fucking pulse spiked as I remembered her. Vivienne…

No.

Not Vivienne.

But someone who looked an awful lot like her. I shoved my hand out and stumbled forward, making my way to where I hoped was the front of the boat. I wanted out of this fucking thing…and I wanted to get back to her.

Bright sparks detonated in my head as I climbed. I clenched my jaw and kept going, past the discarded men’s clothes tossed on the floor, and out the open cabin door.

I should stay, should gather every scrap of information I could on that bitch, knowing full well she was the closest we’d come to finding King. But I didn’t care about that now. I gripped the railing and heaved myself over to the machine that braced the luxury cruiser and slowly climbed.

My boots slipped. I fell and the steel railing hit hard across my cheek. My teeth gnashed and the agony was blinding. Still, I let myself fall, anything to get to the floor faster.

The impact when I landed was brutal. My breath tore from my chest and left me reeling. But it was nothing compared to that desperate howling inside me.

Get to her.

I shoved against the concrete floor and stumbled into the yard. Darkness smothered the marina, leaving the lights of the boats to glimmer and shine, but that only ratcheted my desperation higher. I searched the fence, then stumbled forward, yanked the cut wires, and shoved through.

My fingers were trembling as I hit the numbers on my phone and stumbled along the dock to the gate. But it wasn’t Vivienne I called, it was my brother. “Answer your fucking phone,” I snarled.

“What?” he answered.

Relief hit me. “Thank fuck. Where the hell are you?”

“At the restaurant.”

I exhaled hard, slowing my steps. “Okay. Okay…” I breathed. “I thought there was a problem.”

“No problem.”

But the way he said it made that fear inside me writhe. “Just hold on a second,” I muttered, then shoved my phone into my pocket.

My goddamn head was pounding as I grabbed the gate, then heaved myself upwards. The faint crack…crack…crack of what sounded like gunfire made me turn and look around. But there was no one there, just the yachts that bobbed in the water and the soft slaps of waves against the hulls, so I turned back.

It was fucking messy swinging myself over the fence before I hit the pavement on the other side. I grabbed my phone and lifted it. “I’m back.”

But he was gone. I glanced at the blank screen. “Asshole.” Then I raced for the Explorer.

That nagging feeling grew inside me as I unlocked the damn thing and climbed inside. I started the engine, shoved the heater to blast, and pulled out, accelerating hard. The GPS put me about twenty minutes from the restaurant.

I glanced at my phone, then pressed the button, and listened to it ring…and ring…and ring.

This time, he didn’t answer.

I glanced at the GPS, then my phone, pressing the button for the main guard on duty and listened to the same annoying fucking tone. It rang…and rang…and rang. “Come on, Clarence. Pick up your goddamn phone.”

But he never did…

I pressed London’s number, driving the accelerator all the way to the floor as that nagging sense that something wasn’t right started screaming…

No…

It was screams…

Her screams.

“Carven!” London roared as the crack…crack…crackcrackcrack of gunfire filled my ears. “GET HERE NOW!”

That shrill sound swallowed out everything else.

The sound of the woman I loved…in trouble.

I dropped the phone and it hit my thigh and bounced. But I didn’t care, not anymore. I gripped the wheel and yanked, taking the corner on two wheels. All I saw was the street ahead and the blinding glare of headlights.

All I heard was her terror.

“VIVIENNE!”

The roar ripped from me, bestial and bloody.

Whoever they were…they were fucking dead.