The blond guy grabbed my arm and pulled me out of the building. My emotions got the better of me again, the tears started to flow when I saw the first body of the new agents that had been sent to protect me. They were all lying, broken and still bleeding, on the way out of the building.
“Are they all dead?” I whispered to Lukas.
He nodded in confirmation. “Yeah, you had a lot of guards, but then I guess you are the first daughter now. It’s a shame that one who was posing as your boyfriend wasn’t here. Carter didn’t like his hands on you, even if it was all a fake,” he said, shrugging casually.
I closed my eyes, thinking of Ashton, allowing myself to be led along. “He wasn’t my boyfriend. We had to act like that. My father made us. He was just a bodyguard,” I lied desperately.
He chuckled darkly. “Oh, Carter knows that, if he didn’t know that then that asshole would be dead already,” he stated, watching me intently.
I didn’t say anything as he led us to a black car at the front of the building and held the door open for me. I felt sick as I climbed in the car.
We drove for about an hour or so through the back streets until we came to a derelict-looking building. I looked around but didn’t recognise the place at all. The sun was coming up just as we pulled into the underground parking lot. As we parked up, I closed my eyes. Please God, let me get through this, I prayed silently.
Jimmy opened my door for me, motioning for me to get out. “Come on, Anna.”
I climbed out and looked around quickly. There were only four of them now; this was definitely worth a try. I knew that they wouldn’t be expecting me to be any trouble, so their underestimation of me would work to my advantage. I punched Jimmy in the stomach, and as he bent over in pain, I kicked the other guy in the groin, hard, making him grunt and fall to the floor in agony. I turned and readied myself as saw another guy approaching, but Jimmy had righted himself and wrapped his arms around me from behind, grabbing my arms and pinning them down. I struggled and thrashed, but I couldn’t get free, so I gave up. I wasn’t getting out of here just yet.
“That was fucking stupid, Anna. Just calm down or you’ll get yourself hurt!” Jimmy growled warningly in my ear. I sighed and nodded as he opened a fire door and started leading me up the stairs.
“Where are we? What is this place?” I asked, desperately looking around. It looked like an old factory or something; there were sewing machines, desks and tables all over the place. A thick layer of dust and dirt covered everything in sight, proving that this place hadn’t been used for a while. Crude graffiti stained the walls, most of the windows were boarded up and the plaster on the walls was peeling and cracked. I had no hope of a caretaker or someone stopping by to check on the building and just so happen to rescue me; this place hadn’t been used in years by the look of it.
My gaze immediately landed on a phone as I was led past one of the desks. If I can just get to one of those phones! But who should I call, and what should I say? I don’t even know where I am!
Jimmy was still holding my arms tightly as he guided me through the different levels and doors of the maze-like place. With each passing step, my hope of ever getting out of here faded a little more. I probably just needed to accept the fact that this was my fate and that I wasn’t going to be able to escape his men, there were too many of them. Jimmy shoved me roughly through another door and into a room that looked like some kind of disused office. I glanced around quickly, taking in my surroundings. There was one window, one door and no phone. It was hopeless. The door slammed shut behind me and I jumped at the click of the lock. Not ready to give up yet, I turned and hammered on the door. “Jimmy, please let me out, please!” I begged unashamedly as tears flowed freely down my cheeks.
“Carter will be here tonight, Anna. Just chill out for a few hours, okay? You hungry? I could get you some food,” he offered from the other side of the door.
“I’m not hungry. Please let me go. You know what he’s going to do to me. Please?” I slumped down to the floor, crying hopelessly.
“I’m sorry, Anna, really I am. But I can’t let you go, he’ll kill me,” he replied.
I nodded. I knew he would. Jimmy was always one of the nice ones. Occasionally he would sneak me food and drink or some painkillers when Carter would starve or beat me. Carter didn’t know, of course, Jimmy would have been dead a long time ago for even talking to me.
“It’s okay, Jimmy.” I wiped my tears on the back of my hand. I wouldn’t cry anymore, crying was pointless, crying was weakness, and I refused to be weak. I wrapped my arms around myself and thought of Ashton. I could see his beautiful green eyes, and how angry his face would look if he was here right now. I closed my eyes and leant my head against the wall, praying that somehow I would get out of here before the inevitable happened. I would actually rather die than go back to living like a caged animal with Carter again.
Chapter Nineteen
~ Ashton ~
Exhaustion didn’t quite cover what I felt as I sat on the edge of my bed. I’d just been to work for sixteen hours straight, and my body was hurting like hell. I flopped onto my back and glanced over at the clock; it was only eight in the evening. Unable to resist, I picked up my cell phone and texted Anna, the same as I did every day.
‘I had a hard day at work today. I really would love to talk to you. Please call me. I love you, always x’
I sent it and closed my eyes, not even bothering to get undressed, and fell to sleep immediately.
I woke just after nine in the morning to my cell phone ringing on the bed next to me. I grabbed it quick and answered it, hoping it was Anna. “Agent Taylor,” I croaked, my voice thick with sleep.
“Ashton, it’s Officer Weston.”
I frowned. “Yes, sir?” I replied, sitting up quickly. He never called me; I wasn’t assigned to him anymore.
“Ashton, I’ve just heard something, and I thought you should know,” he sounded remarkably stressed and I felt my body tense up. “Miss Spencer’s been taken, her guards are dead. They think it’s Carter Thomas.”
My tired brain immediately registered what he’d said. Anna. Anna was in trouble. “WHAT? WHEN?” I cried, jumping out of the bed, stripping out of my uniform and grabbing the first clean clothes that I saw, throwing them on.
“Just a couple of hours ago. One of the agents managed to call through to the White House for backup, but by the time they got extra staff there, everyone was dead and she was gone,” he said sadly.
Anger made my teeth ache as I clenched my jaw. I was angry at Carter, angry at myself for not being there, and I was also angry at Anna for sending me away in the first place. I should have been there, I could have stopped this. Out of frustration, I kicked my chest of drawers, taking my anger out on that. When that didn’t help, I grabbed it and pulled it over, spilling everything over to the floor, making a loud crash as the mirror broke and my possessions scattered all over my floor.
“Do they know where she is?” I asked.
He sighed. “No, they have no idea. They don’t think she got on a plane, they’ve been monitoring the airports, but she could be anywhere by now,” he replied.
My heart was in my throat, my hands shaking with rage. If he touched one hair on her beautiful head, I would rip him to pieces! “I need to go, sir,” I stated, not even waiting for an answer.
I disconnected the call and dialled Anna’s number. It answered immediately. “Who’s this?” a man’s voice asked.
I felt the snarl try to rip itself out of my mouth. “Who the fuck is this and what are you doing with Anna’s phone?” I growled as I threw a change of clothes into a bag along with my guns, ammo, knives and my other tactical gear.
“This is Agent Richards,” the voice replied hesitantly.
“This is Agent Taylor. Why do you have Anna’s phone?” I asked, trying to control my breathing; all I wanted to do was smash everything, and that wouldn’t help at all.
“Miss Spencer didn’t take her cell phone
; it’s here in the apartment.”
I closed my eyes and groaned. They couldn’t even track her through her cell signal. Why hadn’t I ever thought about getting a tracking device on her body or something? I could have suggested it to her dad, I’m sure he could have commissioned something small enough to attach to the back of an earring or necklace.
I ended the call, pressing the phone to my forehead, thinking. Officer Weston was right, they could be anywhere by now, with Carter’s money and contacts they could be on a boat, helicopter or private plane, on their way to goodness knows where. He even suggested in one of his letters that they go somewhere else for a fresh start when he got out of jail. How was I going to find her if I had no idea where to look?
I groaned and threw my bag onto the bed angrily. I felt useless; there was nothing I could do from here on my own. I would just have to fly to Arizona and wait in her apartment with the other agents; I would make her dad reinstate me as her guard so I could devote my time to finding her. I wouldn’t give up, not even if I had to look for a lifetime.
If only I could find someone who knew Carter’s whereabouts, or at the very least, someone who worked for him so that I could force them to tell me where she was. An idea suddenly hit me, I wasn’t sure if it would work, but it was sure as hell worth a try. I held my breath as I dialled the one person who I knew would have a chance at finding her. He was a lying, cheating scumbag, and I hadn’t seen him for five years. I’d met him when I was going through a bad stage in my teens and had fallen in with the wrong crowd. He was a low level criminal, but he had a lot of contacts. He used to make it his business to know everything about everyone. I’d looked up to him for a time when I was a young and impressionable seventeen year old, until I realised that wasn’t the person that I wanted to be. That was when I decided to get my life on track and make something of myself, before it was too late. He was one of the reasons that I decided to train to be a police officer. If anyone would have an idea of how to get to Carter Thomas, it would be Julian Simms.
It rang for a long time. I was just about to give up hope when he answered. “This had better be fucking important! Do you know what time it is?” he growled sleepily. Julian didn’t run the same type of schedule that normal people did; this was probably middle of the night for him.
“Julian, I’m sorry to call you so early. It’s Ashton Taylor,” I said, letting it sink in.
There was silence on the line, obviously he was trying to place the name; it had been a long time. “Ashton? Shit, man, I haven’t heard from you in years! I heard you went over to the dark side,” he joked.
I smiled weakly. “Sorry, but I haven’t got time for pleasantries. I need you to do something for me, it’s important. You owe me, remember? Well, I need to collect the favour,” I said sternly.
He coughed a barking, hacking cough that was caused by too many cigarettes and too many drugs. “Yeah, what do you need?” he asked.
I need to you help me save my girl from a sick son of a bitch. “I need you to find someone for me. Or, at the very least, someone who works for someone,” I answered, trying to keep the desperation out of my voice.
“Who?”
“Carter Thomas.”
He gasped. “I can’t help you, I’m sorry.” His voice was gruff, he actually sounded a little scared.
“Julian, you fucking owe me, you know you do! I saved your life. Just get me anyone, anyone that works for him so I can get the information myself if you can’t find Thomas,” I growled, the frustration leaking into my voice now. I grabbed my bag and headed out of my apartment and downstairs, immediately hailing a cab heading to the airport.
“You don’t want to find him, Ashton. Seriously, whatever you want him for, it’s not important enough to find him for it,” he replied, sounding terrified.
I snorted at that comment. “It’s important enough, trust me. Find him and call me back. I’m serious; I’m calling in my favour.” I hung up and closed my eyes as the cab sped me to the airport. I called ahead and booked the first flight they had, but I still had to wait almost two hours. At least I would be there with the other agents, so if they got any leads I would be able to go with them, if Julian came up with nothing.
I couldn’t settle down. I was pacing back and forth, trying to think of any other way I could find her before he hurt her. I’d promised her that he’d never hurt her again – but what if he already had? Had I already broken my promise to her? The pain of thinking about it was torture. My whole body was tight with stress. The helpless, useless feeling was killing me slowly. My Baby Girl was in danger and there was nothing I could do about it.
Just as I was about to board my plane, my phone rang. It was Julian. “Tell me good news, man,” I begged as I answered it.
“Ashton, are you sure you want to do this?” he checked.
“Just give me the fucking information, I’m about to board a plane,” I snapped angrily.
He sighed. “Okay, well, I couldn’t find out much about his whereabouts, but a friend of a friend has just been hired by him. He was bragging in a bar the other day that he’d been hired by Carter Thomas to retrieve something important. Apparently they’ve been hauled up in Arizona for the last few weeks, looking for something, but they couldn’t find it. Apparently they were stationed in some abandoned factory on Western Ambrose,” he said.
Arizona. Looking for something. Holy shit, this is it! Western Ambrose, I repeated it over and over in my head, committing it to memory. “Okay, what’s the guy’s name?” I asked curiously. I needed to find this guy, talk to him, find out anything and see if this ‘thing’ they were looking for was Anna. If it was, then maybe I could find out where they were planning on taking her. I just prayed that he would still be at this factory. I just needed to find the guy, get the information, and then I could pass it on to the relevant people.
“Justin Morrison. Asshole apparently, real nasty piece of work. He told the whole bar about him and Carter Thomas being like best pals apparently. Maybe you could get Carter’s location from him,” Julian suggested hesitantly.
“Thanks. I gotta go get my plane. If I need anything else I’ll call you, okay,” I muttered, disconnecting the call, not giving him the chance to say no.
I didn’t call the White House; they wouldn’t exactly approve of the way I was going to get Carter Thomas’s whereabouts out of this guy who worked for him, breach of human rights and all that shit. Once I had more information, I would call them so we could move on Carter and get my girl back.
I called my new captain and told him I wasn’t coming in for the next few days, and that I had an emergency I needed to get sorted out. As I expected, he was less than happy about it, but there wasn’t much else I could do, and I didn’t care anyway. Nothing else was important apart from Anna.
By the time the plane landed, I felt sick. It was almost three in the afternoon, so she’d been missing for hours now. He could have done anything to her. I got the first cab I could to Western Ambrose and had the cabbie drive me the length of the street.
“Do you know of an old abandoned factory along this road?” I asked the driver, holding him out an extra twenty.
He pocketed it and smiled gratefully. “Well, there are two; one’s an office building really, the other one used to be a sewing factory years ago,” he replied, raising his eyebrows curiously. I made him drive back down the road and point them out to me before I got out and headed across the street to get a better vantage point. I needed to make the sweep as quick as possible.
I quickly called Julian again. “Hey, man, did you say it was definitely an abandoned factory and not an abandoned office building?” I asked curiously. I didn’t want to go into the wrong building and scare off this Justin Morrison guy. I needed him alive so I could beat the information out of him as to where Anna might be.
“Yeah, that’s what my friend said,” he confirmed. “Ashton, do you need some help?” he asked, sounding like he was hoping I would say no. I didn’t think he wo
uld want to go against Carter Thomas at all, but I knew he would if I asked him to. A favour was classed as a debt to people like Julian; he would repay it to the best of his ability. I’d saved his life once when we were younger; he still owed me for that.
“Not at the moment, but thanks. I gotta go.” I disconnected the call and pushed my cell back into my pocket before checking my ankle holster and pushing my other gun down the back of my jeans, covering it with my T-shirt. Next, I slipped my knife into my belt and pushed four extra clips into my pocket before casually walking over to the building, pretending to walk past.
I stopped to tie my shoe outside the door, sitting on the steps and looked around; no one was there so I slipped in. The fact that the door was unlocked made my heart leap, I was sure I was in the right place. This guy Morrison had to be here somewhere, I just prayed he knew where she was.
As soon as I was off the street, I pulled my gun from the waistband of my jeans and slipped an extra clip there instead in case I needed to reload quickly. I made my way through the building, keeping my back to the wall, checking each room for signs of him.
Suddenly, I heard the sound of a walkie-talkie up ahead, so I froze. My eyes narrowed. Why the hell would someone have a walkie-talkie? Without hesitation, I slipped round the corner and put my gun to the back of the guy’s head.
“What’s your name?” I asked angrily.
He stood there, shocked. “Elliot.”
Elliot? I frowned. So where was this Justin Morrison guy then? Maybe there was more than one of them assigned here to find this ‘something important’. “Turn around,” I ordered, pushing the gun harder into the back of his head as a warning. As he slowly turned to face me, I eyed the rest of the room. He was alone. “Where is Carter Thomas?” I asked, watching his face for signs that would give him away.
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