Surge: A High School Bully Romance (Salinity Cove Book 1)
Page 18
"Anytime I try to get help, they stop it from happening." I was starting to blubber. "I don't know what to do."
"Sweetie, you need to calm down, I can barely understand you." I repeated myself. "Who is stopping it?"
"They want Dad. They won't stop until I turn him over or whatever. You need to make him come home."
"Riley, who?"
"The Tritons. They know about the knife and about me and-"
"You need to run."
"What?" I jumped up and stumbled, catching myself with a hand on the wall. "Run? Mom, what's going on?"
I heard a door slam on the other end of the phone and my chest hurt from how fast my heart was beating.
"I love you. Run."
The phone went silent and I looked at the ended call on the screen. I tried redialing the number, but all I got was a busy signal.
"Fuck!" I threw my phone on the couch and turned back to the back patio. My friends were laughing and having a good time. I couldn't go out there and ruin their fun.
There was a knock on the door and I wiped my tears before unsteadily walking to it. The last drink I'd had was really starting to catch up with me.
I flung the door open. I should have looked through the peephole.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Blake
Sometimes there is no choice besides a choice you don't want to make. To defy the admiral would mean imprisonment or worse. Just because Jax was his son didn't mean jack shit.
We parked in front of Riley's house and got out. We could hear laughing from the back as we walked to the front door. We weren't sure how we were going to go about doing what we needed to do, but we were out of time.
"This is really fucked up. It's her birthday." Morgan was ready to take whatever consequence was thrown at him. He had nothing to lose. His family was dead and he had no one besides us. "What if we-"
"No." Jax knocked on the door. "He just wants to use her to lure her dad and mom in. It will be fine."
We had found out at the beginning of the week that Riley's mom was shacking up with Robert. What kind of mother leaves her child to be with a criminal?
All week Jax's dad had been on us to bring Riley to him so he could send a clear message to Natalia and Robert. All week we had delayed the inevitable. Either we brought her to Admiral West or he'd send others.
We couldn't risk other tritons coming into contact with her. We were still unsure of the power she had over us. We didn't feel like we were being lured in by her, but the pull to be near her was strong.
The door opened and my eyes quickly scanned the room. Everyone was outside.
"Hi." She steadied herself by leaning against the open door. Her eyes were glossy with unshed tears and her lips quirked up. "My birthday wouldn't be complete without you three."
Was that sarcasm or was she serious?
"Are you drunk?" Jax sounded surprised and grabbed my arm to stop me from moving forward.
She laughed and a hiccup came out. "Me? Riley Kline, drunk?"
She pushed off the door, causing it to bounce off the wall and hit her as she moved forward. She stumbled right into Morgan, who had been concerningly quiet since we got the phone call earlier that our time was up.
"Momo, why the mean mug?" She had ahold of his biceps and patted his cheek with her free hand. "Did you know that I let Jax dry hump me last weekend?"
Morgan's eyes cut to Jax and then back to Riley. "He might have mentioned it."
"Tonight, it's your turn." She giggled and Jax clenched his fists at his side.
This was going south fast. I stepped forward and plunged the syringe I'd been holding behind my back into her neck.
She gasped, her hand flying to her neck after I removed the needle. She turned her head and the look she gave me promised pain. She opened her mouth to speak, but the drug that would put her to sleep was already acting fast.
Her knees gave out and Morgan scooped her into his arms and walked toward the SUV without a word.
We hadn't wanted to do this. We had even refused at first, but the alternative was the admiral sending his right-hand men to retrieve Riley.
I opened the back door and climbed in, helping Morgan get Riley situated on the seat as Jax climbed in the driver's seat.
She slept soundly with her head in my lap. I stroked her hair as we rode in silence. There was no coming back from this. She might have been open to us before, but now we had crossed a line.
We drove about twenty minutes up the coast before turning off and heading inland. There was a narrow access road that had three checkpoints with gates to let us through. We came to an open area in the rolling hills and pulled up to the airplane hangar that housed private planes and the land entrance to our underwater city.
The scanner turned green as we rolled through it, signaling that there were no explosives in the vehicle. Jax pulled onto the platform that would lower us into the tunnel.
"No turning back now." Morgan turned around in his seat and looked at Riley. "Are we sure this is what we want to do?"
"We don't have a choice. Would you rather my father sent his top men to retrieve her?" Jax's hands were clenched tight on the steering wheel as we waited to descend into the earth.
"No, but she's never going to forgive us." Morgan sat back in his seat with a huff. "Unlike you jerks, I actually care about her."
"I care about her,” Jax and I both said in harmony.
"Everything will be fine." I had been trying to convince myself all week that things would work out in the end.
Involving a human hostage in our world was a risky move from the admiral, but our people were demanding vindication for the damage done to our home and the creatures that lived there.
Robert Kline had built an oil platform east of where our city was. Everything within our power had been done to stop it years ago, but he had deep connections in the government and environmental agencies that were no match for our undercover soldiers.
Jax drove down the two-lane tunnel toward the parking lot. I hated knowing the water was right on the other side of the concrete sides. My skin burned the farther out to sea we got.
The tunnel was a necessary step to ensuring we remained undiscovered. We couldn't have tritons popping out of the ocean all across the world. It was an easy way to access the city undetected.
As soon as we parked, a group of five soldiers came to our vehicle. I tensed and pulled Riley closer to me.
"Fuck." Jax got out and slammed the door. He put himself between the SUV and the men. I wasn't sure what the procedures were for escorting hostages, but it didn't seem too out of place that men would accompany us.
They had words and he pulled out his phone, but one of the men grabbed it from him.
Morgan hit the locks on the door and slid over to the driver's side as Jax lunged for one of the men and was pistol whipped with a taser. He dropped to his knees before he was tasered and fell to the ground. Our bodies didn't handle electrical shocks well. He'd be down for a few hours.
"Get us the fuck out of here!" Panic surged in me and I unbuckled my belt and reached into the pocket on the back seat, pulling out a gun. It would still do some damage with them in bipedal form, but not much.
The tires spun on the concrete. "God damn it!" Morgan pounded his hands on the steering wheel. He met my eyes in the rearview mirror. "They put up the posts."
The locks popped and the doors were flung open. I pointed my gun at the forehead of the soldier closest to me.
"Drop the gun, kid. You're making this way more complicated than it needs to be."
I didn't know what this was, but following Admiral West's order had been a mistake. The men in front of us were some of his top men.
"Blake. Put the gun down." Morgan put his gun down on the floorboard and put his hands in the air.
"Do it, kid. She'll still survive if I shoot her foot."
I put the gun down and they motioned for us to get out of the vehicle. The taser hit me and pain spread through my bod
y as I fell to the ground. My muscles were seizing and my vision narrowed.
We really fucked up.
To be continued…
Submerge, Book 2 - Coming Soon!
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Acknowledgments
First and foremost I want to thank all my fans who have supported my writing endeavors. Your love and excitement keeps me going!
I want to thank Aspen for letting me bounce ideas off her and for giving me pep talks. Your enthusiasm for this book and characters pushed me through.
I also want to thank Ivy for her ongoing support of my writing. A special thanks to Devin for reading a tough scene and giving me your thoughts.
Thank you Julia for speaking candidly to me about tough conversations no parent should have to have.
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