“If you think that’s best,” she said sullenly.
“Hey, I will do everything to protect both of you, but if something goes wrong, I need to know that you can at least handle a gun.”
“Okay. You’re right. Let’s do this.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Reed Security
KNIGHT
Becky ended the call with Cap and we all glanced around the room at each other. We all knew that we were in for one hell of a fight. I stood and headed for the door.
“I’m going for Kate.”
“Wait,” Derek yelled. “We should meet back here and drive out together. You heard Cap. No one does anything alone.”
“I’m not waiting around to get Kate, but I’ll get her and meet you back here.”
“We’ll grab Claire and Lucy. Let’s meet back here in twenty minutes. Rob, take Becky to her place and grab whatever you need,” Derek ordered.
I pulled out my phone, needing to know where Kate was.
“Hello?”
“Kate, where are you?”
“I just got home. Why?” I heard her heels drop to the floor and I could imagine her walking in the back door and slipping them off her feet as she grabbed a bottle of wine. I heard the cork pop and the rattle of the wine glass as she set it on the counter.
“Just stay there. I’m coming to get you. Pack a bag and be ready when I get there.”
“Is everything okay?”
“Just do this for me. We have to leave right away.”
“Alright. I’ll-”
I heard a crash in the background and then heavy breathing. “Garrick!” That name only slipped out when Kate was nervous or scared. I put the phone on speaker and pulled up the app to show me what was happening at the house. Kate was running up the stairs and into our bedroom. She tried to slam the door shut, but a hand shot out and forced it open. I heard her scream echo through the room as the guy shoved his way into the bedroom and tackled her to the ground.
“Shit,” I ran for the elevator, not stopping when Pappy and Derek yelled at me. I didn’t have any time to waste. Kate was in danger and I wasn’t close enough to protect her. I cursed that I had to take the elevator instead of stairs. It was one of the safety features in Reed Security so that no one could enter without permission. There were stairs in the back, but that would take twice as long. When the doors finally opened, I ran to the garage and hopped on my bike, released the clutch and twisted the throttle.
I roared out of Reed Security and onto the highway, heading for my house. I hit every light along the way, but I didn’t slow down even once. I rode on the shoulder and burst through the traffic, not giving a fuck if someone got in an accident because of me. I was at the last light, driving along the shoulder when a car pulled over to the side, blocking my way. I wove through the traffic, driving around the cars that were at a stand still and sped through the light. A car was coming at me from each direction and I didn’t have enough speed because of having to slow down. I wasn’t going to make it across the intersection. At the last second, I turned the bike right and went down the crossroad. It would take me at least a few minutes out of the way and cost me precious minutes that I didn’t have to get to Kate.
When I pulled down our street, my headlight flashed across the front of the house and I knew that I was already too late. The front door was hanging open and there was no sound coming from inside. I needed to be sure and ran inside, clearing each room as I went, faster than I should have. Images of Kate dying on the floor flashed through my head, but I refused to believe that they had killed her. They needed her for leverage; at least, that’s what I would have done. I just hoped they thought along the same lines as me. The house was empty. The master bedroom was completely trashed and there were a few drops of blood on the carpet, but no other signs of whether she was injured or not.
“Fuck!” I shouted, punching a hole in the wall. I ran downstairs to my computer and quickly pulled up the security footage, getting any detail that would help me find her. I zeroed in the guy’s wrist and saw the Night Kings tattoo. That didn’t tell me shit about where she was. I pulled up the outside feed and got a license plate and the direction they headed.
“Cole,” I barked into my phone as I headed for my bike. “Someone took Kate. I don’t have time to explain right now. Is Alex safe?”
“She’s with me now.”
“Grab a bag and take her to Reed Security. I’m going after Kate.”
I hung up and shoved the phone in my pocket as I took off in the direction the car had gone. But the further I drove, the more I knew that I was fucked. There was no sign of her or the car. I pulled over and yanked out my phone again.
“Knight, I really hoped I wouldn’t be getting any calls from you,” Sean Donnelly said into the phone.
“Someone took Kate. I have a plate number for you.” I rattled it off quickly, repeating it and giving him the description of the car.
“What the fuck is going on?”
“Let’s just say that we stepped in some deep shit and now everyone at Reed Security is in danger.”
“Fuck. Let me make sure Lillian and Cara are safe and I’ll meet you over there.”
“Bring them with. Sinner should be making his way to you now to get Cara. Let him know when you have her.”
“Alright. I’ll see you over there.”
Fuck. For the first time in years, I was fucking terrified. This was so much worse than the last time Kate was in danger because this time, she was already on her own. I needed information now and I wasn’t going to get that sitting on the side of the road. I sped off to Reed Security, letting the anger leach through me. I needed rage on my side right now because it was the only thing keeping me from losing my shit. I was going to be breaking my promise to Sebastian because there was no way I was letting any of the fuckers that took Kate survive.
✯✯✯✯✯
Becky
When Knight’s alarm went off, so did several others on my computer. I quickly pulled up where the alarms were going off and switched into op mode. I pulled up the footage and my eyes went wide. We were being hit all around.
“Derek!” He ran into the conference room where I was working and looked over my shoulder. “Your house is being hit. Looks like Claire and Lucy are both there. There are two men shooting at your house.”
Derek and Hunter were gone before I could finish my sentence and I moved on to the next location. I quickly put on my headphones and dialed Cap.
“What do you have?” he answered tersely.
“Cap, they’re at your house now. They’re hitting everyone.”
“Pull up the feed,” he demanded. I quickly pulled up the live video feed from his house. “I don’t see Caitlin. Maggie’s got her gun and she’s shooting at someone.”
“We’re going over there,” Chance said from behind me.
“Cap, Chance’s team is heading to your house now.”
“Fuck, I’m still twenty minutes out.”
“Cap, I’ve got alarms going off everywhere. I need to check them all out. Everyone’s meeting back here.”
“I’ll contact Chance. Don’t go anywhere, Becky.”
He hung up and I glanced over at Rob who was talking to Hunter about the video feed from his house. I went back to work, checking the next alarm. I got Sinner on the phone next.
“Becky, what’s going on?” he asked urgently.
“Sinner, I don’t see Cara on the footage, but your house is on fire.”
“She’s still over at Sean’s. I’ll get ahold of him now.”
“Are Cazzo and Burg with you?”
“Yeah. We already got alarms on their houses. We’re headed to Cazzo’s place. Meghan’s out of town.”
I quickly pulled up the feed from Cazzo’s place. I quickly scanned through the video feed, but she wasn’t on any of the screens. “I don’t see Vanessa in the house.” And then I saw it. She was running outside toward the woods surrounding the house. Men were chasing her
and I jumped with a squeak when I saw her fall to the ground. “Cazzo,” I whispered.
“What? What the fuck happened?” Cazzo’s terrified and angry voice roared through my headset. I pulled myself together. I had to be professional. They needed me right now.
“They have Vanessa. I think they shot her. They’re taking her to their vehicle. Cazzo, Chance’s team already left to get Maggie, and Hunter and Derek went for Claire and Lucy. We don’t have anyone else here.”
I could hear him swearing and yelling, but I was still trying to pull myself together. Reed Security was rapidly falling apart. Everyone’s houses were being burned to the ground or shot up. These assholes weren’t leaving anything to chance. They were sending a message.
Claire
“So, the other night, I was reading this book about a motorcycle club and usually I don’t get into that kind of book,” I said to Lucy as we sat drinking wine. I had already had two glasses and this was my third. I was well on my way to past tipsy since I hadn’t had anything to eat since lunch.
“What made you decide to read it?”
“There was a really hot guy on the cover. I mean, smokin’. He had all these tattoos on his arms and a leather jacket flung over his shoulder. It was hot, and let me tell you, the sex scenes were even hotter.”
“What kind of stuff are we talking?” Lucy asked as she guzzled down some more wine.
I leaned in close to her, almost afraid to say it out loud. “Voyeurism.”
“Seriously? I never took you for the type to like that stuff.”
“Neither did I, but Derek and I like to try different things and it just sounded so hot.”
“What happened to all the Superman fantasies?”
I shrugged. “I haven’t totally given up on them, but I saw that Knight got that motorcycle and then I read this book. It just got me thinking about bad boys and the appeal of the danger and everything.”
“Derek’s not enough of a bad boy?”
“Definitely. This is just a fantasy, Lucy. It’s not like I want him to go out and become a killing machine who smokes and drinks all the time. I’m just looking for a little adventure.”
Something loud cracked around the room and before I knew it, things were breaking all around me. Holy crap, someone was shooting at us! I dragged Lucy to the ground and started crawling for the safety of the other room. Before I got too far, I turned back and grabbed the bottle of wine.
“Really?” Lucy shouted. “You’re going back for the wine?”
I army crawled into the other room until I got to the hallway that led to our bedrooms. “Hey, this wine is really good and it was expensive,” I hissed. When we were both covered by the walls, I got up and ran for the bedroom. Derek had several guns in the wall safe and I went for them right away.
“Is this what you had in mind?” Lucy asked as she reached into the safe for one of the guns.
“Not exactly. I mean, if Derek and I had discussed this and planned it out, that would be different. But since I haven’t talked to Derek about this particular fantasy, I’m guessing it’s not him.”
“Shouldn’t we call Derek and Hunter?”
I walked to the doorway to look around into the hallway. It was quiet in the hallway, but I had a feeling that we should expect more. I shut the door quietly and pulled Lucy to the other side of my bed. We sat down on the ground, ducking down so that no one could see us. I took a deep breath and tried to think of what Derek would want me to do.
“The alarm alerts anyone at Reed Security as soon as it sounds. The alarm would have gone off as soon as the first bullet hit. We just have to wait here for them to show up.”
“We’re just going to sit here and wait for someone to rescue us?” Lucy asked incredulously. “Is that what the heroine in your books would do?”
“Okay, I admit that you can’t always rely on what people do in books as reference. I know this is what Derek would tell me to do. We just need to keep our heads down until they get here.”
The door slammed against the wall and Lucy and I both screamed, instantly giving away our location. I perked up just enough to see over the bed and verify that it wasn’t Derek and then I started shooting. Lucy followed my lead and we took turns shooting at the door. It was all going great, until we ran out of bullets.
“Shit,” I hissed. “I’m out.”
Lucy raised her gun and fired, but nothing happened. “Me too. What do we do now?”
“Now you come with us,” a voice said from the doorway.
Lucy and I slowly stood with our hands raised. My instincts were screaming to not go with him. The guy had tattoos all over his body and was wearing a leather jacket and a bandana.
“Well, this kills the fantasy,” I mumbled to Lucy.
“What’s wrong, Claire bear? Don’t like the bad boy fantasy anymore?” she snarked.
“Let’s go,” the man shouted. Lucy and I walked around the bed slowly toward the man. I was waiting for it. Any second now, Hunter and Derek would break through the door and take down these guys. The man reached out and grabbed me, shoving me into the hallway. Lucy stumbled into me from behind, causing me to trip and fall. “Get up. Stop stalling.”
I got up and slowly made my way into the living room. There were large bullet holes in the walls and the couch was in shreds. My wine glasses were shattered on the ground. I hadn’t even finished the glass I was drinking. My heart started to pound harder when we stepped out of the house. There was only one vehicle in the driveway and it wasn’t Derek’s. I was starting to get a very bad feeling about this.
The man shoved us into the back of the car and Lucy gripped my hand tightly. This was starting to become very real and now I understood her fear. Derek wasn’t here and we were about to be taken somewhere else. I swallowed down the wine that I was about to spew all over the back seat and took a deep breath.
“They’ll come for us. We’ll be fine,” I whispered to Lucy.
The car started moving and I closed my eyes, not wanting to see us driving away from my home. The screeching of tires had my eyes flying open. I turned around in my seat, seeing Derek’s truck come roaring up behind us. I quickly pulled the seat belt across my belly. Lucy was doing the same. I looked back one last time, just in time to see headlights right on our ass. I wrapped my hand around Lucy’s as the truck crashed into the back of the car. We jolted forward, but the strap stopped us from going far.
The men up front were swearing and trying to get control of the car. The truck rammed us from behind again, sending us into a street light. Not wasting a second, I flung off my seat belt and swung the door open, dragging Lucy out behind me. Derek and Hunter ran past us, holding their weapons on the men in the front seat. They dragged them out of the car and cuffed them, leading them over to the truck.
“Claire,” Derek barked at me. “Get your keys and go straight to Reed Security. You don’t stop until you’re parked in the garage, you got me?”
I nodded quickly and ran back in the house for my keys, opening the garage door, and pulling my car out. Lucy got in, slamming the door behind me and we sat there for a moment collecting ourselves. Derek honked the horn, signaling for me to get my ass moving and I put the car in reverse and followed his instructions.
“I bet that wasn’t how you pictured your fantasy going,” Lucy mumbled.
“Not exactly, but it wasn’t bad.”
“Claire, you need help.”
I sighed, knowing it was true.
Cazzo
I drove like a bat out of hell onto my property. Becky had seen her being taken, but I had to be sure. Slamming the truck into park, I jumped out and ran to the back of the property where Becky had said Vanessa was running. The floodlights were on in the back yard and I could see almost everything. I scanned the tree line for any sign of her, my weapon held steady in front of me. But she wasn’t anywhere around. It wasn’t bright enough to look for clues back here. I ran back to the house just as Burg was coming out.
“She
’s gone, man.”
“Fuck. This can’t be happening. I can’t fucking lose her.”
“I know. Let’s get back to Reed Security. We need information right now. We’re not going to get her back by losing it out here.”
I nodded, knowing that he was right. I couldn’t think about what could be happening right now. I needed to work with the guys to get her back. We jumped back in the truck, Burg driving this time as I stared out the window. I swallowed hard as I remembered our conversation this morning.
“Sam, we need to talk about something.”
“Can we talk later? I have to get to work.”
“Um, this can’t wait.”
I stopped and stared at her. She looked nervous and my initial thought was that she didn’t want to get married. We had been going back and forth about it for a while now. She wasn’t sure if she wanted her mother there and I was getting tired of waiting. I had been patient so far, but now I wanted more with her. I didn’t want to put it off any longer. I sat down on the couch, preparing myself for whatever she was going to tell me.
“I’m pregnant.”
I was frozen. I hadn’t been expecting that. I thought we would be married first. We had been careful. Now she was pregnant and all I could think about was that my mother was going to be thrilled. She had been waiting for Vanessa and I to get married and give her grandkids. When I realized that I was just staring at her, I wrapped her in my arms and kissed her silly.
“I can’t believe this. I mean, I wanted to be married first, but hell, I don’t care right now. We’re gonna have a kid.”
“You’re really okay with this?” she asked hesitantly.
“Sweetheart, I’m over the fucking moon.”
“Good. Because I would hate to have to leave you before we got married.”
Whiskey: A Reed Security Romance (Reed Security Series Book 7) Page 7