“Whoa hold up, brother.” Lucky’s tone grew serious. “Slow down a beat and take a breath. Who took who?”
“Scottie!” Chase practically shouted into the phone. “That son of a bitch reporter from the other night rammed my truck, and then he fucking took her!”
“Reporter?” There was a slight pause. “Oh, wait. Are you talking about Levi Taylor?”
“Yes, that’s who I’m fucking talking about!”
Was the man not listening?
“Okay, first, tell me where you are so I can head that way.”
Chase gave his friend the location before trying his best to explain. “We were on the way to my apartment. We…” He paused, unsure of how to describe it. “We got into a sort of serious conversation, so I pulled into the parking lot of this old gas station so I wouldn’t be distracted behind the wheel.”
A lot of fucking good that did.
In the background, Chase could hear Lucky telling Ellie what happened and that he had to go. The shock in the woman’s voice traveled through the phone, reminding him of how dire the situation really was.
He had no idea why Levi Taylor had done what he’d done. Or where the bastard had taken her.
Worse, Chase didn’t have the first clue behind the man’s motive, which meant he was six steps behind. And Scottie…
Scottie’s fate was completely unknown.
The fuck it is! You’re going to get your head out of your ass and find her!
He blinked, shaking away the fear and doubt that had been filling his head. Now wasn’t the time to be scared or freak the hell out. Now was the time for action.
“Get here as soon as you can,” Chase told his friend. “I’ll call in the rest of the team.”
Without waiting for a response, he ended the call to immediately initiate another. By the time he’d contacted Logan, Archer, and Van, the fear he felt for Scottie had transformed into something more.
Something dark. Lethal. A deadly force he didn’t attempt to deny.
The rules he always followed…the laws he’d never once considered breaking…none of those mattered anymore. For him, there wasn’t a question. For him, there was only one goal he intended to reach.
And as Chase waited in that parking lot for his team to show up for their newest mission, he knew. He’d cross every fucking line in existence if it meant finding the woman he loved before it was too late.
Scottie laidon her side in the back of the dark panel van. Her wrists and ankles had been bound with plastic ties, and the right side of her head hurt. But the pounding headache was nothing compared to the pain cutting its way through her heart.
Another tear fell across her temple, joining the others that had gone before it on the van’s cold, metal floor. Chase was hurt. She remembered that part clearly.
One minute, she was preparing to tell him she was pregnant. The next, Scottie saw that van—the one she was in now—heading straight for them.
She’d hollered out his name. Tried pulling him toward her to avoid taking the brunt of the hit. But then everything went dark.
Her respite, however, hadn’t lasted long. Within minutes of hitting her head and being knocked unconscious, Scottie had been awoken with a start as the man who’d hit them began forcefully pulling her from Chase’s truck.
All the while she’d been struggling to get free, Chase had remained unconscious and bleeding, slumped to the side behind the wheel of his truck.
He was hurt, and she’d been kidnapped by a man she didn’t know. To make matters even worse, she had absolutely no idea why.
Chase’s face filled her mind’s eye once again, the imagined image creating a new surge of unshed tears. She’d tried so hard to warn him. Had shouted his name at the top of her lungs while trying to keep from being taken against her will.
She’d kicked and twisted her body like a madwoman, screaming like a banshee while doing everything she could to fend off her attacker. She remembered fighting tooth and nail—literally—to get free from the man’s grip when a flash of pain had exploded at the back of her head.
The next thing Scottie knew, she was here. Tied up in the back of a creepy as hell van with a man whose plans couldn’t possibly entail anything good.
Please, God. Please, let Chase be okay. Please let our baby be okay.