Total pages in book: 61
Estimated words: 59119 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 296(@200wpm)___ 236(@250wpm)___ 197(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 59119 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 296(@200wpm)___ 236(@250wpm)___ 197(@300wpm)
I brushed glass off the seat and sat down, and I opened the glovebox and pulled out the user manual.
When he found me, he could think I’d tried to find a way to start the car without the key.
“Crew!”
Finally.
I yawned and stumbled out of the car again.
He ran toward me. “You fucking idiot—you couldn’t just take a swing at me?”
“By the looks of your nose, I already did.” I feigned weakness and sleepiness and sat down on the ground. I was tired…too tired…but I had some fight left in me.
He shut off the alarm system and then bent over, resting his hands on his thighs as he panted.
“I’m gonna kill you,” I said. That part was true. He’d betrayed me. We could’ve worked together.
He let out a labored breath. “I understand you hate me, Crew. I’m very sorry I have to do this.”
I grinned lazily and peered up at him. “You know what makes me happy? That your son will never see you again. He deserves better.”
That killed the remorse in his eyes, and he turned cold.
Good.
I didn’t want his fucking remorse.
“I know he does,” he said quietly. Then he cleared his throat and opened the door to the back seat. “It’s time to go.”
“My team’s gonna find me,” I told him.
“No, they won’t.” He sighed and hitched his hands under my armpits, and he grunted as he heaved me off the ground.
I let him help me into the back seat; in fact, I didn’t move a fucking muscle. “Yeah, they will. We have Willow Quinn, remember? Ain’t shit on this earth she can’t find. Plus, she has your tech by now.”
That made him falter as he positioned my feet on the floor.
He had to know quite a bit about her. I knew she’d assisted her brothers in several extractions and missions over the years. And they worked with the best.
Mercier squatted down and pulled out my phone. “No password? Unwise.”
No, you know what’s unwise? Password restriction in an emergency when you had two seconds to reach out to someone. The only other options were facial recognition and thumbprint, and that was fucking unwise on a throwaway.
He wouldn’t find our secure chat server. It was well hidden in my bookmarks. Besides, once a message had been registered by a specific phone, it was only visible for thirty minutes.
He went to my regular messages instead. “I assume Elliott is the boss?”
I shrugged.
Dumbass. He was going to text Elliott, wasn’t he? He’d set off so many warning bells that it was ridiculous.
“Try not to sound too much like a rusty old fucker who’s struggling to stay relevant,” I said. “Fuckin’ Feds.”
He frowned at me before he shook his head and refocused on the text.
I chuckled through a yawn. “Think about it—four years and you got fuck-all. Man, you’re useless. Only thing you know is how to spend tax dollars.”
“Damn,” he murmured. “Don’t hold back, Crew.” He showed me the screen.
Hey boss. Can’t really talk but I’m going with Adrien. Please trust me. I will reach out as soon as I can. He knows something about Carillo that can lead us to Shay, Blake, and Marisa, and he offered to let me accompany him on the condition that it’s just me. I will reach out within a week.
“I’ll send this once we have a signal again,” he said.
Fuck. He’d worded himself pretty damn close to how I would’ve texted the boss, except for maybe two things. I could only hope Elliott would react to “accompany” and “condition” as two words I often misspelled. Actually, I couldn’t remember ever using accompany, though it wasn’t so weird that it stuck out.
One yawn set off another, and I lost the energy to fight.
Mercier headed back into the house, and by the time he was back, just a few minutes later, I was struggling to stay awake.
Every emotion in my brain was dulled, and I simply stopped caring.
He eyed me in the rearview and started the engine. “Nice SOS message you left for Ryan.”
I released a breath. “Fuck you. Piece’a shit scumbag. You’re no better than the cartel fuckers.”
Even as I said the words, I felt no punch to any of it. No heat, no anger.
“I sincerely hope I am.” He broke the gaze, and then we were off.
CHAPTER 6
Darius Quinn
“I’ll do a sweep downstairs. You go up.” I jogged up the steps and entered Coach’s house with my gun raised, immediately encountering signs of struggle. “There’s blood on the floor.”
Fucking Christ, the kid really had been taken.
Ryan sprinted up the stairs. “Crew!”
I peered into the living room, then continued into the kitchen. Someone had packed in a hurry.
Crew Finlay
Were we moving or not? It was difficult to tell. I couldn’t hear the engine of the boat anymore, but with the water flowing steadily in the opposite direction we were headed, I just didn’t know. It’d been like this once every day. For about an hour, give or take, I stopped hearing the engine, and nothing happened. Around the same time, too, shortly before I was served lunch.