“Baby,” he whispered. And fuck, he couldn’t do anything but whisper, he was that terrified. It was like those shadows he’d been staring at every night had come to life and he couldn’t breathe around them.
“They took Rosie,” she sobbed. “They came into the house, they pointed a gun at Belle, and Rosie went with them. She knew they were going to kill her, but she went with them because they pointed a gun at our daughter.”
Cade’s blood went cold. Ice cold. Every part of him froze. He stared at his daughter. Took in her wide green eyes. Her little nose. Her red lips. The locks of her hair.
She’s okay. She’s okay and she’s here and your world isn’t falling apart. Keep your fucking shit together. For them.
Gwen stopped sobbing and her eyes went blank. “They pointed a gun at our baby, and now we have to kill them all.”
Luke
“They took Rosie…. She knew they were going to kill her but she went with them.”
Luke heard nothing but that on a replay reel.
Twenty-three hours and thirty-six minutes. That’s all he heard. He couldn’t hear Rosie. He tried. Every moment that he sucked in ash instead of air and his heart shredded in his chest instead of beating, he tried to conjure up her throaty voice telling him she loved him.
Tried to remember the way her mouth tasted, the way her pussy tasted. The way she screwed up her nose when she was frustrated. How her smile lit up a fucking room whenever she was happy, which was a lot these days. How perfectly she fit in his arms.
He fucking couldn’t.
It was as if someone had come and stolen away all of his memories of Rosie, just like they’d stolen her.
He barely kept it together. Fucking barely.
Cade was eerily calm. He’d been making orders, calling in markers to get in touch with someone who could tap into the fuck’s location. Police came and went because they wanted every set of eyes out there looking for Rosie.
Luke barely noticed their glances at him, staring at the side he was standing on, the outlaw side.
He didn’t see any of that. He just saw the last time he’d kissed Rosie.
“I don’t like it.” She pouted.
“What, me going to the clubhouse and trying to figure out how to kill the man stalking you while you drink wine?” His hands found her waist, then traveled lower to her perfect fucking ass. His cock hardened.
She smiled.
His cock hardened even more.
“No. Well yes, I like that because the menfolk are doing all the work.” She winked. “But I had plans for us tonight.”
Luke pulled her into him, smelling her perfume. Smelling her. “What was that?”
She bit her lip and his cock twitched. Her lipstick was bright pink today. Her hair was piled atop her head and she was wearing a bright pink dress. Tight as shit and too short, but he loved it. Her heeled boots were pink too. She was in a ‘pink mood,’ she’d said that morning after he’d told her he liked her outfit. He’d actually showed her. By bending her over the sofa the second she’d emerged from the bedroom.
He fucking loved that. Waking up to a different Rosie every day. But the same in all the ways that mattered. He loved that she would never be happy stationary. That to her, everything in her life was fluid, except the people she loved. With Rosie, that was forever.
“Well,” she said, “I was making room for some more of my clothes and I found a rogue pair of handcuffs.”
Luke’s cock pulsed again and he hissed out a breath.
Her eyes flared. “Yeah,” she whispered, feeling his cock pressing into her stomach. “Now you get why I don’t like it? We don’t get to use them.”
Luke yanked his mouth to hers, kissing her like he wanted to fuck her: hard, rough, and with no mercy.
She blinked dreamily when he stopped, her face flush.
“We’re gonna fuckin’ use them,” Luke growled. “I promise you that.”
She smiled again. “I’ll hold you to that, Crawford. And I’m thinking I get to do the handcuffing.”
She winked and sauntered away. He watched the sway of her ass, his balls crying out to him to fuck her brains out. Now. But he didn’t. Because he had shit to do and she’d be there later on.
But she wasn’t. And now Luke might never get to fuckin’ see her bite her lip, watch her face flush after he kissed her. He wanted to rip his own skin apart for how trapped he felt inside his own body.
“Son.”
Luke’s head snapped up. He’d been sitting in a chair in church, on his own, head in his hands in a rare moment of stillness. He cursed himself for getting lost in that, even if it was for a few seconds. That was a few seconds he would never get back. That was a few seconds that could mean everything to Rosie.
His father stood in front of him, face unreadable. He looked very old all of a sudden. It was strange. He and Rosie had just seen the man and the lines on his forehead hadn’t been there. He hadn’t looked like that.
Luke stared at his father. “I failed,” he choked out. “I swore, since that day in the car, I swore I’d protect her, and I fucking failed,” he hissed, not caring that his father wouldn’t remember the very day he decided to bring down the club to protect Rosie.
And now the only chance Rosie had was the club.
Luke’s father walked in unhurriedly, clapped his son on the back. “No, Luke, you didn’t fail her,” he muttered. “You givin’ up?”
“Fuck no,” Luke said fiercely.
“Then you haven’t failed her,” Bill said firmly. “You know she don’t need protectin’. You know she’s strong. She’s gonna be whole and well when you find her. You’re gonna find her, Luke.”
His father’s voice was firm, but there was something beneath it. Desperation. Because Luke knew his father understood that if they didn’t find her, he’d lose his son forever.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Rosie
They kept me in that house for twenty-four hours.
Fernandez was true to his word. No one touched me. They fed me. Gave me water. Bathroom breaks.
Very polite kidnappers, all in all.
But then again, they didn’t need to starve me or beat me. Physical violence only went so far. They landed the deepest of blows without touching a hair on my head. Those photos worked better than anything else would have.
I got snatches of sleep, for handfuls of minutes. Then I saw Belle’s beautiful locks, matted in blood. Gwen’s sightless stare. Bex enduring more horrors. Bull meeting the Devil truly, without anything to bring him back.
But when Fernandez came back in, I was wide awake, ready.
“Ah, I’m glad to see you’re looking so refreshed,” he greeted warmly.
I glared at him.
“So you’ve considered my proposition?” he asked pleasantly.
“What do you want?” I hissed. “You went to all the trouble to kidnap me, surveil my family, threaten them. You’ve shown me how large your dick is, I get it. What’s with the theatrics?”
“I hear you are a rather… unpredictable young woman,” he said.
I snorted.
“I just need assurances that, on your next holiday, you do not choose to come to my country,” he said smoothly.