21. Lyrius
As round two wound down, Dae-Dae started bouncing and wiggling in his seat. I already knew what that meant.
“Mama, I gotta pee.”
“Of course you do.” I laughed, and the security guard standing beside us glanced over.
“I can take y’all,” he said, and I looked toward the ring one last time.
KO was circling his opponent, making that man work hard to catch him.
The round was almost over, and if I hurried, we’d be back before the start of the next one.
I’d watched enough of KO’s fights to know that he was going to stop playing with him in round three.
“Aight. Come on, baby.” I grabbed Dakoda’s hand, and he hopped down from his seat, being sure to grab that sign.
The crowd roared behind us as we followed the security guards out of the section and down a long hallway toward the restrooms. The further we got from the arena floor, the quieter everything became.
There were only a few workers and a few fans wandering through the hallway.
“I’ll take him into the men’s room,” the security guard said. I hesitated for a second. Normally, Dakoda came into the women’s restroom with me. But he was five. He was getting old enough to talk and yell if he needed something, and security was standing right there.
“Aight,” I said. “Don’t leave him.”
The guard nodded and took off behind Dakoda, who was already halfway to the men’s room.
“I’ll be right here, baby.”
“Okay, Mama.”
“I’ll wait at the end of the hall,” the other security guard said, and I nodded my head, suddenly feeling the urge to pee myself.
“Might as well go while we’re here,” I muttered as I pushed open the women’s restroom door and made my way inside.
Two stalls were occupied, so I made my way to the only open one, stepping inside and locking the door behind me.
I pushed up my dress and quickly released into the toilet.
Dakoda and I needed to get back to the ring before we missed KO’s victory.
“Mama!” I heard Dakoda’s scream through the bathroom wall, and my heart damn near stopped from the fear in it. I was already standing before my brain caught up.
“Dakoda?” I yelled back just as the stalls next to me flew open.
My eyes immediately hit the floor, and I watched as the footsteps crossed the floor in my direction.
Shit. This is an ambush. Every instinct in my body started screaming.
I yanked my phone out of my pocket and searched my purse for the tracking card, the one that came with stud earrings I’d bought Dae-Dae when he was two.
My fingers fumbled with the case. Come on.
Come on. I slid the card between the phone and the back of the case just as a shadow stopped outside my stall.
If KO found my phone, he’d find the card.
If he found the card, he’d know what it meant.
I dropped my purse and slid my phone into my bra just as the stall door flew open.
“Chass?” My breath caught at the sight of Chassidy standing there. For a second, I thought I was seeing a damn ghost. “Chassidy?” I repeated, confused.
“I’m sorry,” she said just as a big man with broad shoulders and a gun already raised came toward me.
“No—” The man’s hand clamped over my mouth.
“Don’t scream.” The barrel pressed against my side, and fear shot through me.
All I could think about was my son. What had they done with him?
The man grabbed me before I could even think about running.
Chassidy turned and exited the bathroom, holding the door open for the man to drag me out.
The corner of my head caught the door, and my vision blurred.
By the time they dragged me into the parking garage, tears were running down my face.
My eyes immediately found Dakoda, and relief hit me so hard it almost brought me to my knees. He was still alive.
“Mama!” His voice cracked as two men shoved him toward a black SUV.
“Dae-Dae!” I lunged for him, but the man holding me yanked me backward and shoved me into the back seat, making my phone slip from my breast and hit the concrete.
And for the first time, real panic settled in because they weren’t taking us together.
I said a silent prayer that they left it there and that Dakoda was still wearing his earring.
The car door slammed, and then something slammed into the side of my head.
The parking garage blurred, and the last thought I had before everything went black was hope that KO would find us.
“I told you this was a mistake.” The sound of a woman’s voice pulled me from the darkness.
My head throbbed as I forced my eyes open.
For a second, everything around me was blurry.
Streetlights flashed through tinted windows of the vehicle.
The low hum of a car engine let me know we were still moving.
The ache in my wrists finally registered a second later.
I was tied up. My stomach dropped as the events from the arena came rushing back all at once.
“Dakoda.” My voice came out rough. I pushed myself upright and immediately regretted it. Pain shot through the side of my head so hard it made my vision blur again. Whatever they hit me with back at the arena had left me dazed.
“Dakoda,” I repeated. “Where’s my son?” Nobody answered. My eyes adjusted enough to finally focus on the people sitting across from me. Chassidy sat nearest to the window, and Cherry sat beside her. So many questions rushed into my head. How did they know each other?
“You should’ve stayed gone.” Something about the way she was looking at me felt different, familiar.
“You had a whole life with your bastard son in Shoreline, but you just had to come back.” Cherry leaned back against the seat and smiled.
“I see why you ditched us, though. That dick almost had me forgetting the mission, too.” I stared at her for a second, and suddenly, I couldn’t breathe.
It was something about the way she said ditched us that had me squinting my eyes to stare at her.
“Victoria?” I whispered, shocked at the realization.
“You know how much money I spent becoming Cherry Sinclair?” She laughed as she pulled off her red wig.
Victoria had always been pretty, but the woman sitting across from me barely looked like the woman I’d known since I was sixteen years old.
The red hair wasn’t even the gist of it.
Her nose was narrower. Her lips were fuller.
Her brown eyes had been replaced with hazel contacts.
Her cheekbones looked fuller. Her jaw looked different.
Even her skin was three shades lighter than I remembered. Everything about her had been altered.
“Oh my God.”
“Yeah.” She crossed her legs. “Fooled everybody.”
“Where’s my son?”
“Alive.” Victoria rolled her eyes.
“Where is he?” I asked again.
“He isn’t the target. Your baby daddy is.”
“Why’d you take my child?”
“I took KO’s son.”
I looked at Chassidy. She sat beside Victoria, staring out the window. She was quiet.
“Chass,” I called her name, and her eyes finally found mine. For a second, I saw my friend, the one who was willing to run away to save me. “What are y’all doing? We never kidnapped people. Dakoda’s just a kid.” I tried to reason with them. “What happened to y’all?”
“What happened?” Victoria snorted. “KO and his brother happened.”
“Victoria—”
“They kil-killed everybody.” Her voice cracked.
“They took everything from me.” She swallowed hard.
“The man I loved.” I stayed quiet because there wasn’t a response to that.
Those people had gotten what they deserved.
She was acting as if they hadn’t tried to kill the man.
“There was blood everywhere, Lyrius. Everybody from the organization is gone.”
The car fell silent, then Chassidy spoke. “We barely made it out alive. KO shot two strippers who were just there working, thinking it was us. We had nothing. We had to start from scratch.” My chest tightened.
“Chass . . .” I glanced at her. “We all had to start over. How is taking me and my son helping anything?”
“I thought you were my sister.”
“She chose him.” Victoria slammed her hand against the seat, and the car went quiet again.
I looked out the window and immediately froze at what I saw.
Up ahead, traffic had slowed. There was a black SUV sitting sideways across two lanes.
And then I saw KO dragging Dakoda from the vehicle.
They found him. Thank God. Relief washed over me before panic hit, and I realized KO probably didn’t know I was here. The tracker had been on Dakoda, not me.
My eyes darted around the car as I tried to think fast. KO was looking around.
I could tell he was looking for me. I glanced at Victoria.
She was too busy staring ahead to notice, and so was the driver.
Suddenly, I felt pressure on my wrist and looked down to see Chassidy had slipped the knot loose on one of my hands.
My eyes snapped to hers, and she looked away like she hadn’t done anything at all.
I took a deep breath and then launched myself across the car.
Victoria screamed. The driver cursed, and the steering wheel jerked.
Everything happened all at once. The tires squeaked as the car spun out of control.
My shoulder slammed into the door. Victoria’s head hit something hard, and then the door ripped open, and my body was being lifted from the car.
“Lyrius!” KO called my name as he tossed me on his shoulder.
“KO.”
“I got you,” he said. His hands were everywhere, checking me, rubbing the knot on my head, and pulling me against him.
“Cherry is Victoria,” I blurted, still trying to process it all. KO’s entire face hardened. I thought he was about to turn around and go looking for her himself. Instead, he cupped the back of my head and pulled me closer.
“I got you, baby. I got you.”
“No!” Chassidy screamed, and I lifted my head briefly and spotted Jaylen with his gun pointed at Victoria’s head.
“Jaylen.” He looked over. “Don’t.”
“Lyrius . . .” His jaw tightened.
“Please.” For a second, nobody moved, and then Jaylen lowered his gun. “Let the police handle it,” I said as the sirens echoed in the distance. “Dakoda?” I asked, looking around.
“He’s safe,” KO assured me, and I buried my face in KO’s chest. His arms tightened around me, and for the first time all night, I finally felt safe.