CHAPTER NINETEEN
DAIRE
The moment Clover hit the alarm on her bracelet, all three of our phones went off with the alert. She hadn’t been gone from our place long. I was in bed half asleep. Admittedly, I was tempted to ignore it. It was four in the morning, and I was tired as hell.
Blaze slammed my bedroom door open, destroying any chance of sleep. “Get up, dick. We have to go. Clover needs us.”
When we arrived at her dorm room using an illegally obtained keycard for the main door, we found it empty. Her bracelet had been removed and tossed on the floor.
“Fuck me.” Blaze kicked the bracelet, shoving a hand through his hair. “I knew I should’ve walked her up. I had a strange feeling, and I didn’t listen. It had to be Zane.”
“Of course it was Zane,” I said, snatching the bracelet up from the floor. “He must have seen her use this to call us. I knew we should have just stuck a tracking chip on her somewhere.”
Cash surveyed the scene. He nodded to the purse hanging from the desk chair. “She didn’t take her purse or phone. He definitely grabbed her. He took her to another location which means we probably don’t have much time.”
“You think he’s going to kill her?” I was doubtful. Zane didn’t want Clover dead. He wanted her for himself.
Cash gave a slow shake of his head. “No. He’s going to do something worse than that. I would if I were him.”
“We have to find her. Let’s go to his place.” Blaze was out the door and down the hall in a flash.
Cash and I followed, trying to keep up with Blaze as he sprinted down the stairs to the main floor. I slid Cash a sidelong glance. “I knew he was getting in too deep with this chick. Have you ever seen him run like this for any woman?”
“Nope. I don’t blame him though. There’s something about Clover. She’s special. Different.” Cash cocked his head to one side, thinking about it. “She has this innocent quality that tells you deep down she’s a good person. Way too good for any of us.”
“Jesus Christ. Don’t tell me that you’re smitten with her too.” I rolled my eyes. “We barely know her. Sure, her pussy is divine. She has the sexiest little moan I’ve ever heard but keep your head on straight. She’s a toy. A possession. Don’t get too attached.”
Cash eyed me as we followed Blaze out of the building and back to the car parked at the curb. “She’s still a person, Daire, and she’s obviously in trouble. Why are you here if she means as much to you as a can opener?”
I scoffed, brushing off his pointed remark. “I don’t like people touching my things.”
With Blaze driving like a maniac, we made it to Zane’s house in half the time it should have taken. The place was dark, the driveway empty.
“What if his parents are here?” Cash asked.
Blaze was already out of the car. “Then they’ll find out what a fucked up piece of trash their son is.”
He pounded on the door and laid on the doorbell. Anyone inside would definitely hear him. When several minutes passed and nobody answered, Blaze kicked the door open. I was happy to let him take the lead when he stormed through the place in search of Clover. It quickly became apparent that the house was empty.
“Fuck.” Blaze slammed a fist into the wall, leaving a gaping hole behind. “Where the hell would he have taken her?”
“Come on, let’s get out of here before a neighbor calls the cops.” With a hand on his shoulder, I steered him out of the house.
Once we were back in the car, we drove around to a few shady motels asking if someone matching Zane’s description had checked in. Nothing.
“We don’t have many options,” I said when we sat in a motel parking lot watching the sun rise. “We can talk to Raina and see if she has any idea where Zane would go, or we can hit up the Sinners. Strike a deal and see if they can dig up any other addresses associated with him.”
“Going to Raina is a bad idea,” Cash pointed out. “She probably has no idea that Clover is missing. Getting her involved might cause more problems.”
Personally, seeing Raina and the Gods was the last thing I wanted. There was bad blood between us. If she found out that Clover had gone missing on our watch, she’d blame us, and things would get nasty. I wasn’t in the mood to scrap with the Gods right now.
Blaze shook his head. “No, not Raina. We’ll try the Sinners.”
The Sinners were a solid bet. They were hackers who knew how to do pretty much anything with a computer and internet access. If there was any information out there that might give us a place to look, they would find it. It wouldn’t come for free though.
“How much is this girl worth to you, Blaze?” I asked as we drove to the Sinners’ house. They did their work out of some basement in the place they shared. “You know the Sinners’ help doesn’t come cheap.”
Blaze didn’t answer for a minute. He fumbled to get a cigarette out and light it, filling his precious car with smoke. “We still have that thirty grand in the account, right?”
I sighed, letting my head fall against my seat. “Yeah, you know we do.”
“Then we have something to bargain with.”
I turned in my seat to exchange a look with Cash who merely shrugged. We weren’t swimming in cash, although we had stockpiled a decent amount. We got paid in plenty of ways. Some people paid us to go after someone who’d wronged them and escaped justice. We also jumped assholes like the Gods and others involved in crime carrying large quantities of money. Sometimes we simply took what we could from those we went after. It all added up.
“Pretty early for an unannounced visit,” Cash observed when we sat in the car outside the Sinners’ house.
“It’s an emergency. I’m sure they’ll understand.” Again Blaze was the first out of the car and up the front walk. He moved with a fearless gait, determined as hell.
A camera out front stared at us as we approached. I assumed there was a lot more security here than that one camera. A voice came through an intercom, demanding to know what we wanted.
“Sorry to come by so early,” Blaze said. “We need help finding a missing girl. It’s an emergency.”
There was a long pause that made me think they would turn us away. A minute later, the front door opened. A blond guy with shaggy hair and a scar under his eye stared out at us. I’d met him once at a party. His name was Felix.
“Come inside, boys. You’re lucky that I’m still up. I haven’t gone to bed yet.” He stepped back to allow us inside. Quickly closing the door behind us, he secured half a dozen locks and hit some buttons on a security system. I’d call it paranoid but I figured they had their reasons to be concerned with safety.
Felix led us into the living room and down to the basement. That’s where an entire wall of computers had been set up. He plopped down into one of the many chairs and eyed us curiously.
“Tell me more about this missing girl. What exactly do you need me to do?”
I let Blaze explain the situation while I gawked at the massive setup before me. Impressive. No wonder these guys had a reputation for getting shit done. They had a lot of equipment.
Felix began clicking around, typing Zane’s name into a search bar. “Zane Larson? No problem. Should be easy enough. Let’s talk payment.”
“What were you thinking?” I asked, cutting in before Blaze could promise this guy anything he wanted.
“You guys handle things that the law can’t handle, right?” Felix glanced over his shoulder at us.
Word got around. No point hiding it from guys who did their own vigilante shit online.
I shrugged. “Yeah, you could say that.”
“Five thousand dollars and a favor we can call in at any time in the future. How does that sound?” Felix raised a brow, his gaze traveling between the three of us.
“Deal.” Blaze stuck out a hand to shake on it. Somehow I resisted the urge to smack him in the back of the head. The cash was no problem. A favor could mean almost anything. That was risky.
Felix shook his hand before reaching for mine. Gritting my teeth, I accepted. If this blew up in our faces, I’d beat the shit out of Blaze.
While Felix clicked around on the keyboard, I did my best to keep my impatience in check. I’d been awake for almost twenty-four hours. Between the need for sleep and the hunger gnawing a hole in my stomach, I was growing more irate by the second.
“All right, well it looks like his parents own a cabin out at Wild Horse Lake. I can get you the exact coordinates. Give me a second.” Felix tapped the keys a few more times and a map showing the precise location of the cabin popped up. A moment later a printer started making noise as it produced the image.
“This has to be where he took her,” Blaze said when he had the map in hand.
“Give me your number.” Felix waved a hand for one of us to hand over the info. “I’ll send you a link for the money transfer.”
It wasn’t as if we could get out of paying. The Sinners could no doubt easily empty our accounts with ease. I gave him my number, grumbling beneath my breath. As soon as the link came through, I made the payment. Clover had better be worth all this trouble. I wasn’t as convinced as Blaze. Since I’d given her the damn bracelet, I intended to see this through.
When we left the house and headed for the Camaro, Blaze was a bundle of energy. “We’re going to the cabin now. I need to know if she’s there.”
“Are you insane?” I snapped. “Let’s go home and get some sleep first. I feel like a zombie.”
Cash backed me up, stifling a yawn with his hand. “I’m with Daire on this one, dude. It’s been a long night. Let’s grab a few hours first. If we’re going to kill Zane, I’d like to be rested.”
“Then I’ll go without you guys. I’ll drop you at home.” Blaze’s tone was sharp and clipped. “The cabin is three hours away. It’s already nine. I’m going to push through and get Clover back. We can sleep after.”
Unable to hold back anymore, I let my hand fly, slapping him in the back of the head. He whirled around with a fist raised, ready to fight. “What the fuck was that?”
Raising both hands to ward off a punch, I chuckled. “That was for making a deal with Felix without getting our opinion. And for dragging us out to the lake at this godawful time. Let’s go get our girl.”