31. Dax
DAX
M y mission only took a few hours, and I hurried back to be with Travis. I didn’t see him when I entered the house, and he didn’t respond when I called. My stomach knotted as fear chilled me. I’d checked in with the guard out front. He hadn’t seen or heard anything unusual.
“Travis!”
No response. I hurried through the house and saw the back door standing open. Maybe he was in the yard.
When I stepped outside, all hope that Travis was okay fled. There were tracks in the yard as though someone had been dragged through the grass, and the back gate was unlocked. I hurried into the alley behind the house.
Tire tracks marred the grass by the gate. Where the fuck was the guard?
Seconds later, I found him slumped over his steering wheel. I ran to his car and immediately knew he was beyond help. No one survived a hole in the head like that.
I bent over, bracing my hands on my knees and fighting the urge to vomit. The gore didn’t bother me, but the thought of Travis being hurt was more than I could take. What had they done to him? Was he still alive? I had to find him. I had to save him.
My instincts screamed at me to run, to do something, but I knew I needed help.
I couldn’t do this alone, and I couldn’t charge in without thinking.
If LePlatt had Travis, we needed a plan to free him, and if…
No, I couldn’t go down that path, but I knew if Travis was beyond saving, I’d rip every one of them apart.
I wouldn’t care what the consequences were.
I called Remy first. I needed to get everyone focused on finding Travis, and that was the quickest way to do it.
I also didn’t want to talk to Beau. He was going to blame me for leaving his brother home alone.
Why hadn’t I had someone in the house with him?
LePlatt’s men had gotten to him so fucking easily.
I pushed those thoughts away. I had to focus on finding him.
Remington immediately gathered everyone to coordinate a search. He put Blackjack on it and offered to call Beau.
“We’ll find him. There’s no other option.” Remington’s words echoed in my mind. He sounded so certain, but he also had to know how scared I was. When Henri had been kidnapped, Remington had been closer to falling apart than I’d ever seen him. He also knew what I was capable of if I lost control.
An hour later, I was pacing the length of Remington’s house, feeling like I was going to come out of my skin.
A knock on the door made me jump. I was way too fucking on edge, but Travis was missing, maybe hurt, maybe being…
No. The thought of someone doing the things to him that I did to evil men had me swallowing back bile.
Travis was everything to me.
I heard the door open, then Ambrose’s voice. “Is Dax here?”
I spoke before Remy could answer him. “What did you learn?”
“Not much yet, but LePlatt’s second-in-command is at the warehouse waiting for you to learn everything you can from him.”
“What?”
“I saved him for you.”
“You took him yourself?” Since Ambrose had come back from the desert, he’d mostly stuck to scouting and intel. I’d assumed he didn’t want to be part of takedowns anymore.
“I did, and I’m going with you now. You’ll need someone there to keep you sane.”
Torture had been one of the few things Ambrose and I had never done together. By the time it was clear that was my role, Ambrose was gone. And after he’d come back, he rarely left the bayou.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. You need me.”
As he said it, I realized how much I did. He pulled me in for a hug. “We’ll get him back, and I’ll be by your side the whole time.”
Ambrose didn’t do sentimental. He never had, even as a kid, but this felt damn close.
“Get going, and report back with what you learn,” Remington said as soon as Ambrose let me go.
Ambrose and I didn’t speak as we headed to the warehouse, but we didn’t need to. Something had shifted in the last few days, and our bond felt solid again.
The man Ambrose had captured was chained to a chair. It was clear my brother hadn’t been gentle with him. His face was banged up, and blood trickled from a wound on his neck.
“I wanted to kill him, but you deserve that honor,” Ambrose said. “And you’re the best at making them talk.”
I’d been questioning my role, wondering if I could truly deserve Travis when I was willing to peel back a man’s skin or pull out each of his teeth one by one while I listened to him scream, but doing my job was going to save Travis.
I might be a dark, twisted son of a bitch, but there was a purpose to what I did.
Travis needed me, and this was how I was going to find him.
“Where is Travis?” I demanded.
“I don’t know anyone by that name.” The man had the fucking nerve to smile at me. That would be the last smile that was ever on his face.
I unzipped my duffle bag and pulled out a long, slim knife. “Let me help you jog your memory.”
It took less time than I’d anticipated to get the information out of him. Just when I started to feel the dark fog taking over, Ambrose knelt in front of the man.
“Jesus. He’s got no fucking stamina.” My twin looked at me and shook his head. “The little bitch wouldn’t even make it through boot camp.”
“So true. At least he’ll never have to find out.” I plunged my knife into the man’s heart, and seconds later, he was dead. I’d gotten what I needed, and I hadn’t lost myself. Travis and Ambrose had become my anchors.
My brother clapped a hand on my shoulder. “Let’s go get your man.”
Travis was being held in the shack where the handoff was set to take place that night.
The bastard I’d tortured had told us LePlatt expected an attack, and he’d intended to use Travis to lure us in before he killed him.
He’d been alive and unharmed when that fucker had left him there with the men who were going to receive the shipment guarding him.
We’d originally intended to let the sheriff have the local contacts so he could process them and they’d go through a mockery of a trial. They were small-time, but now that we knew they had a part in holding Travis, everyone was going to die. Winston would have to fucking deal with it.
We hadn’t been able to nail down a time the handoff would take place.
Our prisoner had told us LePlatt always left that vague and made his pickup men wait.
That meant Ambrose, Winston, and I would spend the rest of the day watching from one side of the shack, and Remington and Lance would take up another position.
As the afternoon dragged on with no sign of LePlatt or any of his men, Ambrose and Winston had to continually talk me down from rushing the shed. Travis was in there. Did I really believe he was unharmed?
“If we wait, we’ll get them all,” Ambrose reminded me for the thousandth time.
Remington radioed us to let us know Blackjack had broken in on some chatter, and LePlatt wouldn’t be heading this way for several more hours. I was going to lose my mind. I was also fucking starving. “Can we at least get some food? All I’ve had all day is a fucking protein bar.”
“You think there’s Door Dash out here or something?” Ambrose asked.
“No, I think one of us can go get something in town since we’ve got to sit on our asses for hours.”
“That’s a lot of hassle. I could just shoot something out here.”
The sheriff looked at him like he’d grown another head, then he turned to me. “Is he serious?”
“Maybe.”
“Of course I’m serious. I could shoot a few nutrias, start a fire, and have them roasted for dinner before you could drive into town, order some mediocre burgers, and bring them back here.”
“You’re complaining about burgers, but you’re fine eating unseasoned, unevenly cooked swamp rat?”
“I make a damn fine roast nutria, and I’m sure there some herbs growing around here.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“Miss Leigh Ann’s burgers are the best I’ve ever had,” Winston said. “And I could be back here with them in less than an hour.”
Ambrose pinched the bridge of his nose and looked up at the sky. “This. This is why I like to stay in the bayou where no one bothers me.”
Winston snorted. “Except when you’re holding law enforcement officers at gunpoint and blackmailing them.”
“Well, that’s fun.”
I hadn’t seen Ambrose smile like that in a long time. He seemed to actually be having fun, not just getting a job done.
“Too bad it won’t be happening again, at least not in my parish. I won’t be fooled by a pretty boy and his accomplices again.”
I grabbed the front of his shirt and twisted it. “Don’t talk about Travis like that.”
“Hey!” Ambrose yanked me away from him. “Calm down. The sheriff doesn’t want your boy.”
“Travis is?—”
“Enough.” Ambrose used his command voice, the one that no doubt had had the soldiers under him pissing their pants.
Even I wasn’t immune to his power, though I couldn’t hold back a smile. He was so much more like his old self today. I’d been trying for years to bring him back to life, but I’d barely made any progress, and now, Winston starts working with us, and suddenly… Holy shit. Did he… Was he…
I’d seen Winston looking at my brother like he’d enjoy a good hard hate fuck, but Ambrose was straight.
Wasn’t he? Except if he was, why was he giving Winston a sly grin that looked like he wasn’t sure if he wanted to fight or fuck.
My brother and a small-town sheriff? That was ridiculous.
Even if there was a chance for them, after we went against our agreement with Winston and slaughtered LePlatt and all his associates, Eric Winston was going to hate us.
Ambrose reluctantly got us burgers, and I somehow survived until go time.
When LePlatt’s car pulled up, Remington and Lance stepped out of hiding, and we followed suit.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” he said.
He gave us a wide smile. “I thought I would see you here. I believe I have something of yours.”
I wanted to rush him and wrap my hands around his throat. Reading me easily, Ambrose laid a hand on my shoulder. “Wait for the signal, then he’s all yours.”
We’d discussed our plan several times, and we felt even more strongly about it once we learned that LePlatt was expecting us. Surprise was our best option.