Chapter 29 Keon
KEON
Tyler disappearing while he was with me has been eating away at the tight lid I keep on my anger. This motherfucker has almost pushed me far enough to rush into that prison alone.
As soon as we’re all in the SUV, Tivon pulls out of the driveway at breakneck speed.
From what Nolan said, Tyler is about twenty minutes away but by the way Tivon is driving, we’ll get there much sooner.
We’re already pulling on our vests and making sure our AKs are ready.
Tivon is driving one handed while Ari helps him strap his vest on.
“Nolan, are you there?” Ari asks once his phone is connected to the SUV.
“Yep. Tracker is still blinking in the same spot. The warehouse they have him in looks empty. Axel is on his way too.”
“We’ll get there before him,” I say. “We aren’t waiting.”
“He didn’t think you would. He just wanted to be there for backup,” Nolan replies. “The tracker keeps losing signal and coming back online. Holden said that it’s still where it’s supposed to be, though.”
“What else is in that area?” Tivon asks.
“Not much. Some more old warehouses and woods. I’m sending some pictures to Ari.”
Ari loads the pictures and starts flipping through them. He stops on one surrounded by a tall chainlink fence and zooms in. “That definitely looks like an Abraham special.”
“I’m going to crush this Cryptic asshole’s skull when I get my hands on him,” I growl, getting more pissed by the second. “If it wasn’t for him, they wouldn’t have grabbed Tyler.”
“He did what he had to do for his brother,” Gavin says quietly, making me snap my head to look at him.
“You’re defending this motherfucker?”
Gavin shrugs. “I know what it feels like to do whatever you can for your siblings.”
“He got your boyfriend kidnapped!”
“Keon,” Ari barks. “Cool it.”
“No. It’s fine,” Gavin turns to face me.
“Yeah, my boyfriend got kidnapped. He got kidnapped doing his fucking job. If you’d take a step back, you would see that.
No one is to blame here but Aharon and Abraham, plus the rest of these punk fuckers breathing down our necks.
We don’t know why Cryptic is doing what he’s doing, but we do know he loves his little brother.
Any of us would have done the same thing to save each other and damn the consequences.
What I do know is Tyler is fine. I would feel that shit like a missing limb if something had already happened to him.
Get your head back on straight, and stop blaming yourself. ”
“I’m not.”
“Don’t lie to me. I’ve had that look more than once in my life. It’s not your fault, Keon.”
I open my mouth to argue, but snap it closed when I realize I don’t want to lie to them. “I should have protected him.”
“We’re all lucky we got out of there,” Tivon responds. “We were surrounded and did what we could. You can’t take this all on yourself. We will get him back.”
“Guys, Tyler’s tracker is moving, and it’s moving fast,” Nolan cuts in. Nolan clicks some keys on his keyboard, and Tyler’s beacon starts flashing on Ari’s app.
Gavin sits forward. “He’s running.”
“Nolan, I need to see exactly where he’s going,” Ari responds.
The screen shrinks several times until we are basically watching Tyler running for his life in real time. We watch him go into the wooded area and stop before he’s running again.
And then it just disappears.
“What the fuck just happened?” I ask, feeling my heartrate skyrocket. Gavin sucks in a breath, and I reach over to grab his hand. He squeezes my fingers, and I can feel him shaking.
“I don’t know,” Nolan answers, clicking like crazy. “It’s just…gone.”
Tivon steps harder on the gas as we listen to Nolan trying like hell to bring the tracker back. Tivon swerves onto an old access road and screeches to halt. “Warehouse is over there,” he says, pointing to our right. “We go on foot. Shoot without question.”
We pile out of the car, pulling our masks on.
We start running toward the cover of trees, and Tivon holds his hand up for us to stop.
He motions to me and Gavin to move to the other side.
Once we’re in place, we start moving again on opposite sides to surround whatever area we can.
Something rubs my elbow, and I spin, just to see our masks staring back at us.
Axel nods his head and we start moving again.
“Cole,” Axel whispers. “Are you in place?”
“Ready,” Cole answers. “On your word.”
“Cole is set up on top of the warehouse across from them in a sniper perch,” Axel explains.
“How the fuck did you get here so fast?” I ask.
“We let Sean drive,” Cole responds. That explains it. Sean drives like a crazy person.
Tivon holds up his hand again and we come to a stop.
Several guards are milling around the grounds, and some are disappearing into the woods.
My guess is to look for Tyler. That's at least good news. If they’re looking for him, that means he’s still alive, and he got away.
But what the fuck happened to his tracker?
“Cole, you’re up,” Tivon says, and we all get into position.
It doesn’t take long before bodies start dropping. We scale the fence as fast as we can, and when we drop to the other side we’re moving, taking out anyone who gets in our fucking way. We gain access to the warehouse, and it’s eerily silent.
“You think they were all outside?” Gavin asks.
“They were,” a voice answers from the ether, causing all of us to try to find the source. “I’m not there, and neither is your friend. He ran, but I don’t know what happened after that. I don’t have eyes outside yet.”
“Who the fuck are you?” Ari asks.
“Cryptic.”
“You motherfucker,” I growl.
“Listen, I explained all this to your friend. I don’t have time to explain it again. There’s more people on the way, and you have minutes before you’re surrounded. Go back out the way you came, and go around the side of the building. That’s the way he went.”
“Sean took out the ones in the woods,” Cole supplies.
“Let’s go,” Tivon commands, and we all follow him from the warehouse. Did Cryptic help Tyler like he helped us? Or is he setting us up again? What the hell is going on? We go back over the fence again, but this time on the back side of the property. “Fan out and find him.”
“Tyler!” I call out and hear several more do the same. Stealth is already out, and as far as we know, everyone is dead. “TYLER!” I look in every place that he could possibly hide, and each place that comes up empty makes my heart sink deeper. What if someone had already grabbed him?
“It’s clear my way,” Sean says. “I’m moving back to the west side.”
“Same here,” Axel replies. “I don’t see shit.”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Tyler, where the hell are you?
“Meet back at the fence. We need to regroup,” Tivon instructs, and I want to argue, but I know he’s right.
There’s too much ground to cover here. I work my way back, and they’re already waiting.
Tivon pushes his mask to the top of his head.
“We’re running out of time before we have company.
Axel, can you and your team wait for them to arrive? Give them a nice warm welcome.”
Axel chuckles. “Sure thing. Let’s go guys.” They go back over the fence and Tivon turns to us.
“He’s out here. I feel it,” Gavin says.
“Me too,” Ari agrees.
“What do we do?” I ask.
“We fucking find him,” Tivon answers. “We know he’s not in the woods. We need to move further out.”
“The only thing left are the cliffs,” Gavin says and then his eyes widen. “The fucking cliffs!”
We all take off running, slapping branches out of our way. We come to an abrupt stop when we see how far down the cliffs actually are, but I can see Tyler’s train of thought plain as day. If he got away, there’s no way he would have let them take him again. So the only way out… was down.
We each get our flashlights out since it isn’t entirely light out yet and try to see if we can catch a glimpse of him. “Tyler!” I yell, but I’m met with silence.
“Here!” Ari calls out. “He’s over here!” I run to Ari’s voice, and he’s pointing over the edge.
About ten feet down, there’s a figure that’s entirely too still.
I go to try to slide over the edge, and Ari grabs my arm.
“We can’t risk it. Go to the car and get my gear.
” I hesitate, and he pushes me away from him. “Go.”
I’ve never run so fast in my fucking life. I don’t even care about the branches slapping me in the face. I jerk open the hatch when I get to the car, grab Ari’s climbing gear, and hustle back to them. I’m out of breath by the time I get there and shove it into Ari’s hands, but Tivon grabs it.
“Not a chance,” Tivon answers, setting it on the ground and squatting to open it. “You just got cleared. I’m not letting you dangle from a fucking cliff.”
“I can handle it,” Ari answers, and I hear the steel in his voice.
“I’m sure you can,” Tivon replies, standing back up with the harness in his hand. He steps into it and pulls off his vest before he straps himself in. “But we aren’t testing it yet.”
Tivon doesn’t give him a chance to argue before he ties the other end of the rope around a tree and walks to the edge of the cliff as we get into position to lower him down. We’re coming, Tyler.
I just hope he’s alive when we get there.