Chapter 10
CHAPTER
TEN
MARNIE
“Baby, wake up.” Rylan shakes my shoulder gently.
Opening my eyes, I realize he’s fully dressed. The room is completely dark.
“Power is out. I’ll kick on the generator when I get back, but you should be warm enough until then. I have a fire going in the fireplace. Icarus is on his way to sit with you.”
I sit up and look around. “Where are you going?”
“I have a building that is damaged from the wind. You stay here. The shop is going to have to be closed for the day. There is no power is parts of Wasilla.”
“Are you sure?”
“They are calling for people to only be out as necessary, so don’t chance it. If you have to go, have Icarus stay with Oly here and you take Juneau. Have him call in an officer to go with you. Okay?”
“Yes, but I’ll be okay.”
“Babe, the message on your computer said Silas was on his way here. I don’t want you without protection until we neutralize him and your father.”
“Okay.” I lean up and kiss him before he heads out of the room.
I lie back down but give up on going back to sleep after a while. I get dressed and make my way out to the living room, where a toasty fire is glowing. Icarus is asleep on the sofa.
Sitting at the counter with a cup of tea, I pull up the app for my security feed at the shop. I see there is power, and a silent alarm is going off. I flick through the images and notice something pressed against the glass of the front door. Some kind of debris. Shoot. I’m going to have to go in.
I leave a quick note for Icarus instead of waking him up, then head out the door. Juneau is sitting on the porch like a sentry.
“There’s a problem at the shop. We need to go.”
“Got it. Let me let an officer know.”
“Make it quick. I don’t want the window damaged. I can’t afford to pay for another one.”
“I’ll just text them while we drive in.”
He pockets his phone, and we walk over to my Denali. I start it up as the wind whips my loose hair around my face. As soon as I get into the driver’s seat, I dig in my bag for a ponytail holder and slip it into my hair, putting it up in a messy bun.
We head out, and the closer we get to Wasilla, the worse the wind gets. In Big Lake and Meadow Lakes, it whips around, and I have to keep a firm grip on the steering wheel. As we reach the outskirts of the city, the gusts grow stronger, jerking my large SUV from lane to lane.
Trees shed damaged limbs around us, and I swerve to avoid debris from buildings and yards all the way to the center of town, where my shop sits.
I turn onto the road and head up the hill toward the strip mall.
The wind is even worse at the top. A branch flies at my windshield, and it takes everything in me not to scream and jerk the wheel.
When I finally pull into the mall, I see a lawn chair pressed against the glass of my front window.
I circle around back as a bright light flashes across the sky.
The transformer on the electrical pole across the street blows, and power instantly cuts out in the surrounding buildings and the strip mall.
I remember the small battery backup on the security system and open my app to turn off the alarm when an unsettling feeling tightens my stomach. I look around but don’t see anything out of place. Juneau’s eyes are on his phone.
“Did you message for an officer?” I don’t want to go against Rylan’s rules. I don’t feel very safe right now and know something is off.
“Just did. I forgot while we were driving.”
“Shit. I don’t want to go in there until we have more backup.”
I don’t want to leave my vehicle. That sixth sense I’ve developed over the years is screaming at me, but my shop is in danger right now. My dream.
Movement catches my eye from my peripheral, and I scream as I see Silas standing along the side of the SUV with a gun aimed at Juneau.
“Get down,” I yell, but it’s too late.
The explosion of glass and blood happens so fast, it feels like I’m watching it from outside my own body.
I see the bullet travel through the window right after it bursts from the barrel.
Then it blasts through the back of the seat and into Juneau’s skull.
Bone, blood, and brain matter fly around me.
Fear sets in, and I don’t even wait, knowing Juneau is dead.
I jump out of the SUV and race for the back door to my shop. I key in my code, and the lock clicks open as a bullet slams into the concrete beside me. Shards of rock fly at me, and I scream again as I slip into the back of the shop.
The alarm starts going off as I run for my office, not bothering to disengage it. I remember the gun I bought with Harley is in my drawer. Another shot fires. It slams into my arm as I duck down. I make it to the office and take shelter under the desk as I reach for the drawer.
“Come out, Mimi. Don’t make this worse. I don’t want to hurt you too badly.”
“No,” I scream.
“I’m going to punish you for defying me, Mimi.”
“I don’t care. I’m not Mimi. I’m Marnie now.”
Once I have the cool metal of the gun in my hand, I feel safer. I control my breathing and close my eyes, trying to figure out where Silas is. I didn’t see my father with him. This part is beneath him, though.
“Mimi, you’re mine now. I’ve convinced your father to give you to me. Come out so we can start our lives together. We can have another baby, if that’s what you want.”
I shake my head as tears roll from my eyes. I won’t let him win. I know backup is coming. Oly is safe. Rylan will kill to get me back.
Slowly and as quietly as I can, I crawl from my hiding spot and twist my body so I’m facing the doorway. Silas is out by the workbench. I stand up and fire the gun, hitting him in the chest. He didn’t expect me to be armed. But nothing happens. No blood. No grunt of pain. He doesn’t even flinch.
He’s wearing a bulletproof vest.
I take aim again. But before I can fire, he shoots, and I drop to the floor, my gun slipping from my hand. He missed, but now I must find my gun. I feel around for it in the dark, but it’s too late.
I hear the cocking of a gun before it’s pressed into the back of my head.
“You’ll pay for that, little Mimi. Let’s go.” He jerks me up, and I cry out from the pain in my arm where he shot me. “You deserve that.”
I reach out and grab a dough knife off the desk, then slip it into the pocket of my jacket. Silas kicks something across the floor. I know it was my gun. It slides under the table.
He leads me out of the bakery and shoves me into the back seat of a car.
I scream, trying to get people’s attention, but no one seems to do anything.
Before he speeds out of the parking lot, he pauses at the open door to my shop and rolls down his window.
He tosses something into it and then another one toward my car.
It rolls across the ground, and I realize they’re grenades.
“No,” I yell as I beat him on the head, trying to stop what I know is coming.
He swings around with the gun and slams it into the side of my head as two explosions rock the car. We roll away, and I fall to the seat unconscious. My last thought is of how much I love Rylan, and how bloody he’s going to make Silas for touching me.
Kodiak
My phone pings from my pocket as I secure the torn awning from the building. Wind gusts around us, pushing my body around. I get the awning tied down and pull out my phone. It’s an alert from Marnie’s bakery. I had Vortex loop me into her system.
“Shit. GB, call Vortex and ask him why the alarm is going off at the bakery. Tell him we’ll be there as soon as we get this building taken care of.”
GB and Fluke are helping me today.
I slip my phone back into my pocket, thinking GB will take care of everything, but instead my phone goes off again.
“Motherfucker, I don’t have time for this,” I growl as I pull out my phone again.
“Come on, dude. You need a secretary,” Fluke grumbles, and I look at him with my head tipped slightly and my lips pinched.
“What?” I demand into the phone without looking at who’s calling.
“Your old lady left here. I haven’t heard from her.”
I pause as my heart clenches. I swore I’d protect her.
“Juneau with her?”
“He’s not out front. So, I’m assuming. I’ve tried calling both of them, but it just keeps ringing.”
“He was under orders to call an officer to go with them if they left. Find out who. We’re heading to her store now. An alarm was going off. Secure and lock down the house. Nothing happens to Oly,” I order him before I turn and walk away from Fluke and straight to my truck.
I jump in and take off for the bakery.
My tires squeal to a stop as I turn into the parking lot and see the fire trucks and cop cars. My heart drops, and I head to the back of the building, where I find her SUV engulfed too.
“Fuck,” I yell.
I need to find out where my woman is. In my heart, I know she’s not in that building or vehicle. But I know she’s in danger.
I’m out of my truck, barely throwing it in park, and leave the door open. Sparky and Vortex walk up to me. Sparky holds out his hands, trying to calm me.
“She’s not in there. But Juneau is in the SUV.”
Shit. The kid was only twenty-four. He’d been a prospect for two years now.
“Where is she?” I demand, needing to hold her, but I don’t see an ambulance being used.
“Whoever’s behind this took her. Witnesses say a woman was dragged out of the building by an older man, who threw grenades into the shop and under the car,” Vortex says. He pauses and looks at the open laptop cradled in his arm. “That tracker you had me install is working, though.”
“Do it,” I order him.
“But, Prez, she’ll feel violated when she finds out you did that.”
I grip him by the front of his flannel jacket.
“Do I look like I give a fuck? She’ll want to come back alive. She’ll forgive me.”
Sparky is looking between both of us.
“Where is this tracker?” He looks uncomfortable and avoids making eye contact.
I shake my head. After this, I’m putting one in her arm or leg.
“In her property vest.”
“So, she’s wearing it.”