Chapter Eighteen
H olden was pissed at himself for not handling the situation better. Hell, he was pissed for getting into the situation in the first place.
Yeah, not keeping vigil would’ve been the smart thing.
Would it, though?
Perez was a dangerous felon, involved in drugs and prostitution, and who the hell knew what else. Holden hadn’t wanted to know when Carter had first started to read the man’s police record. It’d pissed him off that the guy was out running free.
He finished shoving his boots on and was about to open the door when a knock sounded.
His pulse jumped.
“Emily?” He swung his door open then exhaled.
Sinjin stood on his porch, slowly raising a brow. “What’s wrong?”
“She found out about the cameras when both of our phones alerted to a raccoon or something triggering the lights on her property.”
His buddy winced. “Take it she wasn’t happy.”
Holden shook his head and stepped outside. “She went home to check out her place before I…without me.”
He was about to say before he got dressed, but it wasn’t important. Catching up with Emily was.
“You coming?” he asked, nodding toward his car as he rushed for the driver’s door.
Sinjin answered by getting in the passenger seat. Holden handed the guy his phone with the camera feed on the screen.
“Let me know when you see her,” he said, backing out of his driveway. “Should be soon. She left a few minutes ago.”
His buddy nodded. “I know. I heard the slamming door.”
Holden cringed, recalling her parting words and the amount of force she used to shut his door.
“Carter is calling you,” Sinjin informed.
He blinked and nodded toward his phone. “Put him on speaker,” he said as he drove faster than he should through town.
“Go for Holden and Sinjin,” his buddy said, answering his phone.
“Hey. So, I assume you got the raccoon triggering the lights alert?” Carter said.
His stomach twisted at the memory. “Yeah, in front of Emily.”
“Shit,” the guy muttered. “Sorry, man. I’ve been there. I know that didn’t go well.”
His chest tightened. “No, it didn’t.”
God, the memory of the hurt and disappointment clouding her eyes as she stared at him with his phone gripped tightly in her hands shredded his insides. He’d give anything to take away that look he’d put in her eyes. Anything but his ability to keep her safe.
“Well, you are trying to help,” Carter pointed out.
Holden blew out a breath. “Tried to explain it, but she didn’t see it that way.”
“Yeah, didn’t work on Mel either.”
Great. He muttered a curse.
“Where are you?” Carter asked.
“In my car racing to Emily’s with Sinjin. Not convinced of the raccoon thing.” He glanced at Sinjin. “Did Emily get home yet?”
Sinjin shook his head and tilted the phone so he could see the empty screens.
“No,” Carter answered. “I’m looking at the feed, too.”
Holden’s heart lurched forward. “Not good. She should’ve been home by now.”
“Maybe she stopped at Lyndsey’s,” his buddy said through the phone. “It’s on her way home.”
“True,” he replied, slowing down as he happened to be approaching Lyndsey and Gabe’s house. The invisible vise around Holden’s chest tightened. “We just passed it, and her car isn’t in their driveway.”
A sigh rustled through the phone. “Roger that. I’ll comb the street cameras. I…uh…still have access.”
Holden exhaled and nodded. “Thanks.”
He was just about to hang up when his headlights caught the sight of a car parked on the side of the dark road.
Emily’s car.
Holden’s entire body shot to alert, adrenaline and fear rushing equally fierce through his veins. He shook from the force.
“Shit…” He heard Sinjin mutter.
He would’ve too, if the ability to speak or breathe hadn’t disappeared under his wildly racing heart.
“What is it? What’s wrong?” Carter asked and Sinjin filled him in as Holden slammed to a halt behind Emily’s car.
He shot out of the car and rushed to her door, images flashing through his head of finding her body, limp and bleeding. But the car was empty. Headlights were on. Keys were in the ignition, but Emily and her purse were missing.
What the hell?
Sinjin approached with a flashlight he’d no doubt procured from Holden’s glove compartment and together, they scoured the area but found nothing. No skid marks. No footprints in the dirt on the sides of the road. No blood.
Thank God.
“I’ll call the sheriff,” Sinjin said, pulling his phone from his pocket. “You fill Carter in, he’s still waiting on your phone back in the car.”
Holden nodded and walked woodenly back to his car as if in a dream…no, a damn nightmare. After he snagged his phone from inside his car, he told Carter about Emily’s seemingly abandoned vehicle, then they checked the camera feeds, finding Emily’s driveway empty, and no sign of anyone inside the new building.
Now he wished to God he’d had cameras on the inside of her house, too. The urge to rush to her place was so strong he shook. But the feed was clear, and it would be a waste of time. And time wasn’t their friend right now.
“I’ll check the traffic cams leading out of town, starting at about an hour before you said Emily left your house,” Carter told him. “Hang in there, we’ll find her.”
“Find Perez,” Holden uttered through clenched teeth. “I want to know where the bastard is right at this very fucking moment.”
“Roger that,” Carter said. “Mac, Dex, and Hunter are on their way in.”
“Mac?” He frowned. “Why? Tell him to go home.”
Carter snorted. “You tell him. I just put the alert out on our normal channel, and he insisted on coming in. And Hunter volunteered to take a trip to Houston and knock on the guy’s door, if needed.”
Christ.
Holden was so damn tempted to take his buddy up on that offer. But Hunter had a family now. A little boy who looked up to him. Depended on him.
“No,” he told Carter, leaning his back against his car as he spoke.
He appreciated Hunter’s offer but didn’t want the guy to use his “wet work” skills on American soil. Same with Sinjin. Both men had put that shit behind them, and he wasn’t about to ask them to slip back into the shadows.
“Maybe just send Dex to get eyes on him,” he said into the phone. “Although, going to Houston would be a waste of time since he’s obviously in Harland County.”
And he had Emily.
God…if that bastard son-of-a-bitch had laid a finger on her…
“Easy,” Sinjin said, appearing at his side. “Find your balance. You need a clear head.”
His balance was currently missing. All that was left was her car.
Holden shoved his free hand through his hair and squeezed the back of his neck before he released the breath in a long exhale. “Roger that.”
“Ditto, kiddo,” Carter echoed through the phone, and if Holden hadn’t been so out of his mind with worry, he probably would’ve laughed.
Flashing lights from an approaching vehicle shone in the distance. Holden was grateful the guy hadn’t hit the siren. The brilliant colors were enough to alert the perp if he was close by.
“Gabe is almost here. We’ll meet you at headquarters after we give him a SITREP,” Holden stated before he hung up and pocketed his phone.
The sheriff pulled up and got out. “What’s the situation?”
It took less than ten minutes to brief Gabe on the events and timetable of Emily’s departure from his place to when he’d discovered her abandoned car less than ten minutes later.
“You need to get an APB out on Perez,” Holden said, barely hanging onto his control.
Gabe looked at him and shook his head. “It’s not Perez.”
“What?” He blinked. “How do you know that?”
Sinjin stepped closer. “Where is he?”
“Currently in lock-up.” Gabe scratched his temple. “Seems he has been since the day after he was down here threatening Emily.”
Holden’s pulse faltered. Shit. “Then who’s been harassing Emily? Her car didn’t spray paint itself.”
It wasn’t Emily’s ex. He knew this because Gabe had done a search on the guy and found out Mr. Controlfreak had moved to Memphis with his new squeeze over six months ago.
“Don’t know.” Gabe shook his head. “But we will find out. In the meantime, go home. Maybe she’ll reach out to you there.”
“Hell, no.” He shook his head. “I’m going to her place. I’ll wait there for her.”
“Negative,” Gabe said. “My deputies and I are about to head there now. I need you to stay out of the way and let me do my job. You know I’ve got your back and Emily’s. I’ll alert you the instant I find anything out. You’ve got my word.”
The only reason Holden got in his car with Sinjin and rode back to ESI was because Gabe’s word was better than a promise, and the guy had always had Holden’s back. Plus, he knew how important Emily was to Lyndsey. And how important Lyndsey was to Gabe.
A half hour later, Holden was chomping at the bit, busying himself in the locker room at ESI, gearing up with Sinjin, Hunter, Mac, and Dex. All of them were equally quiet, equally focused as they waited for Carter to track down the name of a location to infiltrate so he could rescue Emily. And he would. Holden didn’t care what he had to do, he’d do it.
He was grateful to have his buddies by his side, but he was the only one operating with everything to lose. If he hadn’t lost her already. Emily had been so angry and hurt when she’d left his place.
Of all the damn nights to forget to silence his phone.
“Hey, guys, come take a look at this.” Carter appeared in the doorway and motioned for them to follow him out. “Gabe and his deputies just left like two minutes ago. And now we just lost the feed to five of the seven outdoor cameras.”
What?
“Yeah, check it out.” Carter motioned toward the wall of monitors in his computer den. “Hey…look, we have movement. Someone just pulled up in Emily’s driveway and whoever it was must’ve used her phone to disable the system but obviously isn’t aware of our extra surveillance. Good thing we put them in there.”
“Who is it?” Mac asked, leaning closer to the monitor that showed the view of the driveway. “Anyone recognize the car?”
“Carter, can you get a shot of the license and run the plate?” Holden asked, hoping for quick results, because he wanted to leave and get to Emily now, but knew it was foolish to run into a dangerous situation without all the facts.
A lone figure in a gray hoodie exited the car, then opened the back door and struggled with…Emily’s body.
Holden’s heart felt as if someone had just ripped it from his chest. His blood ran cold. Frozen on the spot, and didn’t thaw out, even when he watched through the available feeds as she was dropped inside one of the dog kennels, seemingly asleep.
God, he hoped she was sedated and not…
“Don’t.” Sinjin shook his head, and Holden wondered briefly how the hell the guy always knew how he was feeling. “She’s good. She’s going to be fine. We’re going to go get her.”
“What are we up against?” he asked, returning his attention back to the screen to assess the situation because he needed to go now.
Carter shrugged. “Just one perp.”
“And a slight one, at that,” Dex remarked, scrubbing his jaw as the camera caught the profile of the person now holding a dog in front of Emily’s kennel.
Shit…he recognized the dog. Princeton…
He wasn’t moving either.
“I’ll be damned, it’s a woman,” Mac muttered.
Holden’s gaze shot back to the feed where the perp’s profile became clear. His buddy was right. It was a woman.
“Hey.” Dex frowned and moved closer. “Doesn’t that look like…”
“Colby?” Disbelief coursed through Holden as he blinked at the familiar blonde’s face on the screen.
“Holy shit,” Carter mumbled. “The waitress who moved here from Houston? The one who is sweet on you, Holden?”
“Don’t think the move here was a coincidence,” Dex said, and the others agreed.
Mac set a hand on Carter’s shoulder. “Do a deep dive on this woman.”
Son-of-a-fuckin’-bitch.
Holden’s chest felt as if it had caved in. “So, this is all my fault again?”
First the guys, then his dog, and now Emily. Bad luck followed him and those he cared about most seemed to pay the price.
Mac straightened from looking over Carter’s shoulder and turned to Holden. “That’s bullshit. This is not your fault.”
Carter frowned. “And what do you mean by again ?”
“That mess of a mission that caused you all to leave Delta,” he said, remembering it like it was yesterday.
“How the hell do you figure that was your fault?” Mac asked, his frown deeper than Carter’s. “It was mine and mine alone.”
Holden shook his head. “No. I knew in my gut that your ex was off. That we were wrong to trust her on that mission, but I didn’t speak up. Just to Dante, but we were both too worried we’d be overstepping boundaries.”
“Hey.” Mac set his hands on Holden’s shoulder and squeezed. “I was the commander. She was my fiancée. It was my fuck-up, not yours. I had my own trepidations that I ignored, so I can guarantee you, even if you and Dante had said something, I still would’ve gone forward with the mission. I put my trust in the wrong person. I wanted to believe there was good in someone who was bad.”
Holden released a breath and a quarter of the weight from his shoulders with it.
“But it all worked out,” Dex said. “Look where you are now.”
Mac nodded. “I put my trust in the right person this time. Someone way too good for me. But I’m holding on to her with both hands.”
“Yeah, well, I found the right person and blew her trust in me,” he scoffed. “And now she’s in danger because of me. So is one of her dogs. I need to go to them. Now .”
Done waiting, Holden strode to his car. They were wasting time. Precious time.
“Carter, get going on that deep dive. Relay info as you get it,” Mac said, hurrying to an SUV, with Dex and Hunter on his heels.
Sinjin jumped in beside Holden. “Colby’s actions are her own,” his buddy said quietly. “You don’t control them, she does.”
Deep down, he knew his friend was right. Didn’t make him feel any less guilty, though.
Holden drove through town as he had nearly an hour earlier, but this time he had a location. He had a perp. He had a mission.
After the last mission, he’d left his dog behind.
No way in hell would he abandon Emily.