Chapter Twenty-Four
Maverick
They should have been back an hour ago.
Stefano said they were on their way and would be home in twenty minutes.
That was seventy-three minutes ago.
I know because I’ve checked the time every thirty seconds since.
“Can you track them from your phone?” Foster asks over the phone. “I’m at your gate. Tell them to let me in.”
I nod at Luca, and he immediately makes the call.
“I’m not sure,” I admit. “I never asked Amelia to turn on her tracking for me.”
The words taste like failure.
There are a thousand ways I could have protected her. A thousand pieces of technology I could have placed in her phone, her car, her purse. Hell, I could have assigned three men to follow her shadow without her ever noticing.
I did none of those things.
Because I wanted her to feel safe with me, not owned by me.
Because I looked at the woman I love and decided that trust mattered.
And it does. But it wasn’t enough.
Now she’s gone.
Olivia is gone.
Stefano is gone.
And the only thing standing between me and losing my mind is the thin possibility that there is a harmless explanation.
A flat tire.
A dead phone. Two dead phones.
An animal emergency that took longer than expected.
A road closure.
Any explanation other than the one my heart already knows.
“Did Stefano share his location with you?” Foster asks.
“Yes.”
I open Stefano’s location.
For one terrible second, the map loads too slowly.
Then the small dot appears.
Not moving.
My lungs stop working.
“Maverick?” Foster asks.
I stare at the screen.
The dot sits on a rural stretch of road with no building in sight.
“He’s stopped,” I say.
“How long?”
I tap the location details.
My blood goes cold.
“Forty-nine minutes.”
Luca turns toward me.
His face goes hard.
“Send me the location,” Foster says.
I do.
Less than five seconds later, he curses.
“That road has no businesses. No houses close enough to matter either. There’s a farm farther down, but that’s it. I’m pulling traffic cameras, but there may not be any that far out.”
“Get inside my gates first.”
“I’m coming up the drive now.”
I end the call and turn toward Luca.
“Bring the cars around.”
“Yes, Don.”
I call Spike.
He answers on the first ring.
“Find them?”
“No,” I say. “But Stefano’s location is active. We’re heading to where it’s pinging. I need you and a few men to meet me. I don’t want to pull men from the estate with so many kids here.”
“On our way.”
“I don’t have a good feeling about this, brother.” The admission tastes like blood. “Victor threatened my family, and a few days later, Amelia, Olivia, and Stefano go silent on a back road? That’s not a coincidence.”
“Send me the location, and we’ll meet you there. I’ll have Bones and Tank with me. Foster?”
“He’s pulling in now. We’re gearing up and heading that way.”
“Good. Be there soon.
By the time I reach the front entrance, the cars are already there. Luca gets behind the wheel. Foster jumps off his bike and slides into the backseat of the vehicle.
The estate disappears behind us, and I stare at the map on my phone as if I can force the dot to move by sheer will.
It doesn’t.
Stefano’s location remains frozen on that same stretch of road.
No call from Amelia.
No call from Olivia.
No call from my brother.
Only silence.
And silence has never brought me anything good.
The road narrows ten minutes later.
Dry brush rises on both sides, but nothing else lives out here. No reason for anyone to stop in this area unless they were forced.
Then Luca’s body goes rigid.
“Don.”
I see it.
Skid marks.
Broken glass.
A deep gouge in the dirt where something heavy left the road.
“Stop.”
The SUV barely comes to a halt before I’m out.
The smell hits first.
Hot metal.
Oil.
Dust.
Blood.
Then I see Stefano’s SUV lying twisted in the ditch and my heart stops.
I run.
“Amelia!”
No answer.
“Stefano!”
Nothing.
Foster’s behind me, calling for medics, police, Spike, anyone who can move faster than death.
I reach the SUV and see the empty back seat.
Blood on the glass.
A small smear on the torn leather.
Livy’s sparkly hair clip lying near the floorboard.
“Maverick!”
Foster’s voice drags me around.
He’s kneeling on the road several feet away…beside Stefano.
My brother lies on his back, one hand pressed weakly against his chest.
Blood spreads beneath his fingers.
Too much blood.
“Stefano.”
I drop beside him.
His eyes are half-open, unfocused, his breaths wet and slow.
“Brother.” I catch his face between my hands. “Stay with me.”
He’s trying to tell me something, but nothing comes out.
“Don’t speak.” My voice breaks. “Save your strength.”
But he tries anyway.
Of course he does.
My sweet brother, bleeding out on a dirt road, still trying to tell me something.
His hand twitches against mine.
I lean closer.
“What? What is it?”
His lips form a shape.
A word.
A name?
But blood bubbles at the corner of his mouth, and the sound never comes.
“Stefano!”
His eyes roll back.
“No.” I press harder against the wound. “No, fratello. You don’t get to leave me. Do you hear me? Don’t leave me.”
“Pressure,” Foster says. “Keep pressure on it.”
“Hospital.”
“Ambulance is eight minutes out.”
“Too long.”
“I know.”
I look toward the empty SUV.
Amelia is gone.
Olivia is gone.
Stefano is bleeding beneath my hands.
And Victor Dane’s threat echoes through my skull.
Perhaps God was kind enough to give you a second wife and daughter so I could take them from you properly.
My vision goes red at the edges.
I hear the Shadows' bikes thunder in the distance.
Good.
Let them come.
Let every man who calls me brother see what Victor has done.
Let them remember this moment when I tell them we’re no longer waiting.
The ambulance arrives in a blur of lights and shouted commands. I refuse to move until Foster grips my shoulder and forces me back so the paramedics can work.
They load Stefano onto the stretcher, and I follow, but the paramedic tries to stop me.
Luca removes him from my path with a single look.
At the hospital, they take my brother straight to surgery.
When the doors close in my face, I stand there staring at them.
Blood covers my hands.
Stefano’s blood.
My brother’s blood.
A nurse says something to me, but I don’t hear her.
Spike arrives with Bones, Tank, and half the Shadows looking ready to tear the building apart.
Foster’s beside him, pale but focused.
“Any sign of them?” Spike asks.
“No.”
The word nearly kills me.
His jaw tightens.
“Then we move.”
“Yes.” I look down at my blood-covered hands. “We move now.”
“Mav,” Foster says carefully. “We’re still mapping out his locations. We can’t go in blind.”
I lift my eyes to his.
“He threatened my family.”
“I know.”
“My woman and daughter are gone.”
“I know.”
“My brother is in surgery with a bullet in his chest.”
Foster swallows.
I step closer.
“There’s no more timeline. No more waiting. No more careful approach. Victor Dane wanted my attention.”
My voice drops.
“He has it.”
Spike nods once. “Where is he?”
“We have three possible locations,” Foster says. “The warehouse in Ohio, a private residence under one of his shell companies, and a small office building outside Cincinnati.”
“No.”
Everyone turns to me.
Foster frowns. “No?”
“He isn’t in Ohio.”
“Maverick.”
“He said he’s been watching.”
The room goes quiet.
“He knew about Amelia,” I continue. “He knew about Olivia. He knew the estate. The children. The Shadows. He knew enough to threaten the people I keep closest to me.”
“This was personal,” Spike adds. “He wasn’t having you watched. He was watching you himself.”
Foster’s face changes as his mind catches up. “If he was watching you that closely, he had to be local.”
“Palm Springs,” I say.
The words taste like poison.
Victor Dane has been in my city.
Breathing my air.
Watching my family.
Learning our routines.
Possibly standing close enough to see Amelia smile. Close enough to watch Olivia walk through my halls. Close enough to know when my brother left the estate with them.
My hands curl into fists.
Stefano’s blood is dried beneath my nails.
“Find him,” I order.
Foster drops into one of the waiting room chairs and focuses on his phone. “Hotels. Rentals. Short-term leases. Private properties. Shell companies connected to Victor Dane, Mark Dane, Riverfront Shipping, anyone tied to the Ohio operation.”
“Airbnbs,” Spike adds. “Vacation houses. Desert properties. Anything isolated.”
“Already searching.”
“Look for cash payments,” I say. “Long-term rentals under false names. Men traveling alone. Men who requested privacy. Properties with garages. Places close enough to watch my estate but far enough to avoid my cameras.”
Foster nods without looking up. “Got it.”
He leans closer to the screen. “I’ve got something.”
“What?”
“There’s a private rental outside Palm Springs. Paid six months in advance through a shell company connected to one of Victor’s businesses.”
“Address.”
“Property is owned by a holding company based in Nevada. No listed tenant. Utilities turned on thirteen months ago.”
Over a year ago.
Victor’s voice moves through my head.
I’ve been watching you.
My vision narrows.
“Where?”
Foster looks up.
“Thirty minutes from the estate.”
The room becomes dangerously still.
“Send the address,” I say.
“I am, but Mav, this may not be where he has them. It could be a watch point. It could be empty. It could be a trap.”
“Then we spring it.”
“Maverick,” Spike says quietly.
I look at him.
“Your brother is in surgery,” he says. “Your woman and daughter are missing. You are not thinking clearly.”
“I am thinking very clearly.”
“He wants you to rush in angry,” he says. “He wants you to be reckless. If that location is tied to him, he either got careless or he wanted us to find it.”
“And what would you suggest?” I ask softly. “That I sit here while Amelia and Olivia are somewhere with him?”
“No,” Spike says. “I’m saying we go in smart enough to bring them home alive.”
I close my eyes for half a second.
When I open them, the rage is still there.
It will always be there.
But I force it into shape.
A weapon instead of a fire.
“Fine,” I say.