Chapter Thirty One — Vinny
An hour before the trap snapped shut...
The tires ate up the highway asphalt. I was driving like a man possessed, trying to outrun my own goddamn shadow. On the dashboard, the tracker on my phone pulsed steadily—a tiny, mocking red dot representing exactly where Jamie was.
We were forty-two minutes away.
Suddenly, the burner phone buzzed violently against the console. I glanced down at the screen. Unknown Number. But I knew there was only one person who would have this specific line if Jamie had given it to him.
I snatched it up, praying to God it was her voice. "Yeah."
"Yo, this the pretty boy?"
We’d only met once, but I recognized the gravelly voice immediately. My heart kicked hard against my ribs. "Moses."
"Yeah. Listen, I ain't got time for the small shit." A heavy beat of static cut through the line. "Jamie told me to call this number if anything ever happened to her."
My blood ran ice-cold in my veins. "What happened?"
"I'm calling before it does," Moses said, his voice dropping into a tense, quiet whisper. "She’s got a death wish, man. She’s running a plan that doesn't include her walking out of there alive.
She needs help—more than what I've got backup for.
She's got three bad motherfuckers about to converge on her in less than an hour. "
"Who?"
"Her brother Draeon, Rage, and some country boy named Marcus," Moses hissed. "She’s trying to play 'em all against each other. Wants to let them tear themselves apart while she slips out the back."
"That's not a plan," I growled, punching the steering wheel. "That's suicide."
"That's exactly what I told her, pretty boy. Swear to God I tried to talk her out of it."
I squeezed the steering wheel until the leather groaned and my knuckles ached.
"I found a tracker hidden in one of her bags, and I'm guessing it’s there because of you," Moses continued. "So I know you're already on your way."
"I am. And I'm bringing an army with me."
"Then get here quicker."
The line went dead.
Bael glanced over at me from the passenger seat, his eyes sharp. "Who was that?"
"A friend of Jamie's." I tossed the burner onto the dash and gripped the wheel with both hands, flooring the gas. "He says she thinks she can play them against each other and walk away. We need to hurry the fuck up."
I quickly relayed the rest of what Moses had told me.
Bael stayed quiet for a long moment, watching the highway blur past. Then, he looked at me dead-on. "You love her?"
I flinched, my fingers tightening even harder against the wheel. I thought about the way she looked at me in the dark. The way she’d saved my miserable life. She had looked right past all the scars, the heavy grief, and the suffocating guilt, and she’d managed to see someone worth staying for.
Someone worth leaving the dark behind for.
"Yeah," I said, the truth breaking clean out of my chest. "I think I do."
Bael nodded slowly, a grim, lethal smile spreading across his face. "Then put your motherfucking foot through the pedal, Vicente. Let’s go get her."