It’s not a choice. It’s his way. End of story.
God, I want to refuse him. I hate letting anything have this much control over me. But I realize, as my body begins to tremble, I’m helpless to resist whatever he wants of me because I am powerless against him. And I’m not stupid. I don’t want to die. Not today. Not like this.
Ryder…again brushes across my heart, but he’s not here. No one is. It’s just me. In this dark room. With two hired killers.
“Yes. Yes,” I gasp, statue-still, afraid if I move the trigger on the gun will move, too. “I understand.”
The man doesn’t respond, not that I really expected him to. He moves behind the camera and flicks it on, then waves me on with the gun.
My stomach roils as I glance down and again read what’s written on the page, memorizing the words there. I can do this. I must do this. I need time so that Ryder can get here. He needs to know I’m okay. Scared, yes, but okay, and I’ll be okay (I hope) until he gets here.
After my internal pep talk, I draw in a deep breath and find that source of strength deep inside me. I raise my head and look straight into the camera. “Dad, I’m safe and my life is not currently in danger, but that will change if you don’t announce your retirement. Now you have a good reason. You need time to heal and you’re doing this for your family. There are no more chances. Time has officially run out.”
Off to the side of the camera, I see the man moving to me again, now with a mask over his face, and it takes everything inside me not to cower away from him, as I add, “If the announcement isn’t made by morning…”
The gun presses to my temple and I shut my eyes, wishing Ryder would storm through that door any second and kill the man next to me.
When said man digs the gun’s muzzle into my skull, I reopen my eyes and manage the final line written out for me, “I die.”
Chapter 16
Ryder
The third monitor along the top row goes black, and it’s only then that I can breathe again. I hang my head and press my fingers against the cool metal table I’m standing behind, trying to regain the control slipping out of my reach.
Inhale…The ropes cutting into Hadley’s wrists.
Exhale…The fear in her eyes.
Inhale…The shakiness in her voice.
Exhale…The gun to her head.
The video had come through my email, personally addressed to me. And that final second I have to watch a gun being pressed to Hadley’s head is when I decide the man who held that gun would die, and I’d be the one to do it.
Logical or not, the promise burns across my soul, as does: No one hurts what’s mine.
“Boss?” Alex’s soft voice rips me from my thoughts.
I lift my head, finding the command center silent, my team watching me carefully. They need direction. They need an order. But I’m barely hanging on here. The senator trusted me to keep him and his family safe, and I’ve failed to keep that promise.
I’ve failed Hadley.
Though abducting her is a bold, desperate move that even I hadn’t anticipated from the blackmailer. Which leads me to believe that this has nothing to do with a tax bill, as we had speculated. There’s something more going on here. I just need to find out what it is.
Before my thoughts begin running wild with speculations, first things first. I ask Alex, “Where’s the senator’s wife?”
“I believe at the hospital with the senator.” Alex spins in her swivel chair, facing her computer monitor. Her fingers begin flying over her keyboard. Soon, on the middle monitor in front of me, I’m looking at the senator’s wife sleeping in the chair next to her husband’s hospital bed. “Yep,” Alex reports. “She’s still there.”
“Good,” I say, relieved, especially to also see the senator doing so well after his successful surgery. From the last report we received, the doctor predicted a full recovery, as the bullet blessedly didn’t hit anything vital. Which gives me all the answers I need to know, really. Hadley had arrived at the house just in time to stop the hitman from finishing the job. But in doing so, she forced the blackmailer to change his plans, which is likely why they took her. “How much security is there at the moment?”
“Dozens of cops and a few FBI agents, too,” says Alex, who begins typing on her keyboard again. Then more security footage of the hospital and the cops stationed outside the room and around the hallway begins to flash on the double rows of monitors on the far wall.
While I would prefer to have my team there protecting the senator, the case against the senator’s shooter is out of my hands now. Or at least by appearance, of course. I like to keep a friendly relationship with law enforcement. We get more done when we work together. But our relationship has clear boundaries: I stay out of their way and they stay out of mine.
Knowing that the senator and Mrs. Winters are safe, I let my mind focus on where it wants to go. To Hadley.
I straighten up from the desk and move to stand behind Alex. There, I cross my arms and scan the faces of my team, who all remain statue-still, awaiting my next move. There are a thousand things I want to do. There are a hundred things I want to ask. But no one can answer me. Our leads have run out, and I can tell by the devastation on the expressions around me everyone knows it.