“Te amo.”
Since he didn’t dare delay any longer, he helped her into Matt’s back seat, where she would be less visible, gave her hand one last squeeze, and shut the door.”
Matt drove away slowly with a jaunty salute in his direction, his truck rumbling toward the end of the lane and pausing at Ghost’s. Jack Cole’s buddy hopped out of the bed and dived into his Tundra, starting the engine and idling.
Waiting for him.
Trees cursed, then grabbed his own duffel from the house, set the alarm, locked up behind him, gave Barney one last head scratch and a few more treats, then climbed into his Hummer. It wasn’t long before he pulled around Matt, settling in for the long miles until they were no longer on a dirt road. Ghost followed them.
Though Trees gripped the wheel tightly, the drive to the edge of town and the hard road was uneventful. He stayed watchful, looking everywhere for Ramos or his violent drug mules to jump out and try to take Laila from him. With every mile that passed, he relaxed.
During the drive, he peered at Laila in his rearview mirror. The sadness on her face was a stab in the heart, and he swore that somehow he’d make this shit up to her and keep her safe for the rest of her life.
Finally, they reached the main drag bisecting the nearest little town. There wasn’t much—a dollar store, some churches, a mom-and-pop grocery store, along with a couple of gas stations, a body shop, and a one-window post office.
At the town’s last intersection, the light turned yellow just as Trees made it through. Matt followed. It was red by the time Ghost reached the limit line, and he watched the guy shudder to a halt. In his rearview mirror, Ghost’s dark blue Tundra got smaller and smaller.
A few feet off Trees’s bumper, Matt kept going, probably figuring the other operator would catch up in two minutes or less. Trees scowled. He’d feel better, especially for Laila’s sake, if they waited for the tail, but it was stupid to sit around and wait like no one was after them.
As they reached the intersection at the interstate, Trees slipped into the left turn lane to head east on I-10. Traffic was almost nonexistent, so he paused, watching Matt zoom past him and continue heading south. Where was he taking Laila? What had Hunter and the other bosses cooked up? Trees hated not knowing as he watched the beat-up Chevy drive away.
Vowing to put an end to this shit separating them soon, he caught a green light and made a left toward the freeway’s on-ramp.
From a dirt corner, a black van lurched forward, tires spinning, kicking up dust. It barreled toward Trees, heading straight for his passenger door. Holy fuck, the driver intended to T-bone him.
Trees stepped on the gas, trying to outrun them and jet onto the freeway. A glance behind proved Ghost still hadn’t caught up.
The Hummer didn’t move fast enough, and the van clipped his vehicle, sending Trees spinning around on the otherwise deserted road, closer and closer to an embankment wall.
His head reeled as he tried to steer out of the over-rotation. But it was too late. The top-heavy vehicle flipped onto its top, then rolled over twice more before slamming against a guardrail and coming to a shuddering stop.
Pain roared in his head. A trickle of warm blood slid from a gash above his brow. His limbs felt like they weighed a ton as he tried to swipe away the blood and clear his suddenly blurry vision, but darkness ringed the edges—and started closing in.
No. No! He needed air. But he couldn’t find the fucking handle. When he did, he couldn’t muster the strength to open the door. It was stuck. Crumpled from the accident? He groped around the armrest until he found the button to roll down the window, but even the chilly winter night didn’t jolt back his dimming senses.
Shit. He was going to pass out. He must have hit his head harder than he’d thought…
Help. He needed help. Nine one one.
With the last of his strength, he felt in his pockets for his phone but couldn’t seem to yank it free.
Suddenly, movement through the passenger window caught his attention. The occupants of the van poured out, illuminated by their headlights—three men shrouded in head-to-toe black. All carried guns pointed straight at him. They spoke rapid-fire Spanish as they wrenched his door open, yanked him from the cab, and dragged him toward the open door of their van as his consciousness gave way.
* * *
Laila scrambled to the far side of Matt’s back seat, craning her neck as Trees’s truck was blindsided before it rolled twice and hit the guardrail. She screamed. Her heart lurched as cold fear washed through her. “Stop! We must help him. Now!”
Matt glanced in his rearview mirror, looking into the night, then gunned the engine. His truck surged forward. “We can’t. I have to get you to safety.”
“We cannot leave him! I am safe. I am fine. He is injured. He is—” Laila whipped her stare back to the scene of Trees’s accident to see if he’d managed by some miracle to get out. Instead, she saw him being dragged away by three men in ski masks who blended in with the dark. Fear became horror. She felt ready to peel off her skin, jump from this moving vehicle—anything to save him. “They are taking him! We must—”
“Keep going. If that’s Ramos and his thugs, they probably think you’re in the truck. As soon as they figure out you’re not, they’ll come looking for you. I have to get you far away.”
“We cannot simply leave Trees! He will die. They will kill him!”
“He’s trained for this and—”
“He is injured!” Couldn’t Matt see that? “He cannot fight all three of them by himself. And Victor wants revenge. He will torture and execute Trees. We must go back and save him.”
Matt shook his head, scanning his surroundings with a sharply watchful gaze. “Ghost is seconds behind him. He’ll pitch in, but Trees would tell me to get you away from the danger. That’s what our bosses would say, too. I’m doing what’s best.”
“You are doing what you have been told. I am doing no such thing.” If she had to jump out of a moving vehicle, she would. But she refused to let Trees be taken, tormented, and terminated.
Matt glared at her through the mirror. “Yeah, you are.”
She ignored him and reached for the handle to let herself out of the backseat. It was locked. She scrambled to find the button to release it, but flicking it did not disengage the lock. “Let me go!”
“I can’t. Never thought I’d use those childproof locks. Good to know they’re useful for something.” Then he reached for his phone.
Who was he calling? The police? It was too late for that, and fighting with the door was doing her absolutely no good. Trees and the scene of his accident were now several blocks away. Terror that she would be too late to save him threatened to shred her composure.