AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I’m with Uncle Terri. He said he’d take me to you, but we’re just sitting in a parking lot.” I checked the tracker. According to the blinking dot, the car Hazel was in had stopped. “Are you nearby?” She sniffled. “Hey! Give me back my—” A sharp crack of flesh hitting flesh filtered through the phone, along with Hazel’s cry of surprise.
My vision tunneled to a single point as rage stoked the fire in my blood to boiling.
“Fucking touch her again and I’ll kill you,” I warned.
Terri had signed his death warrant if he killed my father. I’d make sure it was exceedingly painful for hurting Hazel.
“Oh, now, Jareth. We both know you want to kill me anyway. You forget how well I know you, son.”
“I’m not your son. Where are you?” I ground my teeth together.
Hazel piped up in the background. “Terri… we trusted you.” Her sadness came through loud and clear.
“I want the journal you found and anything else in that box, Jareth,” Terri said, ignoring Hazel. It didn’t matter that I’d only flipped through part of it on my way here. There had to be something incriminating in there than my father suggesting it was Terri for him to tip his hand like this.
“I want my father’s fucking ring.”
There was a slight pause, then a low chuckle followed. “How did you know?”
It was a guess. “The photos I got from Bill.”
“Well, damn. The wild goose chase I sent you on was my downfall. I’ll be in touch when we get settled. And Jareth, don’t do anything stupid, or I’ll send Hazel to you in a body bag.”
“No, you won’t,” Hazel’s low, ferocious growl came across the line.
“Restrain her,” Terri yelled. “She fucking scratched me.”
“Don’t—” Hazel’s name flashed off the screen as he hung up.
“Fuck.” I couldn’t do a goddamn thing.
Warmth trickled down the side of my hand. I glanced at blood seeping from the jagged gashes lacing my palm made by the crushed tumbler in my hand. The red beads slowly fell to the floor. Drip, drip, drip. It mocked me.
I was going to find her and make those two men and anyone else who took part in this suffer.
CHAPTER 32
Hazel
Ineeded to stop crying. The tears obstructed my vision, which wasn’t a total loss since it made the view of Terrible Tony and Traitor Terri less clear, but it also made my head ache, and my nose stuffed up. I ran my arm across my face and winced. My freaking right cheek hurt. I wiggled my jaw left to right, testing out how bad it was. I’d never been hit like that before. I’d been in such shock at first, it took the pain a few seconds to catch up.
Tony looked away when I fixed my glare at him, but not before I saw the regret in his eyes. “I didn’t have a choice,” he explained even though I wasn’t completely sure I trusted him to tell me the truth.
“There’s always a choice.” I pursed my lips, until a zap of pain ran across my cheek at the tightening of my jaw.
Jareth would find me. And when he did, these two were going to be sorry.
I glanced at Terri, who had now lost the title of uncle after walloping me across the face. He thought I was afraid. That what he did had shut me up. Little did he know it lit a fire in me to make things as difficult as I could before Jareth arrived. He’d stop at nothing before he rescued me. And that gave me courage.
Terri knew that though. He was banking on the fact that Jareth cared for me. I knew what Jareth felt was love. I saw it in his eyes every single day. He just wasn’t in the same space where he could acknowledge it to me. That was why I held in my own declaration. Now I wished I hadn’t.
I shifted in my seat, drawing Terri’s attention.
How dare he threaten me like that? Anger surged deep within my belly, raced up through my chest, and reached my head.
My vision sheeted red. I wanted nothing more than to hurt him.
Tony grabbed me by the arms and restrained me in the seat next to him. “Don’t Hazel. You’re making this worse for yourself.”
