Page 137 of Road to Redemption

Zeus had been bold in their attack. It was a matter of moments before Dom cried out, “Here.”

I turned to see her standing over a knocked down section of wrought iron fencing, cursing the sky, flinging an abandoned angle grinder against a nearby tree.

“We have to go,” I locked eyes with Spencer, who nodded furtively.

“Go. I’ll handle the fire department.” Spencer kept an arm wrapped around Caleb’s shoulders while Abi wept into Lady’s fur. “Find our girl.”

Sprinting over to the carriage house, I grabbed two helmets and the spare keys for mine and Dom’s bikes. Dom was on my heels like a murderous shadow, pure lethal rage emanating from her body.

As we pulled down the driveway, columns of smoke painted over the stars and blotted out their light. The Valemont Fire Department was quick to the scene, a truck full of some of the most competent lesbians I’d ever met whipping down the dark road in the opposite direction of our search.

Maybe there will be something left of the house after all.

But it didn’t matter. That place wasn’t a home without Kiera in it.

We drove the backroads first, searching for tire tracks or signs of life up in the woods, but there was nothing. Circling out from the house, we moved to downtown Valemont, and then to the winding country roads beyond town. We even drove past Feverpoint, looking desperately for any sign of Kiera beyond their chainlinked fences.

Nothing.

With each mile we drove, my mind caught up with the impossible nightmare we were living.

This wasn’t an accident. Sure, the house was old. But Dom had so much work done on it. There wasn’t a fucking inch of faulty wiring in the place. Someone had broken into our sanctuary and torched it to the ground. Someone had stolen our girl.

And it sure wasn’t an amateur job: overriding Dom’s security system, getting through the gate… There was only one man with the means and motive to smoke us out like this.

My fists tightened around my handlebars. His name pulsed through my mind with each hateful beat of my heart: Isaac, Isaac, Isaac…

I hadn’t thought my resolve could have hardened any further. But as we zipped through that dark night, I knew one thing to be true: I wouldn’t rest until that demon was dead at my feet.

76

KIERA

I can’t breathe. I can’t fucking breathe.

I wasn’t sure how I’d ended up here. One second I was watching Dom’s silhouette against the flames, holding my breath as she ran back into the fire. And the next…

Darkness. Fabric over my head. Hands over my mouth, zip ties binding my arms, dragging me off into the woods. And the sharp pain of being tossed into the back of a car.

I tensed against the bindings at my hands and feet, but it was no use. I didn’t even have enough leverage to separate my hands. Each deep breath I tried to take pulled the fabric further into my mouth, alluding to my suffocation without actually following through.

I’m going to die here.

A cold spike of anxiety surged through my chest, but I couldn’t let it take over. I couldn’t afford to die here — not while my saviors still needed me.

Are they okay?

My chest tightened, but that thought sobered me more than anything else. Fighting to keep my racing heart in check, I straightened up against the cool metal wall and tried to calm my racing thoughts.

I can’t freak out. I can’t freak out.

Instead, I tried to walk myself through Leo’s calming technique.

Can’t see a fucking thing with this hood on. But I guess I can still feel.

I focused on the rocking of the car — a beater, if the shitty suspension was anything to go off. I could also feel peeling leather beneath my shoulder, the plastic cutting into my wrists and ankles, and the silk of my pajama bottoms.

God. Don’t let them take my —