AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Hammer ignored their comments. “Liam!”
As he thundered down the hall, his friend emerged with his pants half zipped and looking disoriented. “What the bloody… What’s wrong, Macen?”
“She’s gone,” Hammer choked out, trying to swallow the fear and anger lodged in his throat. “I’m worried Bill has her. Her car’s in the lot. The driver’s door is open, and her stuff spilled everywhere. She wouldn’t have walked away and left her wallet, her phone, her…”
Macen’s whole body trembled as he gripped Liam’s shoulders, needing to ground himself with something solid.
“No. That can’t be.” The same horror Hammer felt filled Liam’s voice and stare.
“I don’t know how long she’s been gone,” Hammer barked, trying to contain his panic. “I woke up maybe five or ten minutes ago and found her missing.”
“Oh, fuck. If it’s Bill…” Beck growled, pinning Hammer with a knowing stare.
The doctor knew exactly what Bill Kendall was capable of since Hammer had called him the night Macen had discovered Raine in the alley. The two had slipped a sedative in her soda so Beck could examine her. Hammer had taken photos to document the horrific abuse she’d endured at the hands of her loving father. Liam had seen the pictures just last week. He’d also had the displeasure of meeting Bill, so he understood well the urgency to find Raine.
Swallowing tightly, Liam gripped Macen’s arm. “The security room, mate. The cameras will tell us if that piece of shit has our girl.”
As all four men raced down the hall, an ominous déjà vu crested through Hammer. He swallowed back the urge to vomit.
“What was Raine doing in the car park alone during the wee hours?” Liam asked.
“I think she intended to bake something.” Hammer unlocked the door, flipped on the lights, and hurried inside the private room. “There’s flour, sugar, and other shit all over the counters, but I think she needed an ingredient she didn’t have.” He scrubbed a hand over his face as he sat in front of a bank of wide monitors. “I can’t believe she didn’t wake one of us up to go with her.”
Liam paled. “What was she baking?”
“Something she’s never made. Date scones, I think,” Hammer growled.
Why did Liam care? Bill could well have taken the woman they loved. Macen didn’t want to focus too keenly on the brutalities she could be suffering at this very moment. He just wanted her back.
“God, no.” Liam’s voice cracked. “Oh, love… Not the scones.”
“Why not?” Seth asked. His brows slashed as he stared at Liam, who looked more shaken than ever.
“She wanted to make them for me.” Guilt and remorse roughened Liam’s voice.
Struggling to keep his own emotions in check, Hammer rewound the security feed from the parking lot. “We never had the chance to tell her that Bill had been sniffing around. She went out to that lot, never imagining…”
God, now he wished he’d made the time.
Liam curled his hands into fists. “I thought we could protect her.”
Hammer had, too. They’d been wrong.
When he found the right file and hit play, no one in the room said a word, just stared at the monitor. As Raine hurried from the back door, the time stamp showed four forty-six a.m. Hammer glanced at his watch. Quarter past five now. His gut clenched at the thought of all the terrible things that could befall her in nearly thirty tormenting minutes.
On the monitor, she made her way toward her car. A tall figure dressed in black and wearing a baseball cap stepped into view, sneaking up behind her. Hammer’s stomach pitched as he watched the man grab her. Raine fought, throwing an elbow, stamping on his foot, struggling like a mad thing, using every trick she’d learned in the self-defense classes in which he’d enrolled her. When she turned on the man, still fighting, she tried to knee him in the groin, but he held her down. Raine attempted to shove the heel of her palm into his nose but only succeeded in flipping the hat off his head. Startled recognition had her jaw dropping, her eyes widening.
The face and glowing blue eyes Hammer had hoped never to see again filled the screen.
“I knew it,” he roared, turning toward Liam. “That motherfucker has her.”
Liam nodded grimly. “Wind it back.”
Hammer jerked his attention to the screen once more. Without the hat to conceal Bill’s expression, an evil sneer consumed his face. Chills froze Macen’s every muscle, rolling through him in a debilitating wave.
Liam pressed the rewind button and homed in on Raine. She snapped her hand toward Bill’s cap, knocking it to the ground. Hammer could clearly see the bastard’s bulbous nose and the long white scar bisecting his cheek—a result of a wound Raine had given the son of a bitch over six years ago, when she’d last fought not to let her father take her innocence and her life.
