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I straightened, moving away from Saint’s desk. Calm. I needed to be fuckin’ calm. You can’t think straight worried.
“You try her cell?” I said, but I knew she would’ve. “She drives that piece-of-shit car. Maybe it broke down on her way and her cell is out of juice.” I was trying to think logically, but my mind was already skipping to the worst-case scenarios.
Saint frowned, glancing up at me.
Addie was breathing hard. “I’m at Zero Crow. Her car is here, Vic. But Brin says she didn’t show up for work.” My grip on the cell tightened, and the plastic cracked under the pressure. “I found her keys on the ground beside her car.”
It was like being hit by a fuckin’ tank and flying through the air and landing on an iceberg.
Five hours ago. Macayla had been gone for five fuckin’ hours.
“Go home, Aderyn. Keep Jackson inside and stay away from the windows. I’ll have Saint put a car on the house, and an APB out on Macayla.”
I lowered the phone, my chest tight, and an uncontrollable rage pounding inside me.
Saint was already on his radio, giving the orders.
I was out the door and headed for my truck. I knew Saint would follow.
Jesus. I’d kept my two lives separate for a reason and staying here with Macayla and Jackson had tipped the balance.
Now those worlds had collided.
Macayla
I woke up lying on a black, foam-like mat.
My vision was blurred, and my head felt heavy and foggy. It took a second before I could figure out what had happened. Then it all came flooding back like an imploded dam, the surge sucking me under the depths.
The van. Someone grabbing me. Kicking and writhing. Fingernails scraping. The door sliding closed. Then darkness.
Where the hell was I? What was I doing here? Who had grabbed me?
I slowly sat up, breathing in mildew and dampness. Then my heart skipped a beat at the jangle of chains. I glanced down at my wrists. Metal manacles were clamped around my wrists with a short chain linking them together. They were attached to a two-foot-long tether that was padlocked to the bottom of a chain-link fence.
My breath came in short gasps as I scrambled to my feet, but I couldn’t straighten because of the chain. My gaze darted around. A ten-foot fence surrounded me on an octagon-shaped platform three feet off the ground.
Directly in the center of the cage sat a wooden chair. Above it hung a flickering fluorescent light that droned incessantly.
The space beyond the fence was dimly lit. There were no windows, and the walls and ceiling were rounded and cemented like I was underground.
Oh my God. Underground. Caged ring.
This was the underground fight ring beneath Callum James’ stables where they used to fight as teenagers.
My heart thumped in my chest as my mind scrambled. No. It couldn’t be Callum. Could it? Would Callum do this to get back at Vic for nearly killing him?
But I worked in his bar for months. We’d stayed at his farm the night I’d left Vic. Ethan trusted him. Hettie and the others did too.
Vic didn’t. Vic said he was dangerous. He didn’t want me to sing at his bar or move into his guesthouse.
Panic lurched through me, and I was suffocating in its clutches as it dragged me under its strangling hold.
No. No. I had to get out of here.
I yanked and pulled on the rusted metal shackles around my wrists. I tried desperately to squeeze my hands through them, contorting my hand and scraping the skin until they bled. But no matter what I did, I couldn’t get them off.
I grabbed the chain and put my feet against the fence and kicked as hard as I could over and over again.
