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CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
MILTON
Staggering out of his car, Milton doesn’t know what to take in first. The body of his assistant, Lisa Calderway, shot dead in his drive, or the front entrance of his manor bashed open. His gut twists. Despite the fresh wound just below his left rib, the wave of nausea isn’t because of that. It’s not because of Lisa either, though he’s sorry to see her dead. While Milton knows her being here has significance he will later discover, the poor woman didn’t deserve an ending like this. At least, from the quick glance he gave her, her death looked to have been swift.
Inhaling a deep breath, Milton moves forward quickly, stumbling over to the front of the manor even though each movement is laced with pain. He needs to see her face. That’s all that matters to him—just her. When he finally enters his property, the sight makes him halt. Splinters of wood and glass cover the floor. There’s blood smeared in various places, though not enough to indicate a casualty.
He hears a whimper. Looking to his right, he sees his dog, Beatrice, licking the side of Blue’s head. She’s nudging him with the tip of her nose to wake up, but the usual energetic pup isn’t moving, and Milton knows that can only mean one thing.
He kneels beside them both and feels for Blue’s pulse. It’s not there—the animal is stiff and cold. Wrapping his arm around Bea, he kisses the side of her head like he did when he first found her and her brother abandoned on the side of the road. Their injuries indicated they’d suffered cruelty, though Bea seemed to have gotten the worst. It took her years to trust him.
She licks Milton’s face and whimpers, knowing her brother is gone.
Milton glances around the foyer inside his property, his chest aching with loss. Loss for his canine companion and something even more precious to him. Milton knows. He can feel Heidi’s absence in this big, empty house he wanted her in. She’d begged him not to leave her, and he hadn’t listened. He did this when he should have kept her with him.
Jumping to his feet, his fist meets the wall next to him. He feels the pain shoot up his forearm. He grinds his teeth together to stop the demonic growl erupting from his mouth. Blood pumps from his knuckles, adding to the red stains already on the floor.
“Hilary!” he roars out instead. No answer comes. He didn’t see their car in the driveway, but that doesn’t mean the elderly couple is safe.
Taking two steps at a time, he goes upstairs and down the hall to his bedroom. As soon as he walks inside, he can smell her—the sweetness of her natural scent threatens to drag him into a pit of black fury, but he has to focus. He can’t lose his shit right now. Only when he has Blake on his knees begging for his life will he let it take over.
But right now, Heidi needs him. He has to find her.
Going into his closet, Milton opens a drawer and takes out his emergency cell. He’d lost his during the shootout at the compound—something he’s now convinced had been a diversion. Once again, he’d underestimated Blake. The old bastard had used Deuce to draw him in there while coming here to get Heidi. Blake had taken her right beneath Milton’s nose, and he would pay for it.
As Milton waits for the device to come on, he goes back downstairs and heads for the security rooms where Barnes and Cole set up their gear. It’s empty—the two men are not there. He can guess why, but without visual proof, it’s hard to know exactly what happened to the members of his fucking security.
Gritting his teeth, Milton sits at the monitors to check the surveillance. As he rewinds the footage, he presses Hilary’s name from his contacts. It rings out. He tries Barnes, and the same thing happens. The man doesn’t answer.
Finally, the video footage gets to the point after he’d just dropped Heidi back to the manor. He can see her standing on the porch as he gets into the car and drives away. At least fifteen minutes pass before Hilary gets her inside. Despite what he made Heidi believe, Milton doesn’t have the entirety of the manor inside hooked up with cameras. He put one in the foyer, kitchen, and her bedroom, though she doesn’t use it, and he hadn’t had time to set one up in his yet. The outside grounds are covered, and that’s what he scours first.
It was almost two in the morning on the video when the back door opens. Barnes and Cole head out with serious expressions and guns drawn. Something must’ve tripped the wires they’d installed around the perimeter. That’s the only conclusion Milton can come up with as to why they’re leaving at this hour. He watches them split up. Barnes heads for the line of trees and Cole around the side of the house.
Milton’s forehead dampens with sweat. He’s losing blood and knows he needs to stitch himself up, but he can’t leave. Not until he finds out what happened.
Then he sees something—a dark figure sneaking up behind Cole and taking him out by slitting the man’s throat. When Cole drops to the ground, and the figure turns around, Milton glares at the screen when he sees Nicolas’ face. The fucker smirks before disappearing into the surrounding darkness.
Nostrils flaring, Milton doesn’t have to keep watching to know that Barnes had probably suffered the same fate. He doesn’t have to keep watching to know Heidi had been taken by the very men he’d sworn to protect her from. But he does anyway. He wants to see what he’s done. He wants to see what he’s caused.
He watches everything the surveillance captured. A dozen bikers circling the property, and Lisa dragged out by Nicolas. That’s how they found Heidi. They must’ve taken Lisa after he’d dismissed her for the evening. They’d been watching more than Milton had been aware of. Maxim wasn’t going to be happy with that.
Moments after Blake enters the property, he’s leading Heidi out by gunpoint. Milton’s entire body tenses seeing her on the screen. He watches Lisa crying before she’s shot in the back of the head. Blake blindfolds Heidi and tosses her over his bike. Then they leave, just like that.
His stomach turns again, his mind a whirl of thoughts. Ten minutes later, Hilary staggers outside with Peter in their nightwear. The man’s limping, which means something happened inside the house. They get into their car and drive away.
Milton lets out a short breath, knowing they’ve probably gone to the nearest hospital in Fair Haven. He’ll check later, but for now, they’re safe. Heidi isn’t. Grabbing his phone, he dials a number. It picks up on the second ring.
“We have a problem. We need to speak,” Milton says, knowing the man on the receiving end is still mulling over their earlier argument over Vadim.
“Where?”
“The club. An hour.”
He hangs up, pocketing the device, not able to smother the worry he feels for the girl who has singlehandedly knocked his life off its axis. Heidi isn’t the same as she used to be. Blake won’t tolerate her now, which means her days are numbered.
Blake.
Even the sound of his name ignites so much anger Milton’s desire to kill increases. Milton’s been killed indirectly by that fucker many times, getting others to do his dirty work. It’s fucking cowardly. He knew the old brute had been wary of him all those years Milton served him in that piece of shit motorcycle club.
