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“You and the boys at the lake house?” I ask, knowing that on a Friday night, they won’t be anywhere else.
“Of course.”
“Good, get your asses out the house, get in your trucks and drive out to the Stower Bridge Road. Make sure you pass the Lochfield turning and create a roadblock.
“A roadblock?” Noah sounds surprised.
“Yeah, my mom’s coming through and she’s got my little girl in the car. She’s taken her.” I look at Maisie and hate the words that I’m having to say. This is all my fault, I should never have got us into this position by trusting her again.
“Noah, hurry the fuck up, I’m right on her tail but if she makes it to that turning, there are all kinds of different ways she could go.” I hang up and get back on to the GPS, all while driving like a NASCAR racer.
“Garrett, it’s gonna be okay, isn’t it? Please tell me it’s gonna be okay.” I look in my rear-view mirror and see Wade is still close behind. I don’t know if anyone has called him and told him about Dalton and I haven’t got the time or the strength to do it myself right now.
We drive for another ten minutes before I finally see Mom’s car in front of us. She’s driving far too fast to have my baby girl with her and unless she stole one out of Maisie’s car, I know shewon’t have a car seat. I breathe a tiny sigh of relief when I see the River Boys up ahead. They’ve made the block in the perfect location, where the road goes through the valley and there’s no way she can maneuver the car around them.
Mom must know I’m behind her. I don’t want to imagine what thoughts have been going through her head leading up to this, or how dangerous she may have become. I don’t understand why she’d wanna hurt us like this, not after we took her in and gave her a chance.
“Garrett. I don’t like this.” Maisie looks petrified and I squeeze her leg through her pretty lace dress as Mom realizes she’s got nowhere to go and pulls the car to a stop.
“Maisie, Listen to me.” I cut my own engine and stretch over her so I can open the glove compartment where every Carson keeps a loaded gun.
“Garrett, what are you gonna do with that?” Her eyes glance to the gun warily as I hold it in the hand I use to frame her face.
“I’m gonna do whatever it takes. And I promise, our little girl is gonna be okay.” Kissing her forehead, I get out the truck before she can argue with me. Then hold my hand up at Wade when he storms out of his car would up full of aggression.
“Hang back,” I tell him before calmly approaching the driver's side of the car and being wary of the fact she has a gun.
Mom is staring in front of her, revving the engine like she’s about to attempt to plow through the barricade. Her headlights shine onto Noah and Sawyer, who both sit casually on the hood of Sawyer’s truck with a smoke, and Zayne stands in the door frame of his Ford GT, with his arms resting over its roof.
“Get out the car, Mom,” I tell her in a cool, calm voice that I really struggle to maintain when I see the gun she must have used to kill Dalton, resting on the seat beside her. Breanna is screaming in the back of the car and the relief of knowing she’s breathing takes away some of the anger I feel at hearing hersound so distressed. I lean my head a fraction lower and see that she’s strapped into a car seat, which also makes me a little more comfortable.
“I can’t,” Mom tells me, continuing to rev the engine of the car.
“Mom, do you really think I’m gonna let you take her? Whatever this is, it’s over.”
“I’m sorry.” She looks up at me and smiles sadly before pressing her foot to the floor and making the car spin on its wheels. The River Boys dart in different directions when they realize she intends to go through them and before she picks up enough speed to do some serious damage. I raise the gun in my hand and I shoot.
“Garrett, No.” Maisie comes racing up behind me as I take out a second tire, grabbing my arm and sobbing onto her knees, as the car with our precious little girl inside swerves across the road, it's undoubtable that it will crash either into the barricade or the mountain wall, but the impact will be minimal now she can’t pick up speed. It still doesn’t make watching the hood smash into the side of Zayne’s GT any more bearable. Maisie kicks off her heels and races toward the car.
“Get Mom out. Take her back to the line camp before the police get her,” I call back to Wade, as I race behind Maisie and manage to get ahead of her. “Stay back,” I warn her, even though Mom’s head is planted into the airbag that’s burst out of the wheel and she’s still. I’m very aware of that gun that’s still in her front seat as I open the back passenger door.
Breanna is still screaming her lungs out, and although all my instincts scream at me to lift her out and comfort her, first I reach into the footwell where the gun has fallen so I can secure it. As soon as I have it in my hand and tucked in my jeans, I breathe a long sigh of relief as I unstrap my daughter from her seat andpull her onto my chest. She’s shaking with fear and I cling to her so tight I have to be careful not to hurt her.
“Garrett,” Maisie calls out as she races up behind me.
“She’s fine,” I call out, pulling us both out of the car. I can feel her little heart beating wildly against my chest, as I hold her and watch Wade drag mom out onto the road. He keeps her held to the ground, looking clueless as to what’s happening, while one of the River Boys grab him something to tie her with. Maisie’s eyes swell with fear when she notices all the blood on Breanna.
“Garrett, she’s covered in blood.” She screeches as she frantically checks her over for injury.
“It’s not hers,” Mom speaks up from the ground. “I would never have hurt her.”
I’m about to tell her to shut the fuck up, but my wife shocks the hell outta me when her face turns cold and she turns to face my mother. She says nothing to her, just strides toward her then kicks her in the face with her bare foot. Mom’s head falls back against the tarmac and Maisie proves that ain’t enough when she lifts it back up by her hair and drags her up on her feet. She roars with anger and frustration as she smashes Mom’s face flat into the wing mirror of the car, before letting her fall back to the floor, then rushing back toward me and Breanna. I let her snatch her from my hold, then I wrap them both in my arms, holdin’ ‘em tight and count my blessings.
“Garrett, what do we do?” Wade asks, looking down at Mom who's sitting on the ground with her head resting back against the car door and blood pouring from her nose.
“You tie her up and take her to the line camp like I said. Wait for me to get back from the hospital, we need to get her checked over.” I look at my little girl and hope for Mom’s sake that she’s right and that none of this blood belongs to her.”
“What the fuck happened here, where the fuck’s Dalton?” Wade shakes his head, confirming that he has no idea what’s happened, and I hate that it falls on me to tell him.
