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My gut feelings never failed me. We’d found Tessie in time, but Vince… how long had he been missing?
Questions shot through my mind, each coming faster than the next. A minute longer, and Tessie would have been dead.
How long did Vince have?
Silence.
I finally bit out, “I’ll be right there.”
After hanging up, I texted Tessie’s babysitter and strode to Ari.
“I need to go. Tessie’s babysitter is coming in fifteen minutes. Can you watch Tessie until then?”
Her brows dipped together, her eyes skimming my face, searching for something. “Of course. Is everything okay?”
I didn’t have time to explain, so I gave a half-assed nod and left for the break room.
As soon as Tessie turned to me, I said, “I have to go.”
“Where?” She drew the cap of her marker into her mouth and spoke around it. “You look funny.”
I couldn’t tell her about Vince.
She’d freak, and I didn’t want her worrying, so I lied like a jackass. Even though I felt the time ticking in my gut.
“I’m fine.” Bouncing a curl of hers, like I’d do if things were fine, I continued, “Asher just called me. He needs my help with something. Ariana will watch you until your babysitter gets here. If you need anything, find Ari behind the bar.”
“Okay!” The cap fell out of her mouth when she spoke.
She flung her arms around me and kissed my cheek when I lifted her in a hug. As soon as I set her down, she turned back to the wall and drew a smiley face on it in yellow marker that had the word permanent printed on the side.
“See you later!”
I shook my head but didn’t bother dealing with the marker as I left.
When I got to Asher’s penthouse, Lucy had a pot of tea on the kitchen island, but it had lost its steam. Dozens of Asher’s security team milled in the living room, taking up every inch of space.
Sitting at the bar were Lucy, Asher, Niccolaio, and Vincent’s head of security.
I tossed my keys and phone onto the counter. “What happened?”
“Vince is gone. He slipped past his security team.” I opened my mouth, but Asher cut me off. “Don’t ask how. We all know he’s resourceful. What we need to focus on now is finding Vincent. We can deal with the rest later. Okay?”
I nodded and took in the massive three feet by three feet map on the kitchen island. They’d set tacks all over it in red, green, yellow, and black.
“The green is where he most likely is, the yellow is where he could be, and the reds are a long shot. The blacks are where you’ve already searched?” I confirmed.
We’d done this before, usually when we were hunting people who hid in our territory. Not Vincent.
This had to be a joke.
Every fiber of me believed this was a joke. I knew what I’d felt earlier though.
That dread.
I didn’t share it with everyone else.
They needed their hope, and I needed… I needed to find Vincent and figure out the rest later. Why did it always take losing someone to realize how much you loved them?
