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“But that was over two months ago!”
“Yeah.” A hint of irritation flits across his face now. “I hadn’t expected it to take this long. I thought I would be able to get you alone much sooner, but then there was… Jace.” He grinds his teeth. “Do you know how many times I almost managed to get you alone? On campus, at all those parties, at the coffeeshop, in the parking lot when we were preparing for our auction. Hell, I even took us to that stupid fake psychic and paid him to target you so that you would run off all upset and alone.”
Genuine shock pulses through me. He set that up? He set that up.
“But Jace…” A snarl rips from his lungs, and he shakes his head. “Jace was always fucking there. So…” There is a hint of smugness in his voice now. “I had to get him fired.”
Realization clangs through me. “You tipped off my father. That’s why he came to my apartment that day.”
“Yes. And then you finally got a bodyguard who wasn’t as obsessive as Jace, and I could finally text the people I had hired and tell them to grab you on your way home today.”
“You—”
The door is shoved open. I snap my gaze towards it to find Gregor Doyle striding back into the room.
“Your father was very amenable and complied with all of my demands,” he announces, a satisfied smile ghosting across his lips as he looks at me. Then he shifts his gaze to Lionel. “Your debt is paid.”
Lionel releases a shaky breath of relief.
Doyle comes to a halt in front of me. His face is a blank mask as he waves a nonchalant hand in the air. “Now, let’s wrap this up.”
Dread explodes through my chest like cold poison.
I’m out of time.
44
JACE
The tracker in Kayla’s watch led me to an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of the city. Since the area is so conspicuously empty, I had to leave my car a short distance away and travel the final distance on foot.
Drawing myself up against a huge metal container, I glance around the edge and towards the building where Kayla’s signal is coming from.
There are three cars parked out front. One is the blue van that I’m assuming they used to abduct Kayla. The other two are an expensive Audi with tinted windows and a discreet black sedan.
Two men who look like common thugs stand close to the van. Two men who look like professional security guards flank the building’s front door.
I narrow my eyes. If you can afford that kind of Audi and that kind of hired security, there is no need to use common thugs for a kidnapping. Which means that there are two separate parties involved in this. That might complicate things.
I study the four people outside closely. The thugs don’t appear to be carrying guns. But based on the bulges beneath the other two men’s suit jackets, they most definitely are.
Pulling back from the container, I slip around it and approach the building from the back.
Since I have no idea what’s going on inside, I can’t just go in guns blazing. There is too much risk of Kayla being caught in the crossfire if this devolves into a straight up shoot-out. I have to be stealthy.
Red and purple streaks line the sky in the west as the sun slowly starts dipping below the horizon. I stick to the shadows as I run along the side of the building. My pulse thrums in my ears. Every second I spend out here is another second that Kayla is in there at the mercy of her kidnappers. I need to finish this quickly.
Reaching the edge of the building, I glance around the edge to check if the four men outside have moved. They haven’t. The two guys by the van are still standing there, talking quietly to each other, while the two professionals stand on either side of the front door.
I pull back.
A quick look behind me reveals a set of crates stacked against the metal wall of the building. I back towards them while adjusting my grip on the bat in my hand. After stepping in behind the crates, I reach towards the metal wall and start tapping my fingers against it.
At first, nothing happens.
Then a voice comes from the other side of the building.
“Do you hear that?”
