Page 102 of The Devil's Reward
“Mommy told me to go into the pantry and grab a snack because Viper said some was in there,” she cries, body shaking. “I did and then I heard a man and a weird noise, and I peeked my head out and saw Mom talking to the guy with the bag. He was shoving her, and she was shoving him back and he had a gun. Mr. Viper was sleeping on the floor, and then another man came in the back door. He was so scary and he made them go with them. He hit Mom on the head with something and she fell on the floor and he made the other guy pick her up. I wanted to scream, but I was so scared. It’s my fault,” she sobs.
“No, baby, no,” I tell her. “You were brave hiding in here. I’m going to get your Mom back, okay? I’ll get her back.”
“I want my Mom,” she sobs.
“Give her to me,” Sniper orders, reaching out for her. “I’ll take her with the women and we’re going to put them down in the safe room with Kaleb. Don’t do anything stupid, Shadow. We’ll get her back.”
“It was Dagger, he has to be the one who she was arguing with,” I say as I hand him a still sobbing Macy. She fights a bit but I soothe her with the promise that I’m going to find her Mom. Rose will take care of her, but right now, my focus has to be Quinn and getting her back. Thankfully Macy seems to understand. She stops fighting and buries her face in Sniper’s shoulder, her entire body shaking with the force of her cries.
“And whoever was helping him,” Sniper agrees before he rushes out.
I look at Medic who is ripping apart Viper’s shirt. “It only hit him in the shoulder, but it looks like he got a blow to the back of the head too. It probably stunned him, and when he didn’t go down the way he suspected, Dagger must have shot him,” Medic says briskly. “We need to get him into the med room and I’ll dig this out. He’ll be pissed when he wakes up, but he’ll live. Thank fuck Dagger has always been a terrible shot.”
A small consolation when I know my woman is out there in his hands along with one of Dmitri’s men. “Church!” Bullet bellows, and the fury in his voice is thick. “Let’s find these bastards and end this once and for all.”
I couldn’t agree more.I’m coming, Quinn,I silently think.I’m going to get you and I’ll kill them for daring to touch you.
It’s chaos for a few minutes as the women are all rushed down into the safe room, most of them arguing with us, and we get Viper and Medic into the med room. Rose wants a gun, we ignore her, and Sage is telling us that she’ll break all of our dicks if we don’t get Quinn back. Izzy is quiet, but I can see the pinched look on her face and know that she’s displeased to be shuffled off and out of danger.
I stop when I realize we’re missing one woman and two dogs. “Where are Syn and the dogs?” I demand, looking around.
Stone curses violently. “I’ll find her,” he growls. “I’m going to put a damn tracker on them. If she went back to her place, I’m going to tear her a new one.”
And I won’t stop him. I have to hope that Dmitri’s men didn’t take her too, or hurt her and the dogs. I look around the room and see Kaleb hobbling his way towards me but I shake my head at him. “You go down with the women,” I order him. “Keep your gun handy just in case.”
He looks like he wants to argue, but he nods. “Alright,” he agrees and heads for the basement door.
I see Crypt coming down the steps at a fast pace. “Crypt, you’re on the women downstairs,” I order him when he looks at me in question. He nods and follows Kaleb towards the basement.
I storm into Church and take my seat, though everything in me is burning to go after them. Every moment that Quinn is with them, the higher the chance that we won’t find her alive. I can’t even allow myself to think about that possibility.
“Cryos,” Bullet barks, “bring up the feed of the gate.” He doesn’t even take his seat, just stands looking foreboding as Cryos runs into the room.
Cryos has it up in seconds. “They didn’t come through the gate,” he tells Bullet grimly. He clicks a few more buttons. “They came from Syn’s land,” he explains. I watch on the screen as the big brute of a man slips through the fence and walks right up to the back door. My control slips a bit as we watch him force Dagger out the door, Quinn’s arm gripped tightly in Dagger’s grasp as she struggles, terror clear on her face. I snarl when Dagger suddenly stops and pistol whips Quinn across the face.
“He’s a dead man,” I hiss, body vibrating with fury. He dared to hurt my woman, and even with everything else, for that alone, I’ll kill him.
“They go back on Syn’s land,” Frost observes. “They probably have a car just down the road but out of sight of the gate and our cameras.”
Suddenly something off to the side of the camera moves and I lean forward. “What is that?” I bark.
“Son of a bitch,” King says in shock. “That’s Syn. And the damn dogs.” We all watch as Syn carefully weaves her way through the trees, the dogs hot on her heels as they go after Dagger, Quinn, and the mystery suit. “I’ll let Stone know,” he says, pulling out his phone.
“Don’t bother,” Stone growls as he stalks into the room. “I know she’s gone. That damn woman is going to get herself killed. She’s a goddamned menace.”
“If she dies, Sage will have my ass and yours,” King says tightly. “But we can’t worry about her right now. We need to find out where they’re heading.”
“I’m running his face,” Cryos tells everyone briskly.
“I can’t believe it was fucking Dagger that was our mole all this time,” Milk says loudly, drawing our attention. “What spooked him?”
“Turns out that Dagger is Bull’s son,” Bullet answers, his voice like ice and Milk instinctively winces at the tone. “He got ahold of Bull’s journal somehow, which we believe listed all the places Bull used to keep his stashes, and they were hidden enough for us not to know about them and keep them off the grid and off our radar.”
“Hammer was the one who figured it out,” I add, everyone other than Bullet, Cryos, Sniper, and King looking at me in shock. “Sniper and I went up to get him something for the funeral. Loki alerted on his nightstand and we found three baggies of white powder. Probably cocaine, but one of them must have opened or had a hole because it got on a piece of paper, which was what Loki alerted to. On it was a picture of Bullet, Hammer, and Bull. Only Bull had no facial hair and was younger. Almost the spitting image of Dagger now.”
“Holy shit,” Twigs breathes.
“Why didn’t Hammer say anything about it?” Torque wonders aloud, eyes narrowed in suspicion.
