“I have to find her soon. Kennedy’s condition is too delicate. I don’t know what they will do if she—” Sheldon choked on her words, and when she started to cry, my tension kicked into high gear.
“What do you mean? What condition?”
She took a deep breath, which seemed to calm her before continuing. “Since she was two, she’s suffered from seizures. The doctors haven’t been able to find a cause since she’s never suffered a brain injury.”
“Epilepsy?” When she nodded, I brought my fist down on the dash, cracking the surface and pressed down on the gas, speeding all the way back to Six Forks.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
VICK
“BOSS, THE CAR took off.”
“The place is compromised. Move to location two when it’s safe but keep eyes out for them in case they come back before.”
“And if it does?”
“You handle it.”
The line went dead before he could ask for further instructions. The man cursed while silently wishing he’d never agreed to this job. Kidnapping kids was new to him, but it was a job, and one that paid well, though he now wished he’d asked for more.
The day he snatched the kid, she had some sort of episode that scared the hell out of him. He almost dumped the kid off anonymously to the nearest hospital, but his partner convinced him not to by reminding him how much money was at stake. Luckily, whatever it was didn’t seem to last long so they chalked it up to a reaction from being kidnapped, but when it happened a second and third time, we starting drugging her.
He looked over to the monitor where he could watch her sleep off the drugs. She was so still that he wondered if she might actually be dead.
He wanted to stop drugging her, thinking her little body couldn’t handle so much of it, but his partner didn’t think it was worth the trouble.
“What’s the word?” Freddy asked, zipping up his pants as he emerged from the bathroom.
“We have to move, but he also gave the OK to take care of them if they come back.”
“What the fuck does that mean? We can’t kill them.”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
“Do you think we should go with Plan B? We don’t have much time left before they become suspicious.”
“I told Greg it was a bad idea taking two jobs. We can’t complete them all.”
“No, but they both pay,” Freddy grinned.
“He’s going to get us killed.”
“He’s going to get us paid. This family is as rich as they are fucked up. Just look at this house. All of this and no one even bothers to live here. If they are going to just waste money, why shouldn’t we help ourselves to it?”
“I don’t know, man—”
“Think big, Vick. Besides, with Greg in the hospital, we get a bigger cut.”
“I can’t believe he just bashed his head with a chair.”
The warnings we received about Keiran Masters did nothing to prepare us for seeing him in action. He secretly envied the younger man who was able to invoke so much fear with just his presence. When he spoke, everyone in the room tensed. Even his family and friends feared him. As he recalled the cold, dark eyes from the hospital that promised death, he wondered what it would be like to have that much power.
*
KEENAN
“Do you have anything on the house?” I asked as soon as we were through the door. Sheldon insisted on returning to her apartment, but I was having none of it. I dragged her back to my father’s house. Lake and Quentin were back from searching for Kennedy while Jesse still kept eyes on the house in Camden.
“It was so quick I’m not even sure if it happened, but the curtain there…” Jesse pointed to a window on the lower level of the house, “it moved just after you left. Could have been a draft or—”
“Or the people who took my daughter?”
“You really think it could have been your grandparents?”
“I don’t know, but I now know it wasn’t Mitch.”
“How?” Quentin asked.
“He’s dead,” I blurted. It was the only believable lie. If Q knew about Mitch, he wouldn’t hesitate to tell Keiran because that’s where his loyalty was.
I wanted to silently warn Sheldon from telling just in case, but Q watched me too closely as if trying to read me. “Fuck,” he barked. “Keiran isn’t going to like this.”
“I’m pretty sure it’s all Keiran would have wanted.”
“Only if it had been by his hands.”
I needed to change the subject and fast. I hadn’t had time to concoct a proper story to tell anyone about the impromptu trip. After Sheldon had told me about Kennedy’s condition, it was all I could think about. “It doesn’t matter now. It’s done.”
He hesitated only a second longer than necessary before asking, “So what makes you think your grandparents even know about her, and why would they take her?”
I struggled in my head with a reason for why they could be guilty but couldn’t find one no matter how hard I tried. I ran my fingers to the end of my hair and tugged with frustration.
“Are they even still alive?” Sheldon asked.