“I’m okay,” I promised. “I was…”
“She’s pregnant and needs to be checked out,” Tunnel grunted. “Don’t accept arguments.”
Tunnel grinned at me.
“Good news,” he said, holding out his arm. “Your paramedic awaits.”
I rolled my eyes, but nonetheless followed him out the door.
“What’s going on?” I asked. “How did y’all get here so fast? And how did you know where we were?”
Torren looked down at me.
“You.”
“Me?” I asked, startled. “How did I help?”
“You had your cell phone,” he answered.
“But they took it away.”
“They finally made a mistake,” Silas answered.
Big Papa was standing next to him, discussing something that he’d paused in his conversation before answering me.
“How’d they do that?”
“Took your cell phone, but didn’t turn it off,” he answered. “Though, that was due to one of our undercover operatives taking the phone into custody. Either way, you would’ve been found.”
My mouth twitched.
“That is fucking awesome,” I looked away, studying the long white hallway. “Where are we?”
“The new ‘place’ that they purchased as a front,” Silas answered. “Would’ve been our next place to try if we didn’t find you at their old place. I’m not sure what the hell is going on with them, and why they made such simple mistakes, but I can’t complain about it if it got y’all back to us safe.”
I gasped when I saw Lynn limping toward us.
“Oh, my God!” I screeched. “Are you okay?”
Lynn caught my hand before I could touch him and placed a simple small kiss on my hand. “Been better, girl.”
“Piece of shit!” I heard hissed from behind me. “I gave up everything for you. Watched my husband dote on this little piece of shit kid that wasn’t even mine. You looked just like her. Then he had to go and do it again with that sister of yours! How is a woman supposed to deal with her husband’s infidelity when she does everything for him?”
I paused and turned, finding Candace Morrison standing behind us, spewing venom.
She’d sawed through her ropes, most likely by using the jagged piece of metal that was on the ground near her feet.
Lynn stiffened in anger at my side as he heard Candace’s words.
“I’m not your kid?” Tunnel asked sarcastically.
He’d known, of course.
I could tell that his body was strung tightly, though. I could see the anger pouring through him, holding him stiff as he regarded the woman in front of him.
“No,” she snarled. “But I treated you as mine.”
Tunnel started to laugh.
“If that’s what you want to call it,” he replied darkly. “I seem to remember a time in my life where you treated me like garbage. Refused to feed me. I had to go dumpster diving just to feed my sister and me.”
She sneered.
“You didn’t deserve better. You were trash, only seems fitting that you ate it, too,” she snarled. “Only became useful to me when you joined the police department. Tried to make it come across as you being all noble, but I knew why you were really there. You wanted to shut us down.”
“No,” he countered. “What I wanted to do was live my life with my wife and child. What I didn’t want to do was deal with you and Dad’s shit. I wanted the exact opposite of what you gave me. But you couldn’t stand that I didn’t take your offer.”
Offer? What offer?
She laughed bitterly. “Should’ve taken me up on it. Would’ve saved you a world of hurt.”
Tunnel started to chuckle, and it was so sinister, so freakin’ scary, that I shivered.
I’d never seen him be so cold, but this man standing in front of the woman he’d always thought was his mother…well, he wasn’t the man I knew.
This man was harder, more intimidating. This man was the man I’d known as Ghost before I’d known that Ghost was my Tunnel.
Tunnel was hiding behind a blank mask, one that was clearly in place for his protection—the one he always slipped behind when he was dealing with his parents.
“What kind of ‘mother’ asks her grown son to sell his child to her?” he snapped.
And that, my friends, is when mama bear came out to play.
Chapter 28
Beard the fuck up, then we’ll talk.
-Ghost to his father
Ghost
I looked at Lynn. And by look, I meant really looked.
I’d seen the resemblance, of course. At least in our eyes. But now that I studied him, knowing that he was my uncle, I noticed that we were a lot more alike than either one of us had realized.
I’d seen him once a month for going on six years now. I’d never once suspected that we were anything other than boss and subordinate.
Just five minutes ago, I’d asked Silas if he could help me find my real family. Sure, I’d had a lot of other things I’d needed to take care of, but since I was sitting in a hospital bed with nothing else to do but think, I’d asked.
And had been rewarded.
Though, not by the person that I’d expected it from.
Lynn sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose.
“I can’t help with Audrey’s family,” Lynn said carefully. “From what I remember, the woman was an addict. He used her, kept her clean while she was pregnant, and then took the child. From what I remember, her mother was back under the influence of drugs before her episiotomy even healed.”
“Shit.”
That was from Audrey.
“I’d been harboring hope that I was some filthy-rich, multi-millionaire’s daughter who was stolen at birth, and now you tell me that I am some drug addict’s kid?” Audrey teased. “Well, that’s just rude…but a great deal better than having that woman as my mother. I suppose I can live with him as my father, but only if he stays in jail for the rest of his life.”
Lynn had, apparently, already taken care of that. Not only did my father get charged for kidnapping my sister, me and Mina, but he’d also been charged with attempted premeditated murder.
Holding us there was only to have been a temporary thing. They didn’t actually expect that we’d make it through the night, but my father had gotten overconfident thinking that his operation was more covert and clandestine than it actually was. He’d made a rookie mistake by not thoroughly searching Mina. He’d vastly underestimated her since he hadn’t expected her to be able to conceal a phone in her tight jeans and shirt, and in doing so, his cronies hadn’t realized she even had the phone on her until they’d already arrived at the house they were temporarily using as a base. When it was found, they’d made another mistake by leaving it on instead of turning it off, which enabled Lynn to tap into her cell and access the GPS to find her location within an hour of our abduction.
Lynn got to our location within hours of our arrival there, followed quickly by the Dixie Wardens.
While I’d been busy freeing myself, Lynn got my father talking and waited for him to admit to a few things.