“Rowan, if you don’t get your cum catcher out of here, I won’t be responsible for her joining the ranks of the other dearly departed Selected girls.”
His face flushes with anger. Whether it’s at her words or mine, I’m not sure. Nor do I care as long as he gets rid of her.
Before he can react, our fathers are walking into the clearing, shouting orders and clearing everyone but the bodyguards and us from the area.
“Who would like to tell me how the fuck a girl was taken from under our noses?” Mr. Calloway’s tone is lethal as he walks up to where Tony is standing next to Erik.
“Sir… Mr. Calloway, the camera feeds and security were compromised. We’re still doing a detailed analysis, but from what we can see, someone looped the feed showing Miss Bishop still out by the gazebo. Whoever took her was let in. There have been no unauthorized entrances detected,” Erik reports.
“Well, Erik, that’s obvious bullshit, or Miss Bishop would still be on the premises. Wouldn’t she?” My father snaps.
“Yes Sir. We’re currently looking into it,” Erik continues, but I stop listening. He’s not telling me anything I want to hear right now. His mouth isn’t stating, ‘We have her location and are currently en route to kill any fucker that has her.’ Those are the only damn words I want to hear out of his mouth.
Turning to Liam, whose color has finally returned to normal, I command, “Locate her chip.”
Nodding, our earlier dispute not solved but not as crucial as locating Emma, he pulls out his phone, and his fingers fly away on the screen.
“You chipped her?” Sebastian asks, a sly smile of approval appearing on his face.
“Of course we chipped her. You don’t think Wy and I would let our little angel only have one line of defense, do you?” Karl responds.
“I chipped her. You just co-signed the idea,” I remind him. I momentarily think back and enjoy the night I made her come on my fingers in her sleep. She was so high off her climax that she didn’t recognize the pinch to her skin when I was embedding the tracker.
Thank fuck for that. She’ll have my balls for it when she finds out, and I can’t wait for that fight. First, we have to get her home.
“Find out what happened here and find Emma Bishop or else,” I hear Rowan’s dad bark before walking in our direction.
“Rowaniel, I want this handled and I want her found immediately. Drop everything else. This is priority number one. Do I make myself clear, boys?” Mr. Calloway commands, staring as his brown eyes appear almost black.
We all grunt our agreement, but he didn’t need to make that statement at all. I’ll burn this whole fucking planet down to get my Riri back. There isn’t a hole deep enough or a security measure secure enough to keep me out.
“Have you found anything, Liam? Where’s the signal say she is?” Karl asks. Lola flips between his fingers- he’s itching to cut his way to answers.
“The signal can’t be located. The last ping was right outside the town line, and then it disappeared,” Liam grits through clenched teeth, his hands still moving a mile a second.
The last shred of control I have evaporates. “What the fuck do you mean ‘disappeared’? How is that possible?” I start pacing. My fear is palpable with the thought that someone has taken my girl and they’re untraceable. I need to hit something- more preferably, someone.
Where the fuck is she?
I run my hands through my now unruly hair, trying to find something, anything, to keep me from snapping the closest person in half. If Liam doesn’t answer me, I might ignore my earlier decision to not cut Samantha’s lifeline short.
Stupid bitch.
Liam answers, cutting off my spiraling thoughts. “It means they either found the chip or they’ve gone somewhere out of signal range. I won’t know until I run my diagnostics.”
His comments set my teeth on edge. My gums begin to throb, pulsing to the same tempo as my anger.
“There’s no fucking way they found that chip. It’s fucking untraceable. Those were your words to me-.” My sentence is cut short by the commotion to our left.
“We’ve got something,” Erik shouts, and I’m over to the car before he can utter his next words.
Stopping once I’m at Erik’s side, I take in the iPad in his hand. What I see makes my vision blink out, then blur before righting itself. It can’t be. The rage that fills my blood vows retribution.
With nothing around to punch, I shout, “What the fuck?”
ROWAN
Lydia. Lydia fucking Givens.
The stupid cunt had something to do with this. She was at the party rubbing elbows and smiling in everyone’s faces. I can’t believe August’s dad’s assistant would betray us, but she’s caught on camera punching a code in, letting an unmarked black van with blacked-out windows into the delivery area.
At least we know Lydia wasn’t working with anyone on the Council.
We’ve spent the last five hours combing through countless videos from the party. The main cameras were hacked, but whoever was responsible didn’t know about the cameras on the separate server for deliveries, allowing us a clear view of Lydia’s face. We know she’s working with someone, but because she isn’t part of the inner circle, she wasn’t privy to the upgraded security measures put in place after the two other girls were murdered. It’s too bad she left the party early. She’s just delaying the inevitable.
I look around the car at the varying expressions of my friends. Sebastian looks perplexed. A combination of puzzlement and anger mars his face, making me confused.
Leaning over, I whisper, “Why are you so concerned about her? You have barely spent any time with Emma.”
“I don’t have to know her to be worried, Rowaniel,” he retorts, his tone chastising, like the idea of my question was ridiculous. “I could ask you the same question. Why are you so upset? Have you finally decided to stop being a dick?” He rapidly fires question after question driving his point home.
“Point taken, and no, I still don’t think she’s the right choice.” My answer feels like a lie coming across my tongue. One I’m not ready to admit to myself, much less out loud to anyone else.
Emma is a conundrum that I’m not even trying to figure out. She is trying, stubborn, and not Elite wife material. I stand by that point, but she’s not a plant.
Fuck.
I rub my hands down my face, trying to work through all the shit that’s happened since her arrival. Now’s not the time for this shit. Right now, we just need to get her back safely. I can deal with my confused feelings another time.
Looking up, I see we’ve passed the diner. We’re on our way to The Tombs. Liam has a better setup there. That prompts me to turn my gaze to him. He has pictures of the van up on his laptop. It has no plates or identifiable markers that could be immediately used to track it. Liam’s already at work tracing its route through CCTV. We should at least have an idea of where Emma’s GPS signal went out.
I never thought I’d be happier about the level of stalker August is, but his overzealous need to protect Emma might save her life.
“Do we have a lock on that traitorous skank yet?” Karl snarls from the back of the car. He hasn’t stopped playing with his knife. I’m almost afraid he will use it on just about anyone to calm his twitchy fingers.
The blaring of my phone draws my attention to the inner breast pocket of my tux. Thinking it could be my Dad with updates, I reach in and answer without looking at the caller ID. That was my first mistake.
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.