Total pages in book: 165
Estimated words: 154925 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 775(@200wpm)___ 620(@250wpm)___ 516(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 154925 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 775(@200wpm)___ 620(@250wpm)___ 516(@300wpm)
MaeBe stood there, her feet planted and body unmoving as her mind made nasty connections.
Julia had been monitoring Kyle’s family for at least a year. She’d had people watching them, learning their habits and weaknesses, and she’d used them.
Julia needed someone to make Kyle come to her. Oh, she could pretty it all up by saying she wanted the intel, but what she truly wanted was Kyle.
Julia couldn’t get to Carys or Lucas or David. They were too well protected. She would never get close to Kyle’s mom. Now she couldn’t get close to MaeBe.
But Kala had been sneaking out, making herself vulnerable because that child didn’t understand the meaning of the word or how fragile she could be.
Tears sparked, and fear blazed through her.
Julia hadn’t been coming for her. No one would storm the doors of Sanctum tonight because Julia already had her prize.
“What’s wrong?” Taylor asked. “You went so pale.”
“It’s Kala. She wasn’t here for me this time.”
It was Taylor’s turn to pale. “You don’t think she would…”
Oh, but MaeBe did. She rushed to get to the next row of lockers where Serena was helping Charlotte out of her corset. “Charlotte, Julia Ennis hired mercenaries to come to Dallas tonight. We thought they were coming to Sanctum.”
Charlotte laughed at that. “That’s ridicu…” Charlotte put a hand to her heart. “Oh, god. She’s been watching us all. She knew what Kala was doing, knew she would be vulnerable tonight. I have to tell Ian. We have to call the police.”
Yes, there would be no keeping the authorities out.
She had to find Kyle. MaeBe took off, praying they could find Kala in time.
Chapter Eighteen
Kyle thought about going down to the women’s locker room. He could grab MaeBe and not let her leave his side until…well, until Julia was dead and they were safe. He could keep his eyes on her so nothing could possibly happen and she couldn’t get away from him the way Kala had gotten out of her very secure house and caused a shit ton of trouble.
Except MaeBe was a grown, competent, thoughtful woman who knew how to take care of herself and wouldn’t put her team in danger but would explain to him the meaning of the words infantilize and marginalize.
So he turned the opposite way as he left the men’s locker room and started toward the security office like he’d promised his uncle he would.
Behind him he could hear his uncle talking on his cell phone. “I’m sorry. I know you’re busy but I need you on this, Chelsea. I need all the cameras between my house and Alex’s pulled up, and we need to go through them for the last four hours. Yes, I’ve already sent someone to where her phone signal is. It looks like she’s at a park, but I want to cover all our bases.”
It was going to be a rough night in the Taggart house.
He turned into the lobby, and there was one of the people who was having a rough night. Tasha Taggart stood in the lobby dressed in leggings and a big T-shirt with some K-pop band on the front of it. She had a jacket on, her hair up in a messy ponytail.
“You okay?”
She looked up, worry plain in her eyes. “I don’t know. Did I do the right thing? It’s not even eleven. She could be home by now. I might have panicked.”
He understood her predicament, though he’d never had to cover for his brother. His brother had been practically perfect. The worst David had done was stay up past bedtime to practice his moves for chess club. His brother had been such a dweeb, and he was going to hug the hell out of him because now he realized how hard having a rebel sibling could be. “You did the right thing, Tash.”
“I always do the right thing. It doesn’t make me popular. Kenzie’s angry with me. She thinks Coop and I are being overly dramatic, and Kala will sneak back in when she’s ready,” Tash explained. “But something feels off. She texted me back and it was weird.”
“Weird how?”
“Kala tends to text in emojis and GIFs. This time she used like whole sentences. It was weird. Kenz thinks it’s because she’s so mad at Cooper. I tried getting her to text again but I got nothing. That’s why I came here.” Tash wiped a tear from her eye. “I think something’s really wrong. What if she’s not planning on coming back?”
“She’s not running away.” For all Kala’s flaws, she wouldn’t run. He hoped. “You need to tell your dad when he comes out.” He put a hand on Tash’s shoulder. “And you need to follow your instincts, Tash. Your sisters will get over it. It’s a bad time for Kala to be sneaking out. Your parents have enough to worry about. Do not leave this lobby without your dad. Do you understand me?”