Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 77205 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 309(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77205 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 309(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
My fucking hand was shaky and clumsy as I tried to stab my key in the lock, my mind racing with a million possibilities.
Millie, dead on the floor, caught completely off-guard.
Blood stains, drag marks, because he’d taken her to do unspeakable shit to her.
No.
No, damnit.
There was no way.
No fucking way.
I finally got the key in the lock, and shoved the door open.
To find chaos in the apartment.
Not Millie’s chaos, shoes and clothes and makeup strewn about.
This was a different kind of mess. Drawers upturned, the closet torn apart, my damn mattress off of the frame.
Someone had tossed the place.
But… where was Millie?
Had they taken her, then tossed the place?
I ran through the apartment, knowing there was no logical place to hide other than the closet that they’d tossed, but I looked anyway
In the closet.
The bathroom, finding her cell on the counter.
I even tore open the fucking kitchen cabinets on the off chance that she’d stowed away in there.
That made no sense, of course. Because there was no way she could have kept Storm quiet in there with her.
And he wasn’t in the apartment anyway.
Had they taken Millie and Storm tried to follow?
I hadn’t seen him on the street.
“Think,” I demanded, slamming my fist into my forehead, knowing I needed to focus, no matter how fucking panicked I was.
Taking a deep breath, I glanced around again.
And that’s when I noticed it.
The hook where we kept Storm’s leash and that ugly fucking fanny pack Millie insisted she needed to buy and then wear out in public.
It was empty.
No leash.
No bag.
Maybe Neeley and his men would take and look through the bag, toss it in the pile with the rest of the shit they’d thrown about.
But not the leash.
If the leash was missing, was it possible that Millie just… hadn’t been home? Had she been taking Storm for a walk? Completely unaware that anyone had even been at that apartment? That there was any threat?
I flew back downstairs, rushing out onto the sidewalk, head on a pivot, hoping to find her.
Because if Neeley struck out in the apartment, but found signs of her around, wouldn’t he have waited for her?
Or had he seen her?
Out on the street?
Went to try to snatch her that way?
I wouldn’t say it would be easy to kidnap a woman off of a busy street in the city. But it wouldn’t be impossible, either.
New Yorkers were accustomed to looking the other way, to minding their own business.
It wasn’t that I thought they’d see it and wouldn’t call for help, but that they might not even see it because they were so used to just… not seeing shit.
“What do you need?” Nero asked, reminding me a lot of his brother right then. That calm, controlled, ‘I got this’ attitude that was such a part of Miko.
“Go that way. Look for the redhead with the dog. If you find her, get in a cab with her and go to…” I started, racking my brain for somewhere to send them to that wouldn’t put women and children at risk. “To Nico’s place,” I decided, then ran off in the other direction, knowing it was the way Millie would choose to go for a walk, since there were stores to window shop at.
When I made it too far for her to have wandered, I made my way back.
It wasn’t until I was standing beside Neo’s car that it struck me.
Storm.
And my fucking tendency to think and plan several steps ahead.
His collar, it wasn’t just a normal collar.
There was a little rubber band attached to it.
And inside that rubber attachment?
A fucking GPS tracker.
In case he got loose and lost in the city.
If Storm was with Millie, the collar would lead me right to them.
I reached for my phone, ignoring all the missed calls from Lorenzo and my brother, figuring one or both were likely on the way here right that moment, I brought up the app to track the collar.
My gut twisted as I waited for it to refresh.
“The fuck?” I said, blinking at the screen.
That was blinking a trace in fucking… Newark.
Newark?
I worried that maybe Neeley had her in a car there, but the tracker was stagnant.
Wherever Storm was, he wasn’t on the move. And there was no way he’d run all the way to Newark.
Was he with Millie?
Had she seen them and, I don’t know, ducked into a cab, and begged him to take her out of the city?
Her fanny pack had enough cash to get her there.
And if she didn’t have her phone to call me, it made the most sense that she would run.
I glanced in the car, seeing Nero had left the keys in the ignition, then jumped in, and peeled off.
I saw him as I sped off, his hands out in a What the fuck motion.
But I didn’t have time to stop and explain.