Page 91 of If You Fight

But that could only happen if I reached Alita’s house before he did. He had a good ten minute jump on me, but looking down at the speedometer, I saw my speed top one hundred miles an hour, and that wasn’t the only advantage I had.

I knew exactly where Alita’s house was after driving out there to make sure Robert didn’t have it under surveillance before Serena went to meet her that first time. Jesse didn’t, and he had no idea that taking the route the GPS gave wasn’t the fastest way there.

Turning off the main road, I wound through a back road so dark I knew at any moment something might jump out and I wouldn’t have time to swerve out of the way. I reached over and grabbed my phone again to call Serena, but it went directly to voicemail.

Never before in my life had I felt so helpless to stop what I knew was about to happen. Serena could be on a collision course with Jesse and his orders, and even if she wasn’t a target, she might still get hurt.

Or worse.

I pushed that possibility out of my mind and focused on the road ahead of me. Just a few more miles until I reached the back of the estate and Alita’s carriage house. I had to get there before he did.

Jumping hard onthe brakes, I skidded to a stop and ran up the path to the back door of the house as adrenaline once again pumped through me. A light in the kitchen gave off a warm feel that made me want to believe I’d beat Jesse there. I listened for any sound coming from the house, but I heard nothing.

My heart sank at the possibility that he’d been there already and done his job. I looked through the back door window and saw no one inside.

“Who are you?” a male voice asked behind me.

I turned around to see a man around my age with a shovel in his hand ready to bash my head in. Holding my hands up, I quickly tried to explain what I was doing there.

“I’m looking for Alita. Are you Michael?”

He lowered the shovel to the middle of his chest and nodded. “I am. How do you know my name?”

“Serena told me she met someone named Michael who worked as the gardener here. She said you were a friend of Alita’s.”

“I wouldn’t exactly call myself her friend, but I care about her. Is something wrong?”

I turned to look into the house again and then faced him. “I think someone’s coming for her right now. If you care about her, you need to get her away from this place before he gets here.”

Michael dropped the shovel and ran past me through the back door. I followed him to the front of the house where Alita sat in a chair in the living room.

She looked at him and then me and opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Michael pointed at me and said, “He knows Serena. He says someone’s coming for you tonight.”

“Now,” I corrected him as I stepped toward where Alita sat. “I’m Ryder, and as much as I wish we could take the time to get to know one another, at the moment we don’t have the time. He’ll be here any minute, so if you don’t leave now, you won’t have a chance. Have you seen Serena tonight?”

“No. I called her to tell her Robert had been here to see me and was furious. He knows she and I have been meeting. She told me she’d call me later, but I never heard back from her.”

Standing, she looked out the front window as headlights from a car driving toward the house began to draw closer. Unable to tell if they were from Serena’s car or Jesse’s, I pushed Alita and Michael toward the back door.

“You need to get her out of here now. Do you have a place to go or at least some money to hide out for a while? Do you have a car to use?”

He nodded and smiled. “I’ve been planning for this what seems like my whole life.”

“Go now. Go as far as you can, and then wait for me to call you. Only answer if you see Serena’s number, understand? He will find you if you don’t lay low. I’m going to do everything I can to make sure that doesn’t happen, but you have to go right now.”

Alita reached out to touch my arm and smiled. “Thank you, Ryder. Thank you for taking care of Serena and us.”

I pushed them through the kitchen and opened the back door. “Thank me later. Now just go. Get as far away as you can.”

They ran down the dirt path to an old garage, and in seconds Michael raced away with Alita. Now I just had to worry about Serena.

A knock at the front door made my heart skip a beat, and I slowly walked to the front of the house to answer it. Pulling out my gun, I slowly opened the door as I held my breath, hoping it would be Serena I’d see instead of Jesse.

Outside in the dark a figure stood off to the side, and I only needed one look to know it was her.

“Ryder, what did you do? What did he order you to do?” she asked as she marched into the house and began looking for her mother.

“She’s not here, Serena. She and Michael left already.”

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