Page 120 of End Game

Her BFF must have visited her suite and found it empty.

Kayla: To confront Sybil about Rohan’s findings.

Liv: ur joking

Kayla: Snuck in back way.

Liv: ash with u?

Kayla: Yes. Armed guard outside guesthouse.

Liv: wtf

Kayla: Protecting something? Or keeping someone inside. Mom?

Liv: where’s ash?

Kayla: Doing recon.

Liv: zeke’s going to blow a gasket.

Kayla: I had to come.

Liv: i know but still don’t like. stay safe. keep me updated.

Kayla: Will do.

She slid the phone into her pocket and scrabbled back to her hiding spot to keep watch. What she saw stopped her heart mid-beat.

A light now illuminated much of the downstairs and a dark-haired woman dressed in red silk pajamas and matching robe opened the slider.

She knew that face. She knew those PJs.

“Mama.”

Tears gathered in the corners of Kayla’s eyes at the sight of her uninjured mother. The urge to call out to her vibrated through every sinew in her body, but she tamped down her heart’s desire to give her brain the airspace to think.

She would shoot Ash a text, confirming her mother’s presence. Together, they would develop a plan for freeing her. Once they secured Jillian, she would call her father and let him know they were bringing her home.

The process to create her mental to-do list took no more than three seconds. Long enough for the guard to leave his station and move to the open door where his prisoner stood.

He said something to Jillian, and she laughed.

Kayla’s hand paused in the act of reaching for her phone.

Laughed?

Instead of keeping her prisoner, the guard was there for her protection. Why?

The sour taste of betrayal climbed up Kayla’s throat.

“No, Mama,” she whispered. “Not you, too.”

60

Ash picked his way between thick, mature trees and thin, wispy saplings. As he drew parallel to the front of the guesthouse, he searched for a place to exit without having to lose a layer of skin to the jungle of raspberry bushes at the forest’s edge.

His luck proved to be frog shit. A thick perimeter of briars stood between him and a clear view of the house.

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