Page 1 of Crave Me

1

~Caspian~

Chaos reigned.

Sirens sounded.

Flashing, blinding lights assaulted my senses.

Dozens of shouts came my way vying for my attention.

Shadows surrounded me—my security staff—pushing back the mass of paparazzi gathered around Rossun Central Hospital. Police and hospital security were working to move them back from the main entrance and setting up police tape and barricades because it was so intense.

I’d had to approach from the main, much more public entrance, in order to divert attention away from what was happening at the back entrance—my staff bringing in Dante Mancini and his injured, those few who had survived the explosion at Elijah Bane’s chief arms facility.

Fortunately, I’d been able to change into a set of my backup clothes that I always kept with me when I traveled out to a field operation—a pair of my designer jeans, a navy open collared shirt, and a leather jacket. Showing up here in combat gear would have given the media a field day and led to a great deal of questions.

I was basically drawing fire at the moment.

The press had come here for Skylar.

All the details were coming into me, just slower than I would have liked, given everything else that needed locking down, but what I was aware of at this point was that Damien had brought Skylar into the hospital—instead of my fucking estate which had an infirmary wherein I could call in a doctor, a surgeon, and whoever I needed at a moment’s notice. I had several on my payroll as a precaution. It was to prevent something like this from happening. The press crawling all over the place, getting in my way as well as impacting sick people within the hospital who needed peace and quiet to heal, not this wild circus. But Damien had panicked and come right here instead. Or perhaps it had been more than that, him not wanting to call me as he should have done so he could play the hero all the way.

As it was, it was an additional hassle and aggravation that I could really do without.

Things had absolutely gone south.

As I finally made it through to the entrance, my team ushered me toward one of the staff elevators. Just as I was stepping inside, Luke slipped in like the ghost that he was trained to be.

“King,” he spoke the moment the doors closed.

I punched the button for the floor Skylar was on, trying to swallow down my worry and the twisting of my gut knowing she’d been hurt.

As if that wasn’t enough, there was so much more that had happened—all in one night. The one night I’d taxed my resources in order to carry out the multi-pronged assault against Elijah Bane and Bane Industries.

“Report,” I ordered Luke in a clipped tone.

It was how I needed to be right now. Rational, locked up tight, absolutely focused on solving the many issues surrounding us.

If I allowed sentiment in, it would choke me and render me incapable of dealing with everything.

“The chief arms facility has been cleansed. The fallen have been transported back to Mancini Syndicate territory. Your message reached the other Capo and he’s been reassured that his Don is under your protection here until he regains consciousness and recovers from his injuries. The same regarding Matteo. They won’t cause us any issues and they’ll be keeping this under wraps to avoid their enemies getting wind of Dante being out of commission and seeing it as an opportunity to strike. We’re re-securing the city borders now, along with all King holdings, King Tower, and King Manor. I’ve obtained video footage from that gas station Bastian and Skylar pulled into that shows a fight taking place, Bastian being taken, and Damien protecting Skylar from suffering the same fate. I’ve sent a copy to King-Tech to analyze in a bid to track Bastian’s whereabouts. I’ve also activated his tracker. It’s currently not transmitting, but I’m going to backtrack where the signal was last picked up, it’ll just take some time.”

The doors opened and I stepped out, Luke following close behind as I absorbed his detailed report. He kept my brisk pace as I stalked down the corridor toward the room Skylar was in. “We’ve got a team headed out to Caleb’s last known location too. It’s three hours away, so they’ll be arriving shortly.”

“And his tracker?”

“Pointing to the precise location of his warehouse takedown, where the team is headed.”

I frowned. “That can’t be. He would have returned my call. Not to mention, the fact our conversation was abruptly cut off suggests foul play in itself.”

“That could be for any number of reasons.”

I swung my head toward him. “I don’t need you to offer me false hope, only facts.”

He smiled sadly, then admitted, “It does point toward him suffering the same fate as Bastian. The dropped call, the timing, not hearing back from him for hours now.”

I swallowed hard, trying to squash my emotions.

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