Page 73 of Breaking the Code

He is the epitome o’ light and laughter.

All I want now is to make sure he has a chance to nae just live, but to thrive. To experience and enjoy all life has to offer. I cannae do that if I keep hieing off to places unknown to search for someone who’s been missing for nigh on twenty years.

I’ve read everything I can lay my hands on about human trafficking. The chance Maeve is still alive is slim. These people dinnae want a woman who is nearing thirty years old. They can get that without all the secrecy and risk. Nae. They want young girls and boys.

Maeve disnae fit that description any longer.

I pray I am wrong and that she is still out there, that she lived a happy life. I hope one day we are reunited, but I can’t keep risking everything to chase a phantom. Simon deserved better, and I ignored that in my rage and grief. I ignored him and his love and then, one day, he was gone.

I’ll nae do the same to Tavish. I will give him what I couldnae give to Simon. I will give him all o’ me.

If ye are out there, Maeve, I love ye. I miss ye every day, and I hope ye can forgive me.

The last words whisper through my mind as the wheels touch down. When the plane rolls to a stop, I grab my gear and I walk to the door. As I step out onto the stairs leading down to the tarmac, I look up at the sky and a feeling settles over me.

It’s been lurking in the back o’ my mind and the depths o’ my soul since I glimpsed a small, beautiful boy in a dark, dirty, falling down warehouse. It’s grown and swelled into something I couldnae contain and nae longer will I deny it.

Love.

A smile spreads across my face, and I make my way down to the car Tavish arranged for me. I need to get back to my boy, and I’ll nae leave him again.

CHAPTER THIRTY

TAVISH

The buzzing of my phone jars me awake. I grab my phone and am disappointed when I realize it’s not the alert I set up, so I’d know when Draven landed. Instead, it’s a message from Zayn asking for an update. Sighing, I roll out of bed and head into the other room.

I drop my phone on the desk, then move to the kitchenette Draven installed. He’d said something about convenience, making it more likely I’d eat something other than junk. I don’t know what the man’s hang up is about food and sleep, but he harps on it all the time. Since I’ve fallen hard for the man, I just roll with it.

I grab some water and decide to heat up one of the meals Draven prepped for me before he left. Just as I reach for the handle on the fridge door, a notification sounds on the alert I have set. Spinning on my heel, I race back to the screens.

My eyes scan the incoming info quickly. I finally have the confirmation I need. With each page I skim, the bud of hope that popped up blooms into a fucking botanical garden of elation and I yell, “Booyah, baby!”

I throw my arms in the air, my back arching as I spin in place. The spinning turns to dancing when I flip on the music. I bebop around the room in time with the beat.

“I found your ass, Elijah Monroe! You and Samuel can get fucked because the Society is coming for you!”

I grab the comms unit and shoot off texts to Everly and her men and to Zayn and his partners.

SECURE: T

Found him!

Messages pour in, praising me for the work I’ve put in. All of it makes me giddy with excitement, and I wiggle my happy ass back to the fridge with my tablet in my hand. I grab a container from the fridge and pop it into the microwave.

While the microwave buzzes and spins, I stand at the counter, going through the images thoroughly, making sure I’ve memorized it all.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me?” I ask no one.

There’s no fucking security.

None.

Nada.

Nil.

Zilch.

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