Page 69 of Falcon

“Some hotel off the highway. I went to check in and they took her while I was inside. Fuck!” I shouted again as I slammed my hand on the dash.

“We’ll find her. I’ll be in touch when I get info.”

I ended the call, hit the address Keys sent, dropped the phone in my lap, and peeled out of the parking lot. My hand shook as I threaded it through my wet hair. How did this happen? I was gone not even five fucking minutes! How did I not hear shit?

Thunder pealed, then lightning slashed the sky, and the rain blew in sideways from the shattered windows. The hotel wasn’t a shithole and the breezeway between the two sets of automatic doors could have given an extra sound buffer. Add the fucking storm, all the goddamn noise at that place, and it all probably blended together. Me fighting with the vending machine didn’t help, either.

This had to be Tony’s doing, but why did they take her? Looking over, I wondered if this asshole next to me would make it an hour. Feeling around on his chest, I found a hole through his shirt. At least my woman didn’t go down without a fight. But this shouldn’t have happened at all. I should have taken her inside. Hell, I should have just driven the rest of the way home, but my greedy ass wanted to fuck her into the mattress before I went to sleep, so I decided to stop. Now she was being hauled back to that piece of shit with plans for who the fuck knows. I couldn’t wait to get my hands on him. I was going to go after him eventually, anyway, but he just made his destiny my priority.

Hopefully I wouldn’t be stopped since the clubhouse I was headed to was off the main highway. I shoved the unconscious man to the floorboard so he couldn’t be seen by any passersby, and just hoped my speed and having the windows down in the fucking storm weren’t enough to get me pulled over. I didn’t want to have to kill a cop tonight, but nothing was going to stop me from finding my woman.

The phone rang and it was Hawk. I pressed the accept call button and said, “Did you talk to Knox?” He was the President of the chapter out there. He had been down for Raven’s party, but so many people were there, nobody had any long conversations.

“They’re waiting for you. Keys said a black van pulled into the parking lot not long after you went inside. It happened fast. She was fighting like hell, but she was alive.”

She was alive. Those words would haunt me for the rest of my life if anything happened to her. “Did he see where they headed?”

“He had them for a few but lost them. He’s pretty sure they’re going north. Was anyone tailing you? And you in a fucking tunnel? I can barely hear you.”

I was the one that noticed that kind of shit. Especially with her around. “My windows were smashed. I didn’t see shit. We’d been driving for a while without stopping. I would have noticed.” Wouldn’t I?

“You’re the most observant fucker I know, man. Maybe they had a relay? We’ll see if Keys can figure that out later, but for now, he’s trying to find where they’re going. If he can get a good visual on the tags, maybe we’ll know more.”

“It’s those fuckers from the club we found them at. Some shit happened to her mom a few weeks back. She said someone with a New York accent broke in and asked for Daisy, then put her in the hospital.”

“In that case, I’ll call Petrov. He was working on finding out more. If he knows there’s a direct threat, he’ll move faster.”

“Even if it’s not a direct threat to the club?”

“Fucking with our women is pretty direct. I’ve already ordered her cut, Falcon. Just waiting on you, brother.”

I clenched my jaw. If I was capable of tears, I probably would have shed some then. “Thanks, Prez. Was planning to talk when we got back, but shit hit the fan.”

“We’re brothers first, man. And we all knew. We were just waiting on you to know, you stubborn fuck.”

Running my hand through my hair a few times, I said, “Guess I better find her fast so you can bust my chops.”

“We’ll find her. Let me call Petrov and I’ll be up soon.”

“No, I think you should stay there. Send Eagle and Rooster. I don’t know if they’ll try to get to Lacy or do anything else stupid. Something isn’t adding up. If this was those Jersey fuckers, they found us too easily.”

“Well, Knox said they have your back. I’ll call Petrov and keep you posted. If someone here has a hand in this, they’ll pay.”

We ended the call and I looked over because the man was moaning. It took him a minute of blinking and rolling his head to finally realize where he was. He mumbled, “Fuck,” a few times as he squirmed on the floorboard.

“I don’t know how bad that bullet wound is, so I wouldn’t be moving too much.” His breathing was labored and he grunted a few times as he tried to adjust on the floor. He wiggled into a sitting position and rested his head on the door but didn’t say anything.

“Man of few words. Me too, usually. I like that. But you may as well talk now and get it over with.”

“I’m not telling you shit,” he said with a thick accent.

Bingo. Jersey boy. “We’ll see. Hope you like rock.” I turned the music up to try to drown out the rain, wind, and my bad thoughts.

But as I drove the next hour to our Bristol chapter, visions of Daisy flew through my mind. I tried to hold onto all the good times, but bile rose in my throat as the bad ones kept breaking through. The fear she had in her eyes when I got her out of that place, her running through the woods, the times she broke down thinking I’d push her out on the street like she meant nothing. What would she think now that I let her get taken? Taken by the same fucking asshole that had held her hostage and whored her out. I promised to protect her. Would she ever trust me now?

Hawk called back and I spent the final stretch of the ride talking to him. “Petrov has a good lead on where Romano stays. He’ll keep eyes on ‘em ‘til you arrive.”

“And the van?”

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