Page 122 of Fighting Jacob

“Finish him.” Hank’s voice is a dangerous snarl. “Then go get our girl. Noah is waiting out front.”

My first thoughts are to leave now, but if I leave Curtis conscious, there’s a chance he’ll alert Callum of our arrival before we get there. I can’t let that happen. I have to take him down first.

I’ll try not to enjoy it too much.

I return my eyes to Hank. “If he wakes up, don’t let him leave this cage.”

“I won’t; I promise,” he immediately replies.

As soon as the bell dings, signaling the start of the fourth round, I charge for Curtis. When my fist makes a sickening crunch with his left cheek, shock morphs onto his face a mere second before he plummets onto the mat. I’m on him in a second, punishing him as I plan to punish his brother.

The crowd leaps to their feet, nearly drowning out Curtis’s snarl, “She’s dead.”

If he’s hoping his threat will hinder my onslaught on his face, he’s shit out of luck. I hit him with everything I've got, only stopping when his eyes roll into the back of his head, and the ref is dragging me away from him. He's down for the count, and I'm out of the ring.

I sprint past the spectators screaming my name before darting by the ones still looking for their seats, unaware the fight is over. I run and run and run until I dive through the cracked open door of Noah’s truck. “Go, go, go!”

Noah plants his foot to the floor, rocketing us out of the parking lot with squealing tires and a plume of smoke. I’ve never seen him drive so fast before. He weaves in and out of traffic, pushing his truck to its absolute limit, helping us arrive in Ravenshoe in under fifteen minutes. Adrenaline from the fight is still coursing through my veins—thank fuck—otherwise, I might have crumbled in fear by now. Just the thought of Lola being hurt utterly guts me.

When Noah’s truck mounts the curb at the front of Hank’s Gym, I throw open my door, clamber out, then sprint for the entrance. I stop frozen halfway in when gunfire booms through the silence of the night. It’s followed by a scream I know all too well.

With my heart in my throat, I continue my mission. I beg on repeat for Lola to be safe, for her not to be hurt by the gunfire, but when I scan the gym floor, I’m afraid my worst fear has come true. There’s a body lying on the ground Lola and I wrestle on multiple times a week. It’s not moving.

Chapter Fifty-Nine

Lola

An hour earlier...

* * *

I blink my eyes, clearing my blurred vision. I can't see two feet in front of me, but it doesn't take me long to realize I’m at Hank’s gym. The smell is undeniable.

Just as my vision clears enough to see blobs of color, a voice that forever haunts my dreams trickles into my ears. “She’s here with me, though she can’t talk right now.”

As my memories roll back, I take in my surrounding through blurry eyes. The hardness under my thighs reveals I’m still on the wooden bench Callum demanded I sit on, but the lack of natural light means the low-hanging sun has been replaced with an inky black sky.

I must have been knocked out for a while as it was a little before three when Lydia left. Callum took advantage of the time. My hands are bound in front of my body, and he removed anything that could be used as a weapon to the other side of the room. I could commend him on his smarts if I didn’t hate him so much.

When Callum notices I’m half-lucid, he taps his gun on his lips, demanding I remain quiet before devoting his attention back to my phone attached to his ear. “I won’t touch a hair on her head if you do as instructed.”

My pupils widen when he lowers his gun to my temple before snapping a photo of me with my phone. After a whoosh sounds through my ears, he squashes my phone back to his ear. “Jacob needs to throw the fight. Not in the first round. It has to look legitimate.”

I silently pray for Jacob not to believe a word he says. He’s not like Jacob. He can’t be trusted.

“Then I walk away and leave her as is.” He makes a pop noise with his mouth when he pretends to shoot me. If the smile on his face is anything to go by, he’s been fantasizing about doing precisely that for months. “But if he fails to impress the crowd, I’ll blow her brains out.”

His smirk reveals he intends to follow through on his threat no matter the outcome of the fight. If proof of life wasn’t needed to get Jacob to agree to his plans, I’m confident I wouldn’t still be breathing right now. That’s how unrepentant Callum’s eyes are.

“Once it’s done right, I'll text you her location.”

He just made a huge mistake. I didn’t know Jacob was unaware of my location until now, so I’m more than willing to fix that. I scream with all my might, getting out “Ha—” before Callum silences my screams by pinching the skin between my brows with his gun before disconnecting his call. He stares down at me, his hate unmissable.

“You just went and got your boyfriend killed. If he doesn’t turn up for his fight, he won’t make it out of the stadium. There’s big money riding on him losing tonight, and the men who put it on him aren’t as nice as me.”

When I suck in a sharp breath, the gag in my mouth lodges in the back of my throat. I cough, panicked I’m moments from asphyxiation. My teary response amuses Callum. He watches my struggles with a ghost of a smile cracked on his lips, loving that I’m walking myself to my grave.

My lungs burn in fear when my flaring nostrils fail to suck in the air needed to keep them functioning. I’ve never lacked confidence, but I’m reasonably sure I’m in the midst of a panic attack. No matter how hard my nostrils suck, I can’t get enough air. I feel like I’m suffocating, like I’m literally seconds from death.

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