Page 86 of Cohesion

Lucas sighed. “Fine. Like I said, there are paramedics downstairs; we’ll get you checked out. Both of you are to go directly downstairs, do not pass GO, do not collect two hundred. This is a goddamn fuckingburning building,and I do not want to have to babysit you or explain to Mum how I let you get hurt.”He eyed Will. “More hurt. Get out, stay out, and I’ll be in touch later.”

“Are you okay to walk?” Peyton asked, sliding an arm around Will’s waist. He’d carry him down the stairs if he had to.

“I’m seriously fine, Peyton, I promise.”

Peyton wouldn’t believe that until a professional had looked at him.

They didn’t meet anyone else on the stairs. Probably they were the last civilians still inside. Peyton refused to feel guilty about that. He had training in firefighting and extraction, and how long would Will have been stuck there before someone had found him? He was completely justified in his actions, and he would do it again. Even if the building had been engulfed in flames, hestillwould have gone in, for Will.

Peyton reluctantly handed Will off to a paramedic and stepped back while they checked him over. He did his own assessment, listening carefully and ensuring they were doing their jobs properly. He’d seen Felix work; he knew what they needed to be checking for.

Will had come out of it relatively unscathed. A little banged up, with a few threats that Peyton would cash in on later. They’d started the fire two floors down, which, with a quick fire-brigade response, wouldn’t spread all that quickly. If they’d wanted Will to burn before anyone could get to him, they could easily have started the fireintheir apartment. No one was there to stop them. The world had been their oyster while everyone was looking the other way.

Not only that, but they’d had the opportunity tokillWill. He was all but helpless, and it would have taken one bullet in the back of the head to finish it.

Except they hadn’t.

Peyton absently rolled his bottom lip between his thumb and forefinger. This wasn’t an attempted murder. It was amessage.

He pulled out his phone and dialled Sebastian’s number. After six rings, it went to voicemail, Sebastian’s voice telling him to leave his name, number, and a brief message. He didn’t bother and tried Quinn next.

“Peyton?”

“Have you seen Seb?” he asked immediately.

“Not since he left for work. What’s going on?”

“They set fire to our building, then handcuffed Will in the apartment and left him there.”

“What? Is he okay?”

“Paramedics are looking at him now. Other than a cut on his head, he’s not hurt. I find that suspicious, don’t you?”

“It’s not their usual MO and not the escalation I would expect. Did you try Seb’s phone?”

“Not answering.”

“Let me make some calls. Can you contact Jericho, see if he’s heard from his men watching Seb?”

Peyton was already hanging up and putting in the next number.Fuckfuckfuck. Sebastian better be alright, or there wasn’t anywhere in the entire fuckingworldthat these bastards could run to that Peyton wouldn’t find them.

“Where’s Seb?” Peyton asked before Jericho could say a word when he answered. No time for pleasantries. A heartbeat that felt like a lifetime passed.

“With Spencer and Kendrick,” Jericho answered. “They were making a trip to the prison today. They checked in not twenty minutes ago.”

“Do you know if they made it?” Peyton asked.Why was it so fucking hard to get a location for one man that was being watched?

“They would still be enroute right now and have instructions to make contact once they got there,” Jericho said patiently. “Peyton, what’s wrong?”

“Call them. I’m heading that way now,” he said tersely before hanging up. There weren’t a ton of routes that way, and if he checked a map from Sebastian’s office to the prison, he could make an educated guess which direction they’d gone.

Sebastian hummed the babyshark song as he tapped away on his laptop. Every time he paused and then started back up again, Kendrick’s eyebrow twitched. How long would it take for him to explode?

Spencer sat beside Kendrick on the couch, elbow resting on the arm, a knowing smile on his face as he stared down at his laptop. The smile was getting bigger every repeat of the song, and Sebastain bet once he could see teeth, that was when Kendrick was going to lose his shit. They seemed eerily attuned to each other.

The poor detective that Riley had sent over to “help watch Sebastian” was standing ramrod straight near the office door. Henry Campbell. Riley was an asshole and had known what he was doing when he’d sent the baby-faced cop to him. He might be one of Riley’s, but he seemed so goddamn young that even Sebastian hadn’t been able to tell him to fuck off the way he’d wanted to. Had even offered him a seat—seats that he was running out of because his office was becoming a fucking frat house, and if someone sent one more person to “protect” him, he was going to show them exactly why he made prosecutors piss themselves in court.

Sebastian finished the song, pausing just long enough for Kendrick to relax, thinking it was over. He pressed send on his email, moved to the next one, and then started it up again.

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