Page 105 of My Darling Mayhem

“Which direction did they go in?” That came from Kingston, even though I was thinking it.

Scotty slid his gun onto his back with a thick strap showing over his chest. “They went through the tunnels.”

TWENTY-SIX

WREN

“You looklike you left your heart out there.”

Presley’s words were still echoing around my head after we’d walked to the panic room. We’d found my mom and told her she needed to come in with us, but at Presley’s words, I had searched her face and found a small smile tugging at the side of her mouth.

As if she understood me.

“Taylor is out there, so I’m going back because there is no scenario in which I’d ever let something happen to her.” Presley lifted her shoulder.

She seemed so young, as if she should dart around the corner and grab her book bag to head off to college. Yet she seemed infinitely more mature than me in how she held herself, and how confident she was with her abilities.

I knew what she was offering me, and my heart leapt at the chance. I’d die to keep Cruz safe, but I had already pulled Kane into my heart in a way that made it to where I couldn’t leave him out there. I knew people were out searching, but I had to help as well.

I promised Archer that I would take care of Kane. He worked so hard to protect him; there was no way I could just sit in a panic room while I worried about his fate. So, I walked into the room with my mother and Cruz and saw they had snacks, carpeted flooring, a couch, and a large screen television. They’d be perfectly fine.

“Stay here with grandma, I’m going to find Kane.” I pressed a kiss to his forehead, then felt his little arms come around me.

“I love you, Mommy.”

My eyes burned as I hugged him back and made eye contact with my mother. She pulled something out of a large bag. It looked like the one she’d packed from my house.

“Mi amor, take this, show this man who you are.”

She held out a piece of leather to me, and my heart leapt at the sight of the singed material.

My property patch.

Fresh tears gathered as I stroked over Archer’s name, and the term President’s Wife along the shoulders. Then I slipped the buttery fabric on over my sweater.

Presley appeared again, this time holding out a pair of sturdy boots.

“These might do you a bit better than just your socks.”

I laughed, swiping at my eyes, and followed her out.

Water dripping down the concrete wall near my left side brought me back to the present.

Perhaps this was a crazy idea. I wasn’t trained like she was. I had some muscle memory with the use of a knife, from way back when Manny used to have me practice, but I hadn’t done that in almost twenty years.

I hadn’t even asked why we slipped through a hatch that opened, or why we scaled down a ladder, and began walking down this concrete tunnel that seemed to run under their property. For whatever reason, I trusted Presley. Perhapsbecause she didn’t hesitate to start shooting the men near my son, or the fact that she hugged me when we met. I didn’t know, but I felt safe with her.

“He had to assume we’d have dogs. Any property like ours would. There are too many security checkpoints he made his way through. He also had to have had an insider help him get past the exterior walls. They’re supposed to light anyone up like a Christmas tree if they so much as pass through the first layer of trees. Obviously, that didn’t happen, which means he had help. If they helped with the barrier, then they told him to bring something that would throw off the scent of the dogs or go as far as to tell him about the tunnels.”

Presley talked quietly, and smoothly.

I had so many questions, but I was trying to keep pace with her, and we were moving fast, so I kept my thoughts to myself.

We turned a corner, but not until Presley had scanned it, lifting her gun, like I’d seen on the cop shows. She had perfect posture, as if she’d trained for this a thousand times.

She must have seen me watching because she gave me a quick smile.

“I didn’t have the typical upbringing that other girls had. Not even like Alex or Carter…I was different, always have been. Just took me a while to embrace it.”

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