Page 78 of Loco

If there were even the slimmest possibility she’d pulled it off, I still had time. I still had a chance to catch up, cut them off, ordo something. The not knowing gnawed at me, but it wasn’t going to stop me, it was going to fuel me.

Because if she was out there, and the kids were still breathing, then nothing else mattered. I was going to find them. I’d tear down every wall, every safe house, every rat hole these bastards thought they could hide in. I’d hunt them until there was nowhere left to run.

And if any of them had laid a hand on her or the kids, even a God wouldn’t be able to help them. I was coming with everything I had, everything Iwas, and I wasn’t going to be reasonable. I wasn’t going to play by the rules, I was going to be the nightmare they didn’t see coming until it was too damn late.

And this time, I wasn’t leaving a single one of them standing.

Chapter 25

Roque

The smell of burnt engine oil and crushed drywall still hung thick in the air, but I barely noticed. My ears were ringing with the pressure of everything that hadn’t been said yet—everything I feared was true. My thoughts were spinning in too many directions when Alex and DB approached me outside the house.

They looked grim but focused.

“The driver’s still alive,” Alex said grimly, voice low. “Barely.”

“Neck’s likely broken,” DB added. “Paramedics said they’re stabilizing him, but he’s got abdominal trauma too. Either way, there’s no way to question him yet.”

I nodded once, jaw tight. “Doesn’t matter for now, he was just the transport.”

They exchanged a look, and I knew what they were asking without them saying it.

I gave them the short version. “The guy we’re hunting is calling himself Titian. A top tier in a syndicate we’ve been tracking connected to drugs, property scams, and trafficking. We think he ordered the hit on Kaden Roper and is tied to Romeo Foster. He’s protected and smart and ghosted every database we’ve tried, and we’ve got reason to believe he’s got people on the inside.”

“Like Topper?” DB asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “Topper’s on his way to the hospital with suspected poisoning. Keir and Kai were with me when the call came in about Sayla and the kids, so they’re looking around.”

DB took that in with a slow nod. “How do we help?”

I didn’t even hesitate. “Get my woman and my kids back, and keep an eye on my dogs and the cat.”

Simple. Raw. The only thing I cared about at that moment.

The front lawn buzzed with movement. Uniforms from Piersville PD were fanning out, canvassing the area, knocking on doors, and asking neighbors if they’d seen or heard anything. A few were checking door cams, business surveillance, and anything that might have caught even a sliver of the van or the men involved.

Raul jogged over, phone in hand. “Got something,” he said, a little breathless. “One of the neighbors three doors down had a cam set up across the side yard. It’s not much—bad lighting—but there’s a face.”

He handed me the phone, and I played the clip. It was short and grainy as hell, but there was a side profile. The shape of the face and the way the guy moved tugged at something in my memory.

I called over Keir and Kai. They leaned in, watching closely.

“Looks familiar,” I muttered. “But I can’t place it.”

“Too low-res,” Kai said. “We might be able to clean it up, but not tonight.”

Before I could respond, a familiar voice broke through the tension.

“Well, hell,” Hurst Townsend said, striding toward us like he’d just come from a poker game instead of stepping into a crime scene. “Heard what’s going on. My family’s going to help look.”

I blinked, not sure if I was relieved or horrified. “Hurst?—”

“I’ll text Ned,” he went on, already fishing out his phone. “He’ll have people out combing back roads in twenty minutes.”

My heart sank. The last thing I needed was the Townsend family charging around like a pack of wild dogs amid an already volatile situation.

But then again, they had experience in this sort of thing. Their methods weren’t exactly normal, but they got results, and right now, I needed results.

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