Page 99 of Lockout

She dashed off and Taylor sighed loudly. “Dad says I have to wait a few more years before I can have a phone.”

“You have a phone,” Caitlyn said in a soft voice.

Taylor rolled her eyes. “It doesn’t do anything but make calls.”

“It’s for emergencies,” Jenny reminded her.

Taylor nodded, then shot me a glum look. “I don’t care about emergencies, I-”

Jordan’s gasp of shock made all of us focus on where she was looking.

Ruck stood up from where he’d been sitting at the bar, his hand on the gun stuffed into the back of his jeans.

“Don’t. Not unless you want me to give this girlie here a couple more holes in her head,” the man said as he walked Gabby down the stairs.

How had he gotten on the property? Let alone upstairs? There were two more men behind him, their guns trained on us. Everyone froze.

“Let her go,” Ruck growled at the LoS member.

“Yeah, sure,” he jerked his head in my direction. “Soon as she comes with us. Hangman wants to say hello in person.”

“Keely, no,” Gwen gasped when I stood up.

Eva reached out, as if she was going to grab my arm, but she didn’t as her eyes bounced between me and Gabby.

Dani’s eyes were pleading with me not to go with them. But I wasn’t about to let them take, or hurt, Gabby. Not when it was me they wanted.

“Keely,” Ruck said, “you don’t have-”

“It’s okay,” I told him. It wasn’t. My hands were shaking and I was so scared I could barely make my feet work. But I started moving toward them. “Let her go first.”

“No,youcomeherefirst,” he said. They were moving toward the door now, circling and keeping Ruck, Daryl, and Gramps in their line of vision. The other men were all outside. They must have slipped past all the guards in the darkness.

I held up a hand when Isla started to slide toward the right. We couldn’t risk Gabby. Or any of the other children. Plus, Jenny was pregnant. What happened if they just started firing? Almost everyone I loved was sitting in this room right now and I wasn’t going to let anything happen to them.

Isla paused, but I could tell she didn’t want to let me go either. She shook her head slightly.

My gaze told her to wait. They could come after me once they had Gabby safe. That was just fine with me, but until then we needed to follow directions.

“I’m sorry,” Gabby sobbed, tear-soaked eyes meeting mine. “Don’t go. I’m sorry.”

She had no reason to apologize. This wasn’t her fault. It wasn’t anyone’s fault except the men standing there, waiting for me to give myself over to them. And their boss. I stepped close enough that the man had to let go of Gabby to grab me.

“Go,” I told her, urgency making my voice crack.

Before she could run, one of the other men grabbed her.

“No! You said you’d let her go!” I insisted.

“I lied,” he sneered. Then he dragged us out the door.

Turning in the seat,I glanced out the back window. The headlights were still back there. I knew Ruck, Isla, and the other men who’d been left to watch over us were chasing us right now. But the LoS had managed to lose them a couple of times. I wasn’t sure how long they would be able to keep up.

I tumbled into the man sitting next to me as the one driving took a sharp turn into a parking garage. Frowning, I held Gabby’s hand as I tried to figure out what we were doing there. I didn’t bother to ask. These assholes weren’t answering anything, so I’d finally given up.

The men got out of the SUV and the jerk who’d sat in back with us grabbed me. “Get out.” He didn’t bother to let me try on my own, he just started hauling me out like a sack of potatoes.

I fought, not that it did much good without a weapon, but I wasn’t about to let them take us and do nothing. My nails raked his forearm and he let out a growl of pain as blood sprang from the wounds.

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