Page 65 of Roots of the Wicked

Chapter Twenty-Six

Jax

Once Chase got us into the interior of the yacht, I hopped off him. He sat on the couch and I paced a hole in the beautiful glass-wood floor.

A fucking drone spied on me and Chase as we were having a private moment?

I stopped pacing long enough to glare at him. “I fucked you in the wide open, on the deck of your yacht with a fucking drone lurking in the sky. I thought we were safe from that shit.” I stated the obvious, too dumbstruck to think.

“I know, baby,” he answered.

I dropped onto the couch next to him.

“I don’t want to be a tabloid whore. If you know how to fix this, please enlighten me.” He had experienced this type of situation before and employed fixers who took care of things like this for him.

“I have a few ideas, but we need to head back home.”

“Yes. Back home,” I agreed, talking more to myself. My mind worked at warp speed, but not forming a single logical thought. At home, I had computers and equipment I could use to find out who did this to us.

Amped up on adrenaline and anger, my leg bounced nonstop. Chase took my hand and kissed the back. The level of stress in his eyes mirrored my own.

“A fucking drone, Chase. They were probably recording us the entire time we have been out here. If so, it means we could have at least two sex tapes out by now.”

His eyes grew wide as he stood up from the couch. I followed him to the captain’s wheel.

“We need to return to shore as quickly as possible!” He said in an elevated tone. I had never heard Chase yell in anger, so his sudden outburst had scared the poor man half the death. “Doesn’t this thing have a tracking system? Sonar? Let me see it.” He was never like this. He wanted answers and he wanted them like he was used to getting them in the office.

The captain didn’t appear to know what to do first. Get us the heck back to shore or show Chase the tracking system. I hated to throw a monkey wrench in his idea, but with the kind of tracking the boat had, it wasn’t equipped to locate the drone.

Chase gathered the group of employees and proceeded to question them like a lead detective.

“So, you’re telling me no one noticed a damn drone flying around the boat?”

They all shook their heads.

“No, boss.”

“No, Mr. Taylorson.”

“No, sir.”

Chase remained relentless. He questioned the crew as I paced one second and sat the next, stood and paced again. I personally didn’t think his staff had seen or had anything to do with the drone.

Whoever operated the drone was probably returning it to its home base and based on the type of technology they used, whatever they recorded had likely been downloaded already.

Another slew of curse words spilled from me.

“Fucking, mother fuck, I should’ve brought my fucking devices.” I didn’t even have my cell phone. Chase had requested I leave it all, and I’d foolishly obliged. He had planned for us a quiet retreat from technology and his media stalkers. All we had were a few satellite phones aboard.

Chase and I had managed to avoid the media before now, but his high-tech stalkers were on some next-level shit with that drone. The captain set the boat on a course to return to shore and explained to Chase the tracking on the boat wasn’t designed to hunt a drone.

Chase turned to me. He didn’t have to tell me he was sorry; it was written on his face.

“I apologize, Jax. I promise I will do everything I can to rectify this situation. I’ll sue whoever’s behind this as soon as I find out who the hell it is.”

He drew me into his arms. My body easily melted into his. Unfortunately, my mind remained in a state of upheaval, preferring to troubleshoot ideas to clear the hailstorm threatening my life. My fingers tingled, eager to strike at the keys of a keyboard.

My hold constricted around Chase’s neck. My fist tightened, my nails digging into my palms. “Someone is going to pay. If I find a clue, a picture, a film, or anything that could lead me to them, they are going down.”

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