Page 41 of Loving Lex

“The fuck?”

I spun and raced toward her apartment, hoping she’d just gotten home, but knowing in my gut that wasn’t the case. I stopped short at her door, standing ajar, that inch of darkness bringing a chill over my entire body. The fog was suddenly gone as my intuition kicked in full force.

My hands balled into automatic fists at my sides as I toed open the door and peered inside. “Shay? Baby? You here?”

Nothing but eerie silence greeted me. My heart sank to my feet, and I had to fight the urge to burst inside like a tornado. Her apartment was still tidy, no overt signs of a struggle, but enough was out of place to tell me there had been one. Things were knocked off her coffee table. A framed print on her wall was askew.

Next to the door, her bag was strewn carelessly in a chair, its contents spilled on the floor. She never went anywhere without that fucking bag.

The metal of my truck keys glinted at me from the floor, and rage laced with panic boiled in my gut. My eyes burned with sick regret. I had been fuckingsleepingright down the corridor.

Blindly, I picked up my keys and turned in a circle, begging for something to make sense.

“Jesus, baby, what happened?” I choked through gritted teeth. I scoured the rest of her small living area. “Where are you?”

I had no idea where to turn. What to think. Who would do this, and why?

On autopilot, I tried calling her again, and my own image lit up on a cracked screen among her things on the carpet.

“Fuck!” I roared, swinging hard, my fist landing in the drywall next to me, the dull ache of my knuckles barely registering.

I knew my rage wouldn’t locate her, but I had no idea... wait. Yes, I did. I raced to her bedroom with a prayer on my lips, even though I’d forgotten how to pray ever since I got thrown from a helicopter and lost the only life I’d ever loved. Now, something I loved more than my own soul was lost, and I’d do anything, give anything, including my faith, to save her.

I scrambled over to her dresser and grabbed her jewelry box. I dumped it over on her bed and began rummaging through the contents.

“Tell me you wore it today, baby. Please...” I begged out loud, hoping against hope she’d worn the cameo necklace that sported a GPS tracker. The club had provided them to all the girls in the wake of the Lady Killer murders.

It wasn’t there. She hadn’t been at work, and I didn’t remember her wearing it by the pool last night, so the odds were slim, but...

Maybe.

I was at my truck in seconds, my phone already to my ear. Lucky answered on the second ring, and I wasted no time filling him in on the situation.

“Okay, brother,” he said, his voice low and serious. Calming. “I’ll relook at all my intel and update Maverick and the team.”

“Thanks, man.”

“Don’t thank me until we get your lady home safe, Lex.” He waited a beat as the gravity of the situation settled on both of us. “You’re heading to see Kane, aren’t you?”

“I don’t have a choice, Lucky,” I said, not even seeing other cars, traffic lights, the road. “It’s my only lead at this point.”

“You could be heading into the lion’s den.”

“Maybe. But I don’t think so.” It didn’t matter. It was my only shot to find her, and I’d play Russian roulette right now if that’s what it took.

“I’ll be in touch soon,” he promised. “And I know I don’t need to say it, but please be careful, brother.”

“I will.”

I did my best to tamp my raging emotions as I burst through the front doors of Kane Enterprises. Surprisingly, the man himself was at the front desk, talking to the receptionist.

The security detail stood at attention, clearly recognizing me, but not clear as to why I was there and not the club. Gideon Kane simply smiled, ending his conversation with his receptionist, and stood straight to face me, his eyes unreadable and dark as always as he took me in. “Mathison,” he intoned, the question buried deep in there.

In my periphery, I saw JD uncoil like a cobra from the corner. Slowly, unhurried, yet still deadly as fuck, his eyes trained on me, his hand on his sidearm as he calculated what the hell I was doing.

“Someone took Shay,” I blurted out.

Kane’s brows furrowed. “Shay?”

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