Page 102 of Ruthless Protector

“What do you want? Why are you doing this?” I said, backing up until I was pressed against the wall.

He didn’t answer. Instead, he gagged me with a dirty rag he pulled from his back pocket to stop my screaming, and carried me out of my house, to a waiting car.

As soon as the door shut, the car sped off. I was in the back, pressed against the door, scared out of my mind. My pulse raced so fast I felt dizzy. I sucked breaths in through my nose, desperate for a decent lungful of oxygen, but I couldn’t seem to get enough.

I was pretty sure I was going to pass out.

The last thing I wanted to do was lose consciousness. Not when I had no idea where they were taking me, and not when I didn’t know who was at the other end.

The two assholes in the car with me had been guarding the door at the poker game, which meant I was on my way to meet one of the criminals who sat at that table, someone Trent had obviously pissed off.

I just didn’t know which one.

The black dots dancing across my vison grew bigger as I continued to struggle to get enough air. Then everything went black.

I heard a vicious curse, then…nothing.

25

Willa

As soon as I hit the stairs to Willa’s apartment, I knew something was wrong. Call it a sixth sense or intuition or whatever, but the feeling of something crawling down my spine only increased when I knocked on her door and it swung open, unlatched.

I almost tripped over the rug by the door when I walked in. It was shoved back, half of it flipped over on top of itself. Then I took in the rest of the entrance hall. The table was overturned; the framed picture of Tilly, Willa, and Rebecca that had had sat on top of it, lay on the floor, the glass shattered.

Willa was gone.

As I stormed the rest of the downstairs, calling her name before heading to the floor above, I knew I wouldn’t find her. I fucking knew it. The bathroom door hung at an odd angle, dangling drunkenly from one hinge, the outline of a dirty boot print still on the white painted surface.

I took in the small room, each breath exploding from my lungs, adrenaline pumping mercilessly through my veins, tightening my muscles, as I desperately tried to keep it together. As I tried to piece this together.

She’d run up here, trying to get away. And whoever had pushed their way in the front door, had chased her up here. They kicked in the door, while she stood in here, scared out of her mind, and dragged her from this house.

I shoved my fingers through my hair.

What the fuck was going on?

None of this made sense.

Why would Trent take her? Why would he come for Willa when he had Tilly? When he already had his bargaining chip. He hadn’t even given her time to get his money, hadn’t called with details for the exchange.

No, none of this made any damn sense.

Logic told me Trent had to be involved in this. I moved back through the house, more carefully this time. Two sets of footprints. Two people had come in here, and wherever they’d come from, they’d walked through red-tinged dirt or grease.

What I did know, was if it was Trent, he hadn’t come in alone.

I pulled my phone from my back pocket, while calling on every shred of control, forcing myself to stay focused when I wanted to roar at the top of my lungs and tear this city apart. I needed to lock it down. I needed to do my job, and I couldn’t do that if I lost my shit. I had to be the ex-cop, the P.I. I couldn’t be the man whose woman and kid had been snatched out from under him. I couldn’t be him and stay sane, not if I wanted to save their lives.

I sucked in a rough breath and called Van.

“Yeah?”

“Willa’s been taken.”

Van growled out a curse.

“I won’t lose them,” I said. “I can’t.”