When the phone wakes me up from a deep sleep, I jump in bed and almost fall off the side. Greg is already reaching over and tagging the phone off the side table by the time I have righted myself on the bed and calmed my heart a little.
Jesus, who the hell calls at four in the morning?
“Cage,” I hear him rumble. In a moment of silence, his voice has lost all the rough sleepy sound, and he barks his next words with so much venom, my eyes snap to him in shock. “What. Did. You. Say?”
When he tosses the covers back, throws a shirt in my direction, and starts pulling on his own clothes, I know that this isn’t going to be just a pleasant wake up call. Something is wrong. He would never pull me out of bed like this.
“When?” He barks into the phone, frozen as if turned to stone with his pants only up to his knees, and looks over at me. When I see fear in his eyes, I know that this is not going to be good. “Get fucking over there now, Coop. Call local on the way and figure out what you can. Now, Coop.” He pulls the phone away, and after dropping it down on the floor, walks over to me. “Baby, it’s going to be okay, yeah?”
“You’re scaring me, Greg.” I just look at him and wait for him to spit it out. “Who is it?”
“Coop got a call from the monitoring company in charge of your mom’s security system. You remember the system I put in a few months ago? Wired it straight to our servers so all distress calls get reported to us as well as the local authorities. Shit, baby. Someone pressed the panic button. Coop called me first, but he doesn’t know anything else. Get dressed and let’s make sure everything is okay.”
When I clearly can’t force the moves on my own, he helps me pull on my clothes and guides me out to the truck. We make the trip across town to into the neighborhood where my mom lives in less than ten minutes. When we turn on her street and see her house lit up with all the emergency vehicles surrounding, it my heart stops and I know I’m going to be sick.
“Stop the truck! STOP IT NOW,” I scream and slam my hand over my mouth. He pulls over and stops the car. By the time he makes it around to my side, I have already lost the contents of my stomach all over the sidewalk.
“Baby, stay here and let me go see what’s going on okay?” I know he is trying to do what’s best, but no, that is my family in that house.
“NO! We do this together. I need to know, Greg. I need to know what is happening and I can’t be without you when I find out.”
“Right. Come on, baby, and stay at my side.”
We walk the few feet left between where he pulled over and the police tape begins. I have to fight every instinct in me to keep from running straight for the front door to find my mom and Cohen and make sure they are okay. He looks around for a few seconds until I hear him calling someone over. I don’t hear the words; my eyes focus only on the open front door, watching as a dozen or so uniformed men walk in and out of my mother’s house.
I don’t even realize that I am shivering until Greg pulls me to his side and wraps me in his arms. I can feel his voice against my ear, but I still can’t make out the words. After a few seconds, I feel his body tense and look up into his eyes.
Even in the dark of the night and the odd shadows the flashing lights make on his face, I can tell he has lost all the color in his skin. He looks pale, hollow, and pained.
“What? What is it?”
“We need to get to the hospital, baby.” He looks down at me and I can see it there in his face that he isn’t telling me everything.
“Tell me now, Greg. I can’t take the not knowing.” The tears are already coming quick and I can feel the sobs starting to bubble up. “Tell me now, dammit!” I scream.
“Your mom, baby, she’s been hurt, and we need to get over there.” He’s still not telling me everything. His own tears are starting to fill his eyes, and he blinks a few times, trying to compose himself the best he can. “It’s Cohen baby, he’s—he’s not here.”
I don’t hear anything else after that. I feel my body hit wave after wave of bone chilling cold. I hear Greg calling out my name, and feel him reach out to grab me as my vision dims and my body crumbles.
For what feels like the millionth time, I look over at Melissa, her body curled tightly around her legs, much like the last nine hours. She looks so small sitting here in the stark hospital waiting room. With both her legs pulled up tight against her body, and her arms constricting them in place, she hugs herself, her eyes staring off into the distance, but not seeing anything. I’m not even sure if she is emotionally still here in the room.
Maddox and Coop just left with news I did not want to hear. It looks as if Simon Wagner has reach, even from the grave. The monitoring system that I had installed at Lilly’s house is the best of the best. We had learned a valuable lesson after what we’d gone through with Izzy’s ex-husband a few years ago. Now, there’s a camera on every entry point to her house. When it comes to my family, I won’t take any chances.
Maddox pulled the security footage, and when he found out what happened to Cohen, I was the first person he called. It seems that Susan Wagner hasn’t gone away quietly as we had originally thought. He explained that in the film she is walking up with an unidentified man, and after a few minutes of working on the door, makes her way inside. Things are quiet for about five minutes before he sees her running back out with Cohen in her arms. He doesn’t have to say it but I can tell by his tone that it hadn’t been pretty. I only know that Cohen was awake, alert, and appeared to be unharmed.
That little reassurance is all I have to go on right now.
The man that had entered the house with Susan Wagner had spent another ten minutes or so inside before coming back out. Best guess was that Susan had hired him to take care of Lilly while she snatched Cohen. Coop is monitoring the police scanners but so far, there haven’t been any sightings of them. There is an Amber Alert going out as we speak but we all fear it’s too late to stop her from crossing state lines.
Before they left, they let me know that, after looking into Susan’s background, their best guess is that she is heading west to the Vegas area, the last known location of her sister, Ann.
Lilly has been in surgery for the last eight hours and it isn’t looking good. When Izzy arrived a few hours ago, I set off to get some information on Lilly. I had hoped to offer Melissa some hope, but that thought quickly vanished when I learned how grave the situation was.
She suffered not only a blow to the head, but also multiple stab wounds and several vital organs had been affected. It wasn’t looking good, but I couldn’t give up hope, and I damn sure couldn’t show how much I was dying inside when I needed to be strong for my girl.
The only thing I can do now is make sure I got our boy home.
I walk back over to Melissa and kneel in front of her. Her eyes meet mine but she doesn’t focus until I call her name a few times.
“Beauty, I’m going to make a call right now. Izzy’s going to stay right here with you okay?”
She just looks into my eyes; all the light that is normally shining back at me is gone. Her eyes are flat and her expression locked tight in grief.
“Okay, baby. I’ll be right back.” I lean forward and kiss her forehead, holding my lips there for a few moments before standing. I squeeze Izzy’s shoulder and walk out into the hallway.
There is only one man that can possibly help me now. If Susan Wagner has taken Cohen, threatened my family, and possibly taken my woman’s mother from her life, I will stop at nothing to make sure that I not only get Cohen back, but that Susan fucking Wagner won’t ever be a threat to my family again.
It takes me a few seconds to control myself enough to dial a number I haven’t used in years.
“Breaker.” I hear snap through the line.
“It’s Cage. Break… Neck. Fucking breakneck.” I wait, choking down the ball of worry that threatens to escape. After I lost Grace and took off, I hooked up with Braxxon Breaker out west. His MC club had been on a charity ride and we just happened to cross paths at the right time. After a night of partying, I decided to stick with them for a few days and enjoy the benefits that come with a bunch of bikers. To this day, I know I have a brother for life in Braxxon Breaker, and just because it’s been years, that doesn’t mean he won’t come running with one word.
“Cage, brother. What’s up?” He doesn’t sound pissed that I cut into his time now. Curious maybe, but not angry.
“Cuts me fucking deep needing to make this call, Braxx. Got a situation and it isn’t a situation I can take care of.” There isn’t anything else that needs to be said. He knows what I’m saying without actually saying it.
“Name it, brother.” He says. I hear some shuffling in the background so I wait a second to respond.
“My girl, fuck… there isn’t enough time to explain the six degrees of fucked up I’ve found myself in. My girl’s nephew. The other grandparent took him, snatched him right out of bed, and did not leave anything pretty behind. Her mother is critical and questionable. Best I can find is she took him your way. Braxx, I won’t let anyone hurt what is mine. Never again. This ends.” By the time I get it all out, my control is slipping even more. I manage to sound a whole hell of a lot calmer than I actually am. I can’t lose it, not here, and not before I have Cohen locked tight in my arms.
“Cage, brother, I need you to say what you need from me?”
“I’ll be in Vegas in twelve hours, tops. Got to find my boy and bring him home. I wouldn’t be making this call if I didn’t need you. Turn that shit red, Braxx.” There will be no doubt left when this is done. Susan Wagner will not fuck with what’s mine and walk away clean.
It only takes a second before his deep rumble hits my ear. “It’s done, Breakneck. Headed that way. Dial me again when in Vegas.”
“As soon as I land. Owe you big, brother.” There will never be a way to repay this debt, but I will gladly hand over anything he wants in payment if it means my family is in my arms, whole and safe.
When I hear the line go dead, I make my way back inside and pull Melissa into my arms. We continue to sit there, staring at the door, and waiting for news on Lilly.