I don’t think I lost consciousness, but I can’t say for sure. I do have a killer headache and assumed I had a nasty goose egg to go with it. I can’t check because my damn hands are tied to the back of the hard chair I’ve been forced to sit in.

Wishing I had listened to Colton was all I could think as I watched two men chat with each other. They were about twenty feet away and talking in low voices. Low enough that I couldn’t hear what they were saying. I had no idea if they were plotting how they were going to kill me or something far worse. I kept telling myself I could survive this. I was a strong woman. No matter what they did, I would survive.

This was up to me. Colton would look out for himself and his daughter. He had to keep Abby safe. When the man, Frank, had answered my phone and demanded Colton show up, I had hope. That had been hours ago. But Colton never showed and the men who were holding me captive were growing restless. I could feel something was about to happen. I thought about everything I wished I had told my mom. I hated to leave her alone in this world, but I was grateful she had Mr. Peters. He would help her through the grief.

I sighed, looking around the empty warehouse and staring out the windows that were high on the wall. It was getting dark out. I assumed it had to be after seven. That explained why I had to pee so bad. I had been kidnapped ten hours ago and not been given the luxury of a bathroom.

Damn him. Damn my own stupidity for getting mixed up with a guy I didn’t know. I had hoped he would show up and be my cavalry. That hope had slowly been evaporating throughout the long day. He wasn’t coming. Frank had taken a lot of pleasure in reminding me of that fact. Telling me he expected more of his ex-employee. As if any of that mattered. Somehow, I didn’t think Colton was really all that concerned with getting a good job reference from the man.

I closed my eyes, trying to picture myself on a beach, soaking up the sun with a strawberry margarita in my hand. I imagined the smell of the sea and the wind blowing through my hair.

“Hey!” I heard one of the men shout.

I opened my eyes and saw him race out the door. More shouting and what sounded like a gunshot followed by a man screaming.

“Oh shit,” I gulped down the bile in my throat. “Oh shit.”

I wasn’t ready to die. I thought I was, but I was wrong. I began to furiously yank and pull at the restraints cutting into my wrists.

“Please, oh God, please,” I whispered as I struggled to free myself. Whatever was happening outside was bound to spill over inside at some point. I didn’t want to be shot. I didn’t want to be hurt. I wasn’t that brave.

“Jenna!” Colton’s voice snapped my head up.

“Colton?” I croaked, afraid to believe what I was seeing.

He was next to me in a flash, a mean-looking knife stained with wet blood was in his hands and then cutting the ropes that bound me.

“Let’s go. Can you walk?”

Standing on shaking legs that had gone to sleep hours ago was difficult. I did my best to put one foot in front of the other. The blood started to flow the more I moved.

I shrieked when a man came through the door.

“It’s Kevin,” Colton assured me. “You’re okay now. We need to get out of here though.”

I let him pull me across the floor of the warehouse, taking me outside where he began to jog down the road, pulling me with him. His Tahoe was parked in the middle of a cornfield. I shook my head, thinking about how pissed the farmer was going to be.

Colton put me in the backseat before jumping in the driver’s seat and speeding down the road.

“Are you hurt?” Kevin asked, turning to face me from his front seat position.

I reached up and felt my head. I had taken a hit to the face in the struggle and probably had some bruises on my arms from the manhandling, but I felt fine.

“No.”

“Okay, we’ll get you back to the motel and you can get cleaned up,” he said, his voice soft and his eyes kind.

“Cleaned up?” I murmured, looking down at my arms and bare legs. I could see dried blood from some scratches. I didn’t even remember getting those.

“You’ll be okay,” Kevin assured me.

I looked to the rearview mirror. Colton’s blue eyes were cold and dangerous as he looked at me. “Where’s Abby?”

“She’s with Rose at a hotel outside Lincoln.”

I breathed a sigh of relief. “Good. Did you get them all? Is it over?”

I met Colton’s eyes in the mirror again, but he quickly looked away. It was Kevin that answered.

“Not all of them, but we’re safe for now. We’ll deal with Frank later.”

“The men that were at the warehouse, are they—” I stopped, not saying the word.

Colton looked at me. “Yes. It was the only way.”

I leaned my head back against the leather seat, accepting his words for now. I wasn’t a violent person and couldn’t believe I was actually relieved to be in a vehicle with two men who had just killed four other men. If I let myself think about it too hard, I was going to go crazy. I was safe—for the time being. They hadn’t cut off the head of the snake, which told me this wasn’t over. I still wasn’t entirely sure if I was on the right side of this whole thing. I hoped I was, considering that Frank had violently kidnapped me, but it was hard to know anything for sure.

My eyes opened, and I caught Colton staring at me again. “What is going on? Please tell me. I think I deserve to know why I was kidnapped,” I asked, my voice harsh.

He and Kevin exchanged a look. I waited for his canned reply that he would tell me later. Later had come. I wasn’t going to be put off another minute. I wasn’t going to hide out with him and pretend he was my knight in shining armor.

Colton drew in a long, deep breath. “I worked for Frank for a short time back in Boston. I had just done my last fight and wanted a steady job. He asked me to work security for him and offered me a ton of money to do it.”

I nodded my head, encouraging him to keep going.

“Frank is a wealthy man and tends to make enemies. He has security around him all the time, wherever he goes, guarding the big ass mansion he lives in. It seemed like a nice, cushy job with regular hours. He owns a shitload of properties and he isn’t a nice guy to folks that don’t do what he wants. I had only been working for him for about a month when I started to figure out he wasn’t who he said he was. He wasn’t the upstanding businessman who rubbed elbows with some of the city’s most influential people. His wealth hadn’t come legally. I wasn’t sure how to get out of the situation. Then, I saw how evil he really was.”

I held my breath, waiting for him to finish the story, sensing I was about to hear something horrible.

He looked at me in the mirror once again. “One night, we were out at a club. I was on his security detail, but I wasn’t allowed into his inner circle. He had a couple of guys that went everywhere with him, even to the closed-door meetings. Frank and a couple of his guys left the main area. I followed them without them knowing. I wanted to know what they were up to. I guess you could say my curiosity won out and nearly got me killed. I walked in on him roughing a guy up. He ended up shooting him,” Colton said in a dry, monotone voice.

“Oh,” I muttered. “But why does he want you? Or me for that matter?”

There was a long sigh. “Because I witnessed a murder. He saw me standing there like an idiot. Frank wiped his hands and left his guys to take care of the body. I followed him back to the VIP section he had been sitting at and pretended nothing happened.”

“But now you’re running from him. Why? Did he threaten you?” I asked, trying to understand how we had gotten to where we were today.

“I showed up to work the next several days while I figured out what to do. I pretended nothing happened and so did he. Once I got shit figured out and made the plan to move here, I left in the middle of the night. Unfortunately, no one quits working for Frank. You’re either in it for life or your life is cut short. He doesn’t like to leave loose ends. He doesn’t want a witness running around that could threaten to shatter the perfect image he has created for himself. While there are plenty of people in power who know exactly what he is, they look the other way because he donates large sums of cash to their political campaigns and charities. He’s the guy they call when they’ve screwed up and need help getting out of trouble.”

“Why would you ever go to work for a man like that?” I said with disgust.

“I didn’t know. I thought he was the man I saw on the cover of the do-gooder magazines. I had no idea what he was truly like. I took him at face value—a mistake I’ll regret for the rest of my life. However long that may be,” he mumbled.

“And you picked Beatrice, Nebraska to hide in?” I asked, shaking my head at my own dumb luck for hooking up with the one guy that had some serious baggage.

He smiled. “My grandma grew up here. I figured it would be off his radar. I should have been more careful. I hoped once he realized I was gone, Frank would forget all about me. I was wrong,” his voice was grim.

I nodded my head in understanding. He looked at me once again and I could see the regret in his eyes. I actually felt bad for him and what he had been going through. I wished he would have told me early on. It would have made a huge difference. Or would it? I felt a huge weight being lifted from my shoulders. Colton wasn’t a bad guy. I hadn’t fallen for a man with a criminal past. He was the good guy. I wanted to jump up and down, screaming while clapping my hands.

“Thank you for telling me. Although, it would have been nice to know that a little earlier,” I quipped.

Kevin chuckled. “I told him to tell you, for what it’s worth.”

“Thanks,” Colton muttered.

“I wish you had. I would have been more inclined to believe you when you said I was in danger,” I complained.

“I told you.”

I shook my head. “Don’t even start with that. You could have said a lot more. You could have told me you were innocent. Instead, you led me to believe you were some thug on the run.”

Kevin was softly laughing in his seat.

“I’m sorry,” Colton muttered. “You’re right.”

I nodded my head once. “Damn straight I am.”

“We’ll be to the motel in about twenty minutes,” Colton announced.

“I need food. I’m starving,” I complained, beginning to feel human again. The fear and terror at what was to come had taken care of my appetite. Now that I felt relatively safe, I was starving.

“We’ll order a pizza,” Colton offered.

I nodded my head, dreaming about all the pizza I was going to eat. “Better make it a couple and since this is your fault, you’re buying.”

Kevin laughed again, slapping his hand on his jean-clad thigh.

I was glad he was amused. I had had a shit day and wanted nothing more than a cold beer, hot pizza and a bubble bath. I hoped the hotel had one of those big tubs. I was going to soak for hours.