Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 74062 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 370(@200wpm)___ 296(@250wpm)___ 247(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74062 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 370(@200wpm)___ 296(@250wpm)___ 247(@300wpm)
“It’s okay,” Crow tells me. “He’s here for Mahoney.”
“No.” Mahoney struggles in his restraints. “I’m not going with him.”
“Would you like to die here or back in Mexico?” The stranger asks, his dark glare pinned on the man chained up behind me.
Frustration burns through me because I have no fucking clue who he is, or why Crow and Falcon are willing to let this man take Mahoney. This is our vengeance, not his. “What the fuck is going on?”
“Lucille,” the stranger says as her name rolls off his tongue. His eyes track hers, and it seems she knows who he is. My gut churns as she regards him with a smile.
“Hawk, I need you to listen to me, to trust me,” she says, stepping forward. With every movement, I can see her hands tremble. “This man is here to help us,” she says. “He can bring your sister back.”
I flick my gaze to his. “Is this true?”
“I know where she is, yes. The twins as well,” he tells us, glancing at Crow. “But I need to take Mahoney in. There’s no other way. It will be a swap.”
“Who the fuck are you?”
He pulls out his wallet and hands me a card. Undercover agent. “I’ve been working on this case for almost eight years. It’s the first time we could get Mahoney where we need him, out of prison so we can exact the correct punishment.”
“No, I’m not going with anyone,” the old bastard says, as if he has any choice in the matter. He will do as we please, not as he wants.
“Bring my sister and the twins,” I tell Agent Ramirez. “We will talk.”
Once he’s gone, I know I need to talk to the guys. We need to figure this shit out. I didn’t miss the fact Falcon’s brother wasn’t included in the deal.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CROW
We’re seated in the living room with Lucille between Hawk and myself, and Falcon at her feet. The sight of us all cocooning her has him smiling. He’s the gentle one, mostly. But after what she’s been through, I have a feeling we’re going to want to keep her close for a long while until she’s not shaking like she is right now.
“Tell me what the fuck that was?” Hawk is frustrated. But when Ramirez walked in, I was holding a gun to his head. Shit had gone down, and they were convinced this was Mahoney’s hideout. When I told him we had the bastard chained up downstairs, he called off his team.
“Ramirez is convinced he knows where Molly and the twins are. I don’t know if they’re alive, or if it’s true, but I needed to make the decision. We all did.” I glance at Lucille and Falcon. “If we can get them back, then we’ll hopefully be able to heal our families. Who knows who else he has found. I mean, this could close a case which has been open for years. We don’t know what we’re going to do once we get confirmation it is our siblings, but it’s worth a fucking shot.”
“This Ramirez guy, you trust him?”
“As much as I can,” I tell Hawk. “You know how much I hate cops, agents even more, but if he has intel, I’m willing to listen.” I’m not the biggest fan of any law enforcement. The reason being when my brothers were taken, they didn’t do their job. I believe they could have stepped up more than they did. It’s why we lost them.
“I still don’t like it,” Hawk tells me. “What if he’s here to free Mahoney again?”
The thought did cross my mind. “Which is why I asked for us to be present when they end him.” When the agent explained his reasons for breaking into our home, I needed more than a promise. There had to be substantial reasoning for me to step back and allow him to take the man I spent half my life wanting to kill.
I would have happily gone to prison if I had taken out Mahoney with my bare hands. The satisfaction would have brought me closure. So, I made a deal. I struck it with Falcon and Lucille beside me. I should have waited for Hawk, but I knew he would’ve trusted me. Even if he didn’t trust the cop.
“My father will be taken in by them and will pay for what he did,” Lucille tells him. She’s been through so much today, but the way her eyes sparkle makes my chest ache. She still looks at us, each of us, as if we’re her saviors. When we’re the ones who put her in this fucking mess. If it wasn’t for me, she would never have been in the car with Volkov.
“It’s a chance I’m willing to take,” I tell Hawk.
His gaze flicks to Falcon. He’s the only one of us who doesn’t get his sibling back. Ramirez didn’t mention anything about Falcon’s brother. I can’t imagine how many children these bastards have taken, and I don’t want to think about what they’ve been through in the past ten or more years.