“Mr. O’Brien, we need to escort you to a safe location.”
Coach and I stop our conversation and eye the unfamiliar man in our locker room. He’s wearing all black, with an earpiece in one ear. There’s a gun on his hip, a radio on his opposite side, and a Kevlar vest strapped over his black shirt.
Coach folds his arms. “And you are…?”
“Security for Mr. Stephen O’Brien, sir. He went to go pick up his stepdaughter and hasn’t checked in within our designated timeframe. It means going through Protocol Orange.” The guy actually looks a little apologetic. “I realize this is half-time, but my orders are non-negotiable.”
“Let me see your credentials,” Coach snaps, glancing at me. “Hockey doesn’t have a fucking half-time, you idiot. We’ve only got one period left. The most important period.”
The man hands over his identification. His neck is getting red.
Coach scans it, then dials some number on his cell. “Mrs. O’Brien.”
I jerk—then realize that he’s calling Aspen’s mother, not mine. I turn away sharply and press my fingers into my eyes. Damn, that hit a little too hard. But then the true realization hits: Dad went to go get Aspen, and neither of them came back.
My stomach sinks.
All thoughts of Aspen leaving me, or choosing to skip the game, goes out the window. There’s no fucking way that my father wouldn’t check in with his security, especially knowing the protocols. Stuff he probably created to keep everyone safe.
Which means it was Aspen’s stalker.
“This is Coach Roake,” he continues. “Can you confirm the security company that your husband employs? Uh-huh. Okay, excellent. Thank you, ma’am.” He hangs up and eyes me. “Well? Go get changed into street clothes.”
I nod and hurry inside, brushing past my friends. Greyson, Knox, and Miles all fall silent when they see me, but my throat is closing. I don’t have words to tell them that something bad happened to my girl.
Something I could’ve fucking prevented if this day had gone any different.
I remove my pads and skates in record time, snatching my phone from my bag and pulling up the tracker.
She’s still at her apartment.
My brows furrow.
That doesn’t fucking make sense.
“Tell us,” Greyson demands.
When I look up, all of the team has cleared out except my three best friends.
So, quietly, I tell them what I just found out. Which is painfully little.
“Listen, if you go with the security, they’re just going to try and keep you safe.”
I nod along, because… well, no shit. And then I see what Greyson’s really driving at: they’re not going to search for my dad or Aspen. They might call the police, or track his phone…
The locker room door bangs open, and two girls storm in.
Violet and Thalia.
The former goes straight to Greyson. He takes her hand and kisses her knuckles, then starts unstrapping his skates.
“Wait,” I protest. “What are you doing? You have a game—”
“A game we’re up by four in,” Miles interrupts. “All the second string goalie has to do is keep the puck out of the net for twenty minutes.” He begins to undo his pads, too.
I watch helplessly as they all start changing, and my gaze goes to Thalia.
“Here,” she says, thrusting the phone at me.
I take it. There’s an open call line, the seconds ticking away.
“This is Steele.”
“Steele,” a man replies. “Cillian Monroe here. I was called away on urgent business to Chicago, which I believed had to do with my brother. However, I’ve now learned that this was a diversion.”
My chest tightens. “What sort of diversion?”
“The sort where he orchestrates an elaborate plan to get Aspen, her mother, and her sisters all in one place.”
I’m going to be fucking sick.
“I’ve been detained in Chicago,” he continues. “Temporary, but definitely my brother’s doing. If you can get out of the city—”
“I can’t. He has her already.”
Cillian swears. “And her mother? Her siblings?”
“Not yet.” I grip the phone tighter. “Please, give me anything you can to help us. I need to get her back.”
And to his credit, he does. He outlines what her father might do or be capable of. That he probably has a weapon.
“The hardest part would be finding her,” he finishes.
“That’s not a fucking problem. Thank you for the help.” I hang up and toss Thalia’s phone back to her.
“Here’s the deal.”
All eyes swing to me.
“I’m pretty sure Aspen is being held hostage with my father… by her dad. A psychotic asshole—I’ll fill you in on those details on the way. They’re either still in the apartment, or he discovered the tracking implant and left it there.” I slide my shoes on and gesture to Thalia. “Keys?”
She holds them out to me.
“Great. Now, you and Violet—distract that security guard. We just need time to get out of the locker room.”
The girls both nod in affirmation. Greyson won’t want Violet anywhere near this mess anyway. I find Miles, Greyson, and Knox all standing at the ready, and take a deep breath. As quickly as I can, I explain the shit I’ve discovered about Aspen’s dad. The people he was tied up with in Chicago, the way even the crime lords wanted him gone, that he did some sick and twisted shit to Aspen when she was a kid. I don’t go into detail about that.
I won’t.
Can’t.
But the rest is free information that might help us figure out who we’re dealing with.
“He might be looking to establish himself here in Crown Point or take Aspen away from here—I don’t know what his goal is, and I don’t fucking care.” I slam my fist into my palm. “She’s mine. No one gets to take her from me.”
“Let’s go,” Greyson says.
He reels Violet in and kisses her forehead, then we all move to the door. The girls slip out first, and their voices drift back toward us. They get softer, and Miles peeks out first. He motions for us to go—so we all book it out into the hallway.
The padding on the floor meant to protect our skates now muffles our footsteps. We get around the corner, and Knox shoves open the exit door. As a unit, we hurry to Greyson’s truck. It’s always unanimous that he drives, mainly because I think he’d have a stroke if he deigned to sit shotgun—or worse, in the backseat—of anyone else’s car.
Unless he had access to Violet, in which case…
I claim the front seat, earning a glare from Knox, and the two brothers hop in the back. Greyson takes off like a shot, but he doesn’t go toward Aspen’s apartment.
“What are you doing?” I’m about ready to yank the wheel.
He gives me an irritated sigh. “I called in reinforcements. We just need to get them.”
“Them?”
Greyson doesn’t say anything else. Not until we screech to a halt in front of the hockey house, and Jacob comes trotting out with a huge duffle bag. He forces Miles to scoot into the middle seat and sets the duffle on his lap.
As soon as the door is closed, we’re off again.
“Anyone know how to shoot?”
I crane around and stare at Jacob. “You’re not serious.”
He shrugs. “Okay, no gun for you.”
Jesus.
“This guy is bad news, right?” Jacob eyes us. “So he’s probably expecting police trouble, if anything at all. Which means we need to think not like the police, and more like…”
“Thieves,” Knox supplies.
Jacob grins. “Yeah.”
He hands me a crowbar from his bag. Fuck knows where he got it, but he seems to have more than one. Knox gets one. He gives Miles a metal pipe. I grip the cold weapon, adjusting to its weight. It’s only a little thinner than a hockey stick.
Greyson parks half a block down from Aspen’s apartment. He holds his hand out for the keys, motioning for us to stay put.
Yeah fucking right.
I ignore him and step out onto the sidewalk, my grip on Thalia’s keys like iron. I tuck the crowbar into the back of my pants. I unlock the door and step into the large entryway. There’s a staircase off to the side, a row of mailboxes, and then their apartment door.
If I had my stuff, I wouldn’t have needed Thalia’s keys. But my set is on my dresser at home, left there like an idiot because I didn’t drive to the stadium.
Jacob, Knox, and Miles are right behind us, walking through the silent lobby. We reach her door, and I stick the key in. Turn it.
There’s no audible click of the lock or the weight of the deadbolt sliding open.
It was already unlocked.
A sinking feeling takes over me, and I slowly open the apartment door. It’s completely dark. As one, we move into the unit. Jacob passes me a flashlight, and I click it on. The brilliant light sweeps across the living room and kitchen. I spot her purse on the kitchen island, balanced on the edge.
Greyson and Jacob go down the hall and split off, checking the two rooms. Miles peers into the bathroom, while Knox sticks by me.
I recheck the app. She should be here.
“O’Brien,” Jacob calls from the entrance of Aspen’s room.
I hurry to join him, and my stomach twists at the sight. Her room has been trashed—her bedspread and pillow are missing, half the clothes torn out of her closet. The bar that we put in her window, to prevent it from being opened from the outside, is on the floor.
“Oh, god.” It slips out before I can stop it.
“Give me your phone,” Jacob demands.
I hand it over without hesitation, staring around at the wreckage.
He fiddles with the app, then nudges me. “The tracking implant has a heat sensor. If it goes below ninety degrees, it sends you an alert. And since it’s still active, it’s still working.”
He hands my phone back.
I stare at it. She’s moved a bit, but the pulsing dot is still here.
My head tips back.
Well, here could be… up, too.
“She’s on another floor.” Holy shit. He’s been here the whole time. “Guys.” I burst back out into the main room with Jacob hot on my heels, and we rejoin the other guys. “She is here. Upstairs. On another level.”
We head back into the hallway and go for the stairs. Miles mumbles something about calling the police, and his brother agrees with him. I think I might, too. Especially since we’re walking essentially unarmed into an unknown situation.
Suddenly, a sound rips through the stairwell. The crack is louder than anything I’ve heard, worse than the sound of a puck hitting the glass during a game. We automatically look at Jacob. His dad is a police chief, after all. He’d know the difference between a firework and…
He nods once, his expression dark.
It was a gunshot.
“We need to call the police,” Knox says. “This is out of our control—”
Jacob grabs for me. Miles might, too. There’s a flurry of motion behind me as I lunge forward, up the steps and out of their reach.
They can call in the fucking National Guard—it won’t be in time to save Aspen.
But I can. And I will.
