Page 65

Hadley

“Lady Brittany Christina Pink, I know it’s been a long day for you.

Daddy just went to go get the keys,” I say as I walk up to the open side of the trailer.

She sniffs out and kicks the side of the trailer again, like she’s agitated.

It’s out of character for her; she doesn’t usually mind her trailer.

I peek in and see her white mane, tall stature, ears flicking toward my voice.

“You’re my very best girl, but don’t tell Fergie I said that,” I say, and then click my tongue.

But then, a whirring sound startles me. I take a step back from the trailer, and the sound of the truck trying to start without the engine turning over happens again. I didn’t see or hear Ace come back this way yet.

“You technically do not own this horse, pumpkin,” a voice says as the driver’s side door creaks open. I know that low, slow Kentucky drawl better than anyone, and it makes my hackles rise, forcing me to immediately raise my defenses. He shouldn't be here.

My father slams the door shut and stalks closer to me.

I feel around in my pocket for my phone, but my hands are shaking as I try to press the side buttons and swipe blindly for the emergency alert.

He looks thinner, his hair slightly longer than how he kept it all my life, and it’s the least polished I’ve ever seen him.

“As promised, pumpkin, I’m going to take what’s mine,” he says, holding up a gun and pointing it at me.

My body tenses at the threat, nerves making me shiver as I stagger back.

“Wasn’t referrin’ to you. You proved you’re fuckin’ worthless to me. Thought I’d help myself to this thoroughbred, but the truck doesn’t seem to be cooperating. So I’ll settle for what you took from me.”

Tears start falling, and my throat feels like it’s closing. There isn’t an ounce of love left in my bones for him.

I hear Ace call out my name over the pounding in my ears, but I can’t see him on this side of the trailer.

“Don’t do that.” My father tsks. Waving his gun in my face, he says, “Perhaps he just needs a little bit of motivation.”

I try to think of what I could possibly say that’ll shake him.

“Leave him out of this—” But my plea gets cut off when a loud boom sounds out from behind us, followed by a massive wave of heat.

My body flies forward, hands hitting the pavement first, then my chest just barely stopping my face from colliding with the gravel.

Before I can put together what’s happening, I hear, “HADLEY!” That’s Ace again. And that scream is one of distress.

A response to my husband dies in my throat as I’m shoved back down, and this time, my face hits so hard that it slaps against the surface, and with it comes a biting burn that has me cursing.

With his foot pressed into my back, my father grits out, “You stay right there.”

“HADLEY!” Ace shouts from what sounds closer, but not close enough to see me.

Glass bursts and shards rain down on the pavement, a handful reaching where I’m flat out and face down.

“The truck won’t start,” my father says. “I’m leaving the horse. Come get me.” He pauses, then adds, “You’re done when I say. We have a new deal now.”

I move my head to the side to look at him. He seems in control and calculating, despite the chaos around us. With a phone in his hand, he continues in a biting tone. “Get him in your truck and get here. Now , or I promise, I will kill your brother.”

With my thoughts racing, I try to make out what he’s saying or who he’s even talking to.

I steady my voice the best I can. “FBI and Fiasco PD are probably already looking?—”

His foot and full weight push into me as he leans in, making it difficult to breathe, and seethes, “Fiasco PD and Fire have their hands full. Nobody’s looking for me, Hadley. Now do what you're told for once in your pathetic life and be quiet.”

His words make my eyes water as anger rages within me. I’m shaking from getting slammed against the ground and literally stepped on. Swallowing my panic, I focus only on the anger. I will not let him do this.

The brakes of a truck squeal to a stop next to us, and a false sense of relief hits me as I glance up enough to see a red stripe along the side of the cab. The big, bold letters that read: Fiasco Fire Rescue, and below that: Fire Chief.

“Hawk?” my voice rasps, barely audible for anyone to hear it.

“Quiet,” my father reprimands, shoving me back down just before he rushes for Hawk’s truck.

From the back of the parked truck, my father yanks out a zip-tied and muzzled Governor Hawkins from the back seat.

What the hell? He presses a gun into the governor’s back, moving him into the cab of Hawk’s truck.

I look around desperately, but there’s not a single person around paying attention with the chaos of the explosion behind us.

The governor tries resisting, but my father knocks him on the back of the head with the butt of the gun, his body going limp as my father’s getting him into the back seat.

“Hawk!” I call out this time, but instead of rushing to help, he simply looks at me, eyebrows pinched, and then floors it, just as the sound of more glass blows out behind me.

Jolting, I cover my head with my hands, staying against the ground until I only hear people yelling from a distance.

Panting, I shift my entire body, turning over and pushing myself to sit up.

I blink slowly as I get my bearings, staring down at my hands.

Small cuts are bleeding over embedded pieces of gravel.

When I look up, that’s when I see the fire, and there are people calling out my name. My world stops for a fraction of a moment as I struggle to pull a full breath in— Ace . I don’t hear him shouting for me anymore.

“Ace,” I try to yell, but it comes out pathetically quiet. My legs tremble as I push myself up to stand. There’s blood on my knees and the air licks like an angry wind at the side of my face. “ACE!” I bellow out, dread filling my veins at what could have happened to him.

I turn toward the chaos and see my Mustang—or what used to be my Mustang—engulfed in flames. My father blew up my fucking car?! My head spins with rage and unease as I watch people running around and shouting for their loved ones while smoke billows upwards in a black cloud around us.

“Ace!” I yell out again, a sob catching in my throat as I walk closer to the back of the trailer. Lady kicks at the sides, whinnying. She’s as spooked as I am.

“HADLEY!” is shouted again from the direction of the town green, catching my attention.

As I turn and lean against the trailer, Grant rushes toward me, Linc and Faye not far behind him. The looks on their faces have more tears trailing down my face.

“Hadley? Hadley!” Grant calls out. “Hadley, fucking hell,” he says as he reaches me and moves quickly to help me, looking at the gash along my face.

“Hadley, fuck!” Linc’s beside me seconds later, pushing his brother aside and pulling me into his chest. “Oh, thank fuck.” He holds me close, and it’s enough to have another sob tearing from my chest. Faye stands next to us with Grant, both of them looking around, trying to make sense of what just went down.

Fire engine horns blast loudly as they come barreling down the road, with a series of police cruisers following close behind.

“Holy shit, you scared the life right out of me,” Lincoln breathes out, turning my hands over to examine my bloody palms.

“Where’s Ace?” I ask shakily, tears blurring my vision. “I heard him call my name, but then?—”

“He’s alright,” Grant cuts off my worry. I exhale heavily, my shoulders slumping with relief.

Lincoln removes his glasses and wipes his forehead. “I really didn’t want to have to tell him you were inside that car when he came to. Hawk was helping him over to his truck to wait for a paramedic. Said he must’ve gotten knocked out, but you weren’t with him.”

“How the hell did your car blow up?” Faye asks, brow pinched as she looks over at the flames.

And then registers what Lincoln just said, and my stomach drops to my feet. Relief morphs into bone-deep terror. “What do you mean Ace was with Hawk?”

Grant and Linc glance over to where they’d left their brother.

“Hawk wasn’t helping Ace,” I say in a rush as I look down the blocked-off street and can’t see anything other than red and blue flashing lights and panicked faces.

None of them belong to my husband. “He...He took him,” I tell them, making sense of it.

“The governor was tied up and...” Spotting my phone, I step over to the sidewalk on wobbly legs.

“Hads?” Linc says as I’m calling Ace. Only, it goes right to voicemail, and I just about lose it. “What are you talking about? Who took Ace?” He glances at Grant, who’s watching me now with concern.

“My father was right here. Tried taking my horse, but the fucking truck wouldn’t start. Then my car exploded,” I say with my arms moving wildly, stuttering over my words. “He had the governor, and a gun, and then he got into Hawk’s truck.”

“Your father?” Lincoln spits out.

“Fuck!” Faye barks out, just as she takes out her cell phone.

Grant is studying me, and then looks out over his shoulder. “Let me find Griz. Something isn’t—” he cuts himself off, looking like he just worked something out as he rushes off.

My head pounds as painfully as my heart, the only certainty bringing me any clarity being the fact that I don’t trust a single thing when it comes to my father.

He’s desperate, pissed off, and he wants what he’s “owed.” I’m betting he took Ace to get the payout he needed to disappear.

I don’t know what the hell Hawk has to do with any of this, but he’s involved somehow, and I’m not just going to sit here and hope the monster gets caught.

I’ve already waited and paid for it. I refuse to do it again. I’m done being quiet.