Page 35 of Dangerous Affair (The Phoenix Three #2)

“I s she planning to stay with you and Harlow tonight?” Liam asked.

Would she need to get her things from his condo?

He rubbed his hand over his chest, right where there was an ache in the vicinity of his heart.

His place was going to feel empty without her in it.

He didn’t have to be there to already know that.

Grayson lifted from the chair. “I think so. Don’t give up hope, Liam. Most relationships experience a bump along the way.”

“Not fond of bumps.” And he wasn’t so sure this was a simple bump. Instead of hearing her, he’d closed his ears to what she’d said from the beginning, thinking he could change her mind. All he’d done was prove her point.

“Hey,” Harlow said as she walked into his office.

She went straight to Grayson, and Liam glanced out the window when she lifted on her toes to give him a kiss. He’d never kiss Quinn again, never wake up next to her again. The sooner he accepted that… He didn’t want to accept it. Maybe she just needed time, and with that time, maybe she’d miss him.

“Is Quinn ready to go?” Harlow asked.

“She’s in the conference room,” Grayson said.

“No, I just looked in there.”

Liam frowned. “I saw her in there, too.” He stood, telling himself not to panic. “She’s around here somewhere.” She had to be. He walked past Grayson and Harlow out into the hallway. “Quinn?” She didn’t answer.

“I’ll look in the bathroom,” Harlow said.

“Where is she?” She wouldn’t take off on her own, would she? Grayson disappeared into his office while Liam’s search for her grew more frantic. She wasn’t in the war room or any other room he checked.

“Liam, come here,” Grayson said.

The urgency in Grayson’s voice had Liam hurrying to his office. “You find her?”

“Unfortunately.”

Liam’s heart dropped to his stomach. What did unfortunately mean? “Where is she?”

“Come look at this.”

He walked around Grayson’s desk. The security camera feed from the lobby was frozen on the screen. “What are we looking at?”

Grayson hit Play, and they both watched as the elevator door opened into the lobby.

Quinn stepped out, and it seemed she was deep in thought.

A minute later, she turned back to the elevator and pushed the button.

Was she coming back up? Hope beat in his heart that she hadn’t been any happier than he with the way they’d left things, and she was coming back to talk.

“Who’s that?” A man was walking up behind her, and Liam frowned when he recognized the face. “That’s Lamott’s deputy. I thought they left.”

“Watch,” Grayson said. “I’ve turned the volume up on the sound.”

When they’d outfitted the building with security cameras, they’d included audio. The deputy stopped behind Quinn, crowding her body.

“We’re going to quietly walk out of here, Miss Sullivan,” he said, startling her.

“One sound out of you, and it will be the last one you’ll ever make.

” The deputy showed her the knife he held.

“Don’t for a minute think I won’t cut you and leave your body for your boyfriend to find if you don’t do exactly as I say. ”

Liam growled. “He’s a dead man.” He stared hard at the screen as the video continued. She should have been safe in their building, but they’d unknowingly invited the devil into their midst. They didn’t have security personnel in the lobby, hadn’t thought they needed it. That was going to change.

“Ow. That hurt,” Quinn cried as she tried to pull away, but the man held on to her.

“The fucker cut her.” When the deputy walked her out of the building, Liam wanted to punch his hands through the screen and snatch her back. “She has to be so scared. I was supposed to protect her, and I let my ego—”

“Stop right now,” Grayson said. “That shit’s not helping her.” He pushed away from his desk.

“Yeah, okay. We need a plan.” He was going to tear the deputy apart with his bare hands when he caught up with them.

“First we have to figure out where he’s taking her.”

“Back to Hope Corner?” Liam said. “We can’t call her phone. If he hasn’t thought to take it away from her, calling her will remind him to do that.”

“Let’s hope she still has it on her. She’ll call you if she gets a chance to.”

“She… Wait, I put a tracking app on her phone.” With the shock of her being taken, he’d forgotten he’d done that.

Thank God he had. He logged into the app.

“Looks like they’re heading toward I-95.

If they go north, then he probably is going back to Hope Corner.

Let’s go. I’ll drive.” He was halfway out of the room when Grayson stopped him.

“Hold up, O’Rourke. You were a Marine Raider. You wouldn’t have gone on a mission with a half-cocked plan.”

Liam fisted his hands as he turned to his friend. “And if it was Harlow in that car? Where would you be right now? I’ll tell you where. Chasing them down, just like I’m going to do.”

“True, and you would have stopped me, like I’m doing now. And I would thank you for it.”

He was right. Liam knew it, but that didn’t mean he liked hearing it. “They’ve got a good thirty-minute head start on us, and the longer we delay leaving, the bigger that lead is.”

“So, we get our helicopter friends to pick us up. I’ll call Brant and put them on standby so they’re ready to go when we are. We need to get Coop in here, too.”

“Let’s hope they’re available. I’ll call Coop while you call Brant.” Somewhat mollified that they’d be able to catch up with Quinn in a helicopter, he got Cooper on the line. “We need you here stat.”

“On the way.”

No question on Cooper’s part as to why they wanted him here immediately. That was what it meant to be on a team, to be a band of brothers who would always have each other’s backs no matter what.

“Bad news on the helo,” Grayson said. “It’s out on a charter. Brant said it’ll be back in three hours, and he can have it refueled and ready to go thirty minutes after that.”

Not what he wanted to hear. “Coop’s on his way in.

” He checked the tracking app. “They’re still heading toward I-95.

Should reach it in about twenty minutes, then we’ll know which way they go.

We’re only an hour behind them now. If we drive, we can make up some of that time, more than waiting three hours for a chopper. ”

“I still think the helo’s our best option.” Grayson headed for the door. “Let’s go in the war room.”

Liam followed him out. “We’ll need transportation when we land if we take the helo. We drive, that problem’s solved.” He couldn’t handle twiddling his thumbs while they waited for the helicopter to return. If they drove, they could leave as soon as Cooper arrived.

Grayson put an aerial view of Hope Corner on the large wall screen. They were studying the map for possible landing sites if they helicoptered in when Cooper arrived. “Sitrep?”

“Quinn’s been taken.” It was hard to even say that without putting his fist through the wall.

“Shit. How’d that happen?”

He brought Cooper up to date. “So, drive or wait for the helo?”

“Drive. We’ll lose another three hours waiting for the helo, then add the time it’ll take to fly us close to Hope Corner?”

Liam nodded. “We take the car, we’re only an hour behind if we leave now.”

“That’s if they’re going to Hope Corner,” Grayson said. “If we take the helo, no matter where they go, we can…” He stared at the aerial view on the screen. “No, you’re both right. We’ll be too far behind taking the helo. We drive. Let’s gear up.”

“Good thing you put that tracker app on her phone,” Cooper said as the three of them were putting enough weapons on their bodies and in their duffel bags to start a small war.

“I agree, because now I don’t have to shoot myself for not doing it.”

As they rode the elevator down, Grayson called Brant and canceled the helicopter. “He said if we need backup, they’ll be on standby.”

Brant and his partner, Zed, were former SEALs who’d served together before opting out of the Navy and starting their security company. They were good people, men who would always have a brother’s back.

Grayson took the driver’s seat, Liam the passenger’s, and Cooper the back. The Range Rover’s 626 horsepower twin-turbocharged V-8 was fast, with plenty of legroom for big men.

It was a car Grayson kept for missions like this. Liam pulled up the tracking app. “They’re on I-95 North. Looks like Hope Corner is their destination.

“Do you think the sheriff’s involved?” he asked.

Grayson passed three slower-moving cars. “I didn’t get bad-guy vibes from him, but he could just be a good actor.”

“I didn’t get any either. The deputy, though, whole nother story.”

“Yeah, I didn’t like him either,” Grayson said.

“When we catch up with them, the deputy’s mine.”