Page 29 of DFF: Delicate Freakin’ Flower (Family Ties #5)

The Halcyon was all clean lines and glossy windows, with perfectly manicured landscaping designed to distract you from the truth—that you were in the heart of a city where people vanished for far less than what Gabby knew.

Marcus took the corner fast, tires gripping the asphalt, and we slid into the parking garage behind the building with two other trucks following. Eddie pulled in beside us, already talking into the comm device we’d passed out during the drive.

I jumped out of the truck before it had even come to a complete stop, my heart already racing.

Gabby was inside—alone—and still wasn’t answering her phone.

I’d called three times during the drive down: once when we crossed the state line, again twenty minutes ago, and a third time just now, standing in the hotel garage with my pulse pounding so hard it felt like my heart was echoing in my ears.

There was nothing, not even a declined call. And that silence was the part that scared me the most.

“She’s still not answering,” I told Marcus as he popped the tailgate and passed out gear—low-profile earpieces, concealed sidearms, and burner comms with encrypted lines. “If she was okay, she’d have picked up by now.”

“She’s not stupid,” he replied. “But she’s alone, and that’s the part I don’t like.”

“None of us do,” agreed Eddie, falling in beside me. “But we’ve got people moving.”

And we did. The Townsend name wasn’t just a name in this part of the country. We not only had the ranch behind us, but my family had respect and other business ventures.

Our other brothers, Elijah, Jackson, Jesse, and Wes, were already deployed and spread out around the hotel.

Friends from the old crew had either arrived or were in position.

One of them—Kade—had eyes on the lobby. Another, Boone, had slipped into hotel staff clothes to monitor the elevators.

Elijah and Wes were working their way up near the penthouse floors, heading toward the stairwells.

In the room next door to Gabby’s were Jackson and Jesse. They’d gone in about five minutes earlier, using a key card I’d obtained from a desk manager who didn’t ask too many questions and had a clear appreciation for cash.

We had eyes, and we had muscle, but what we didn’t have was time. And that was the one thing keeping my lungs locked tight. I couldn’t hear her voice or see her face, and I had no way of knowing if she was already too deep into whatever trap she’d set for herself.

“She’s not just the bait,” I said aloud, more to myself than anyone else. “She thinks she’s the solution.”

Eddie nodded grimly. “She’s trying to protect you and your family. She thinks walking into this alone is going to end it.”

I scrubbed a hand down my face and stared up at the building’s sleek mirrored windows. “We get in there, and we end it our way.”

We split up. Marcus and Wes took the freight elevator through the service hallway, creeping toward their position.

A quick pulse from Jackson came through the comms, letting me know they were in place.

Jesse was stationed on the other side of Gabby’s room, listening through the shared wall with a directional mic, waiting for the signal to move.

But the anxiety wouldn’t let go. It gnawed at me, a constant, biting reminder of how quickly things could go to hell. All it would take was a handful of seconds for Maddox to walk in, for Gabby to be caught off guard, disarmed, and taken, just like that.

I sent one more call to her phone, jaw locked tight. My heart hammered as I listened to the ringing.

Once. Twice. Still no answer. It just rang until it didn’t, and then it went straight to voicemail.

My grip around the phone tightened so hard I half-expected to hear the plastic casing crack under the pressure. “Hold on, Gabby,” I muttered, my voice low, almost a prayer. “I’m almost there.”

“Fuck this,” Jesse’s voice snapped through the comms. It was followed by the distinct sound of a door splintering under force.

I was already moving, sprinting down the seventeenth-floor hallway, boots pounding against the carpet. I barely noticed the hotel staff stepping aside, their wide-eyed expressions blurring past as I ran full tilt toward Room 1712.

The door was wide open by the time I got there. Jesse stood in the middle of the room, gun raised, his gaze sweeping the corners like he still expected something—or someone—to lunge out at him. He shook his head.

“She’s not here,” he clipped, his breathing ragged.

I shoved past him and stepped inside. Everything was untouched.

There was no chaos, broken glass, or overturned chairs.

Most importantly, there was no blood. The sheets were neatly tucked, the window was closed, and the air still held that crisp, impersonal scent of fresh linen and money.

It looked like no one had been here at all. No fight, no struggle, just absence.

“Shit,” I breathed, scanning the room again. “She planned this.”

Behind me, Marcus stepped in with Elijah on his heels. Jesse was already moving again, checking the closet and the bathroom like maybe he’d missed something. But I knew the truth, and the cold certainty of it settled in my gut like a stone. Gabby wasn't here, and she’d likely gone on purpose.

Wes brought up the rear, his laptop slung over one shoulder and headset hanging loosely around his neck. His frown deepened as he stepped inside, scanning the room and the tension thickening in the air.

“She bailed on her own?” he asked uncertainly.

“She didn’t bail,” Marcus replied, moving to the window and peering out. “She walked out. Probably the same way Maddox came in.”

Jesse gave a half-laugh as he holstered his weapon. “I like her, girl’s got huevos. Straight up.”

“Yeah, well,” I snapped, still pacing the room as the adrenaline refused to settle, “she also walked into something we might not be able to pull her out of.”

That shut everyone up. Then Elijah spoke, his voice quiet but firm.

“Guys.”

He was crouched beside the TV stand, fingertips brushing along the inside edge of a decorative bookend. He leaned in and slowly pulled something free—a pinhole camera, small enough to miss if you weren’t looking for it. He held it up between two fingers.

“Still warm,” he noted. Then, gesturing toward the armchair, he added, “There’s more, she wired the room.”

He passed a tiny recorder to Wes, who was already setting up. His laptop was open in seconds, cords snaking out of his bag as if they knew exactly where to go. He moved with the kind of speed that came from muscle memory, fingers flying across the keys as he worked to sync the data.

The room fell into silence. The only sounds were the soft hum of the laptop fan and the occasional frustrated curse under Wes’s breath as he pieced everything together.

Then the screen lit up, and a grainy video feed flickered to life. It was the room we were standing in now and showed Gabby sitting on the edge of the bed.

Then Maddox entered.

The footage played, and everything in me dropped. My stomach bottomed out, and a thick, sick weight settled behind my ribs.

Jesse sucked in a sharp breath, Marcus swore under his breath, and Wes went pale, visibly shaken as he watched the scene unfold. Elijah said nothing. He stood off to the side with his arms folded, his jaw clenched tighter with every passing second.

“No,” I whispered, stepping closer to the screen. “No, no, no.”

The video kept going. We couldn’t hear the words, but we didn’t need to. The tension between them, the body language, the deliberate pacing of the conversation—it told us everything.

I'd been right when I'd said that Gabby hadn’t been taken. She’d made a choice and walked into it with her eyes open.

And now we had no idea if we’d get her back.

I could see it on her face. The moment it hit her, there might not be a way out. That whatever choice Maddox had given her, it came with a cost she was willing to pay. I saw the shift in her eyes, the quiet resignation, and then, the flicker of resolve.

She wasn’t being taken, she was making a choice.

“She’s sacrificing herself.” Marcus's voice was low and grim. “She’s trying to end it without dragging us down with her.”

“Goddamn it, Gabby,” Jesse breathed, his hands clenched at his sides.

Wes leaned away from the screen like it had burned him. He scrubbed both hands over his face, shaking his head. “This is bad.” His voice was rough. “This is so, so bad.”

I didn’t answer. I just turned on my heel and headed for the door, every step fueled by the roar of blood in my ears.

“Where are you going?” Elijah finally asked, his tone unreadable.

“To find her,” I said without looking back. “To end this.”

Because whatever Gabby thought she was shielding me from—whatever bargain she believed she could strike to keep us safe—she was wrong. She didn’t have to do it alone.