His to Take (Wicked Lovers #9)(123)
Author: Shayla Black

Not wasting a second, Joaquin raced over the man’s limp form, toward McKeevy, now darting fifty feet ahead of him for the red truck. Bailey’s limp body hung over his shoulder, her torso flopping along his back. He’d run too far for Joaquin to get in a clean shot without risking her, especially with dwindling sunlight, but if the crazy separatist got her in the truck and left, Joaquin doubted he’d ever see her alive again.

Planting his feet, he tried to steady his shaking hands. Calm. Focus. Breathe. He lined up his shot and fired—once, twice. From this growing distance, he hit just wide of the moving target.

Thoughts raced. Options dwindled. He’d been tentative with McKeevy to protect Bailey. He had no problem shooting the asshole’s tires.

Altering his aim slightly, Joaquin pointed the gun and fired again. The first shot pinged off the rim. The second seemed to hit its target. McKeevy would make it out of the parking lot, but he wouldn’t get too far without stopping for air or a patch job. Just for good measure, Joaquin fired at the tire again, hitting it. Then he balanced once more, waiting for the moment the asshole would throw Bailey in the truck, then try to climb in himself, leaving his back vulnerable.

Three, two, one . . . As his finger tightened around the trigger of his P229 and he squeezed, the bastard he’d previously shot jumped on his back and wrestled him for the gun. Joaquin fought back with an elbow to the gut and a right hook to the jaw, followed by another shot between the eyes. The hoodied goon fell to the ground, finally dead.

By then, McKeevy was peeling out of the parking lot in the red truck. Cold dread filling him, Joaquin gave chase on foot, but it was too late to keep the madman from stealing Bailey away—maybe forever.

*   *   *

THREE hours later, Joaquin paced the local-yokel sheriff’s station, going out of his fucking mind. He scrubbed a hand down his face, worry eroding his guts like acid. How was Bailey feeling? Was she still alive? Was McKeevy, even now, beginning to tear her delicate body apart?

He couldn’t think that or he’d go homicidal and insane.

“Coffee?” Deputy Williams offered with a sympathetic glance.

“No.” He’d probably puke it up.

As soon as the red truck had disappeared from sight, Joaquin had raced to his own SUV and tried to give chase, but McKeevy and the dead dipshit had already slashed his wheels. Even with the tires on McKeevy’s truck compromised, Joaquin doubted he’d be effective at catching him and Bailey.

Still, he’d tried, but he hadn’t caught sight of them before he’d reached a fork in the road. Though lost and worried out of his mind, he’d refused to give up, exiting the remote, parklike area the same way he’d entered, all the while calling the number for the Philly branch of the FBI as he speeded down the two-lane road.

Still in mid-conversation with the feds, Joaquin hadn’t encountered any sign of the red truck—just a police barricade. He’d been tossed out of his SUV, slapped in cuffs, and thrown in a cruiser faster than he could blink. Every one of his protests and explanations had fallen on deaf ears.

Quickly enough, he found out the waitress in the restaurant had called the sheriff about a shooting. Joaquin provided details and advised them about the body laid out in the lot. LOSS member Andrew Vorhees had perished on the asphalt. Good riddance.

For the past two hours, Joaquin had tried everything possible to prevent being charged with murder and to start a manhunt for Bailey before it was too late. After a few calls from Sean’s end, the police had finally listened to reason and a pair of feds from Philly had entered. They were working through the last of the red tape now and had ruled Vorhees’s death self-defense. Soon, Joaquin would be free.

But McKeevy had three hours’ head start.

“We found the red truck abandoned in an industrial area about five miles from the lake.”

Joaquin let out a curse, trying to hold everything else in. “McKeevy wouldn’t have been prepared to have his tire shot, and he may not have known that he’d be confronting us today, so I’m not sure he would have had a backup vehicle ready. Any reports of stolen cars nearby in the last few hours?”

A deputy tapped a few things on the ancient computer. “A new red Mercedes convertible and a minivan that’s about two years old.”

“He’d take the minivan,” Joaquin assured him. “He’s got a hostage to transport, and he wouldn’t risk fleeing in the flashy-ass convertible.”

One of the feds from Philly—Joaquin couldn’t remember his name, so he’d dubbed the guy Generic Suit Two—nodded. “McKeevy will be heading west. We studied Vorhees’s burner phone. He had a few text messages. He and McKeevy had orders to bring her and Aslanov’s research to the LOSS leadership at their compound in a remote section of Decatur County, Iowa. We’re calling agents in Kansas City and Omaha to see if they can seal off the roads around the compound. But even if he goes there, a barricade may not work. Remember, these are separatists, so they’re survivalists, too. They grow their own food, slaughter their own meat. They’ve also made their own roads and tunnels.”