Claimed (Blood Ties Book 6)

He took a step closer, inciting terrifying panic inside me. “Well, Vivienne? When was the last time you bled?”

Tell him.

Tell him right now.

And everything will change. Everything. Will. Change.

“London!” Helene called from across the room, tearing her gaze from her phone and shattering the moment. “We have new intel on a possible location for Colt.”

Heads snapped her way. A pang ripped across my chest as I turned. Everything changed at that moment. London left my side, striding toward her. “Where?”

“They don’t know yet,” she answered, glancing from London to me. “We could finally extract some information from one of the IT chips from the Vault.”

“The Vault?” London searched the room. “You have information from there?”

Only then did I finally look around, to the screens and screens of information flickering across what looked like glass walls. But they weren’t walls, they were some kind of monitors.

“Yes.” She moved to one of them. “And have for the last three years. I’ve had countless IT guys on this, but we’ve never been able to break the code…until now.”

“What changed?” Harper asked.

She answered, reciting some coding information I had no idea about. Still, whatever it was, it rocked Harper where he stood.

“The information,” London growled, bringing them back to the real reason we were here.

“There’s a list of condemned buildings that were purchased by The Order. They range from old slaughterhouses to closed down import/export warehouses. I have three teams working through them now.”

“How long?” he growled.

I stepped closer as she answered. “Five, six hours tops.”

He shook his head, mentally calculating the difference between capturing Hale or hedging our bets on information that may or may not turn up anything. Because we’d been here before, hadn’t we? We’d had information they swore was where The Order was holding Colt. Intel that’d been wrong. Could we risk it now? Right when we almost had Hale?

I glanced at London as he scanned the others, stopping at Carven. “We get this done. Drag Hale back here and extract the information we need, then we’ll know. We’ll know for sure.”

There was relief in Carven’s stare.

Relief I felt to my core.

My hand lowered to my stomach on reflex, drawing my focus.

Soon, I whispered inside my head.

I SHIVERED in the blistering cold, huddled hard against Carven as we waited in the back of the Raptor for the signal to move in. I scanned the darkness outside the vehicle, then glanced at the clock on the dashboard. 8:55.

Five minutes.

“We need to move,” Carven growled.

“Not yet,” London answered. “Not until we get the signal.”

“The timing is critical,” Guild said in front of us in the passenger seat.

“You think I don’t know that?” Carven snapped. “This is my brother’s life hanging in the balance. If we miss this…if we—”

I squeezed his hand. “We won’t.” I met London’s stare in the rear-view mirror. “We won’t miss this.”

“There’s movement.” Harper’s voice cut through the moment, bringing a whole new level of tension. “Headlights are coming this way.”

I turned my head, catching the faint glimmer through the trees lining the river’s edge in front of us. Now? I turned back to London. Do we go now?

“You have your gun, pet?” London questioned softly.

I met his stare, those dark eyes dangerous. Still, I gave a nod.

“Then we move,” London finished.

“Finally.” Carven yanked the handle and shoved out of the car. I slid after him as both London and Guild opened their doors.

Until Harper’s voice came through the two-way once more. “Wait.”

We froze.

Red and blue flashed.

The police?

More lights followed…a lot of them.

“What the fuck is happening?” London barked into the handset.

“Hell if I know,” Harper responded. “Standby.”

Standby? STANDBY?

My pulse was racing. My nerves were shot to hell. I gripped the gun at my side.

Seconds.

That’s where hell waited. In those moments while we waited.

“London…” Harper’s voice cracked through.

London raised the two-way to his lips. “What is it?”

“You’re not going to fucking believe this,” Harper growled. “There’s a fucking news van.”

What?

“That’s it. I’m coming,” London snapped, glancing at the others.

Slowly, we all holstered our weapons. Guild walked around to the rear of the four-wheel drive and opened the door before shutting it once more.

“Here,” he muttered, handing out black windbreakers. “The last thing we need is more attention.”

We all took the jackets, heading to where more headlights filtered through the trees. The bitter cold wrapped around me as I followed Carven between spindled trees with weapons for branches. Headlights burned brighter, but my focus was drawn to the red and blue neon glare that made my panic rise to new heights.

A dark blur headed toward us until Harper’s face came into view. “There’s someone down at the water. The police are here and it sounds like the coroner is on the way.”

“The coroner?” London jerked his gaze to Harper. “What the fuck for?”

“Sounds like they found a body in the water.”

London glanced around. “Jesus fucking Christ. Hale is supposed to be here any goddamn minute!”

“I know.”

London turned away, scanning the cars and the vans that now crowded the edge of the river. He raked his fingers through his hair. “This is a goddamn bust.”

“Not yet,” Carven muttered. “Not while we have those bastard’s Hale needs in our grip.”

But we couldn’t hold them hostage forever. London knew that.

“There’s a body!” The faint words reached us from the riverbank. News crews snapped to attention. The red and blue lights sent sparks in my eyes as that faint voice cried out. “Oh, my GOD. It’s HAELSTROM HALE!”

“What. The. Fuck?” London’s eyes bulged.

We all moved, striding toward the growing commotion. They seemed to come out of nowhere, more news vans, more people.

“Move!” London barged a cameraman out of the way as he readied himself for the story of a lifetime.

“Hey!” the asshole responded.

But none of us cared, stepping down to where the dark water lapped the high river edge. Faint red and blue lights bounced off the surface of the dark water in a moody kaleidoscope. The sight froze me to the spot as the four police officers crowding the edge pulled something toward the bank.

“This can’t be happening.” The words slipped from my lips as they hauled a very bloated body from the water.

All my rage.

All my hate.

Directed at one man alone.

Now I felt…cheated.

“No fucking way!” Carven took a step forward before he turned to London. “So that’s it? HE’S GONE?”

Heads turned toward us.

I clenched my fists, my body shaking with uncontrollable rage. I wanted to launch myself toward them and slap that body across the face. Wake up! WAKE THE FUCK UP! He’s not dead. He can’t be…

“That’s it. It’s over,” Carven whispered. “He’s gone.”

I waited for someone to respond, for them to say ‘the fuck it is!’

But no one did.

“It’s Hale!” A woman cried out behind the detectives as they loaded the body onto a stretcher and hauled it up the embankment. “It’s Haelstrom Hale.”

I didn’t want to look at the body as they came closer, didn’t want to see that same fucking face that haunted my nightmares. But as the two officers headed past us toward the white coroner’s van, I found myself unable to look away.

Not him.

Not him.

I stared, finding the same face I’d seen so many times before. It was him. It was Haelstrom Hale. I turned away as my stomach clenched tight, driving acid all the way into the back of my throat.

No.

I lunged, tearing away from them, and stumbled forward in the dark.

“Vivienne?” London called.

But I couldn’t stop. I had to get away from them as fast as I possibly could. Acid burned in the back of my throat. I fell to my knees, stiffening my arms on the cold ground as I retched.

“Vivienne?” London was right beside me, dropping to rub my back. “Easy now.”

I shook my head as tears came once more. Why the fuck was I always crying? I didn’t want to cry. I wanted to shoot Haelstrom Hale in the head and beat his stiff corpse until my body was as numb as my mind.

Beep.

London’s phone vibrated.

“Fuck’s sake,” he snapped, pulling it from his pocket and answering it. “What now?”

The sharp catch of his breath made me wipe my mouth on my sleeve and turn toward him. London didn’t breathe. He didn’t blink. He stared at me, then said. “You found him? Where?”

My heart lunged. I shoved against the ground, pushing up.

“Jesus,” London croaked and closed his eyes. “Tell them NOT to go in until we get there! DO YOU HEAR ME?”

My emotions plummeted as London turned from me to the others, lowered his phone, and called out. “We have him! WE HAVE COLT!”