Dax (The Theriot Family 4)

I pushed those thoughts away. I had to focus on finding him.

Remington immediately gathered everyone to coordinate a search. He put Blackjack on it and offered to call Beau.

“We’ll find him. There’s no other option.” Remington’s words echoed in my mind. He sounded so certain, but he also had to know how scared I was. When Henri had been kidnapped, Remington had been closer to falling apart than I’d ever seen him. He also knew what I was capable of if I lost control.

An hour later, I was pacing the length of Remington’s house, feeling like I was going to come out of my skin. A knock on the door made me jump. I was way too fucking on edge, but Travis was missing, maybe hurt, maybe being… No. The thought of someone doing the things to him that I did to evil men had me swallowing back bile.

Travis was everything to me.

I heard the door open, then Ambrose’s voice. “Is Dax here?”

I spoke before Remy could answer him. “What did you learn?”

“Not much yet, but LePlatt’s second-in-command is at the warehouse waiting for you to learn everything you can from him.”

“What?”

“I saved him for you.”

“You took him yourself?” Since Ambrose had come back from the desert, he’d mostly stuck to scouting and intel. I’d assumed he didn’t want to be part of takedowns anymore.

“I did, and I’m going with you now. You’ll need someone there to keep you sane.”

Torture had been one of the few things Ambrose and I had never done together. By the time it was clear that was my role, Ambrose was gone. And after he’d come back, he rarely left the bayou.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. You need me.”

As he said it, I realized how much I did. He pulled me in for a hug. “We’ll get him back, and I’ll be by your side the whole time.”

Ambrose didn’t do sentimental. He never had, even as a kid, but this felt damn close.

“Get going, and report back with what you learn,” Remington said as soon as Ambrose let me go.

Ambrose and I didn’t speak as we headed to the warehouse, but we didn’t need to. Something had shifted in the last few days, and our bond felt solid again.

The man Ambrose had captured was chained to a chair. It was clear my brother hadn’t been gentle with him. His face was banged up, and blood trickled from a wound on his neck.

“I wanted to kill him, but you deserve that honor,” Ambrose said. “And you’re the best at making them talk.”

I’d been questioning my role, wondering if I could truly deserve Travis when I was willing to peel back a man’s skin or pull out each of his teeth one by one while I listened to him scream, but doing my job was going to save Travis. I might be a dark, twisted son of a bitch, but there was a purpose to what I did. Travis needed me, and this was how I was going to find him.

“Where is Travis?” I demanded.

“I don’t know anyone by that name.” The man had the fucking nerve to smile at me. That would be the last smile that was ever on his face.

I unzipped my duffle bag and pulled out a long, slim knife. “Let me help you jog your memory.”

It took less time than I’d anticipated to get the information out of him. Just when I started to feel the dark fog taking over, Ambrose knelt in front of the man.

“Jesus. He’s got no fucking stamina.” My twin looked at me and shook his head. “The little bitch wouldn’t even make it through boot camp.”

“So true. At least he’ll never have to find out.” I plunged my knife into the man’s heart, and seconds later, he was dead. I’d gotten what I needed, and I hadn’t lost myself. Travis and Ambrose had become my anchors.

My brother clapped a hand on my shoulder. “Let’s go get your man.”

Travis was being held in the shack where the handoff was set to take place that night. The bastard I’d tortured had told us LePlatt expected an attack, and he’d intended to use Travis to lure us in before he killed him. He’d been alive and unharmed when that fucker had left him there with the men who were going to receive the shipment guarding him.

We’d originally intended to let the sheriff have the local contacts so he could process them and they’d go through a mockery of a trial. They were small-time, but now that we knew they had a part in holding Travis, everyone was going to die. Winston would have to fucking deal with it.

We hadn’t been able to nail down a time the handoff would take place. Our prisoner had told us LePlatt always left that vague and made his pickup men wait. That meant Ambrose, Winston, and I would spend the rest of the day watching from one side of the shack, and Remington and Lance would take up another position.