Heartless Savage (Angels Halo MC Next Gen 7)

His sharp inhale gave me hope that he believed me and I didn’t have to go through the whole “you’re not dreaming or talking to ghosts” thing like I had with Mom, until he spoke again. “I don’t know what sick game you’re playing, O’Brion, but I won’t let you torment my wife like this. I will find you and put a bullet through your heart. Just as you did ours when you took our baby girl away.”

“Daddy, please listen!” I begged, tears spilling over my lashes at the pure agony I heard in his voice, even through the rage. “It’s really me. It’s Nova, your princess. I’m not dead. I don’t know what everyone else is talking about, but I’m in—”

“I said stop!” he roared, making my ears ring. “I’m not going to let you play with my head, O’Brion. Just know I’m coming for you. Soon, you hag. Count your days because they are numbered.”

The phone went silent, and then all I heard was the dial tone since I was on a landline. Blinking the tears from my eyes, I sat back in the chair behind the desk, my heart hurting more than any other body part. My poor parents. I couldn’t imagine the pain they were going through, imagining I was dead.

But if they thought I was dead, Ryan probably did too.

Shit, I had to reach him and make him understand that I was alive. With fingers that shook, I dialed his number again. It rang over and over again before finally going to voice mail. “Ryan, my parents think I’m dead, so I’m going to assume you do too. I swear to you, this is me. It’s Nova. I’m alive. I don’t know how to convince you other than to show you. I’m in Colombia. Please, just come see for yourself. Ramirez took me. And Cali. She’s okay too, so let Garret know. Plus, I kind of need a ride home. I mean…I can’t exactly hitchhike to New York from here.” I tried to tease in hopes of making him at least smile, but my voice broke on the last few words. “Please, Ryan. Just call me back. I love you.”

Dropping the phone into the cradle, I pressed my palm into my forehead, mentally willing him to call me back.

40

Ryan

I stood in the river of blood I’d helped create, but my thirst for vengeance wasn’t satisfied. More than thirty bodies littered the street, but the one person I most wanted dead wasn’t among them. Sheena O’Brion was nowhere to be found, not even in her beloved Ireland, where Garret and I had spent the last two days hunting her down.

We’d lost men of our own along the way, and even then, five of our people were lying among the dead. Garret had a bullet hole in his shoulder after this skirmish, but we were both ready to take on the entire country if that was what we had to do to bring down the woman who had stolen Nova from me.

“She knows where Lis is,” he snarled from where Mom was packing his wound with gauze. Pop was helping her, but he had been silent since the bullets had started flying. If I’d been paying attention, I would have noticed he hadn’t said much since Sheena O’Brion’s name had first crossed Ciana’s lips. We’d all known she was after us—me, especially—we just hadn’t anticipated her going this far. The depravity of what she’d done to Nova was an act of a sociopath. “She knows, and the whore won’t even show her face.”

“We’ll find her,” Mom told him with confidence, putting tape over both sides of the gunshot wound. “Maybe not today or tomorrow or even next week, but we will find that stupid cunt.”

“Is she safe?” Garret mused to himself, not even seeming to feel the pain as Mom continued to tend the wound. The bullet had gone straight through, and Mom said it looked fine—it just needed to be packed, and then it could be sewn up once we got on the jet. “Or is she like…Nova?”

“Don’t think about it,” she advised, her tone hard as we were all reminded of how we’d found my precious angel. “One way or another, we will find your Lis.”

She wasn’t making promises that we would find her whole. The probability of finding Cali dead after so much time had already passed was far greater than finding her alive.

I pulled out my phone so I didn’t have to think about Nova or Cali, and I noticed I had two missed calls from an unknown number, as well as several voice mails. I recognized the country code and quickly lifted the phone to my ear, listening to the messages.

“Ryan, hey.” My knees went weak when I heard her voice saying my name. I stumbled and dropped onto my ass as I clutched the phone to my ear, my breaths coming in harsh pants as I listened.

“I know you are probably losing your mind right now, but you can relax. I’m fine. I swear. Just a little banged up. I don’t want to talk about all this over the phone, so just call me back at this number, and I’ll tell you where I am.” There was a brief pause and then, “I love you.”

Tears blurred my vision and my fingers shook as I started to call her back, but before I could hit connect, another call came in. Seeing it was Jet, I sucked in a deep breath and answered.

“That fucking cunt O’Brion just tried to call and prank Felicity!” he growled in a low, deadly voice as a greeting. “Pretending to be Nova, the sick bitch. I swear, if I didn’t know better, I would have sworn it was my little girl. It sounded just like her. But you all were sure it was Nova that you found up north.”

I closed my eyes. Of course, Sheena was trying to torment us all. She wasn’t done making me suffer.

Defeat filled me. The relief I’d felt at hearing Nova’s voice turned my heart to stone now. She really was gone. I’d seen the body, and even though I’d tried to deny it, even convinced myself that my heart would have actually stopped beating the moment hers had, I knew that wasn’t really possible.

“I bet she used one of those apps to make her voice sound like Nova’s,” Jet muttered. “Felicity is even more torn up than she was when we first got here. The doctor had to sedate her. Find that stupid cunt and bring me her head, or leave this shit to me. One way or another, I will look into her dead eyes and tell her to save me a place in hell because I’m going to enjoy torturing her for the rest of eternity.”

I swallowed the lump in my throat and finally spoke. “Was it a Colombia number?”

I heard him shifting around then his voice filled my ear again. “Yeah, I think that’s the right code for Colombia.”

“Fucking Ramirez.” Maybe I couldn’t get my hands on Sheena yet, but I could deal with Manuel. Perhaps we would even find Cali there as well. Whether that was alive or dead, I didn’t know, but I had a feeling her stepbrother had her. If I’d been thinking clearly, I would have already sent Garret down there with a small army and let him check it out himself.

But with Sheena who the fuck knew where, I needed to take some aggression out on someone.

“I take it you’re on your way to…” His voice drifted off for a moment. “Sweet mother of God,” he gritted out. “We have company.”

I jumped to my feet, causing all eyes to jerk to me. “Who is it?”