Kristen Ashley - Breathe

The air was getting thin.

I used up too much panicking.

I needed more.

I moved the plastic thingie so it covered my mouth and nose and breathed in.

Chace’s words came to me.

Baby, breathe.

My eyes shifted to the note I’d found when I’d stopped panicking, pulled it together, surveyed my close confines, found the flashlight and the tank. It was resting against the wood at my side.

You have four hours. So does he. The phone has minimal charge. No GPS. You’ll have enough time for one call. Use it if you need to say good-bye.

My eyes shifted to the phone they left with me.

Then they closed.

Ella Mae sang in my ear.

I kept my eyes closed.

I felt Chace’s arms around me, his body pressed to mine, our hips swaying.

We were getting married. We were going to build a family.

I held out for twenty-nine years. I held out for Chace. I held out for a hero.

He would find me.

Chace would find me.

Chace

“I don’t know shit, ” Bonar spat, eyes to Chace even though Deck had his limp body held up by his neck.

Chace sucked in breath, looked to his watch and remembered the time the text came through because it was burned in his brain.

Faye had less than three hours.

His eyes moved to Deck. “She has less than three hours.”

Deck pulled back an arm and let fly. When he connected, the blood splattered against the wall behind them.

Chace’s phone rang. He pulled it out and took the call.

“What?” he clipped into it as Deck leaned into Bonar, jerking Bonar to him with his fingers wrapped around his throat and growled something low that Chace couldn’t hear.

“Brother, we’re pullin’ them in and they’re all lawyerin’ up,” Frank said in his ear.

Chace opened his mouth to speak but he heard in the background, “Charge them all with three counts of conspiracy to commit murder and book ‘em.”

Cap was there.

“We don’t have evidence to support that.” Chace heard Frank tell the Cap.

Then he heard Cap mutter from close, “We’ll worry about that later. Charge ‘em, book ‘em and give that to me.” Then Chace had Cap direct. “Son, whatever mess you’re out there makin’, have a mind to me bein’ able to clean it up.”

Disconnect.

If Faye wasn’t running out of air, he would have smiled.

Instead he tipped his eyes to Bonar who was bleeding profusely from his nose, several cuts in his lips and the entire left side of his face was swelling.

Deck was localizing the damage and it looked like it hurt like a bitch.

Bonar’s eyes shifted from Deck to Chace.

“I knew this was the man you were,” he whispered, getting it wrong.

This was exactly the kind of man he was, but a man like Bonar would never understand the reasons why.

“Where is she?” Chace whispered.

Bonar grinned.

Deck shook him and his head flew back and forth like a ragdoll.

When Deck stopped shaking him, Chace repeated, “Where is she?”

“Compartmentalization,” Bonar whispered through another grin.

Fuck, he didn’t know. He might give the order but he would have no idea how it was carried out or maybe even by whom.

Chace felt movement and looked behind him to see Bubba walking into Bonar’s bedroom.

He didn’t delay. “Talked to Krys. Don’t get this but I’ll say what I get fast. Whoever that guy is Faye knows on the computer sent a load of shit. They printed it all out and everyone’s been combin’ through every word and digit. Shambles and Sunny showed. Wendy. Twyla. More. Saw a number that this one,” Bubba jerked his head to Bonar, “called a lot. Traced it to some corporation in Denver. No name. But the dude on the computer has got skills. He locked on that number’s GPS.” Bubba lifted up his phone on which a text was displayed. “And right now, whoever he is, he’s local.”

Chace turned to Deck, jerked up his chin and then moved to the door.

“I’ll be pressing charges,” Bonar called after them and Chace stopped because he felt Deck stop.

“Motherfucker, bring it on. But know this, you call the cops, I’ll see to it that we’re cellmates even if I have to make shit up. You’ve looked into me. You know my skills. Only difference will be, I’ll make it so Chace and me’ll be out way before you,” Deck told him then he delayed no further and followed Chace as Chace left the room.

In his Yukon, Deck at his side, following Bubba who was exceeding the speed limit, fighting the excruciating pain in his chest, the sour in his gut, Deck’s phone rang.

“Yo.” Chace heard then, “Right,” then a beep and, “Phone the texts were sent from, a burner. No shot at GPS.”

Chace sucked in breath.

Then he drove.

Five minutes later, five minutes less of Faye’s air, his phone rang.

He pulled it out, hit go and put it into his ear.

“What?”

“Son, you’ve had them arrested.”

His father talking soft and quiet. Ma was asleep.

“Yeah? And?” Chace clipped.

“I can hardly talk to them while they’re incarcerated.”

“Maybe your lawyer can get word to their lawyers to be smart and start talkin’.”

“I’m afraid they won’t listen. What’s happened tonight, it’s been made clear I’m out of their loop.”

“What?” Chace asked.

“You’re off-limits. Valerie’s off-limits. And when I met Faye, I communicated to them that she was off-limits. I’m alarmed they’ve made this move. It isn’t like them and I knew nothing about it.”

“Well, you makin’ that clear hasn’t been all that helpful, Dad. My life got jacked. Mom doesn’t know it but she was threatened with learnin’ about your perversion. So the people whose asses you’ve been coverin’ haven’t been all that safe. Now, including Faye.”

“I had no idea they were planning to target Faye, Chace. I had no control over the other. Fuller did that to you two,” Trane reminded him.

“You let him,” Chace shot back. “Now, as this isn’t helpin’ things, unless you got somethin’ for me that will, we’re done.”

“You need to talk to Clinton,” he advised.

“Already done. Compartmentalization. You know how he plays it. You got another name for me?”

There was silence then, “I’m not this man, Chace,” he said quietly. “I’m not the man you think I am. The only reason I had that association with Clinton, not to mention the one I was forced to build with most of those men, is because that tape forced me into that association.”

“Bonar’s been on your team for a long fuckin’ time, Dad.”

“When this started happening and we became aware that the others were facing the same thing, we allied and Clinton’s job description was adjusted accordingly.”

“My woman, the woman whose finger I put a diamond on tonight, Dad, has less than three hours of air. You givin’ me this history is not helpin’ her one fuckin’ bit. Now do you have shit for me that might help me?”

“Will the police be at my door soon?” Trane asked back.

There it fucking was.

“Don’t know. Don’t give a fuck. But honestly surprised you aren’t already in custody.”

“Your mother –”

Covering his own fucking ass.

As always.

As fucking always.

Because of that, Chace lost it.

“ My woman has less than three hours of air, ” he thundered into the phone. “This is not about you, this is not about savin’ your ass and this is not about protecting Ma. This is about saving the goddamned life of the woman I fuckin’ love. So do not call me unless you got shit that will help Faye. ”