Page 30 of Fighting Shadows

His face is guarded as he regards me.

“He’s found her?” he asks, almost hesitantly.

“He has,”

“Do the others know?” he asks, barely managing to get his words out between choppy pants.

“Hey, are you ok?” I ask him softly, reaching out and settling my hand on his shoulder.

“I-I think I’m…”

“You’re having a panic attack. Breathe in…” I mimic the motion a few times before he copies me, “hold,” I squeeze out around my held breath, “now release.”

He copies the motion three more times until he seems calmer, his shoulders relax, and he stands to his full height.

“Where was she?” he asks me while wiping his sweat off with a towel. He is already walking towards the door.

“Colorado,” I answer.

“Why the fuck would he take her there?”

“From what I can guess, it’s another state, so he had plenty of opportunities to hide on the way there…” Climbing the stairs, I can hear the others moving around, the zippers for our bags opening and closing as we get prepared to get her back. He’s also hiding in a place called Breckenridge, and I’m just guessing here that he thought it was a small enough place that no one would ever think to look there.”

“How are you so calm?” Zander asks me, a hint of annoyance in his voice.

I whirl around to face him, squaring my shoulders.

“Because someone fucking has to be. Atlas is a mess, Dominic has become the fucking angel of death since she was taken, Tobias ran off to look for her leaving us all here to just deal with it, and you have been so far gone in your anger that you were nofucking use. Do you not think I want to fall apart like the rest of you? That my heart isn’t hurting just as much?”

“I didn-”

“No, you didn’t think about it because you’ve all been so caught up in your feelings while I felt like I had to bottle mine up so I could try to look for her while I was stuck here.”

My breathing is ragged as I stare down at one of my best friends; his face slackens and fills with guilt as he looks at me. Before I realize what is happening, he pulls me in for a bone-crushing hug.

“I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry.”

“It’s fine. We’re all feeling her loss right now, so let’s go get her so we can try to be normal again,” I say, patting his back, so he lets go.

“I don’t think any of us are ever going to be normal,” he laughs, pulling away, and we walk back up to the others.

“Nah, but we can try, can’t we?”

Traveling in a car with three other guys is bad enough. Between the bags and all of us being over six feet, there’s barely any room. Add a restless Dominic to the mix, and it's straight-up torture.

“How long until we get there?” Dominic perks up from the back seat, sticking his face through the gap in the middle to the front.

“We have another seven hours,” I tell him, glancing at the GPS to be sure.

"If you pull over and let me drive, I could get us there quicker.”

“You would also get us caught speeding, and then we’d be behind on time. Kelvin doesn’t own that many people in Colorado to get us out of it,” Atlas scolds him, settling his head back against the headrest.

“Fine,” he pouts, crossing his arms over his chest and falling back into his seat with a harrumph.

“Brenn is going to meet us there but has ordered us not to tell Kelvin,” Zander says.

“Is that wise? Not telling her dad that she’s been found,” I ask, feeling uneasy about leaving him out of such a big moment.

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