Page 54 of Claimed By Daddy

“I’ve checked with some contacts,” Nikolai discloses from the backseat. He might usually be our chaos, but right now, he’s calm and collected. Tapping his thumbs against his phone, he continues to type to someone on the other side as he shares what he knows, “Sargsyan has a private jet parked on the eastern hangar strip. There’s no flight plan. The plane is prepped for takeoff. Just waiting for its passengers to arrive.”

“Let’s be real. Even without a flight plan, we know where he’s taking her,” Cillian mutters. “He’s going to fly her out of the country and disappear to Armenia.”

I stare out the window, my jaw permanently clenched as it has been since they took her. Towns whizz by as we race down the interstate. “If they make it into the air, it’ll be near impossible to find her again.” The thought makes me want to vomit. The fact that no one argues only drives home how accurate my statement is.

Nikolai’s eyes are hard and unreadable as he continues to type into his phone. Cillian has a quiet rage simmering behind his silence—murderous even. Damon is in the seat behind me, checking his weapons with quick and efficient movements.

“ETA?” Cillian asks.

“If traffic stays clear, eight minutes,” Gunnar answers.

“They’re only a few miles from the airfield,” I solemnly share, my eyes not leaving the phone screen. “We don’t have eight minutes.”We might not have two.I shove a hand through my hair, gripping hard. My pulse is a fucking jackhammer, every breath razor-sharp. Leaning forward, elbows on my knees, I try to focus through the thunder rattling my skull. All I cansee is her face. Eavan… my princess.The only soft place in my world of bullets and blood. I told her she was safe with me. She trusted me, and I’ve let her down. We all let her down.

“We need to be there in four,” Cillian mutters, eyes narrowed as he glances between the road and the clock on the dash. “Or we might be too late.” Gunnar stomps on the accelerator, and the engine roars as the speedometer creeps into triple-digit numbers.

“Jagger and Hawk are three miles back, following our trail like vultures,” Damon informs us. “They’ll be a few minutes behind us.”

“Too late,” I gripe. “We don’t wait for them. We go in heavy and fast. No time for back-up. We stop the plane and kill everyone who helped make this happen.”

“The plane is a Gulfstream G550,” Nikolai reads Hawk’s text. I don’t know if Hawk has a man on the inside, if he hacked their travel manifest, or if he’s using satellites.And right now, I don’t fucking care where the information is coming from.“Two-man flight crew, both ex-military. Six ground men we can see—two at the hangar doors, four patrolling the jet. Could be more inside.”

“And Eavan?” I ask, unable to hold back the question.

“I don’t know,” Nikolai answers honestly.

My hands ball in my lap. “No survivors,” I growl.

“None,” Cillian echoes, quiet and deadly.

Nikolai asks, “You want to make the call? Or should I?”

“You,” I insist, not knowing if they’re still watching my phone.

He taps on his screen, and Jagger answers quickly, “Jagger.”

“What’s your status?” I ask.

“Not far behind you,” he answers. “We can see you a few cars ahead. What’s the plan?”

Nikolai demands, “Give me a rifle and a vantage point.”

“You’ll get it.” I spin in my seat to face him. “We’ll drop you just off the service road behind the northeastern perimeter. Should give you the line of sight.”

“I’ll take the pilot first.” His tone is flat. “Then the crew. No one flies that jet.”

I nod, leaning back in my seat, adrenaline already burning slow and steady in my veins. “Cillian and I will go in head-on. Damon, you and Gunnar circle around. I want fire from both sides. We squeeze.”

Gunnar grins without looking away from the road. “Love a good squeeze.”

“Jagger and Hawk, you follow at a distance, swing around, and flank from the south hangars. Intercept anyone running. Kill them all.”

“Roger that,” Hawk affirms.

“And Jagger? Hawk?”

“Yeah?” they answer in unison.

“If that plane’s wheels leave the ground?—”

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