Page 27 of Rescuing Rebecca
“Lord, save me,” Zander muttered. “I’m surrounded by goons with guns.”
“Goons with guns,” Cody repeated. “That’s fucking awesome. We should make it our slogan and get it printed on matching T-shirts. It’d be like a group bonding thing. We could write it off on our taxes.”
“Hell yeah,” Grant agreed. “We can make it part of our official good guy uniform and wear them under our superhero suits.”
“I think I liked you all better when you were sleeping,” Chase said.
“That’s okay,” Jamie replied. “We liked you better when you were sleeping too.”
“I wasn’t sleeping,” he protested. “I was resting my eyes.”
“Motherfucker,” Zander groaned. “We’re all going to die.”
Grant jumped in before anyone else could get a word out. “Not on this mission, Z-man. Don’t you worry, I’ve got you covered.”
“That’s what we’re afraid of,” came the unanimous response from multiple sources.
“Dickheads,” Grant muttered, sounding slightly offended, and Jay’s grin spread so wide his fucking cheeks hurt.
Christ, he loved these morons.
CHAPTER TEN
After a long night of sitting in front of her monitors, Becca was dead on her feet. Except she wasn’t on her feet. And hadn’t been for far too long. Holy hell, her ass had gone numb. More than usual. Her legs too. Also, her brain.
Beneath her computer desk, she wiggled her toes. Maybe. She tried again. Yep. There they were. Ten little piggies wrapped in fluffy green socks and stuffed into a pair of bear paw slippers.
Like actual-looking bear paws. With two-inch claws and everything.
A gift from Nik last Christmas.
The only gift she’d received.
She stretched her arms over her head, arched her back, and the yawn she unleashed damn near dislocated her jaw while the bright lights of the computer room made her eyes water. A couple of slow blinks later, and her computer screens came back into focus.
Shit. The cursor winked a steady rhythm at the end of the code she’d created. A reminder she forgot to hit the Enter key. Her lip stung as she exhaled hard, and moving at the speed of cold molasses, she dropped her hands and tapped the little plastic rectangle while simultaneously sending up a prayer.
Phase two. Complete. Now she waited for Maya to take the bait.
Her guess? It wouldn’t take long. A day or two. Three tops.
Maya wanted what Becca had. She’d always wanted what Becca had. Didn’t matter what. Or who. From material possessions to affection and attention, her sister had strived to be the one who won it all.
The center of the universe in her own mind, Maya liked it best when the world revolved around her. At home. At school. In private. In public. There’d been no escaping her twin’s relentless envy. Her need to be the best, the brightest, the most desirable followed them everywhere.
Becca couldn’t have cared less. Her sister hogging the spotlight? Just another day in the life of the Barrows family. Until she’d snapped and raped Jay before murdering their parents in a bloody rampage that had shocked an entire nation.
Despite Maya’s fits of jealousy, her mood swings, her constant need for acknowledgment, and insatiable drive to fill a void that didn’t exist, no one had recognized the disturbing escalation of her alarming behavior.
Nobody saw her violent outburst coming. Not their parents. Not Becca. Not Jay.
Seven years.
It’d been seven years since she’d woken up in a hospital bed. Alive. Alone. Adrift in a sea of grief, anguish, and loss. And she’d been playing a game of hide and seek ever since, trying to discover Maya’s location without revealing her own whereabouts in the process.
They both had reasons to stay off the grid. Reasons to avoid detection. Although their motivations had been entirely different. Maya had wanted to dodge a lifetime in prison. Becca had been desperate to send her twin to a federal penitentiary—for the remainder of her days—without coming face-to-face with her attacker.
Which facility? Didn’t matter. So long as her sister remained locked away.
