Bennett Mafia Read online

  His eyes narrowed. He didn’t move his phone. “You’re lying.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Right. Who’d lie about having diabetes?”

  “Someone who wants to judge how far away we are from her hiding spot.” He smirked again. “And speaking of, why Calgary? You know we have holdings there, right?” His eyes slid up and down my body, lingering on my lips. “Though, I have to say, the woodsy, all-natural look you have going on works for you. Makes me think of embracing some wood too.”

  I felt a flush trailing up my neck.

  What was this? Tanner was flirting? No, this was just his personality. Brooke had talked about how he was a player, even back then. It seemed that hadn’t changed. In a way, it calmed me a little bit, finding something still the same. Something at least sort of familiar.

  But I had to know. Feeling my throat growing raw, I rasped out, “Did you find me for him?”

  Tanner lowered the phone to his lap. His head tilted to the side.

  He didn’t reply, just stared at me for a full minute. He wasn’t going to answer, damn him.

  “My father,” I clarified.

  His eyes widened a fraction of an inch. An emotion flared before he stomped it down. His phone came back up, and his gaze returned to it. “No. Now shut it and chill.”

  “My blood sugar—”

  “You’re not diabetic. You weren’t when you were twelve, and there’s no way you got type 2 since then. Stop insulting my intelligence.”

  Well then.

  I could try the door, jump out of a moving car, and tear through the woods—but that would only work if I could run after I landed. We were moving so fast, it would be useless. They had four fucking vehicles here. Who knew how many guards were in each of them.

  I sat back. I would wait to see who was at the end of this drive.

  That was my only option.

  CHAPTER SIX

  I slept for a while—not sure how long—but we drove for three hours after I woke up before we stopped. I’d been counting and looking around until we pulled into a gas station. There were no other businesses around it, just forest. I had to figure they’d picked this place for that specific reason.

  Once our vehicle stopped, both the guards got out and opened our doors.

  Tanner put his phone away and sighed. “Don’t try anything, Gone Girl.” He gestured outside. “See all those guys?”

  I gulped.

  Ten of them got out of the cars and took up positions around the gas station.

  “They will surround the station so you can walk free in there, but if you try to make a run for it, they’ve been approved to shoot you.”

  My eyes flew back to his.

  He seemed smug. “With that said, have fun peeing. Pick anything you want inside and put it on the counter. We’ll foot the bill.” He whistled as he got out on his side. His door closed, and the guard followed him as he went toward the building.

  The guard on my side was still waiting. My stomach clenched, but I got out too.

  I needed a camera—just one connected online would be enough for Blade to find me. It was past time now that my roommates would’ve realized something had happened to me. They probably looked for my car, which would’ve still been at work, and Blade would’ve sent all the alerts on full blast for me.

  We were trained for situations like this. I just needed to leave a trail of some sort. As I crossed the parking lot (empty except for our vehicles), I spotted a camera at the corner of the building.

  Thank God.

  I raised my head so he could get a positive ID.

  “It won’t work,” Tanner called from the door. He waved to the camera. “They’re offline. It’s why we come here.”

  But there’d be video, at least. Some proof that I’d been here. Blade would find it, eventually.

  I stepped inside, and as if hearing my thoughts, Tanner added, “The whole system was shut off before we even pulled in. We called ahead.”

  He stopped to look over the magazine rack, pulling out an issue of something that had Brooke’s face on the cover

  His mouth tightened. “Go to the bathroom, Riley. I’ll still be here when you’re done.”

  He pulled out his phone, so I went ahead. I felt like collapsing on the toilet.

  They’d taken my phone. I had no clue if they’d taken my bag too or left it behind in my car. I still didn’t really know how far away we were, but they were driving back roads for a reason.

  They were smart, damn smart.

  I left the bathroom, and even though I knew they had guards outside, I poked my head around for any escape routes.

  There were none. The door that led to the rear of the gas station was kitty-corner to the front desk, and three guards stood in front of it. The clerk was a gangly teenager, standing off to the side by the register. Tanner had placed some water bottles, food, and a few other things on the counter, but the kid wasn’t ringing anything up.

  A second later, the bell over the door jingled and an older man entered. He nodded to Tanner and walked around the counter, then did the same to the kid, who looked relieved as he slipped out the front door.

  They’d called in the owner, or the manager. Whoever he was, he moved with purpose and familiarity as he began ringing everything up.

  Tanner looked over as his phone began ringing. “Get whatever you want, Riley.”

  My neck was stiff as I moved toward the beverage aisle. I needed water, food, but I didn’t move far so I could eavesdrop when he answered the phone.

  “Yeah?” A pause. “We are.” Another pause. “Will do.”

  Well, that was informative.

  I shook my head and went to grab everything I needed. I bought a toothbrush, toothpaste, and deodorant, along with water and a couple pieces of fruit, up to the front.

  Tanner moved aside as I put them on the counter. “We have all of that for you where we’re going.”

  “You didn’t tell me that.” I still pushed them ahead.

  It was small, but it was my only way to resist. I didn’t think a toothbrush, toothpaste, and deodorant would break the Bennett bank. They were billionaires.

  The owner/manager didn’t meet my gaze as he rang my items up and bagged everything.

  Tanner said something to one of the guards, gesturing to me. The guard nodded and moved toward me as Tanner went to the bathroom. I realized the guards were slipping into the bathroom through a back door I’d missed. They were coming in and out in pairs.

  They had coordinated all of this to help them as well.

  I went to the front door to wait. Two guys moved with me, and it was eerie how two other guys from outside came to stand near the door at the same time. I knew they were talking into mouthpieces, but it just showed how prepared and professional they were. A whole new level of helplessness washed through me, but a surge of anger came right after it too.

  I didn’t like this feeling.

  My father was powerful too, dangerous, and he’d never had a setup like this. He couldn’t have afforded it. He also didn’t have the need for it. I hated him, but he didn’t have the enemies the Bennett family did. Owning his trucking business wasn’t profitable enough to put him at the billionaire level. Not even close.

  “Okay.” Tanner emerged from the bathroom, putting his phone away as he walked toward me. “We’re ready to go.”

  I spied one of the men handing an envelope to the owner before picking up all the bags.

  I had to admit, I was surprised they didn’t just go in, take what they wanted, and leave. The owner wouldn’t have done anything. No one went against the Bennett family, but he seemed happy as he skimmed through the envelope.

  “Riley.”

  Tanner waited for me outside the vehicle, one of the guards holding the door for me.

  I hurried my pace, then cursed myself for doing that. I could walk the speed I wanted to walk. There was a slight breeze in the air. It was usually in the twenties in June around here, but I shivered. The temperature h
ad dipped lower as the sunlight began to wane.

  SHIT!

  I’d forgotten to look at the time inside.

  I’d been so consumed with thinking of escape routes, then watching how the guards were operating, that I completely forgot. But, thinking back, I had taken a step toward the counter, and two guards had moved to intercept me.

  They’d planned for that.

  It wouldn’t have made a difference.

  There had been no clock in the gas station, or I know I would’ve noticed it.

  My throat started burning.

  They really were prepared for me.

  “How many girls do you kidnap?” I yelled to Tanner.

  He glanced to me before rounding the back of the SUV. I could see him through the windows.

  I snorted as a guard opened the door for me. “Is it a regular thing? Monthly? Bimonthly? Every week? Every few days?”

  I didn’t expect a response as I got inside, but I was expecting Tanner to get in with me. I was going to keep taunting—another small point of resistance, the only thing I had going for me at this point.

  But he didn’t get in.

  His door closed abruptly, and so did mine. My leg had barely cleared the door before it slammed shut, then locked.

  I looked around in alarm. I was the only one in the SUV, but they’d locked me in.

  “Hey!” I banged on the window. My voice was probably muffled, but they could hear me. Or so I assumed. “Hey!”

  No one looked.

  Tanner had disappeared from his side.

  A complete wall of guards came around my SUV, blocking everything except the little I could see through the gaps between their necks and heads. I moved around, trying to get a better look at what was going on.

  I could see Tanner walking toward an empty section of the parking lot. Four guards trailed him, but stood a respectable distance back.

  Something was coming.

  Someone was coming.

  And we didn’t have to wait long.

  Three SUVs sped down the highway and turned into the parking lot, parking in front of Tanner with a swirl of dust.

  I half expected all the doors to open and guards to emerge, since those looked like the same SUVs as we were traveling with. But they didn’t. The only door that opened was the back door of the second SUV.

  Kai Bennett had arrived.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  I hissed to myself as my blood boiled and froze all at once.

  He’d only become more since I last saw him.

  Taller. More good looking. More riveting. More dangerous. More, more, more. And I hated it. That had become more too.

  I loathed him now.

  There was no comparison between Kai and Tanner. Tanner had been the womanizer, the flirt back then, and besides the smirking asshole he was for kidnapping me, there were plenty of hints that he was still those things now.

  But as I looked at the brothers standing across from each other, power dripped from Kai Bennett. Authority emanated from him, even just standing there.

  Every single guard stood an inch taller.

  The tension in the air went up a notch, and I felt it even inside the vehicle. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up, and goosebumps ran down my arms.

  Sunglasses blocked his eyes as he listened to what Tanner was saying, but his eyes flashed in my memory—how dead they’d looked when he told me to leave Brooke alone, right after their father had told her Cord was dead.

  I felt sick to my stomach, and my hand moved there, as if to keep the contents in.

  No one else made my skin crawl with disgust except my father. Kai Bennett and Bruce Bello were cut from the same cloth.

  I should have looked away, if only just to keep from emptying my stomach, but I couldn’t.

  My heart picked up. I felt it pounding in my eardrums, and I tasted bile in my mouth. But still, I couldn’t look away. Resting a hand on the window, I scooted even closer.

  I needed to try to read their lips—beep.

  No. They couldn’t.

  I heard another beep, coming from the front of the car.

  Crawling forward, I heard a third beep. A phone had been left up there. There was a wall and a small window separating the front from the back, but I could get through that window. Feeling it, it moved an inch.

  They hadn’t locked it, but I could see why. It took all of my muscles to get it open that one inch. A fourth beep sent my blood rushing through my body. Adrenaline and excitement filled me with almost a frenzied need to get to that phone.

  I used my entire body to get the window open farther.

  One more inch.

  Goddamn, a fifth beep.

  The phone was in the console, right underneath my fingers.

  I tried again, almost throwing myself backward to get it open a bit more. I didn’t want to rock the vehicle, make them aware of what was I doing, but it worked.

  Shit.

  I felt the SUV tremble, and I paused, glancing over my shoulder.

  The guards remained with their backs to the SUV. The two Bennetts were still talking, neither looking my way. I was safe, for now.

  The window had opened another two inches, more than enough to get my arm inside. Snaking it through, with my face pressed against the window, I reached down to the console.

  I grabbed the phone, my fingers just grazing it. I cupped it and pulled my arm back through the window.

  My pulse jackhammered inside me.

  I was shaking, almost uncontrollably, but as I opened the screen, I nearly wept. No passcode needed. I dialed in a safe number to call.

  A second later, I heard, “411. What is your information?”

  Tears wet my face. “This is Section 8, Hider 96. My location is at these coordinates.”

  There was silence on the other end. They were listening.

  “I’ve been kidnapped by the Bennett family.”

  That was all I needed to say.

  They knew what to do, and no matter where I went now, they would find me. That’s what we did. As soon as I gave them my Hider number, Blade would receive an alert. He’d be listening within a second, and right now, I felt sure he was locating me.

  A minute later, orders should’ve been dispatched to the nearest Hiders, and within five minutes of those notices, they would be in a vehicle, heading for me.

  I only had to wait for them to arrive.

  I knew Blade, and one phone wouldn’t be enough for him. He would use this location to find other phones, and he would ping trackers on all of them. Unless the Bennett family had anti-trackers to mask their signals—which I had never heard of—Blade would track me even if we departed from this location before the Hiders found me.

  “Four Hiders are en route,” said the voice at the other end of the line. “Terminate this number. Erase your steps.”

  Gladly.

  I erased the history of the phone call, put the phone back in the console exactly how I’d felt it placed, and went to work getting that window shut.

  I had it shut minus a centimeter when the guards began moving.

  They parted at my door, and I saw Tanner heading back to me, his head down and his jaw clenched.

  I scrambled to my seat, sitting there as if I’d never moved. My head was down when his door opened and he got inside. I sniffled, wiping the tears away as the other two guards got in their seats.

  I could feel Tanner’s gaze on me.

  No one said a word, and a second later, the SUV started to pull away.

  We were leaving.

  Looking over, I watched the other three SUVs go ahead of us, and as we returned to the road, our pace kicked up compared to the speed we’d been traveling before. The tension I’d sensed outside had come into the SUV with Tanner. He didn’t lounge now, or take his phone out. He sat almost as a guard, except those guys seemed to sit even taller, even straighter, and with their heads back another inch.

  Both guards kept their fingers on their earpieces.

 
We drove for a complete hour like that, until it got dark.

  When we slowed, it was pitch-black outside, except for the headlights.

  We turned onto a gravel road, forest still all around us. We went over a metal grid in the road, then through a gate after that. Moving at a snail’s pace, it was as if we were waiting for something until suddenly, we began moving faster. We hurtled down this narrow gravel road, and I clocked it around two miles before we slowed again.

  This time, we paused before another grand gate, and it opened to reveal a house. The word mansion couldn’t describe it. It was more of a compound. The driveway circled in front of the main house, but there was another house just as big to the right and more buildings behind them.

  My people were out there, but I had no idea how they’d get to me. A hopeless feeling filtered in until, no. I wouldn’t have that. I’d just have to get to them.

  Somehow.

  Then the doors opened.

  It was showtime.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  I didn’t see where the Master of the Bennett Universe went, but Tanner went up the stairs, surrounded by guards. Another two waited for me, and as I started up after him, two more moved in behind me.

  They led me into a grand entryway with white marble flooring. Flecks of gold nestled within the rock, which matched a fountain off to one side. The underside of the fountain shimmered gold as well. A large, white-carpeted staircase circled around, curving upward, and that’s where my guards seemed to be taking me.

  Tanner ignored me, disappearing somewhere farther into the house.

  My guards and I kept going, all the way to the fourth floor and down a long hallway, then up another set of stairs until I felt I was in a whole other wing. We passed through a glass-encased walkway that led us from the main home into the second building, and then up another set of stairs. I tried to keep track of where we were going, but it was getting harder the farther we went.

  They led me into a back hallway that rounded the second home and up one last set of stairs. A granite wall stood in front of us, and a guard pressed his earpiece, saying, “Here.”

  An unlocking sound clicked, and a door opened for us. We went inside, and I knew this was my prison.