Total pages in book: 160
Estimated words: 151097 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 755(@200wpm)___ 604(@250wpm)___ 504(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 151097 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 755(@200wpm)___ 604(@250wpm)___ 504(@300wpm)
HUNTER
Two weeks missing…
For two weeks, I’ve been plagued by the same dream of the night Coby disappeared without a trace. A nightmare, really. And no matter how it goes, it always ends the same—with the taillights of a black Denali speeding away with my best friend trapped inside. And when I wake up, I’m haunted by the shadowed outline of the man who’d taken her.
The only cure was to hold off sleep for as long as I could, so I’ve spent every waking moment since she was taken combing the streets for my other half. And whenever I eventually collapsed from exhaustion, I made sure I was too intoxicated to dream.
Like now.
Tipping back my head, I poured the last of the vodka down my throat while a river of fresh tears soaked my face. All around me were pictures of Coby and me scattered all over the floor. They were all hers since she was more sentimental than I, and now I was the one drawing comfort from them, wondering if I’d ever see her smile again.
I’ve been putting feelers out to find out who the hell had taken Coby. I’d only gotten a glimpse of the dark-eyed stranger, but his description and the circumstances were enough to spook anyone who knew anything from talking.
And now there was this anxious twisting in my gut telling me that I’d never see Coby again. None of it made any sense. All the evidence pointed to a targeted attack, but there was only one problem.
Coby didn’t have an enemy in the world.
Coby didn’t, but that didn’t mean the people in her were without them.
My gaze fell over the pile of glossy four-by-sixes until it zeroed in on one of Coby posing with her brother in front of his club before it opened. The picture was taken the day Roshaun got the keys to the building, and Coby insisted on being there to celebrate with him, dragging me along.
“Bitch ass,” I growled at that grinning piece of shit before crumbling the photo in my fist and tossing it away. Picking up my gun that had been resting by my side and stumbling to my bare feet, I spent the next half hour trying to sober up fast. Once I was steady on my feet, I left the apartment I shared with Coby.
“Aye, what’s up with you, Hunter?” Gary greeted me with a smile as I passed him on the stairs. He lived a couple of floors above me and had been trying to fuck for years.
“Not now,” I snapped as I stormed past him.
“Damn, my bad,” he grumbled.
Ignoring him, I jogged across the parking lot toward Deborah, who was parked by the pond overlooking our apartment building. It was the wee hours, so the streets were empty, charging me only ten minutes before I reached the hospital. I’d come the night Coby was taken to question Roshaun about what the hell happened, but the bitch had suffered a pneumothorax and had been surrounded by doctors and nurses in the ICU.
I prayed all night that his ass would die, but he just kept right on living.
I hadn’t returned since that night, but there was no time to kick myself for it. I didn’t even know if he was still here, but I wasted no time parking and rushing inside the hospital.
It took another ten minutes of navigating the hospital maze and a little white lie with the nurse at the desk to find out what room he was in, but then I was walking into his private suite without warning, paying no mind to the startled nurse on the other side of his bed, who was swapping his IV bag.
“Oh!” she gasped when she noticed what I was clutching. “Absolutely not. No, ma’am. You can’t bring that in here!”
“Shut up and stand over there,” I ordered with my gaze fixed on a sleeping Roshaun and my gun pointed at the corner where I wanted the nurse to stand. After a brief hesitation and realizing she’d never get between me and the door in time, she stumbled into the spot I’d pointed out.
The pain meds they had Roshaun on must have been heavy because he was still out of it when I stepped up to his bedside.
“Wake up,” I ordered with zero emotion as I slapped his cheek with my gun a few times.
It took a few minutes for Roshaun to fight off his meds and the initial confusion after a long and deep sleep, but then his gaze widened when he noticed me standing there and felt the muzzle of my Ruger on his cheek. “What the—Hunter?” He blinked at me. “Fuck are you doing here?” His gaze darted around the room, unfocused and hazy. “Where’s Coby?”
Roshaun was one of those types who assumed having a dick between his legs put him in charge. Being ordered around or bested by a woman would strike a huge blow to his pride and damage him more than any physical blow.