“Where have you been?” I grilled.

“I came as soon as I could. Can you let us in?” John quipped.

Begrudgingly, I stepped aside to let them in. Jesse made his way to the small dining table Sheldon had positioned in the corner and began to set up.

“I went home first, but when I only found him,” John indicated to Jesse, “I came here next.”

“We received another ransom note. We needed you here hours ago.”

John’s expression darkened as he looked around the room. “Son of a bitch. What did the note say?”

“If Sheldon doesn’t kill Keiran in twenty-four hours, Kennedy will die. Does that sound urgent enough for you?”

“We need that address now,” Keiran ordered. The angry vein in his forehead was beginning to pulse.

“We need to talk, son.”

Kennedy could die soon, and he wanted to talk? “Please, John. Just give us the address.” He turned to me with sad eyes full of regret but no answer.

“What could we possibly have to talk about right this second?”

“Mitch.”

“Yes. I am preparing to blow his head off and bring my niece home. What is there to discuss?”

“Mitch wasn’t the one who took Kennedy.”

“You don’t know that for sure,” I directed to John.

Keiran looked from me to John before pinching the bridge of his nose. “Someone want to tell me what the fuck is going on?”

“Mitch is dying. He has been for the last three years.”

“And you know this how?”

“Because I’ve been keeping him in a cancer facility a few hours away.”

The room chilled noticeably following John’s revelation.

“Come again?”

“Your father came to me three years ago after being diagnosed with a cancerous tumor. By the time he came to me, he was far too weak to take care of himself so I took him to an after treatment facility.”

Keiran was nearly rabid by the time John had finished explaining. “Where?”

“He’s under my protection, Keiran but know this is to protect you, too.”

“Yeah?” Keiran asked. “And who will protect you?”

“Look, the only reason I told you was because I didn’t want to waste the little time we have on a dead end.”

“Bullshit,” Keenan countered. It was the first time he’d spoken since the confrontation began. “If it’s a dead end then give me the address and let me make that decision. You have nothing to lose except your life if you don’t.”

I had never seen Keenan this way before. Threatening people was Keiran’s thing, which made me wonder once again just who it was that returned from California, and could I trust him with my daughter?

Right now, he was part of the hope I held of bringing Kennedy home, and once she was home safe, I would do whatever it took to protect us from him once and for all.

As if sensing my thoughts, he turned to face me, his eyes darkening with each second that passed. He seemed to be sending a silent message, one that I wasn’t too sure I wanted to decipher.

I looked away but not before catching the slow, sinister smile that made him look almost evil.

I could no longer see the person he was. I look at him and all I see is a fallen angel because, in many ways, he is.

“One way or another, we are getting my daughter back tonight,” Keenan announced. “So here is the plan.”

* * * * *

“I don’t feel good about this,” Lake said for the thousandth time as she paced back and forth. The guys minus Dash and Jesse had taken off for a town about three hours away where John had first found Sophia and Keiran.

If I weren't so afraid, I would have laughed at how life could come full circle when you least expect it, but nothing about this night was laughable.

Keenan and Keiran had chosen to go with their gut with only just a few hours left. If they were right, Kennedy would be back in my arms tonight. If they were wrong…

“I feel like I should be doing something.”

“There’s one little detail your boyfriends seemed to have forgotten about,” Jesse quipped without taking his eyes from the computer. He had been silently working on pulling up a satellite feed of the house.

“What’s that?”

“The FBI,” he spelled out slowly. “Has anyone bothered to fill them in?”

“Believe me, they didn’t forget,” Dash stated. “If Kennedy is in that house, then no one involved will be walking out alive. Besides, the FBI hasn’t been too helpful and neither have the private investigators my father hired.”