Fatal (Portland Street Kings Book 2) (21 page)

In my shock at Corey just appearing at my house, I miss looking him over and noticing his disheveled appearance and the fear in his eyes.

“Rex left, he got out of his restraints and we can’t find him,” Corey rushes out the words without taking a breath in between.

Lana gasps and then fists her hands and glares at Corey. “Where the hell were you, Corey? You were supposed to watch him.”

“Getting some lunch,” Corey fires back at her furiously. “I was starving.”
 

I hear Slater talking to my left and look over. He’s on his phone talking, “Piper. Where are you? You safe?” Slater pauses and then exhales in relief. “No, it’s okay, we’re all safe. Baby, please calm down, breathe. That’s my girl. Now promise me you’ll stay put at work, okay?” Silence follows and then Slater says, “I love you, too, see you soon.”
 

I’m drawn back to Lana and Corey arguing. “Why the hell didn’t you ring me, Corey? That would have been a lot quicker than driving all the way out here.”

Corey reaches behind his back and we all take a step back and tense. He pulls out a cell phone with a purple case around it. Lana’s phone. “Because you left your phone in Rex’s hospital room.”
 

Lana’s expression turns apologetic. ”Oh. I’m sorry. Thanks for bringing it to me.”

Dom walks over and offers, “I can help you search for him, Corey.”

As if only noticing Dom for the first time, Corey replies with a curious expression, but decides now isn’t the time to ask what he’s doing at our house. “Thanks, Brett. Why don’t you try T.K.’s and the garage? I’ve been to the garage already, but he might have turned up after I left.”

Dom nods as Lana begins to panic. “No, no, no,” while peering down at her phone.

I place my hand on her arm to try and calm her down. “Lana, what is it?”

“Rex is the only other person who knows my phone’s password, and I have a text message on my phone from an hour ago, that I never wrote to Della, asking her where she is. And she replied straight away saying she was at the Save-A-Lot food store in Portland.”

A huge weight hits my chest and I have trouble swallowing.

Lana looks up to me and in a quiet voice says, “He wouldn’t hurt her. Rex won’t...” her voice trails off as does her eyes into the distance.

“What the fuck would he want with her then?” Slater and Dom both ask at the same time, both in furious voices aimed at Lana.

I stand in front of her and with dark eyes I look to both of them and growl, “Back the fuck off.”

I turn to Corey and repeat, “What the hell would Rex want with my sister?”

“I have no idea,” Corey sputters.

“I’m calling Save-A-Lot. Maybe she’s still there,” Pacer announces.

“Fuck,” Slater growls. “Could today get any worse?” He turns to Pacer. “If she’s still there, make sure they tell her we said to stay put inside the store.”

“Got it,” Pacer answers and races inside to use the house phone.

Slater speaks to Kelso next. “Grab my keys Kel, and get
Chevy
out. If Della isn’t already on her way home, I want to follow her home from the store.”

Kel disappears into the house next.

I grab Lana’s hand and spot the fear in her eyes. “It’ll be okay, Dove.”

“Rex wouldn’t hurt her,” she whispers. “But that man who woke up last night, I don’t know who that is, Mack. I’m scared for Della and I’m scared for my brother, too.”

My palms sweat and my heart beats rapidly. Panic begins to set in.

“Lana, what do you mean by
‘that man’?” S
later presses.

I answer for her, “Right now Rex has a huge disconnect between what’s real and what’s going on inside his head. He’s been having psychotic episodes during his withdrawal.”

Slater’s face turns ashen and I swear to God seeing my big brother die a little more inside, every time he thinks he could lose one of us, never gets easier.

Dom begins to pace. He joins his hands and puts them on the back of his head and slumps forward as if trying to stay calm.

“He’s got her. He has to,” Pacer says sprinting out of the house. He comes to a sudden halt in front of us all, breathless, but continues anyway, “Manager says the trolley boy brought in a purse and spilled groceries just over half an hour ago… and it’s Della’s… it’s her license. He said he called the police and he’s still waiting for them to turn up.”

Dom rushes to Corey and grabs the collar of his gray T-shirt and starts shaking him. “Where the fuck would he take her?”

Corey stutters and then his eyes widen and he finally answers, “Train tracks. The bend we used to drink at, down by the Ohio River near Shawnee Park. The last few times we’ve found him there lying on the tracks completely out of it. We’re lucky we made it a few times, trains still go through there regularly.”

Dom drops Corey and he only just catches his balance in time to not fall on his ass.

“I’m gonna fucking kill him this time,” Slater growls and points at Corey and Lana. His face is bright red and his veins are popping out. “He lays a hand on her I’m gonna slice him open from his neck to ass crack, whether he’s fucking sane or not,” Slater’s hysterical yell rings through the air.

I’ve never seen him so out of control. I stretch my arm out in front of Lana, not sure if I’m going to have to hold my own brother back from my girl. Lana’s holding tight to the arm I’m protecting her with, and I can feel her shaking. But is she shaking out of fear for herself or Rex? I don’t know.

Chevy’s
rumble comes up the drive.

“Pace give me the gun.” Slater extends his hand to my brother and Pacer hands it over quickly. Slater checks the clip, takes the safety off and races over to Chevy with Pacer following.
 

I grab Lana’s hand and lead us over to Fang immediately, ready to follow my brothers to find our sister.
 

I’m stopped by a hand on my arm and Dom’s panicked voice asking, “Let me ride with you?”

I nod immediately, not caring to argue about anything right now. My sister’s life could hang in the balance.
 

I sit a shaking Lana in the front seat of my car and Dom jumps in the back. I’m in and starting Fang while Slater speeds out of the driveway and fishtails all the way up our street.
He’s fucking reckless right now.
 

I’m accelerating and catching up to them in no time. My palms are sweating with a slight tremble and my heart’s racing a million miles an hour. This is nothing like racing; I have a sick, ugly feeling in my gut. There’s no peace here on this road today, only a heart-wrenching panic that’s slowly taking hold of my body and mind.

Chapter Seventeen

Lana

Please be okay. Please don’t hurt Della. Please be okay.

The shaking turns to an all-body trembling. Mack reaches across to try and calm me, but I push his hand away. I’m not angry with him. I’m scared for him, for his sister, and I feel a terrible guilt that again it’s my brother who’s possibly hurting their family, but in particular, Della again.

The long back road toward the tracks is empty and we can hear a train’s horn off in the distance. The drivers toot their horns often through these parts to alert any cars crossing roads that a train is close by.
 

Swallowing and breathing become difficult as we come to the bend at the train tracks we all know so well from our childhoods.
 

We spot Della’s car up ahead and Slater swings his car to the side behind her blue Mazda, spitting up rocks and dirt from how quickly he steps on the brakes. I’m forced forward in my seat, the belt pushing against my neck roughly as Mackson makes the same quick stop.
 

We’re all jumping out of the car at the same time and racing over to Della’s car. Slater, Pacer, and Kelso are opening the doors and checking inside, but we can easily tell they find no sign of her.
 

As if everyone realizes at the same time the car is a dead end, we hear a loud screeching. We all look down toward the tracks and the world tilts on its axis.
 

A train horn blasts and I blink, once, twice and then I grab at my stomach, bend and scream with everything I have, all the anguish and terror I’m feeling surges through my body and out my lips. “Rex!”
 

My brother looks toward me as each of the guys begin to sprint toward Della and my brother, my lost and damaged big brother who’s now holding a flailing Della against her will on the train tracks, their bodies facing the fast oncoming train.
 

I can’t breathe. I can’t move. I can’t think.

The blast of the train’s horn sounds…

Once.

Twice.

Thrice.

Right down to the moment it extinguishes the life of my brother and my friend.

Anguished shouts rip through my dry throat, but it’s nothing compared to the pain of the sensation of barbed wire tying itself around my heart as my brother stares death in the face and doesn’t flinch, doesn’t move.
 

I clench my eyes closed unable to watch the demise of my flesh and blood. Della’s screams rip through my body like sharp knives tearing away at my skin. The ear-piercing sound of the train’s screeching brakes seems to stretch on forever.
 

Dirt hits my knees and spots appear in front of my eyes. My trembling fingers touch the earth. I want to grasp something firm to steady myself and stop the painful beats of my heart.
 

My body begins to rock backward and forward of its own accord. “Please God, no. Don’t do this to me. God. Not him, not my brother.” My hoarse voice ends in an inconsolable cry.
 

I dig my fingers deeper into the ground, pushing brutally hard, desperate to feel the dirt under my nails. Praying to endure something, anything other than this unbearable heartache.

Chapter Eighteen

Slater

Indescribable pain slices through my body.

I can’t see anything. Only Della’s face with a blackened background. She smiles, but I know it’s not real. It’s my pain.
 

I’m frozen in fear, but the pain in my chest tells me I’m still breathing, still here.
When she’s not.
 

I sense the stitches holding together my well-kept existence snapping apart.
 

My family was all that kept me together.
 

Chapter Nineteen

Dom

I’m too late.
 

She’s gone.
 

Dead.
 

Bile rises and my knees crash to the ground as the train continues to pass me by at a punishing speed. Wetness coats my cheeks, but I can’t focus or think straight. All I can do is grasp my head in my hands, squeezing my scalp, crushing it with all my strength, begging reality to be full of lies.
 

Agonizing yells surround me. I’m drowning in their sorrow.

Finally, the train comes to a complete stop, and the heat from the wheels finds it’s way to my chest and face.
 

Did Della feel the heat? Did she feel pain? Oh God please, no.

Abruptly and without warning I look up into the sky and a mighty scream rips from my mouth. I can physically feel the veins on my face near popping pressure.
 

All of a sudden I hear chatter and look at the train to see people in the windows staring down at me, confusion and sadness coating their features.

I glance over my shoulder and I spot Mack standing with his mouth hanging wide open with an ashen expression on his face.
 

Kelso is on his knees, next to his brother, hands covering his face while his shoulders shake with his silent grief.
 

Slater is close by them with a horrified stare on his pale face, his eyes still glued to the spot where his sister was standing just moments ago.
 

In the distance, Pacer races to the front of the train and on his way stopping to look underneath. Looking for Della’s body? Maybe in his mind, he thinks he can still save her, that she could’ve survived such a brutal impact.
 

Right before I look away, he halts, chest to the ground looking under the train, then he spins quickly and I watch bile explode from his mouth.

He found her.
 

Della.

The woman I love.

I stare down to the ground and then lift my palms, examining my hands, remembering a time when my flesh touched hers. I groan as a new wave of blanketed darkness covers me and what’s worse, I can still feel our love pump through my veins, our bond stronger than ever, as if it alone keeps my heart beating.
 

Muffled voices and pounding on the train windows cause my blurry eyes to look up. Their dull words don’t make sense. However, they keep pointing to the other side of the train. And then I focus on one woman’s lips…

“She’s alive.”

I must be imagining it, my reality distorted, unable to handle the grief which slams into my mind, body and heart with each second that ticks by.
 

I sense movement next to me and I look up to find Mack and Slater staring at the people also.
 

Slater slams his body down on the ground, chest first and then stills, before shouting, “Della!”
 

My eyes widen massively—it’s a shock at first—and then I’m chest to the ground, searching under the train.
 

And then I see her. On the other side of the tracks, lying on the grass, whole, but unconscious.
 

I place my hands under me and stand to find a way to her. Wetness coats my cheeks, but I’ve never felt so unashamed to cry.

Slater is banging on the train doors, trying to get the strangers to press the button for the glass to open. I don’t wait for the strangers to figure out what he wants. I start sprinting toward the closest gangway connection. My chest is rising and falling heavily.
What if she’s dying right now, what if she needs urgent attention?