CHAPTER 321: SPARE THEIR LIVES (7)

Nick’s POV

It’s been over twelve hours since Georgia and Katie vanished, and still, nothing. No leads. No signals. No goddamn trace.

The boardroom had turned into a full-blown command center. Maps, CCTV snapshots, and scattered documents covered the long table. Everyone was there, even Reagan and Sarah. The investigation team that Oliver and Liam had formed together with the police, were all trying to piece together something that didn’t make sense.

"Here," Vicky said softly, handing me a glass filled with something orange. "It’s a vitamin drink. Finish it all. You haven’t slept a second, and you’re running on fumes."

I didn’t argue. I downed it in one gulp, the tang of citrus hitting my tongue, but it barely cut through the pounding in my skull. The exhaustion had dug deep into my bones, past the point of pain, straight into numbness.

"I don’t know what to do anymore," I muttered, my voice hoarse, staring at the floor as if the answers were etched there. My mind was blank, no logic, no strategy, only noise.

Vicky sat beside me, rubbing slow circles on my back. "You have to rest, Nick. Even for ten minutes. A short nap will reset your mind, and you’ll think clearer. Everyone’s doing their best. You can’t lead if you’re falling apart."

Her words barely sank in before a familiar voice cut through the tension.

"Nicholas!"

I looked up, and for the first time in hours, my chest cracked open. My mother.

I stood, and she was in my arms before I could say a word. The scent of her perfume, the warmth of her touch, it undid me. For a second, I wasn’t the boss, the leader, the man with all the answers. I was just a son, wanting to cry into his mother’s arms and beg her to make the monsters go away.

"Mom..." The word came out broken.

"We’ll find them," she whispered, cupping the back of my neck. "I promise you, Nick. We will."

Her words should have comforted me, but they only made the ache worse. Because what if she was wrong? What if this time, we didn’t find them?

She pulled back to look at me, her eyes soft but steady. "You need rest, son. Georgia wouldn’t want to see you like this. And Katie... she’d be scared to see her father looking like he’s a zombie that hasn’t slept a wink."

I forced a weak smile, though my throat tightened. She was right. They both were.

But how could I rest when every minute that passed could mean losing them forever?

Still, I nodded. "Yeah... I’ll try."

Because if I didn’t pull myself together soon, I wouldn’t be able to save them.

And failure wasn’t an option, not when the two people I loved most in this world were out there, terrified and alone.

I stepped for the door and then froze. Someone I did not expect had slid into the room like a nightmare.

"What are you doing here? You shouldn’t be here," Sarah hissed. "Raymond, please go home."

Raymond found me with bloodshot eyes and a crooked smile. He looked wrecked, stumbling like a man who’d been bleeding from the inside. The smell of alcohol hit me before he did, sour and loud.

Before he could reach me, my mother moved.

*SLAP!*

The sound cracked across the room. Everyone’s heads snapped toward them.

"You! You’re Raymond Davis! How dare you show up here!" she screamed, fury raw on her face.

"I’m here to help, pl—" he tried to say.

*SLAP!*

She hit him again, harder this time. Her hand trembled, but she didn’t stop. "Get out of here. Do you want me to drag you out?!" she shouted.

Raymond’s gaze slid to me, pleading in a way that made bile rise in my throat. He swayed on his feet, more pathetic than dangerous.

"Nick, please. Let me help. I’m sure it’s Nancy’s doing. She couldn’t pull this off alone, though; surely she asked for help. I have an idea, I know them. I am sure she asked the people who killed David. You need me," he slurred.

The words hit me like ice down my spine. For an instant, the room went silent, the air folding in on itself.

"You know what?" I said, my voice low and steady, the calm of someone trying not to explode. On the inside, a hurricane tore through me, rage, disbelief, grief all folding into one terrifying thing.

"You knew who killed David," I repeated, each word deliberate. "And you waited until now to tell us?"

"Look, I stayed silent for Georgia’s sake," Raymond insisted, breath reeking of whiskey. "I was protecting her and Katie. If I’d said anything, the man David owed a huge debt would have taken her. Made her his—his mistress. You understand me, right?"

That did it.

Every nerve in me tore. The room narrowed, everything turned black until all I could see was his face, the face of a fucking devil. Heat slammed into my skull, and everything else went deaf.

"I do," I said, and the words felt like poison in my mouth.

Then my fist moved before my brain could stop it. It connected with his jaw with a sick, hollow sound. He staggered; I hit him again, harder, and sent him crashing against the door.

It wasn’t enough. My whole being is craving for more. I want to see him bleeding, until his bones turn to dust.

Voices blurred into a distant roar as I closed the distance. He was on the floor, stunned. I stepped over him and drove my boot into his shoulder... once, twice... each kick a release of the fury I couldn’t imagine I would one day feel.

I wasn’t thinking about consequences. I wasn’t thinking about anything but the image of Georgia and Katie, and the sick, slow burn of betrayal this man did.

"You fucking bastard!" I screamed, hand cocked to strike again.

Strong arms wrapped around me. Liam’s voice cutting through. "Nick, enough!"

"Let him talk," Reagan shouted from the edge of the chaos, steady as a lance. "He might be able to give us a clue where Georgia and Katie are."

Vicky and Sarah’s shouts collided with Liam’s grip, but all I could see was Raymond sprawled on the floor, his pleading eyes tiny and worthless. Every second he lived was a second I wanted to tear out of the world.

They held me back, and for a heartbeat, rage and grief braided together. Raymond’s words sat in my chest like ice. If he truly had known, if he’d let us suffer to protect some cowardly calculation, then nothing I did would be enough.