Page 49 of Dragon’s Dream

“Alright so lets hack some fucking sattelites or some shit and get a look at properties. Do we need to send drones over them? My best guess would be Briarfield. I don’t think they would’ve kept them in the car longer than that. You have a four year old who is probably already stressing out because of what has been going on with their mama.” Anchor says.

“I like how she thinks, do what she says. I want to get this figured out soon. I want my whole family back together before anything happens.”

My phone starts ringing in my pocket and I almost ignore it. I know that Liza doesn’t have my number memorized so it couldn’t possibly be her and everyone else is here, they would come get me if something was going on. I lift my phone and see that it is Peyton.

“Pey, can I call you back? We haven’t found anything and I really want to just focus on this.”

“Shut the fuck up Cane and listen to me.”

That got a rise out of me and I snapped my head up and looked around the room.

“Okay. What’s going on?”

“Liza and Walker are at Briarfield Memorial. You need to get here.”

A memory that changed my life forever hits me in that moment and no matter how hard I try I cannot push it away.

The prospect that was working the gate comes running in and you can only describe the look on his face is absolute terror. The look on his face makes my heart drop to my stomach.

“Um, you need to come out to the gate! Now!” He yells and turns and runs back outside.

I watch as my dad takes off running following the prospect outside. All the brothers that were in the room follow behind him and what we see when we first arrive makes me stop and almost fall to my knees.

A body.

Naked.

Beaten.

Our mother.

We all watch in horror as my dad runs up to the body and rolls her over. We notice that he removes something that is pinned to her chest and hands it to Terror.

“Baby, please wake up. Baby, no. Missy, please don’t leave me.” Dad has his head buried in her hair and you can tell he is sobbing. The words come out choppy and his shoulders are shaking.

Peyton comes and puts her arms around me like she needs someone to hold her up and I see Parker do the same with Cannon. In this moment that is who he is, he isn’t Twister, he is my twin brother Cannon. We hold our little sisters and try our best to protect them from what is happening.

You can’t even think about how you can possibly protect the people you are supposed to protect when the woman who gave you life, who has been there for everything is being held by your father lifeless.

Everything around us seems to stop and just like that my world shatters. How in the hell are we here? How is it that our mother is gone? This all has to be a fucking nightmare.

I don’t know how long we all stand here and watch as my father breaks down. They have been together practically their whole lives. They were each other's other half. I wanted what they had some day and I felt like I fucking found it. But how in the hell would I keep her safe from this world? How would I be able to handle something like this if something happened to her? Everything in me is shouting to let her go to protect her, to push her as far away from this life as possible so that nothing touches her or those two boys of hers.

I’m snapped out of the memory of the day my mother died and brought back to the present by Sophie. She looks at me and I know that I still have the phone to my ear.

“Cane? Are you okay?”

I shake my head to try and fully get back to the present. “Um, yeah. I’m fine. Peyton is at the hospital and he says that Liza is there.”

“What kind of mafia man kidnaps someone and wants to keep them hidden, but then brings them to the hospital, basically outing them? It doesn’t make any sense and honestly in my opinion sounds pretty fucking stupid. What else did Peyton say?”

“Hold on.” I put the phone on speaker phone.

“What happened? Are you sure it’s them? Why are they there?”

“Slow down, okay? I was told by Dr. Mercer there was a VIP on the VIP floor that needed to fill out some paperwork. I went up there and when I turned around the corner I saw Walker and some Italian walking into one of the rooms. Here I sent a photo.”

I pull up the messages on my phone and the thread that is between Peyton and I when the message comes in. Pulling up the photo you can clearly see Walker walking with that Italian prick who kidnapped them. Walker looks devastated and you can tell from the photo he has been crying and it breaks my heart.