Blyssfully Undone: The Blyss Trilogy - book 3 (23 page)

Travis

I roll over in bed with the intention of wrapping my arms around Jules and having a morning rendezvous, but quickly realize her side of the bed is empty. I’m always the first one awake in the morning, so this surprises me.

Maybe she’s in the bathroom.
“Jules?” I call out, but I’m met with silence. I get out of bed and throw on a pair of jeans. “Jules?” I call out again as I look into the bathroom. Being a light sleeper, I have never had her be able to slip out of bed in the morning without me knowing about it. I make my way downstairs, looking into each room as I make my way to the kitchen. Quinn and Stryker are drinking coffee at the table.

“Guys, has Jules been down here?”

They both shake their heads. “Stryker and I have been the only ones up for the past half-hour, Trav. What’s up?” Quinn asks concerned.

“Jules isn’t upstairs, and I can’t find her.”

“She’s gotta be upstairs. You’re the first one I’ve seen surface from the bedrooms.”

I shake my head. “No, man. I already checked.” I don’t like the bad feeling creeping into my gut, and the guys can see what I’m thinking.

“Travis, she’s here. I sleep for shit on the sofa; I’d know it if she came down those stairs at any point,” Quinn tries to reassure me, but it’s not working.

I turn around on my heel and head back up the stairs, taking three at a time with the guys following fast behind me.

“Jules!” I yell out, panic lining my voice. I give hand signals for the other guys to check the other rooms one-by-one as I head back to our bedroom, looking for clues. As the guys call her name, I scan over the bedroom, scrutinizing every inch of the place. The light streaming in through the window catches my attention, and that’s when I notice the window is an inch ajar. “Fucking hell!”

I lift the blinds all the way up and open the window to look out. “Travis! What did you find?” Stryker asks from behind me.

I turn around with a grim feeling. “I think she took off out the window.”

Stryker shakes his head. “Nah, man…there’s no way.”

I lift a brow. “Really? If you wanted out bad enough, how would you get out?” Stryker rubs the back of his neck in a nervous gesture. He knows I’m right. “Shoes. Where are her shoes?” I skirt around Stryker, looking for them.

“Umm…Travis,” Stryker says warily. I turn around and receive a sucker punch to my gut. Stryker stands beside the bed, holding up her engagement ring.

“
Sonofabitch
,” I snarl. “How the fuck could this have happened?” Immediately, I go into combat mode and begin barking orders. Everyone disperses with a task as I quickly get dressed. Every minute that ticks by with no sign of Jules is a minute in Hell.

Everyone scrambled to get their shit and gear into the van. Stryker is the last one in the van, and he slams the side door closed. As soon as Chase turns the ignition key, I’m on Quinn. “When will we be able to get her voice signal?” I ask as Quinn starts setting up the electronics.

“Calm down, Trav. Trust me, you’ll be the first to know. You need to calm the fuck down and let us do our jobs,” he says with irritation lining his voice as he continues to work on his laptop. He was always able to play a game of chess, figure coordinates on a map, and fly an airplane, all at the same time, and yet be fully engaged in a conversation. I would never understand how the hell he did it. The man is a genius. “I’m pulling up her tracking signal right now.”

I move in behind Quinn, looking over his shoulder at the laptop screen. He points his finger at the bleeping dot on the screen and explains, “She should be showing up in this area here, but she’s not.” He turns to look over his shoulder at me, his eyes wide. “I think she’s in the fucking air.”

“Holy. Fucking. Shit. Are you sure?”

Stryker looks over at me and nods. “He’s right, man.”

“She had no I.D., no money, nothing.”

“Yes, but there is nothing her daddy can’t handle, right?” Quinn asks.

I close my eyes and sigh. “All right. Georgia it is.” That’s the best educated guess we can come up with, and if we just sit here, waiting for her to touch ground, we will be losing valuable time.

“Are you all on board with this?” I ask everyone.

“You know we are,” Stryker says.

It’s at least a six-hour drive to Atlanta. I would love to fly, but I think TSS would frown at the amount of weaponry we would be toting along.

Two hours into the trip, and I’m about to crawl out of my skin when Quinn announces Jules has hit ground. I sit on the edge of my seat, greedy for intel, but Quinn says nothing more. “Well, dude…where the fuck is she?!”

“I’m getting there! Hang on to your panties, woman,” Quinn replies while staring intently at the computer.

“Chase, I need you to make some phone calls. I have a feeling it’s time to pull in some back-up,” I order.

Chase glances back from the driver’s seat, giving me a quick nod in the rear-view mirror.

“Yep, just what we thought. She’s in Georgia. Private landing strip, no doubt owned by her daddy,” Quinn utters.

“Can you get a voice on her, yet?” I ask.

“Already on it. Might take a little time; we’re a little out of range, but I’ll work something out.”

“Shit, that’s not good enough,” I bite out. I’m so damn wired my gut feels as if it’s churning battery acid.

Stryker, the ever-knowing psychologist, leans in to whisper, “You’re not going to do her any good, not this way. Not to mention, you’re more apt to make mistakes, and one of us could wind up dead over it.”

I take a deep breath and lean away from him before I coldcock him. He’s right, but I’m not in the mood to hear his shit. I stare out the window, growing more anxious as I watch each mile go by in what feels like slow motion.

“Look, Trav,” Stryker cautiously starts off. He can’t help himself. He always has to give his two cents even though I know he’s only trying to help. “She’s not Clarissa. This is a different set of circumstances.”

“Is it really, Stryker?” I look at him out of the corner of my eye. “A marred soul is a marred soul, no matter how you slice it. Who’s to say what one person goes through is less significant than another? All because you evaluated and measured this shit out on the Stryker tipping scale?”

“Fair enough. I guess what I’m trying to say is maybe she’s a fighter. I don’t see her giving in.”

And that right there is my fear—Jules throwing in the towel, giving up on life.

I lean my head back against the car seat and close my eyes. Every single scene, every finite detail of my past, comes rushing in like a tidal wave to the forefront of my mind. There is no tamping down the raw emotions that have washed over me. Clarissa was the love of my life. Her family moved in across the street from Grant when I was in the fifth grade. Grant’s wife babysat for them a lot, and the little squirt grew on me. Every spare second of her life, she was constantly spending it in my space. By the time I left for the military, she was starting her freshman year of high school. She didn’t know it then, but I knew I was going to marry her.

By the beginning of her senior year of high school, things were happening fast between us. We were getting serious about each other. I wanted to be there for her when she graduated, but I couldn’t. I was doing a tour overseas.

As a graduation gift, I wanted to fly her overseas to meet me in Europe, and I knew her parents would flip their lids, so I offered for her older brother to come along too. I smile at the memory. She was excited as shit when her folks said yes.

The guys and I had our R&R scheduled and her tickets were bought. I had no idea. She was too young, too innocent, and far too pretty.

I thought she’d be safe traveling with her older brother.
The stupid bastard.

They had arrived a few days early to do some sightseeing in Europe, because I sure as hell wasn’t interested in being a tourist. The only sight my eyes were going to be on was her in my bed for three days. I don’t know how the hell Stryker did it, but he managed to sweet-talk our commander into letting us take off a day early.

When I got to the hotel to surprise her, she had left. Cellphone service was not the best back then. So my buddies and I took off to the bar down the street. I’ll never forget that night. As fate would have it, I ran into her piece-of-shit brother at the bar. I remember being out-of-my-skin ecstatic, expecting to finally see my girl. I glanced around, and not seeing her in the crowded little bar, I asked her brother where she was. He said Clarissa had taken off for the bathroom, but that had been a while ago. Instead of investigating, he brushed it off, thinking she had decided to dance or some shit.

Immediately, I started searching for her, and then panic began to envelop me when no one could find her. Quinn, with his
Rambo
ways, was able to extrapolate some information from a patron. Apparently he had found someone who had some intel for a price. I would’ve handed my whole life savings over if need be. It was an organized setup, and apparently there were a few guys who regularly
worked
the local bars, looking for pretty young women. They managed somehow to drug her drink, and when she went to the ladies’ room, that’s when they made their move.

Motherfucking human traffickers had make their move. Stole her, robbing her of her dignity and soul.

Yeah, little did I know the sex industry was legalized there, which opened the doors for forced prostitution and trafficking, and the fuckers in power wonder why sexual exploitation is out of control. They rolled out the red carpet to the Transnational Criminal Network. You can’t tell me those corrupt officials don’t know what the fuck they’re doing. They helped facilitate the lucrative business. Of course, prostitution is legal, but to purchase said prostitution is a crime. Go figure.

The slick bastards are so sophisticated and multifaceted; I found out later they’ve acquired close to five million women over time. Law enforcement could barely skim the top of that shit. Needless to say, it was up to me and my men to get her back, and I couldn’t have done it without them. They laid their careers and lives on the line for me. Yeah, my men and I went rogue. That’s a whole ‘nother story.

When we found her, with what little clothing remained on her body, she was strung out on coke and huddled in a corner with five other women who looked the same as her. I will never forget those eyes. Those eyes were fucking hollow, far away, empty, and despondent. I was surprised we were able to find her. Lucky for us, we had finally caught up to the bastards two days later, and had we been one hour later in finding her, she would’ve been gone forever on a boat to God knows where.

Unfortunately, it was already too late for Clarissa. They gang raped her, and that’s all I could get out of her. We spent the next two days holed up in a hotel room together, trying to help her cope. I know they did more, but she couldn’t bring herself to talk about it, not when it was too fresh and raw. I’d like to think between Stryker and me that we had her mind set in the right direction. I tried to get more time off, but my CO was not having it. I had to send her back home with her worthless brother. Why I didn’t go ahead and kill him, I don’t know.

I found out she had to go into counseling within days of her getting back home. I barely got to talk to her, being overseas, and it gutted me. Two weeks later, her parents sent word she had committed suicide. Didn’t I feel responsible as fuck for that?

From that day forward, I lived in vengeance. Transnational Criminal Network was on my list as soon as my military term was up. Granted, the difference I’ve made has been but a faint echo, but I feel as if I’m doing my part. I know when I’d take out one outfit, another two would spring up somewhere else.

I didn’t like my hands being tied to rules and regulations that come with a badge. I figure criminals don’t have rights, and they lost their rights the second they took another. My men and I decided to be independent contractors. When the CIA got wind of a developing drug that would alter perceptions and act as an ecstasy drug, I didn’t blink twice to sign up.

I let out a heavy sigh, I’ve never felt so overwhelmingly helpless as I do right now, and I pray to God history is not repeating itself.