Redemption

Chapter Nineteen

The light turned green and he put his foot to the gas. He needed to get home. He would be safe there. There, he could tell her how much he loved and cherished her. A tear silently trickled down his cheek as he thought about her. He knew he wasn't going to see her again. There was something deep inside of him that told him so. He was going to miss her so much and he only hoped she would forgive him.

He was stopped at another red light when he realized there would be no chance of escape. The same SUV pulled up behind him and roared its engine at him. It was like a car possessed, except that the driver was the one who was possessed.

He muttered under his breath about the damn light for it to change and when it did, he put the pedal to the metal. It was a last resort to escape these maniacs. It would only be so he could see her beautiful face once more.

He never made it through the intersection.

He was blindsided by another SUV and his car was sent sideways, tumbling top over bottom until it came into contact with a nearby tree. Smoke was shooting out from under the hood and something liquid was leaking. A deep, yet shaky breath told him that it wasn't gasoline, but he knew he had to get out of the wreckage.

His eyes had been closed as his body stabilized itself from the shock of the impact. With a deep breath, he opened them to see that he was virtually unharmed. The passenger side of the vehicle was what had made contact with the tree and his airbag had deployed, protecting his skull from being shattered. A huge sigh of relief left him as he unbuckled his seat belt and stared out of the shattered windshield. With any luck, his assailants thought he was dead and they would just leave him be, yet he knew that wouldn't be the case. They wanted to make sure to take care of him personally. The whole car accident was just a ploy to weaken his defenses.

With a groan of exhaustion, he peered through the rear-view mirror, expecting to see only passers-by, but what he saw chilled him to the bone.

If the tension was high before, it was nothing compared to the atmosphere, now. It was like all of the air had been sucked out of the room, leaving Nicholas feeling more than a little awkward in the silence. It reminded him of the last time they'd all gotten together, yet even back then it wasn't this hard to breathe.

He got up from the table and decided to walk around the living room area of the apartment. The whole area was entirely opened, so wherever you stood, you'd be able to see everything. And that meant that he had a perfect view of the table where his wife and daughter sat.

It was the opened area that Danni had found so appealing when she chose the apartment. The only rooms that were closed off from the rest were the master bedroom, the guest bedroom and the bathroom, which was set in the middle of both bedrooms.

He glanced at many of the photographs that were upon the walls, bookshelves, and a table or two. There were only a few from before Danni moved away from home, but the one that stood out for him was the one that was placed upon the wall. It had been taken when she was only five-years-old. He'd taken her out on one of their infamous daddy-daughter excursions, which had been the happiest day of her life. He would admit only to himself and of course to her that it was one of the happiest days of his life as well. Every one of their outings was the best time he'd ever had in his life. He missed those so much and now that things were warming up between all of them, he could have one of those days again.

He smiled at the shining face of his little girl and glanced back at the woman who continued to stare down her mother. She wasn't his little girl anymore and he needed to realize it; they both did. She was an adult with a good life. They couldn't change that anymore than they could change the stars.

With a sigh, he turned back to the photographs. Others consisted of a group of people he didn't know, but assumed that Danni did, otherwise she wouldn't have it upon her wall. Then, on closer inspection, he saw Sue's smiling face as her teammates crowded around her for a group shot. Two very strong women in the same family was quite an achievement. And the fact that they'd both decided to do good things with their lives was an even greater one.

The next he looked at contained a smiling Danni as she snuggled into the arms of a very handsome, yet gruff-looking man. By the look of the background, they looked like they were in the park and by the looks of their attire they certainly weren't having a picnic. Their clothes, which were only t-shirts and jeans, were splattered with mud, yet their faces were clean. It was most likely from a friendly football game they'd been playing with the people from the group photo, he'd concluded.

As he looked closely at both pictures, he saw that the man was in both, which meant that he worked with Sue. He was an FBI agent. At least Danni wasn't dating just anyone. Someone in his station was certainly a few steps up from Jonathan Graves.

He smiled as he saw the happy expression on his daughter's face. Whoever he was, he was certainly making her happy and he hoped he got to meet him before they returned home in the next few days. He pulled the frame from the wall and carried it over to the table, where the two women still sat. He returned to his seat and placed the photograph in the center for all of them to see.

"I was just looking at all of your pictures and I noticed that this man was in quite a few of them. Who is he?" He glanced between his two women and waited for one of them to even look at the thing. At least that way they would be able to end their staring contest. He was satisfied when Danni pulled her gaze away from her mother's to look at which one he was talking about. He saw her eyes light up as she tried to hide the smirk that was beginning to creep to her lips.

"His name is Bobby," was all she said. Apparently, her temper was still up there enough for her not to embellish too much on the man. Her father could see how she would have loved to talk endlessly about him, but there was something stopping her from doing so.

"He's very handsome," Charlene spoke up, giving her family a shock. They hadn't realized that she'd looked at the photo as well. "Are you seeing him? What does he do?"

It was over-protective questions like those that usually got Danni's blood boiling to a hotter temperature than before. This time, however, it wasn't the case. She seemed more worried than anything and it showed when she glanced at the clock. He still wasn't home. "We've been seeing each other for a year." A short chuckle escaped her. "Actually, it'll be a year on Friday." She glanced down at the ring finger on her left hand. It still remained bare, even though Bobby continuously told her how much he wanted to marry her. He wouldn't string her along, she knew. That just wasn't him. That man had a plan up his sleeve and not even his case would get in the way. The question was when he would get the nerve to ask her.

"You've been dating that long and you never bothered to have us meet him? Danni, we only want you to be happy and we could have understood," the older woman spoke up as she reached across the table and took her daughter's hand in her own. She was surprised that she had done it and even more surprised when the girl didn't pull away.

With another glance at the clock, Danni shrugged. "It never came up."

Three shadowy figures approached the vehicle. They were large and menacing-looking as they stalked their prey; him. He would have fought to get out of the car, but there was no use running. These men were ruthless and would do anything to take him down. He'd accepted his fate a long time ago. This was his end and he had done everything possible to make sure that all of his priorities were taken care of.

The door was wrenched open and he was roughly pulled from within and tossed to the ground. All of them stood above him in a circle just waiting for him to stand up. But, he wouldn't be that stupid. He wouldn't give them the opportunity to knock him down again.

"Do what you want to me. You'll be stopped after I'm gone."

A loud chuckle emitted from the man who stood above his head. He was the leader of the group and he usually took pride it disposing of this sort of garbage himself. "I'm surprised at you. I half-expected you to beg for your life like all the others did before you."

"I wouldn't give you the pleasure of seeing me grovel," he spat at the man's feet and he was given a kick to the stomach for it. He let out a loud 'oof!' and collapsed to the ground.

With a snap of their leader's fingers, the other two men bound his hands and feet behind his back and left him to lie on his stomach. He tried to struggle against the bindings, but the rope used was too strong from him to shimmy out of. The leader put his large, boot-covered foot upon his back to stop his squirming.

"Now, do you see what happens when you don't appease me? I was going to let you live, but you've screwed with me for the last time." He grinned evilly, which he victim couldn't see and removed his gun from the holster at his waist. A loud click! was heard and it meant that the bullet was in place. "I hope you said goodbye to everyone." He held the barrel of the gun to the head of his prey and chuckled once more.

"You will be stopped!" He cried out before the trigger was pulled. It was only a ploy to make the predator nervous, but when he was in the mood to kill, there was nothing that could ruin the excitement that ran through him.

"I highly doubt that," was the last thing he heard as the trigger was pulled, the sound reverberating throughout the neighborhood. They knew it was their cue to exit when multiple lights turned on and sleepy men and women peered out their homes to see what was going on.

They saw the still smoking vehicle and the poor tree that it had come in contact with. They saw the man lying motionless in the grass only ten feet away with his hands and feet bound. They only thing they didn't see was the faces of the assailants as they ran into the darkness.