My Great Escape Led Me to You (Emily Blair) novel Chapter 1270

Elizabeth could see his hands shaking as he opened the email and clicked on the video attachment.

As soon as the footage started, all the color left her face.

Emily was on her knees in the dirt, tied up tight. Duct tape sealed her eyes and mouth. The world around her was nothing but wild, empty hills, the night pressing down like a weight, making it almost impossible for Elizabeth to breathe.

But what made her heart stop were the two knives pressed right against Emily’s neck. The blades looked icy and sharp.

A man stood behind Emily, one hand gripping her hair, yanking her head back and exposing the soft line of her throat. It looked like he could end everything with a single movement, blood everywhere in an instant.

Elizabeth couldn’t take it. She squeezed her eyes shut, unable to watch a second longer.

She heard Tristan curse, his voice rough and furious.

Elizabeth’s chest tightened. She forced herself to look again, desperate to spot something, anything, in the background that could help them find Emily and Benjamin.

But there was nothing. Just endless, featureless wilderness.

Elizabeth’s mind spun out of control. Her eyes darted over every inch of the screen, top to bottom, side to side, but she couldn’t focus, couldn’t even process what she was looking at. She was just staring, helpless.

She forgot it was a video. It wasn’t over.

Suddenly, she and Tristan watched as a hand came into frame holding a knife. In a flash, it cut into Emily’s slender arm.

Blood spattered everywhere.

Emily jerked in pain, a muffled cry escaping her. Her face turned ghostly white.

That was it. Elizabeth couldn’t hold herself together anymore. She slumped back in her seat, vision blurred with tears, her whole body trembling.

The car was dead silent.

The three men up front turned to look back, wanting to say they’d keep trying, that there was still hope.

But when they saw their boss, tears streaming down his face with his eyes squeezed shut and his phone gripped so tight his knuckles were white, the words just died in their throats.

They stared, shocked. One of them tried to speak, voice shaky. “Boss… we’ll do everything we can… please don’t…”

He trailed off, unable to come up with anything that might actually help.

So they all just sat there, quiet, the weight of everything pressing down on them.