HIS BRANDED BRIDE: Steel Devils MC

by Sophia Gray

  Cautiously, we stepped forward, holding our guns high. When the dust began to settle, I realized with a sinking feeling that the warehouse had been accessed much more recently than the store.

  “He’s been here,” I said in a low voice. “He was here recently.” The warehouse was huge—I couldn’t even see the other end of the inside. “Look,” I said, gesturing at the ground. There was a sheaf of papers improbably fluttering even though there was no breeze in the building. “He must have been here, trying to clear out his tracks.” I picked up one of the papers and held my cell phone flashlight up, trying to read it. For the second time, I felt a sense of foreboding and dread. “Look, Seb, he was trying to get rid of the evidence.” The names and addresses on the paper had been covered with white-out and hastily typed over. I could still read snippets of the original, but it was clear that the file had been tampered with. “He was trying to lie about where all of the money came from.”

  “He’s on to us,” Seb said, his voice a tone darker. “We need to get out of here, he may even have it rigged somehow.”

  “That’s fucking ridiculous,” I snapped, crumpling the paper into a ball and tossing it on the floor. “We have to search the rest of the warehouse.”

  I was starting to feel the sand running out of the hourglass, so I made Seb search one half of the warehouse while I searched the other. I didn’t find anything except for more papers on the floor and broken crates. There was no sign that Audrey had been here at all.

  Curling my hand into a fist, I slammed it against the wall. “This was all for nothing,” I said, not caring how loud I was. “We did all of this for nothing. And we wasted so much fucking time!”

  Seb walked over and shook his head. “We didn’t do it for nothing. We were looking for your girl, right? That’s something. Even though we didn’t find her, we still tried.”

  I grabbed him by the collar. “We are not giving up,” I hissed out in Seb’s face. “Not at all. So if you want to leave, you can leave. But I’m staying until I find some hint of where Audrey was taken.”

  Seb glanced down. “Lennox, this might be better left to the cops,” he said in a low voice. “We’re out of our league. We have no idea where this guy’s hiding, and you’re the one who told me what a raving lunatic he is.”

  I swallowed hard. “I get that, but I’m not giving up until I know Audrey’s safe! Can’t you respect that?”

  Seb frowned. He turned away from me and tucked his gun inside his jacket. “I know you wanna be the hero of the day and save her, but sometimes that’s not how real life works.”

  “What the fuck are you talking about?” I narrowed my eyes. Anger welled up within me, and my skin grew hot. I took a deep breath, but it didn’t help. “Of course I have to help Audrey! It’s my fucking fault she’s in this mess in the first place.”

  “I know that, Lennox. And I know you don’t want to hear this, but this could have been any girl! Not just Audrey. It could have been any of the women from the company.” He raised his eyebrows at me. “You’ve slept with all of them, right?”

  “What the fuck are you saying, Seb?”

  “I’m saying that you’ve already decided your company is more important,” Seb said calmly. “You told Hodges that you wouldn’t give it up to save Audrey’s life, and then you decided that you had to have your cake and eat it, too. Just walk away with your company, man, who cares about Audrey? Obviously, you don’t—not that much, if you weren’t even willing to give LennoxCo to Hodges just to get her back.”

  “You’re a fucking asshole,” I spat out. “You only care about money and yourself, in that order.”

  Seb held up his hands. The fact that he was managing to stay calm was enraging me all the more. “Don’t say that. I’m only telling it like it is. All you’ve ever cared about is your damn company, and you know that’s true. You didn’t prioritize her life, and now you need to let the professionals handle this.”

  I swung back and punched Seb hard in the jaw. Flesh and bone cracked beneath my knuckles and a searing pain shot up my arm as Seb recoiled. When he stood up, rubbing his jaw, he eyed me ruefully.

  “Don’t hate me for being honest,” Seb said. “I know you don’t want to think of the truth this way, but come on, Lennox. You didn’t even think about turning LennoxCo over to Hodges when he made his demands. You immediately said no.”

  I closed my eyes as his words sunk in. I would have never admitted it, especially not to Seb, but deep down, I knew he was right. I wasn’t a good person. And even though I cared for Audrey, selfishly, I couldn’t have put her first.

  “I’m a piece of shit,” I muttered, slumping against the wall. My gun fell out of my hand and clattered to the floor. “I don’t deserve to live.”

  “That’s being unfair.” He squatted down next to me and looked into my eyes. “Look, brother, you may have gone soft in the head, but you’re still an alpha male. And you do what you think is best. But don’t start acting like a fucking martyr when we’re in this situation because you’re the one who put us here.”

  My shoulders slumped, and the fear began to leave my body. “I deserve to die,” I said glumly. “You’re right. I thought I could do everything myself, but I can’t. I’m a piece of shit.”

  Seb shook his head. “You made the best decision for you and your company. A lot of CEOs wouldn’t, but you’re a true businessman.”

  I got to my feet and brushed my hands off on my pants. “Yeah, at the expense of another human life,” I shot back. “I can’t believe I didn’t stick up for Audrey. I should have done that.” Suddenly, I thought of her parents, poor and alone. “Goddamn it, Seb, people are counting on Audrey. Her parents, she helps her parents. And that damn dog!”

  “So stop whining about it and go find her.” Seb gave me a little nudge towards the door. “We’ll look somewhere else. But you should call the cops, too.”

  I shook my head. “Not doing that until we try a few more places. Hodges may have won this battle, but the war isn’t over yet.”

  “That’s the spirit,” Seb said. He clapped me on the shoulder again, and I realized that I couldn’t stay mad at him. Seb may have been an old partner in crime of mine, but it took a true friend to say the things that he’d just brought up. I knew he didn’t think less of me for doing what I’d done, but I was starting to realize that after this whole ordeal was over, I was going to have to make some massive changes in my life.

  We walked back into the shoe store and then left through the back door that we’d slammed open. The nighttime air was cold and smelled vaguely of fish and rotting garbage. Seb sniffed the air and then gave me a disgusted look.

  “You ever think about how fucked up it is that this city reeks of garbage and fish year-round? Most places only have to deal with that shit in the summer. But we have it year-round.”

  The skyscrapers of Chicago loomed above us like giant sentient guardians, and for a moment, I felt incredibly small.

  “It doesn’t seem fair,” I said darkly as we climbed into the car. “It doesn’t seem goddamned fair at all.”

  There was a buzz in my pocket, and I reached down and grabbed my phone, praying that it would be O’Brian. When I realized that it was an unknown number, a shiver of fear crawled down my spine.

  “Enzo, did you really think you could get the best of me?” Hodges laughed before I had a chance to respond. I held the phone at a wary distance from my face, staring at the blank screen and imagining his smug pink face.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I lied. “Now where’s Audrey?”

  There was a pause, then Hodges laughed again. “I don’t know why you have to be so demanding. After all, we’re not even working together, and you’re still demanding things from me. Don’t you know that you only get to act that way with business associates and colleagues?”

  “Fuck you,” I spat out. “You kidnapped my fucking girlfriend; I’ll talk to you however I want.”

  Seb’s eyebrows raised but I h
eld up a hand and gestured for him to be quiet. The last thing I needed right now was another one of his smart aleck remarks.

  “Oh, she’s your girlfriend now, is she?” Hodges chuckled again. “Well, if you want to hear her say hello…” He trailed off, and there was static as he lifted the phone away from his ear. I heard him yell something indistinguishable and then there was a bloodcurdling scream that punctured the air with horror.

  Oh my God. He’s hurting her. He’s hurting Audrey. Panic bells went off in my head, and I felt like I was struggling to breathe underwater. Blood rushed to my face, and damp sweat broke out on my forehead as I waited in agonizing silence for Hodges to say something.

  “Well?” Hodges chuckled. “How was that? I think she misses you, Enzo. You’d better hurry up and sign HodgesCo… Oops!” He chuckled again. “I mean, LennoxCo. You’d better hurry up and sign LennoxCo over to me, Enzo.”

  “That isn’t happening,” I said through gritted teeth. “Where is she? And what the fuck do you want with her?”

  “Well, she’s down hanging out with a couple of my friends,” he said, putting a cruel emphasis on the last word. “And they brought their dogs with them! She likes dogs, right? She kept asking about some stupid dog.” Hodges sighed, and I felt anger rise through my body like a tidal wave. “Anyway, some of my dogs are getting a little hungry. It’s been a few hours since they ate, Enzo. And even though your girlfriend is pretty skinny, I think she might make a nice meal for them.”

  “Shut the fuck up. Where the fuck is she?”

  “She’s down in a warehouse by the waterfront,” Hodges said casually. “And if you don’t come here soon and give me that flash drive that you stole, we’re going to kill her and throw her body into Lake Michigan.” He paused. “I mean, the pollution might be bad enough to kill her on its own. Or maybe we’ll feed her to the dogs after all. I haven’t decided yet. You’d better hurry up,” Hodges added. Then he hung up.

  I pulled the phone away from my ear and stared at it in shock. “He’s going to fucking kill her,” I said to Seb. Then suddenly, I sprang into action and rapped on the partition. “Waterfront,” I yelled to the driver. “Now!”

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Audrey

  It seemed like hours had passed. Maika was snoring as he leaned against one wall of the warehouse with the German shepherds sleeping at his feet. The sun had gone down, but I couldn’t see any moonlight filtering through the ruined ceiling of the building. It was dark and cold, and I felt more afraid than I ever had in my life.

  Richard hadn’t come back. I’d heard footsteps outside earlier, and my heartbeat had sped up so fast that I thought it was going to pound right out of my chest and leap away. But nothing happened, no one came in, no one called to Maika or the dogs. Sergei hadn’t come back either. I was even more glad for that.

  I wondered what Enzo was doing. The longer I went without hearing word from him, the more I began to worry that something really sinister and awful had happened. What if he’d been killed in the car wreck? It had been powerful enough to knock me out, and he’d been closer to the side with the impact. I knew Enzo was strong and in good health, but I still worried. A head injury could knock anyone out. What if he forgot who he was? What if they took him to the hospital and he couldn’t remember what had happened?

  I tried to keep telling myself that it would be okay, that he would come for me, but it was hard to sustain hope when I hadn’t had any good signs. I had no way to keep time except for watching the movements of the sky, but I knew that things weren’t looking good. Richard would come back and kill me at any moment. I just hoped it would be quick.

  And Pepper. My poor, poor beloved doggy. What was going to happen to her? I cringed thinking about what could have happened after the accident. Had she been killed? Had she run out of the car into traffic? I didn’t see a lot of stray dogs in Chicago, so I had to assume that maybe someone would have taken her into a humane society. But she didn’t have a microchip. Even though she’d been wearing her collar, I worried that someone could have ripped it off of her and then paid the nominal fee to adopt her.

  Stop worrying, I tried to tell myself. It’s going to be alright. Whatever happens, you won’t have to worry for much longer. Maybe someone really nice found Pepper, and they’re going to give her a good home. A tear leaked out of my eye as I thought about whether or not Pepper would miss me. I’d given her a good home—lots of love, snuggles, and table scraps. She’d been a loyal best friend, but I didn’t want her to spend the rest of her life in misery. If I couldn’t take care of her any longer, I prayed that she’d find someone who could.

  Maika stirred and one of the dogs opened its mouth, yawning widely and then snuggling back down against the others. Richard had left the woolen blanket wrapped around me, but I wasn’t able to move much, and the cold had sunk so deeply into my bones that I felt like I was never going to be warm again.

  My teeth had stopped chattering long ago, and my hands had been numb for so long that I’d almost gotten used to not moving around. Every time I closed my eyes, I prayed that my torture wouldn’t last much longer.

  The sound of footsteps outside made me jump. They weren’t like the footsteps from earlier. Those had been tentative, like kids playing around in a place they weren’t supposed to be. These footsteps were heavy, purposeful. Whoever was approaching knew what they were doing.

  I closed my eyes and tears leaked down my frozen cheeks. Please be Enzo, I begged silently. Please, please, please. I can’t stand seeing Richard again. Anyone but him. Even Sergei. Please!

  The double doors swung open, and Richard’s heavy, meaty frame strode into the warehouse. The gag had long since made my mouth feel dry and full of cotton, but I swallowed all the same. He walked over to me, his face barely lit in the low light.

  “Ah, Audrey, I see you’ve been a good girl,” Richard said. He clasped his hands together in front of his chest. “You haven’t moved at all.” He leaned down and looked at my face. I felt blood rise to the surface of my cheeks. I knew exactly how I must look to him—beaten down, weary, and crying like a little girl.

  I tried to speak, but it just came out as a soft mumble with the sock in my mouth.

  “Ah, ah, ah, Audrey, no talking, remember?” I shuddered. Richard’s voice was almost kind. I closed my eyes as he stepped closer. “Audrey, not very much longer now. I know this hasn’t been a fun very wait for you. If only Enzo hadn’t been so selfish!”

  My eyes flew open.

  “Ah, but you didn’t know that, did you?” Richard frowned. He let out a long sigh. “It’s always so unpleasant discovering things about someone that you wish you wouldn’t have known. Isn’t that right?”

  I almost nodded but managed to stare straight into his eyes.

  Maika woke up and scrambled to his feet, running over to Richard with a gleam in his eyes.

  “Maika, enough,” Richard said. “We’re not acting yet.” He held up his wrist and checked his watch. “You know, we still have a few hours.” Hope welled up in my body as big as a balloon. Richard yawned. “But you know, I don’t feel like waiting much longer,” he added. “I’m tired, and I want to go home.” He chuckled, and my anger came back tenfold. “It’s so tiring—waiting around for people like Enzo Lennox! I feel as though I’ve been waiting for him my whole life. And now I have to find someone else since Enzo didn’t work out. I have to find someone else to help me. I’m certainly not going to retire in the state that I’m in!”

  Maika didn’t respond. He stood there behind Richard, a hulking figure in the darkness.

  From outside, there was a loud noise. At first, I expected to see Sergei dashing through the open doors. But instead, I heard voices. Lots of voices. Masculine, deep voices. Like Enzo’s.

  I shivered. Richard’s head snapped up.

  “What the fuck?” Richard turned to Maika. “What the fuck is going on? What the fuck are the cops doing here?” I saw the flashing lights through the lone vents on the top
of the building.

  Maika shrugged.

  Richard glared daggers at me. “You,” he hissed out, leaning close. “If you had anything to do with this, I’ll kill you right now.” He reached into the pocket of his overcoat and pulled out a gun. “If you make so much as a peep, I’ll kill you and feed you to the dogs. By the time the cops get here, you’ll be nothing but dog meat. Sound good?”

  More tears of fright began to spill down my cheeks, and I nodded as emphatically as I could. Please don’t kill me, I silently begged. Please, Enzo, hurry up!

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Enzo

  As the car lurched away from RH Shoes, I pulled my phone out of my pocket and began to dial. My fingers felt like clumsy sausages as I punched in O’Brian’s number and held the phone to my ear. When I heard a busy signal, I screamed and threw the phone on the floor.

  Seb held his phone out to me. “Try mine. We don’t have much time.”