My mind instantly went to her. I had to go back, I left my heart there. “Not in a hurry,” I said softly. “I already handed over all my reports and sorted through the paperwork before I left.”
“That’s where the doom is,” he said with a chuckle. “Infiltrating the clubs seems like a piece of cake when it comes to those damn papers, doesn’t it?”
My response was a smile.
He pulled the door open and ushered me into the monitoring room. We met three other detectives there, all waiting to listen in on the interrogation. I was decently acquainted with them so we exchanged handshakes.
Almost immediately, the detective in charge walked into the interrogation room and took his seat. He slammed his folder of files on the table. “He’s a tough one, isn’t he, that Snake?” he commented. “All the others gave up the one they called RJ, and pinned him as the orchestrator to save their own heads, but he’s refused to say a word till now. I’ve always wondered what motivates these guys, beyond the money, of course? Especially him? In a different setting, he would have been a decent leader or the CEO of a Fortune 500 company. Why the hell would he be on this path?”
I watched Nathan Snake, the cold brutal man who had led me over the last two years, through the one-way mirror. Suddenly, he turned to the one-way mirror and looked at it. For a second, it felt as if he was looking right at me, but of course, he wasn’t.
A knock sounded on the door, and we all turned towards the officer who’d come into the room. He had a phone in hand. “Lee,” he called. “Miller needs to take this. He has an emergency down in Arnault.”
My eyebrows met. “What emergency?”
He handed the phone over to me.
“Hello?”
It was Yuri. “Where the fuck is your phone?”
I was taken aback by the hostility in his tone. “It’s been submitted. It’s evidence.” The nerves in my gut tightening with dread. “What is it? Is she okay?”
“She’s not.”
“What happened?”
“Jeremiah just called,” he said.
I almost doubled over from the implication. I walked out of the room despite the calls of the other detectives.
“You know him, right?”
“I do, he’s undercover in Deaths Hand. What did he say?”
“Michael. Do you know Michael? He’s the main dealer for their club.”
I stopped then and shut my eyes. I wanted to punch my fist into the wall. My voice was a croak of disbelief. “What happened?”
“He contacted a few of them from the club to help him with something so Jeremiah tagged along. He mentioned some beef you had with Michael over Della-Ray so when they went to her house last night to kidnap her, he figured out what was going on. They have her captured now and moved to some cabin in Sugar Groove. Looks like he’s going to …”
“He’s going to what?”
“What do you think, Gage? They already think you’re dead.”
“Going to what?” I yelled.
“He told them he was going to have her then pass her off to them to use at one of their orgies.”
“Miller!” one of the officers called behind me.
I was already storming towards the exit. “Send people over to that cabin right now,” I shouted urgently.
“You know I can’t do that Gage. It’ll put Jeremiah in danger. It's not possible for anyone beyond the four of them to have known about this plan.”
I turned around and smashed the phone on the ground. As it shattered, I stared at it and fought to breathe. It felt like I was going to collapse. I felt the tears fill my eyes.
Just then, two of the detectives I had abandoned in the room came running out to me.
“I need to go back to Arnault now. Right now!”
“It’s not recommended that you return so quickly unless it’s an emergency. Why don’t you give it a few days?”
I curled my hands into fists. “I need to fucking leave right now! My family is in trouble.”
One of them retrieved his keys from his pocket. “Got it. Come on, man. I’ll order a copter, right now. It’ll be ready and waiting by the time we get there.”
Della Ray
The room I was in smelt like death.
Or perhaps it was just the way I felt.
I was still huddled in the corner by the bed, stained with my own blood, my face and arms throbbing. My only hope now was that perhaps I had injured Michael enough for him to stay away and not attempt to put his stinking cock in my mouth.
So many times during the night, I had thought of my baby. I buried my head between my knees to hide my tears as the realization dawned on me that I might never be able to see her again, and if by some miracle I did, I wouldn’t be the same loosey-goosey person. How could I after these monsters brutalized me. Perhaps they would hurt me so much that I would never be able to find whom I once was before tonight.
Bone’s image came into my mind and I immediately pushed it away. I couldn’t handle that grief now. Turning my head, I wiped at the tears on my face and turned toward the window by my side. I needed to survive for Jess’s sake. Maybe I could try to pry some of the planks away.
At the sound of the door, I rushed away from the window, my heart in my throat that Michael had returned. It was not Michael, but one of the other men. This one was as bald as an egg and tattooed with the image of Gollum holding the ring. He shut the door behind him. He let his hand make a crude stroke of his crotch and when I jumped to my feet with fear, a sick smile spread across his face with excitement. “Time to play, bitch,” he called mockingly.
I plastered my back to the wall. If only it would swallow me up. “Don’t come any closer to me,” I warned. “Michael will be very angry. I’m his woman. He wants me for himself.”
“Well, not so much after the way you attacked him. He was gonna share you with us when he was finished, anyway. You’re going to be sucking a lot of dicks, sweetheart. So you better get used to the idea. Me, I just can’t fucking wait anymore.”
“I’ll hurt you,” I snarled. “I swear.”
“Try that same wildcat shit on me that you did to Michael and watch me dig your pretty eyes out.” Out of nowhere, he produced a knife and held the shining blade in the air. “I will carve my initials on your face and kill you myself if even your teeth graze me. Get on the bed, bitch.”
He was no Michael. I realized now that it had all come to an end for me.
Gage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYyarcp5LtU
-I will be there, I will be there-
After a short copter and car ride that seemed to take forever we arrived at the agreed upon meeting point.
Jeremiah met us down the road from the house. The moment I jumped out of the car, he appeared from the trees and hurried up to us.
“Where is she?” I asked.
“She is locked in one of the rooms. One of our members, Bull has his eye on her, but it looks like the men are starting to get restless. They haven’t had fresh meat like this for a long time. What’s your plan?”
I felt as if my brain was on fire. Without answering him, I began to hurry forward, but he stopped me. “What is your plan, Gage? Otherwise, I’ll be in deep shit.”
“You fucking left my girl alone with those monsters.”
“Yuri!” he said through gritted teeth.
Yuri locked his hand around my wrist. “Gage, we have to do this right or we could implicate him. He’s spent four years in there. I’m not giving him up for anything. Not even your girl.”
I forced myself to calm down, my gaze on the cabin in the distance as they conversed.
“Michael and Tav will be back any moment now from his treatment,” Jeremiah said in low tones. “You both need to either be gone by then or—”
Suddenly, her high scream pierced the afternoon air.
I tore Yuri’s hold away and sprang into a dead run. I readied my gun the moment I arrived at the house and kicked my way through the front door. There
was only one closed door in the whole room so I rammed myself against it. The wood gave away immediately on impact with my bulk and I burst into the room.
At the sudden intrusion, the beast that had been on top of her turned around in shock.
His pants were around his knees with his dick out and ready for the assault. My gaze fleeted over to hers and I felt something in my chest shatter at the bruised and battered woman that I was supposed to protect.
“Gage!” Yuri called in warning as I aimed my gun, but I was past reason.
“What the fuck is going—” The first shot blasted into his crotch and an agonized scream tore from him as blood splattered everywhere.
“Get her!” I yelled.
Yuri hurried over to help her off from the bed.
Without blinking, I pointed my gun at his chest and blasted two more bullets into him. He had a leg in death’s door but he wasn’t dead like I needed him to be. I could feel tears rolling down my face as I blasted one more, straight into the middle of his forehead.
I could hear her cries and screams as she was pulled out of the room by Yuri, and soon I was left with only Jeremiah as he gazed at the carnage of human flesh before me. I couldn’t move … I didn’t know how I was ever going to face her.
“What the fuck, Gage? How are we going to explain this one?”
Shutting my gaze, I reigned in my ragged breath, and put the gun away.
She was standing outside the cabin. She looked numb. No expression showed on her battered face.
I stopped in front of her.
She raised her head to gaze at me.
The ache I felt for the state she was in was soul deep. I couldn’t understand how she could ever forgive me for bringing her into this danger.
The moments ticked away, her ragged breathing the only sound she made. Then she lifted one hand and touched my face. “You’re not dead,” she whispered in awe.
“I don’t know how to express how sorry I am,” I whispered back.
“They said you were dead,” she said slowly, almost in a dream like state.
“I’m an undercover agent with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives,” I explained immediately. “I am so sorry that I couldn’t tell you the truth … and I am even more sorry than you could possibly know that I wasn’t here to protect you. I—” Words failed me and my heart broke all over again at how inadequately I had protected her. I would have given my life to take back all the pain she had suffered in this ordeal. There were no words enough to tell her this. I held her gaze and didn’t stop the tears as they rolled down my face.
She wiped them with her fingers. “Don’t baby. Don’t. A few slaps doesn’t count for nothing. You’re alive and that’s all that matters,” she whispered.
God, I loved her so fucking much. I actually felt insignificant in the face of her quiet strength. Before I could tell her, we were interrupted.
Jeremiah burst out of the cabin. “Michael and Tad are on their way,” he announced.
It struck me for the first time, who the man he was referring to was. “Tad? The Mongol’s secretary?”
He nodded.
“Why is he with Michael?” Yuri asked.
“I don't know.” Jeremiah shrugged. “He was with him when he stopped by the clubhouse to get Bull and me.”
I rose to my feet then and turned around to face the both of them, the saddest smile on my face.
“I think you should leave, Gage …” Yuri said.
“Not without Della-Ray.”
“You can’t take her,” Jeremiah protested. “She has to call the cops right now and say that she has been kidnapped and assaulted. It has to be on record. Otherwise, no one will be able to explain how they got here.”
“And what about the body?” Yuri asked.
“That’s for you to clean up. Speak to your superiors,” Jeremiah stated. “He threatened you both with a gun, you reacted to protect yourselves.”
“Then what about you?” Yuri asked.
Jeremiah stopped then and sighed in exhaustion, his fingers running through his messy head of ginger hair. “I don’t fucking know.”
A moment of silence ensued and then I spoke, “Let’s go to the kitchen.”
Both men came with me and soon we were in the adjacent room. I addressed Jeremiah, “How important is completing your assignment to you?”
He kept his gaze fixed on the wooden floor deep in thought before finally responding, “I’ve put four years of my life into it,” he said. “I don’t want to throw it all away.”
“Okay then,” I replied. “It means that you cannot have been here.”
Yuri turned to me his brows brimming with anger. “Does that mean that you’re going to take care of Michael and Tav?”
“I’m not going to let Tav go.” I growled.
He shook his head. “Not like this, Gage.”
“All of this is because of him. I joined the program to get him …”
He shook his head. “No, not this way.”
“I’m sorry, but I’m out of time and patience and frankly, interest. I wanted him to rot the rest of his life away for killing Mace, but now I just want him gone. He cannot exist in the same world that I do. You can report me if you choose to.”
Silence.
I knew they wouldn’t.
“What about Michael?” Jeremiah asked. “Are you going to take care of him too?”
“What do you think?” I scoffed.
“Gage,” Yuri called.
“I think you should leave, Yuri …” I said.
“Nah, don’t do it,” Yuri tried again.
“He’s a piece of scum. I’ll be doing the world a favor. He put his hands on her. If I don’t take care of him today, he’s going to turn up dead before the week ends.”
“How are we going to fucking explain all of these?” he complained.
“We turned up to save her ... they acted up. We defended ourselves,” I said.
The room went quiet for the longest time and neither of us moved. My mind was already made up … no matter what happened, these three had written their sentence the moment they touched that sweet, innocent girl who had never harmed a soul.
“When do I make the call?”
Her voice was so sudden that we all jumped.
She was standing by the door, her gaze boring directly into mine.
I wanted to call out to her, but my mouth couldn’t form the words.
“Will this get you into trouble?” she asked.
My response was simple. “I don’t care.”
“I do,” she said.
An all-consuming fire started in the pit of my stomach. “Will you disappear with me?”
“Gage,” Yuri called, but I was unable to drag my gaze away from hers or to even respond for that matter.
Finally, she broke her gaze from mine and turned to him. “I’ll make the call. I don’t need a reason stronger than Gage’s supposed death for me to move out of the county for a fresh start.”
I couldn’t breathe.
Yuri pulled his phone out of his pocket and she went with him as they returned to the cabin’s living room.
Gage
I heard the car crawl to a stop and waited for Michael to come to me.
The first thing they noticed as they walked into the room was the body of their colleague sprawled across the bed that had now turned a bloody red.
“Holy Fuck!” Tav roared.
Michael staggered away in fright. They were both completely speechless for the first few moments before Michael darted his head around for lingering danger. His eyes instantly connected with mine at the opposite end of the room, where I was seated while calmly waiting for the both of them.
All the color drained away from his face.
“Isn’t this …” Tav stuttered. “The fucking biker from Order of Blood?”
“Aren’t you meant to be dead?” Michael gasped. A crazy laugh escaped Michaels lips then as he shook his head in realization.
“You tricked everyone. You’re the fucking rat.”
I wasn’t interested in him … yet. Instead I looked at Tav.
He had begun to slowly retreat away from the room.
The sound of a cocking gun came from behind him. He froze, his hands in the air. When he glanced around and saw Yuri behind him, he shut his eyes with defeat. He knew it was an ambush. The game was up, but he didn’t know why. “What the fuck is going on?” he asked.
“Do you remember Mace Herald from the Black Angels club?” I asked.
Not even an ounce of recognition flashed in his eyes.
I went on, “Three years ago, on June 15th, you knocked on the van of his window at the Maple Canyon intersection. And when he rolled down the glass, you put five fucking bullets into his head. His wife couldn’t recognize him, you lowlife. He had two kids. Babies. But you don’t care, do you? Nah …”
His eyes widened with the memory. “Joker? Are you talking about Joker? What the fuck does he have to do with you?”
“He was my best friend.”
“How the fuck is that possible? He was a fucking agent … he was working for the ATF and that’s why the club—”
“You only found that out a year later. You killed him because he found out about the funds you stole from the club’s merchandise. He called you out on it and told you to report yourself to the club, but you killed him to save your own fucking neck. It’s taken me a long time to catch up to you, and here I am. I swore to avenge him, so time’s up for you, I guess.”
“So what now?” he asked. “You’re going to off me too, do the same to me as I did to him? You can’t, can you? You’re the law.” He had the audacity to smile.
I pulled out my gun and pointed it straight at him. The smile dissipated from his face at the realization that I wasn’t joking.
I cocked my gun and his hands flew up in a useless warding off gesture.
He was gunned down straight through the heart, and then through the abdomen to throw off the precision of the hit when they ran their investigations. Being hit in an attempt to attack us would be his end story.
Saving Della-Ray Page 21