The Bold and the Dominant

by Shayla Black

  As they rounded the corner onto Kendall’s street, Liam tried to hold himself together because panic didn’t do her any good.

  Beck handed both men a pair of latex gloves, then donned his own. Hammer drove slowly past the house as Liam craned his neck. He didn’t see a single light on, inside or out.

  Pulling to the curb near the middle of the block, Hammer cut the engine. After slipping on their gloves, the three men exited the vehicle, carefully closing the doors with nothing more than a snick of sound. As they made their way down the sidewalk, a dog barked from somewhere behind them. Another followed suit, but neither animal was close enough to attract unwanted attention.

  Hammer darted down the driveway, drawing out his gun when he stepped into the shadow between Bill’s house and the neighbor’s. Liam and Beck followed, both stopping to peer through the dirty windows. Liam couldn’t see a thing except darkness. Not one sound came from inside. The place felt dead. An icy ripple slithered down his spine.

  Pulling a penlight out of his pocket, Liam made his way to the attached garage. Shining the tiny beam of light through one of the grimy windows along the face of the door, he saw no sign of Raine. Even Bill’s truck was gone.

  “Anything?” Hammer whispered.

  “No,” Liam responded in the same furtive tone.

  Quiet as a cat, Beck crept to the back door. Gripping the doorknob with a steady hand, he twisted it slowly. Giving a short, low whistle to get his and Hammer’s attention, Beck flashed a triumphant smile and opened the door.

  It hadn’t been locked. They’d just been handed a gift—or walked into a trap.

  Hammer hurried inside first, gun drawn. Liam followed in close behind as Beck quietly closed the door, then trailed them.

  The stench of rotting garbage, sour gin, and stale cigarettes hit Liam’s senses like a prizefighter’s right hook.

  “Jesus,” Beck muttered under his breath, then pressed a palm over his nose.

  Liam wanted to retch but forced himself to breathe through his mouth instead. Shielding the beam from the penlight, Macen raised his hand, and the three men froze like statues, straining to listen for the slightest sound.

  Silence.

  As Hammer moved through the room again, he looked both furious and frustrated.

  “Fuck this. I’m not afraid of that cocksucker.” Macen flipped on the kitchen light. “Kendall, you motherfucking coward, come out and face me!”

  Cockroaches scattered in every direction. Stacks of moldy food stuck to mismatched dishes that littered the counters. Liam stared at the black streaks of grime on the yellowed linoleum floor as his eyes adjusted to the harsh light.

  Beck cursed again. Repugnance crawled all over his face.

  “Raine!” Liam called out, then cocked his head to listen intently.

  Hammer and Beck paused, too. No answer.

  “C’mon, you miserable piece of shit,” Hammer provoked. “You want your money? I’ve got it right here.”

  Quiet enveloped them once again.

  “Give Raine to us, and you can live out the rest of your days in style,” Liam offered. “All five fucking seconds of it,” he murmured, his voice low and deadly.

  “Raine!” Hammer screamed again. “Make a noise for us. Kick. Scream. Anything.”

  Not even a creak stirred from the miserable house. The oppressive silence wrapped around them. Hammer’s expression fell desolate.

  Beck opened a drawer near the sink and withdrew two long knives, then handed one to Liam. “Let’s check out the rest of the house, just to be sure.”

  “If you find Bill first, cut off his balls and shove them down his throat for me, will you?” Liam sneered.

  “Then I’ll finish him off with a round to the head…eventually.” Hammer’s icy glower left no doubt he meant to make the prick suffer.

  Liam couldn’t agree more with that plan.

  “I want to hurt him, too,” Beck drawled cynically. “I’ve got that shit down to an art form.”

  Making their way through the house, Liam found it remarkably more revolting than the first time he’d been there. The gut-churning odor of rotting garbage and fetid decay clung like an oily black film. Beer cans and cheap gin bottles littered the floor as they made their way down the hall, searching for Raine.

  Exploring every closet and cubby, they called out to her, pausing to listen for the tiniest scrape or moan. With each room that turned out empty, the glimmer of hope Liam had been clinging to faded darker until the red he’d been seeing turned black.

  Standing outside Raine’s old room, Liam felt his hand tremble on the doorknob. He didn’t want to see the posters of her teen idols on the walls again or be reminded that his raven-haired lass had once lain on the bed only to have her innocent dreams stripped away by the monster she’d called Dad.

  Beck seemed to read his mind. “Go ahead. I’ll check this room.”

  Hammer’s brows furrowed with concern as he stepped in behind Beck. A snarl rumbled from Macen’s throat as he darted back out and raced down the hall toward Bill’s room.

  Beck emerged less than a minute later, pale and visibly shaken. He shook his head bleakly.

  “Son of a bitch!” Hammer bellowed.

  Liam and Beck ran down the hall, then bolted into the master bedroom to find Hammer pacing and cursing. Empty dresser drawers gaped open. Macen ripped several hangers from the barren closet before heaving them across the room in a violent rage.

  Bill had left, and Liam had little hope the bastard had any intention of returning. The gravity of Raine’s peril slammed into him anew. Finding her now would be difficult, if not impossible. A needle in a fucking haystack.

  “I’ll call Seth and have him contact the police,” Beck said in a dismal tone.

  “Goddamn it, I thought she’d be here.” Hammer sounded stunned, shaken. “That he just wanted money and the chance to yank my chain. Where the fuck is he?”

  Liam wondered the same thing. And what if they’d wasted time on this wild goose chase instead of calling the police, and it cost Raine her life?

  “Come on,” Beck urged. “We need to get out of here.”

  Hammer nodded, then he and Beck hurried outside. Liam followed, closing the door behind them. The snick of the knob left him feeling as if he’d abandoned Raine.

  Liam swallowed the fear in his throat and followed the other men across the yard. A new level of panic trampled him. Time was running out if they wanted to find her alive. He could almost hear the mocking tick-tock in his head.

  Once in the car, Beck rang Seth. Hearing the doctor say that they’d failed to find Raine choked Liam with hopelessness. But he’d bloody well keep fighting to get her back…unless he knew for certain he had nothing left to fight for.

  “Before we head to the club, the private eye I hired to check in on Bill periodically sent me the names of a couple of the asshole’s haunts. Let’s check them out,” Hammer suggested.

  “What kind of places? You think he’ll be at one of them?” Liam asked, almost hating his wretched hope but needing it so badly.

  “Mostly restaurants and bars, so I doubt he’ll be hanging out. I’m hoping someone will know where to find him or will have seen him recently.” Hammer scrubbed a hand through his hair. “I don’t know what else to do.”

  “Let’s go,” Liam urged.

  Hammer pulled from the curb and sped down the street. Liam noticed his friend wasn’t concerned about getting pulled over any longer.

  As they darted onto the highway, he remembered the photos Hammer had shown him of the last beating Raine had suffered at Bill’s hands before running away. Liam tried to clear his mind, not fixate on the horrors Raine could be experiencing as they broadened their desperate search.

  The first bar Hammer stopped at was closed. The second, though open, had only two patrons inside, eating eggs. No one had seen Bill lately. Ditto with the third.

  Liam felt the despair rolling off Hammer’s body. It echoed inside him.

  �
��Where next?” he asked, his frustration spiking.

  “That was the last place on my list. Fuck!” Hammer snapped, anxiety taking its toll. “I’d convinced myself she’d be at Bill’s, just waiting for his cash. Now I don’t have a goddamn clue.”

  “We should head back to the club,” Beck suggested. “I’m sure the place is swarming with cops. Maybe we can help them somehow.”

  Liam wanted to believe that. Unfortunately, he didn’t. He had to pray that his strong, wily girl, who had escaped her sire before, could somehow do it again.

  If not, he and Hammer would lose another woman they shared, only this one had been a blissful surprise who’d stolen his heart as well. The sick irony was, they’d be sharing the debilitating pain of losing Raine together, as they should have after Juliet’s death. Jesus, how had Macen lived through this devastation alone?

  Damn Bill Kendall to hell and back. The bastard had forced him and Hammer to play by another set of rules, and having the control ripped from his hands filled Liam with a sense of despair. Still, he’d do, give, or say anything to have Raine back.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Dawn broke over the San Gabriel Mountains in the distance as Hammer pulled into Shadows’ parking lot, now choked with police cars. Plainclothes officers gathered evidence. The camera’s constant flash reflected off Raine’s little compact like strobes. The driver’s side door still hung open—a stark reminder that he’d failed to protect her from Bill after all these years.

  Hammer remembered the day he’d given her the keys. He could still hear her squeal of excitement, see delight twinkle in her blue eyes. The memory only deepened his guilt. Desperation tore his heart from his chest. Fear made every anxious second feel like a century because he knew if Bill wasn’t waiting around for his money, he’d chosen to end their cat-and-mouse game. He’d want maximum pleasure out of the pain he inflicted—on both Hammer and Raine.

  Bill would probably torture her unspeakably and kill her.

  Hammer dragged in a shuddering breath, trying to hold himself together and hang on to hope that somehow, some way he’d find Raine alive.

  “Bloody hell,” Liam complained. “The car park is a circus. We don’t have time for this.”

  Beck snorted. “Just wait until the reporters show up.”

  With a curse, Hammer stopped the car and killed the engine. “Reporters don’t give a shit about anonymity. If you need to get out of here, go.”

  Beck shrugged. “I’m done caring about being outed. If my vanilla patients don’t want a kink doctor, fuck them. I’m not leaving until we find Raine.”

  “I thought you were supposed to be in surgery. Isn’t that why we left the lodge?” Liam asked with a puzzled expression.

  Hammer hadn’t thought to ask. He’d been too busy worrying about Raine.

  “After I left you at the emergency room, I got a call from the head of the harvesting team. The donor died, but when they retrieved the heart, it was wasted. So my patient is back on the waiting list again,” Beck explained. “I sure as fuck wasn’t staying in my condo with your ex. Shadows was closer than my house, so I crashed here.”

  A hard tap at the window made Hammer jerk in his seat. An officer wearing a scowl bent to peer into the car. “You’ll have to leave. This is a crime scene.”

  Hammer wasn’t in the mood to deal with bureaucracy. Opening the door, he stepped out. Instinctively, the cop snapped back and put a palm on his revolver.

  “Easy,” Hammer soothed. “I’m the owner of this club. These men are with me.”

  Liam and Beck climbed out of the car and flanked him.

  As they stood shoulder to shoulder, the officer eyed them. “I need to see some ID from all of you. Where have you been?”

  I can’t afford to placate you, fucker.

  “Breakfast meeting,” he replied curtly, digging into his wallet.

  “Mr. Hammerman,” a familiar voice in a uniform called out as he approached the group. Macen bit back a smile when he spotted Dean Gorman, a fellow Dom and member of Shadows. “Hey, I haven’t seen you since the Policeman’s Ball.”

  Dean extended his hand, and Hammer shook it, feeling a bit of relief. “Glad you’re here, Sergeant. I was just explaining to your cohort that I own this club.”

  “I’ve got this,” Dean dismissed the other officer, who grunted and walked away.

  The sergeant turned to make sure his fellow cop was out of earshot. “I’m sorry to hear about Raine. Bill Kendall is her dad?”

  “’Fraid so,” Hammer answered. “Do you have any leads on him?”

  “No.” Dean sighed. “A couple of units left Kendall’s house a few minutes ago. They said the place was a pigsty and should be condemned.”

  He knew that but played dumb so he didn’t put Dean in the awkward position of keeping his B and E a secret. “And they didn’t find anyone?”

  “Kendall’s clothes are gone, so the assumption is he’s skipped town and taken Raine with him.”

  “Maybe, but that monster has been itching to get his hands on her for years. I don’t think he’d put off whatever he had planned to flee the city. My guess is, he’ll stash her somewhere close but isolated where he can hurt her or…” Fuck. Saying the words stabbed Hammer with terror. “Maybe even kill her. Then he’ll leave.”

  Dean winced. “I told the detectives that Raine is a family friend. They issued a BOLO for Kendall, his truck, the van, and Raine. Since everyone in my precinct now knows this is personal for me, they’re not wasting a moment.”

  Hammer knew with every second that ticked by, the odds of finding a kidnap victim alive dropped exponentially. A thick lump of panic lodged in his throat. He couldn’t speak. All he could do was nod in appreciation for Dean’s help.

  “Thank you.” Liam gripped the officer’s shoulder with a grateful squeeze.

  “No worries.” Dean glanced between Hammer and Liam as if he wondered which one of them she belonged to now. “She’s irreplaceable to a lot of us. Shadows isn’t our kinky home without her. Hang in there. We’re doing all we can.”

  Please let her be alive. I can’t lose her now.

  Struggling to maintain his composure, Hammer stared at the cops still examining the crime scene. He wanted to rail at them to find Raine faster.

  Then Macen saw two big television vans pull to the curb and clenched his jaw. “The vultures have landed. Let’s get inside.”

  When they entered the club, the few members who’d been sleeping in the new rooms on the other side of the club were awake and looking shell-shocked as they gave statements to a pair of detectives. Hammer made a mental note to stress the importance of guarding his members’ identities.

  Scrubbing a hand through his hair, he spotted Seth at the bar, nursing a bottle of water and looking desolate. Before Hammer headed over, Dean and one of the detectives intercepted him.

  Hammer directed them to his office, then spent the next thirty minutes answering questions about Raine and Bill. He tiptoed around the fact that he’d bribed Kendall to stay away from her. To prove the urgency of the case, Hammer showed the man pictures of a beaten and bruised Raine as a teenager. After that, the detective radiated fury.

  Then Hammer joined Liam, Beck, and Seth at the bar, hoping to God something broke soon.

  “How did the inquisition go?” Liam asked, nervously tapping his fingers.

  “It was tedious but necessary.” Hammer took a seat next to him.

  Liam gave him a sympathetic stare. “What did you tell him?”

  “Everything I could without explaining the ‘contact’ Bill and I have had over the years,” Hammer replied bitterly. “I didn’t want to give them any reason to look at me as a suspect. It would only waste time.”

  On his right, a couple who had joined the club after moving to