by Eve R. Hart
“Empty,” Hunt whispered as he slyly peered inside. “Well, sort of. There’s a body. Female. She’s dressed really nice but missing a shoe.”
That told me that she wasn’t a captured girl. She wasn’t one that was to be sold to the highest bidder. I looked in to see for myself. By her hair, makeup, and clearly expensive clothes, she definitely wasn’t one. She didn’t have that week-old dirty hair or the dark circles under her eyes. Or the starved look to her frame. She didn’t look like they purposely tried to cover up the bite marks or bruises from where the sick fucks had gotten rough with her. No, she was…there for a different reason.
Before I could say anything, he dropped down into the room. His head cocked to the side as he took in the dead woman’s face like he was trying to place her. I followed suit, standing behind him looking over his shoulder.
“The Butcher. Well, one of them anyway. That name seems to be taken by so many people these days,” I said with a huffed laugh as I tried to hold back my eye roll. “Sadistic fucking bitch.”
“Looks like whoever was her guest for the night used her shoe to free themselves from the wall,” he said, keeping his body crouched and making his way over to the wall under the window. His fingers reached out and touched the loose dust from the drywall. “There’s blood on that drill.” Hunt grimaced for a fraction of a second. “I would have killed her too.”
“So…guess this means he’s gone,” I said stating the obvious. I mean, it was clear that whoever had been tied up or chained up or whatever in this room was no longer here. I looked over and saw the dried trail of blood leading out the door. It was a wide trail, the size of a body. There had been a lot of blood spilled in that one spot. “That blood has already dried. So I doubt that’s from your guy.”
He cut his eyes up at me as if to say no shit. Clearly, he’d already dismissed it and wasn’t going to waste his breath to say so like I had.
We were too late, but at least our guy wasn’t dead. Right? I hoped he’d made a clean escape, anyway. Seeing as the door was still shut, the body was still in the middle of the room, and there wasn’t a crazy kind of commotion outside the door, I would have assumed they didn’t even know what had gone down in here just yet. It was only a matter of time and the longer we stayed here the better the chance that we’d be found out.
Then, like the universe had read my thoughts, the clink sound of a lock turning had us both frozen in place.
“I’ll be in the car,” Hunt said moving to the window. It wasn’t that he was afraid to fight, it was just that he’d rather not.
Whatever. I could handle this shit myself.
But because I was me, I couldn’t resist saying something to poke at him.
“Really?” I whispered harshly. “After you stood there and smelled the burnt up flesh of all those innocent girls they did that to?”
And that right there got him. Got him thinking beyond his little tracking mission. Got him to open his eyes to the rest of the picture around him. Also, got him unsnapping his knife holster and moving to take his place hind the door.
Me? Well, I stood in plain sight. Trust me, it was all part of the unsaid plan.
“What the fu—” The big guy didn’t even get a chance to finish his sentence before the wide-eyed look of horror overtook his face and the gurgling of blood filling his esophagus took over. He didn’t even have a chance to reach for his gun.
Hunt, being a lot smaller than the guy, struggled to bring him to the ground slowly so as not to make any more noise than necessary. Then he wiped the blade of his knife off on the guy’s grease smeared shirt. By the looks of him, I pegged him as a simple lackey. We needed to take down Keften, since we were doing this. Sure it wouldn’t stop trafficking, but it would make one less man in the trade.
With a chin jerk, we were moving out the door. The basement had been set up as an extra floor of sorts. There was a long hall with three bedrooms off of it. By the time we made it to the stairs, we’d taken down three men without a sound. We ascended the stairs, and came face to face with another guard. This one had time to fire off a shot, narrowly missing my head. That was enough to alert everyone that was left in the house.
Then it was all mayhem and bloodshed. But in all honesty, they didn’t stand a chance. Five shots from my handgun and they were all down, clean shot directly between their evil eyes.
“See, you didn’t really need me,” Hunt said after we cleared the rest of the house.
“Keften’s not here. He must have run when he heard the shots,” I said, double checking the faces of each body. Clothing alone told me these men were throwaways. A man with his job, his empire, wouldn’t wear everyday shit. And it wouldn’t be dirty and rumpled on top of that.
“Moving on then,” he said sounding super focused.
It wasn’t that he didn’t care, in fact, I could tell you that he was pissed about Keften getting free. He’d derailed his job for this, and we didn’t even get the target. He thought he’d failed.
And maybe I felt that way too, but I was satisfied with what we had done. It may not have been much, but I could only hope that it was some sort of dent in Keften’s empire, in his plan. If anything, I’d put a few thorns in his side. Yeah, that was enough to make me smile just a bit.
“What’s next?” I asked as I closed the passenger’s side door.
“I drop you. Bocca got away, so wherever he is, has to be safer than here. You’ve done your job.”
I couldn’t very much argue with that. With a shrug, I left it at that, and when he dropped me back off at my car, I merely gave a nod as a goodbye. Then he took off without so much as a glance back in the rearview mirror.
My job was done. Time for a drink.
What?
You think I needed to go after Keften?
Well, that would have been the noble thing, right? One should never mistake me for being noble. I wasn’t a damn knight in shining armor. Sure, I kept my killing to guys that deserved it, but they were always jobs. Until a contract came across my proverbial desk for Kefton’s head, then I wasn’t going to go after him. Think what you will, I had a fine line I had to walk. If I started making my own jobs, if I started randomly taking out the kingpins, then it would draw too much attention to myself. Not only that, then I’d no longer be the executioner, I’d be the fucking judge too. Sorry, but I wasn’t one to carry that extra weight on my shoulders.
I had to believe that his time would come. And maybe if I was lucky, I would be the one holding the clock.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Bocca
I had a really fucking good memory. I stored all sorts of shit up in this big head of mine. Some might have called it photographic, but I chose to just see it as using my brain to its fullest ability. I had names, dates, addresses, and events all stored up there. In a blink, I could recall what I was looking for.
Sara Ann. Four blocks from the county hospital. Fourth floor, corner apartment. Yeah, I knew it all, though maybe I shouldn’t have. It was my job for the club to know these things. To look into club associations and make sure everything stayed under the radar. It was expected of me to dig up every little fucking detail of someone’s life. Whether or not I would share that depended on the situation.
To be honest, it was a bit taxing sometimes.
They called me Bocca because it means mouth in Italian. Sometimes it might have seemed like I talked too much. But that was the thing, the shit I said, the little tidbits I spilled, were nothing of importance. In a way, it was a way to distract people from the fact that I held everyone’s secrets up in here. That was a heavy thing for one person to carry on their shoulders. But I did. And I didn’t ever complain about it.
Sometimes I played charming and fun, but mostly that was just an act. Some people knew that because they knew the things I had to keep inside. And some people saw straight through my act. Nadya. Yeah, there was no fooling that chick. I both respected and feared her. I was glad she was on our side, that was for fucking sure. She ha
d the ability to look at someone and read them in the blink of an eye. She was kind of creepy sometimes but I kind of liked her. And she was honestly the best thing for Tank and Grass.
But enough about that.
I drove through the city on autopilot because I not only knew where I was, I knew where the hell I was going.
I parked on the street, not giving a fuck if the car would get towed. I knew I left DNA behind but I suspected it wouldn’t matter. It wasn’t like that psycho chick would be reported missing or dead. I imagined that if they didn’t do the clean up themselves, that they had an evil version of Mr. Clean to do their shit work.
Okay, do we really need to talk about him right now? Yes, he was a cleaner. Yes, he was the club’s number one go-to guy for getting rid of the dead bodies we sometimes ended up with. But I knew the guy, knew his work ethic, if you will. He wasn’t out there taking random jobs from random outlaws. No, he had standards. He worked for the…let’s say, not so bad guys.
So, there I was, sitting outside of Sara Ann’s building wondering how the hell I was going to get up to the fourth floor without causing a fuss. There was a door guy and security in the lobby, that was the hard part. I also knew that there was a service elevator around the back for when people were moving in and all. That was the smartest way in. Only, I didn’t know if it required some sort of code. That, unfortunately, wouldn’t do me any good right now. Fuck it, I had to try. I couldn’t go back to the compound until I had my head straight and I was able to protect them. The current state I was in, I couldn’t even protect myself. Plus, I knew I wouldn’t be making it much further, hell, I shouldn’t have even driven here. I was honest to God, ready to pass out.
A few more minutes. I just needed a few more to catch my breath before I moved on. I wasn’t being a baby, but everything felt like it was on fire. My fingers were currently numb and possibly my toes too. Every time I moved the fabric of my clothes caught on those stupid fucking mini-stakes sticking out of me, causing a new, hotter rush of pain. It was going to be so much fun getting those out. I wasn’t looking forward to that at all. My only hope was that Sara Ann had something to dull the pain, even if it was alcohol. I’d take what I could get right now.
I pushed the door open and stumbled out, nearly getting my face tackled by an oncoming car. Good thing the driver had lightning reflexes. Also, good thing they were an asshole and just drove off without stopping to check on me.
I walked, well limped would really be more accurate, to the side of the building. With blurry vision and a throbbing in my head that felt like my whole body was rattling, I scanned the place for cameras. None. At least not that I could see. I was pretty sure I was right. Maybe this building wasn’t all that nice and secure after all, which worked for me right then but at the same time, didn’t make me happy. While I didn’t know Sara Ann all that well, I knew she had helped the club out a time or two as best as she could, and also, she was from Moon Hill. Kinda made her one of our people in my mind. She needed to live in a place that took the safety of their tenants a little more seriously. Maybe once I was breathing normally again, I’d have a chat with her about it.
Unable to hold my sexy body up any longer, I fell against the wall, using it for support as I forced one foot in front of the other. I made it to the back corner of the building soaked in sweat and panting like an overweight chain smoker doing a 5k.
Around the back was an exit to the stairs, and a little further along the wall was an odd indent that wasn’t very wide. This had to be it. If I couldn’t get on the elevator then I’d have to take the damn stairs. I really didn’t want to do that.
There wasn’t a button for the elevator on the outside, but there was a speaker box with a call button right there on the wall. I contemplated playing delivery man for about two seconds but given the late hour, I was sure they’d come and check it out for themselves. Oh, and wonder why I hadn’t just walked in the front when there were so many open spaces along the curb. There was a chance that I’d be seen by someone. The chain was starting to get heavy not only around my neck, but in the bag hanging off my arm. I needed this fucking thing off.
I shuffled my way back over to the rear exit for the stairs. I could feel my legs shaking and threatening to give out on me at any second. The door was locked, one of those key-card access kind of things right there blinking red every ten seconds.
That was when I gave the fuck up. I knew it was pathetic and downright sad for a man as strong as me, but come on, I had just been through the worst hell of my life. I was still in shock that I’d actually made it out.
My back hit the wall with a force that rattled my teeth and reminded me of the bruises that marred my stunning face. Then I sank to the ground, my knees buckled and my body collapsed like a sack of potatoes falling from the sky.
That was it for me. The darkness around me somehow grew darker, the dim street lights fading from my vision. My heart still beat, but I could feel it struggling to keep up its battle. This wasn’t how I wanted to die. This wasn’t how I was supposed to fucking go out. This wasn’t even a bit glorious or remarkable.
“Sir?” A sweet voice filtered into my ears.
I think I managed a groan as my head attempted to lift itself up.
“Are you alright?”
“Nope,” I said trying my best to smile up at the woman that I currently couldn’t see. “Are you hot?” I asked because, well it was me, and if I was going to go out with a woman right there in front of me, then I sure as hell was going to make the best of it. Maybe I could get her to give me a handie before I passed out.
Her steps grew cautiously closer. Hey, at least my hearing hadn’t faded. Then there was a sharp intake of air and I knew that she was close enough to see the damage that had been done to me.
“You need a doctor,” she said.
“Yeah, that’s why I’m here,” I said in a joking tone. Seriously messed up, bloody, broken, and with a chain around my neck and I could still pull off the charm. I think. I hoped.
“Sir, you’re not at the hospital.” Her voice sounded a little less concerned now. And maybe there was a bite of annoyance in there.
“I just need to get up to the fourth floor. There’s a doctor up there. I know she’ll treat me right away.”
“She’s not here.”
Well, fuck me. This night just kept getting better and better. Also, how did she know that Sara Ann wasn’t home right now? I was too out of it to think about it.
“Come on,” she said with a heavy, resigned sigh. Then her cold, slender fingers were slipping under my armpit like somehow she could lift me up. I couldn’t see her but I imagined that she wasn’t some kind of She-Hulk. I wasn’t as bulky as those gym rats but I had a good amount of solid muscle on me. I helped her as best as I could, letting out a long groan as I pushed myself up with my free arm.
“Oh, mother fucking shit balls,” I cried out when my body fell into her and managed to wedge the stick in my shoulder deeper. This caused the bag to slip from my arm and drop to the ground with a clang and a thud that rang out into the night air.
“Is that a chain around your neck?” she asked, sucking in a harsh breath.
“Yep,” I replied, my eyes fluttering open and my vision clearing just a bit. “I like the kinky stuff. Really gets me—”
My words caught in my throat as I looked down into the most beautiful eyes I’d ever seen. Brown, but not just brown. No, they were dark. So dark they threatened to be black. But they weren’t cold. No, there was a vibrant warmth in them. I felt like I was on the floor again. Or maybe that was just my heart.
“I don’t think I want to know,” she said with a small shake of her head as she gingerly worked my arm up and over her shoulders. “Um, I’m going to say that the stairs are a no go.”
I grunted and strained as I hobbled my way over to the service elevator where she was attempting to drag me. It was almost cute how she thought that she could do such a thing.
“Uh, Hank,” she sa
id into the speaker after she’d pushed the button and someone had responded. “It’s Rosemarie, I hurt my ankle at work. I meant to park up front but I am so tired, I forgot and parked back here. Would it be alright to get a ride up?”
Her voice was all sugar and hot honey. Sweet and warming. There was no way this Hank guy could deny her. It would be like killing a child’s parents right in front of them. For real. That was how it was.
“No problem, Rosemarie,” Hank said through the speaker and even with the crackle and distortion, I could hear the tender care he had for this woman holding me close. “You get on up there and ice that ankle.”
“Thank you, Hank. I will.”
Then the doors opened and she wrestled me inside the steel death box. The door closed and then without her hitting any buttons, we began to move up. We came to a smooth stop on the fourth floor. Perhaps she had been lying when she said Sara Ann wasn’t home. But wait, that didn’t make any sense, because she hadn’t pushed any buttons. So that meant that Hank was the one controlling the thing. Which meant…
“She’s my neighbor,” she—Rosemarie—answered like she could read my mind. “The confusion is clear on your face. And you’re grunting while trying to work it all out in your head. Do you have a concussion? Did you hit your head?”
“Um, no?” My voice went high with my answer. I hadn’t hit my head, but someone had hit it for me. With that said, I was pretty sure I wasn’t concussed. I knew the signs well and they weren’t there. I was just hurting, really fucking badly.
“Try to look normal. Mrs. Ferrley across the hall is a nosy old bat. I don’t want to have to deal with that.”
I gave a firm nod, took in a huge lungful of air, and stepped out of the elevator with my back steel straight. In my mind that was how I did it anyway. At her door, which was literally right next to Sara Ann’s, she dug out her keys and I buried my face in her neck to hide my weakness. Also, to get a strong whiff of the fresh floral scent coming off of her. And that was when I noticed something else. An odd smell that was not easily mistaken.