“What happened?” Dad didn’t pull any punches, especially when the call he was taking was on the line reserved strictly for emergencies only.
“Motherfucker is dead when I find him.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Dad snapped.
I ran a hand through my hair and continued to pace along the side of the building, my eyes scanning the area for any signs of someone listening in. “Someone beat the shit out of Tess.”
“The girl from the supermarket? The same one you won in the poker game?
“Yeah. I found her lying in a puddle of her own blood at her place.”
“Jesus Christ, Miller. What the fuck were you doing at her place? I thought you were done with that shit?” The phone practically vibrated in my hand as I did my best to control the desire to slam my fist into the wall behind me at his ignorance, and I had to remind myself that his ignorance was my own doing. Plus, landing myself in the hospital would not help Tess. I’d save it for the man who put her here in the first place.
“Did you not hear a goddamn thing I said? Someone broke into her apartment and knocked her around.”
“That shit happens all the fuckin’ time. Call the police and let them deal with it. She’s some piece of pussy, what’s it got to do with you?”
“What’s it got to do with me?” I snapped. “How about the fact I’ve been dating her for the last several months. That work for you?”
There was a brief pause where all I could hear was the sound of my own rapid breathing. This was the make or break moment. The moment where I found out just how royally I’d screwed up by not coming clean about my relationship with Tess sooner.
“I’ll send your brother down and put cleanup on standby. When Ashton shows up, come to the house. We’ll deal with this.”
And there it was.
Dad didn’t pull any punches. Someone hurt a member of his family—even if he hadn’t known that she was part of it until now—he wasn’t having it. The line went dead.
I had my instructions. Now to follow them.
I jogged back to the waiting room to wait for news about Tess, lamenting the fact that I wasn’t a smoker because at least then I’d have something to do with my trembling hands instead of keeping them trapped inside my jacket pockets like some weak little bitch.
The cold plastic of the cheap chairs bit into my legs as I sat closest to the doors leading to the treatment rooms. The smell of disinfectant permeated the air. I watched on as new patients came in and existing ones came out. Still there was no news on Tess.
I checked in with the lady at the desk numerous times, each time ignoring the look of pity in her eyes because if I dwelled on it I would start to wonder why she pitied me, and that scenario wasn’t worth contemplating. I had a very loose grip on my sanity and I was clinging to it with everything in me.
Finally, a man in a long coat came into the room and called her name. I jumped up, startling the elderly gentleman next to me, knocking his walking stick to the ground. I apologized, retrieving it for him before taking the doctor by the elbow and pulling him to a quiet corner of the room.
“How is she?” I didn’t bother to try and hide the desperation in my voice. The doctor gave me a once-over, took in my expensive suit, and offered a sympathetic nod as he gestured for me to follow him through the double doors, back to where Tess was.
“She’s sedated for now. We’ll be moving her to a room shortly.”
I couldn’t pull my eyes from her. “I want her to have her own room. I’ll pay for it.”
The doctor pulled back the curtains to the cubical farthest from the door. The cuts and bruises around her face seemed that much worse next to the stark white sheets. Her skin was peppered with gauze and tape, and I could see a cast peeking out of the side of her gown. I slumped down in the chair next to the bed, afraid to touch any part of her. There was barely an inch of her body left unscathed. If she would have just listened to me. If she had gone to my place instead of home. If we hadn’t argued.
If.
Rage, revenge, sadness, and pain all warred for my attention, but I had to shove rage and revenge to the back of my mind. Until Ashton showed up, there wasn’t much I could do.
The doctor gave me a general update, which I barely heard. The whole time his lips were moving all I could think about was that maybe Dad and Ashton were right. Maybe nothing in the world was more important than the woman who held your heart—not even the business. The ache in my chest deepened when I realized that it had taken for this to happen, for Tess to be attacked for me to see I needed her much more than I needed my father’s approval; than the business. She was everything.
“Miller?” a soft, sweet voice called from behind me.
I glanced over my shoulder and there stood Elena. Glassy, red rimmed eyes stared back at me. The doctor was nowhere to be seen. I hadn’t even heard him leave the room.
“Hey.”
She stepped forward and rested a hand on my shoulder. “I’m so sorry. How is she?”
I screwed my face up, trying to remember some of what the doctor had said. “A few broken ribs, a broken wrist, plus a concussion.”
I returned my focus to Tess, her bruised and battered face taunting me. I had a damn good idea whose fault it was and I wanted to ring the bastard’s neck. Elena’s small hand covered mine and I felt some of the tension in my hand release, the knuckles returning to their normal color rather than a strained white.
“Why don’t you take a walk? Give yourself time to cool down. I’ll stay with Tess.”
The desire to stay by her side warred with the desire to hunt down Ray Wasden and beat him to within an inch of his life. I should have ended the prick after the tire incident, but I’d let Tess convince me to leave it alone. That had to be the first time in my life where I’d walked away. Never again. I would never leave her in a position where she wasn’t safe. Even if she didn’t like it, that was tough. Nothing like this was ever happening to her again.
“Miller?”
My head snapped up.
“Go,” she said. “Ashton will be here in a minute. She’ll be safe while you’re gone.”
Not that I didn’t trust Elena, but Tess was stronger than her and look at the mess she was in. Having Ashton there would settle my nerves.
“Hey.” Ashton pulled back the curtain, smiling at Elena who had taken my vacated seat. “I’d ask how you’re doing but you don’t need small talk. You need to go. Tess will be fine with us.”
He wasn’t talking about a walk. He knew I wanted Ray found. It had been the same for him when Elena’s ex attacked her. It killed him that she had to handle it on her own.
“I’m going. Can you do me another favor?”
“Name it, it’s yours.” His voice was solemn. Ashton and Elena saw Tess as part of the family, and family was sacred.
“I need you to call a moving company. I want Tess’s shit out of that place and into mine before she gets out of the hospital.”
He nodded and handed me his keys. I left the room, the only thing on my mind was my hands around Ray Wasden’s neck, choking the life out of him, but I knew that wouldn’t happen. After I made Dad understand what Tess meant to me, there was no doubt in my mind that he would come up with something a little more creative.
The day was clear, the sun high in the sky. Tess would have noticed the leaves on the trees and the birds starting to head south. I noticed these things now but only because of the influence Tess had had on my life. She worked hard in school, but she always stopped to notice the things around her. Somebody was going to pay for trying to end such beauty.
I had no idea of the time. I just knew the longer Wasden was out there, the farther he’d be able to get. I pulled my phone from my pocket, made my call, and waited two rings before someone answered.
“Have you found him yet?”
“We think he’s staying with a friend in a house on the outskirts of town,” Charlie answered.
“Don’t give me t
hink. I want that asshole at the club within the hour. I don’t care what it takes, that motherfucker better be in front of me in sixty minutes. My only requirement is that he’s breathing when he arrives.”
“We’ll get him.”
With nothing left to say, I hung up and climbed into Ashton’s car. Time to pay Dad and Mom a quick visit. I’m sure Mom was flipping out about Tess, especially considering I hid our relationship from her. Dad was incredibly open with Mom so I had no doubt that she would know everything by now. I just hoped she backed off long enough for me to get Wasden. After that, she could reprimand me all she liked.
I pulled up at the valet but didn’t bother stopping to chat like I normally would. I’d make up for it with a decent tip. When they had Wasden, I wanted to be ready to go.
The elevator doors opened and I stuck my key card in for the penthouse. A few minutes later, I walked through the front door.
“Miller?” Mom’s voice called from the kitchen.
“Yeah, it’s me.”
She ran out, wrapping me in a hug. “I’m so sorry to hear what happened to Tess. I wish you would have told us when we met her. I’d have gotten to know her before now.”
I patted her on the back. “You will, as soon as she’s back on her feet.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
I shrugged and took a step back to lean against the couch. “At first, I wasn’t sure it would last long. We had a bumpy start. Once things settled down, Dad started giving me shit about things not getting done at the dealership. I was worried if he found out, he would think I wouldn’t be able to handle running the business as well as being in a relationship.”
“Actually, if I would have known it was a woman who grabbed your attention and not a variety of pussy, I would have backed off.”
I looked at my dad striding across the room, his brows heavily set. “You would have backed off?”
“Fucking a bunch of different women takes time. If you’re going out every night just to get your dick hard and get off. Maybe a bit of attention you have to use to get the girl off. Now, a relationship? That’s work, but something more. You have someone to share the load with. Feelings are involved and things can get ugly quickly if you’re not careful.”
“Probably why things are a fucking hot mess right now.”
Dad’s face hardened. “Oh, some bastard is going to pay. The question is, how much. Do you love her?”
“What?” I narrowed my eyes.
“Do you love her?” He moved to stand directly in front of me. “Are we breaking bones or are we maiming? I’ll teach a man a lesson for hurting a woman, but if you love her then she’s family and no one fucks with family, Miller. You know that.”
“More than you can imagine.” The words left my lips and I meant them. Mom squealed.
“Finally,” she said, staring up at the ceiling. “Just know, after all this is over you and I will be having a discussion about keeping secrets.”
I nodded once. I was losing patience with all of this shit. I needed to get to Wasden. The phone in Dad’s office rang and we looked at each other before moving quickly. Dad shut the door behind him. My mom knew everything that went on, but sometimes plausible deniability was all that separated her from the men. It was an important distinction, though. Dad had a rule: business shit never touched the women.
“Malcolm,” he said, hitting the button for speaker and announcing himself.
Brock’s voice came over the line. “We have him.”
“The club. Twenty minutes,” I answered.
“We’ll be there.”
The line went dead and I gathered up my stuff, eager to get over there and get shit sorted.
“The club?” Dad asked, shrugging on his coat.
I nodded. “I installed an additional two layers of sound proofing.”
“Good.”
My desire to kill Wasden got stronger when I thought about how Tess looked lying in that hospital bed; battered, bruised, broken. I pulled into my space around the back of the club. Brock was already there. It would be hard to miss the Chevelle with its cherry red paint.
I led my dad through the bar and dance floor to the wall in the back. There was a simple looking door. A half empty storage room; at least, anyone walking into the room would see it as such. Not much in there except a few filing cabinets, extra chairs and tables. The moment I stepped through I lunged for Ray, foiled only by my dad’s arms wrapped around my waist.
“He needs to talk first. Talk then hurt.”
He was right. I needed answers; specifically, how he knew where to find her. His wrists were bound behind him, holding him against the chair. I couldn’t see what Brock had used but knowing him like I did, I would have said zip ties. They were quick, painful, and the more they squirmed the tighter they became. It would be a bonus if he broke his own wrist trying to get loose.
Wasden opened his mouth to speak but I gave a swift shake of my head. This appeared to stun him and I took the opportunity to fish a handkerchief from my jacket pocket, the piece of material serving as an effective gag as I slowly fed the entire thing into his mouth, watching his eyes bulge as he struggled to draw breath.
I didn’t speak immediately, choosing to let the stark silence of the room work its magic. Many gangster-type films would choose this moment—the prey incapacitated, at the mercy of its predator—to insert a long-winded spiel; an explanation as to how they had come to be in this situation, and what was to happen as a result.
That wasn’t how it worked in real life. If I was going to shoot someone in the kneecap, I wouldn’t tell them. Why give them the chance to defend themselves or to move. No, for the prey, the fear of the unknown was much more effective.
The sound of my shoes echoed around the sparse room as I moved toward a lone filing cabinet, right in Wasden’s line of sight. His eyes tracked my movement as I opened the top drawer, reaching in slowly. Wasden struggled against his binds, screaming against the cotton in his mouth, the sound muffled and pitiful. A small chuckle left my lips as I drew out a bottle of scotch, raising it to him and unscrewing the lid before taking a deep slug. Tossing the cap to the floor, I made my way toward him, reaching out to pull a discarded chair across the room, watching Brock flinch as the metal scraped against the concrete, only stopping when I placed it in front of Wasden, about a foot from where he sat slumped in his seat. I took a seat and let my eyes wander over him as I took another drink, using my free hand to loosen my tie. His clothes were stained, the white of his shirt yellow and torn, his pants spattered with what looked like mud. At least, I assumed it was mud. His hair was in disarray. Thick clumps of hair matted with blood stuck out from the side of his head. I snapped my fingers and his eyes came to mine, the iris almost disappearing into the bloodshot whites.
“How do you know where Tess lives?” Dad asked.
I pulled the cloth from his lips. “I have no idea where Tess lives.”
Dad nodded toward Ray. “Lies,” he said simply. “He needs to understand that the truth is his only ticket out of here.”
He looked down and Ray and asked if he wanted to change his answer. Brock gave a sharp crack of his knuckles and I got a good look at Ray’s face. Looking at it, I was shocked he was willing to still tell us lies. There was a nasty gash above one of his eyebrows; the other eye was swollen shut. His lip was split in two different places and when I glanced farther down, I noticed his arm sat at an awkward angle, even when held by the ties. It didn’t look broken, but I didn’t need a medical degree to know that his shoulder was no longer sitting in its socket.
Brock drew back and threw a quick punch to his other eye.
Dad pulled out another chair and rested his foot on it, using his thigh as an armrest. I waited for him to keep asking Ray questions, but he didn’t. Instead, he stood there silently. Waiting.
“Isn’t there anything else you want to know?” I asked him.
He shook his head. “This is your show, you run it. I’m just here to wat
ch.”
“Fair enough.” I turned back to Wasden. “Let’s try this again. How do you know where Tess’s new apartment is?”
No answer.
The cracking sound and the howling scream that followed let me know that Charlie’s punch had broken a few ribs.
“One more time,” I said. “How did —”
He spat on the floor, the red liquid pooling at his feet, his teeth stained as he admitted, “I followed her home from school one day.”
“You followed her home and decided to stop by and knock her around a bit?”
“Knock her around a bit?” His eyes went wide. “I didn’t touch her, I swear.”
“Are you telling me you figured out where she lived for no reason?”
“I was going to kidnap her.”
This time it was my fist that flew directly into his lip, splitting the other side for good measure. “Why the fuck were you going to kidnap her?”
“Because she’s mine,” he panted, an evil smile playing at the edge of his lips despite his precarious situation. He really was a dumb fuck.
Dean’s foot shot straight into his balls. He tried to hunch over, to protect them from the pain, but Brock wouldn’t let him go.
“I think you need a reminder about the last time we had a conversation about that. Why didn’t you kidnap her?”
“The guys who I hired ran off with my fucking money. When I get my hands—”
Dad stood up straight. “You won’t be getting your hands on anyone for a while, if ever again.”
I nodded at Dean who gave another quick shot to Wasden’s ribs. “Now tell me who would want to hurt Tess?”
He took a minute to answer, breathing through the pain. “Marcello.”
“What the fuck would Nathan Marcello want with Tess?” I snapped, annoyed with the bastard for lying to me.
“Money.”
I paced through the room. “Are you fucking telling me that Nathan Marcello is responsible for putting Tess in the hospital?”
“Yes. He wants more than what you gave him.”
“I told Marcello that Tess was off limits. Gave the bastard money. He knows not to touch Tess.” Little shit had to be lying to take the heat off himself.
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