Serving the Bad Boy: War Hawks MC

by Carmen Faye

  I tried to smile at him, but I only felt anxious and awkward now. Catarina smiled nervously, seeming to hope everything was smoothed over as well. Ali appeared to be thinking about my offer. He brought his hands together in a prayer-like manner and tapped his fingertips against his lips.

  “I think I’m going to have to say no. I don’t want to work with you or help you. Besides, Tarek doesn’t know anything about my work. When Hamilton realizes that, he will let Tarek go. Tarek will return to me, and I will see that he has proper care,” he said, moving his hands and looking at me coldly. “I don’t know you. Tarek didn’t know you. He told me how you saved him. That was too coincidental. You were probably planted there. The whole thing was probably some big scheme Hamilton cooked up to insert you into Tarek’s life, into his bed.”

  “I resent what you are implying,” I said, stung by the accusation that I would do any part of what he was suggesting. “I was not part of anyone’s plan or acting under any instructions from anyone. Our paths crossed in a bad situation. People bond over things like that all the time.”

  “Tell me you didn’t sleep with my brother,” Ali said loudly, seeming to struggle over his words again. “My brother, tell me you didn’t sleep with him.”

  “Well, I did, but not because someone told me too,” I said defensively. “It just happened.”

  “Tell me you didn’t sleep with him and leave him without a word. Tell me, when you left him behind you weren’t just thinking of yourself,” he said, rubbing his head where the muscles seemed to be tensing again.

  “I did, and I was, but I was scared. I had a boring life that suddenly had guns and explosions, and I was scared!” I yelled. “I didn’t leave Tarek because I was in cahoots with anyone. I left because I was scared and the person helping him seemed to have been putting him into all these dangerous scenarios. You seemed to be just as bad as the person we were running from.”

  Ali and Catarina seemed surprised, but not necessarily moved by my outburst. At first, they each just looked at me unblinking. Catarina seemed shocked at the manner I had been speaking with a man of Ali’s stature. He seemed unamused by me altogether.

  “Mr. Poole, I believe Ms. Beckwith’s decision was understandable,” Catarina offered in my defense.

  Her words went unheard. Ali was solely focused on me.

  “Why would you think that? I’m in the drug and supplement industry,” he said, squinting at me. “Poole Pharmaceuticals donates to more charitable causes than any other pharmaceutical company in the state. My research has made advances in a variety of medical treatments.”

  “I think that because there is always a gun pointed at his back,” I scolded. “Whatever you are doing that makes Tarek have to clean up after you is keeping him in danger. He borrowed some money from you? Fine. Charge him interest as he repays you, but don’t make him pay you back with his life.”

  “You wouldn’t understand,” he said.

  “I wouldn’t understand?” I asked incredulously. “How much was the loan?”

  “What?” he asked, shocked by my question.

  “How much was the loan. It was for his restaurant, right?” I asked.

  “What is your point?” Ali asked.

  “I’m just curious how much his life was worth to you,” I asked. “That’s when you started making him put his life on the line for you. I just wanted to see what you valued him at.”

  “It’s not like that!” he snapped.

  “Then, what is it like?!” I yelled louder. “What is it like that some woman you don’t know and are only making assumptions about could keep you from going to rescue your brother? I came back. I told you Perry Hamilton has taken him. I’m trying to do the right thing, and you are still just sitting there questioning me.”

  ***

  Tarek

  “Fine, I’ll unfasten your restraints,” I agreed. “You screw me over, I end you. I don’t like violence against women, but self-defense is another matter.”

  “You have my word if I have yours,” Nurse Fleiss replied.

  I had no other way out, and I was losing time. I chose to take her at her word. I untied her hands first, then she unbound her neck as I worked on her feet. I could see the marks where I had strapped her wrists tightly. She didn’t even rub them a second from discomfort.

  She hopped off the bed with ease and began grabbing a few of the tools she had originally laid out for my time with Hamilton.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “I’m not stepping out of this door with you unarmed,” she said. “If we bump into anyone on staff and they see me with you, they will try to kill us both. You should get a few sharp or heavy things to defend yourself, too.”

  “I think I’ll manage,” I replied, cracking my knuckles and flexing my fists.

  She shrugged and ran her hand along the wall. When she did, a panel in the wall raised revealing a wall device for retina recognition. She took one last look at me.

  “Swear you aren’t going to knock me out and leave once I open this door,” she asked again.

  “Swear you won’t lead me to somewhere worse for Hamilton,” I replied.

  She nodded and faced the device, leaning in close. After a second, a small light passed over her left eye and back. A moment later, the door opened.

  “Let’s go,” she said, peering around the doorway before stepping into the hall.

  I followed her lead as she went opposite the way I was brought in. We passed a few other rooms that were empty but looked as menacing as the room I was held in.

  “Hospital of Death,” I said, repeating what Nurse Fleiss had called the place previously. “I guess I should just be pleased there must not be a lot of patients here.”

  “Oh, no,” she said, still guiding us through the building. “This hall just holds Dr. Hamilton’s office and his rooms for his personal projects. The main facility upstairs is beyond capacity at any given time.”

  “Who does he keep there?” I asked.

  “Whomever he wants,” she replied softly.

  She had stopped before we turned another corner to see if anyone was around first. Once she saw there was no one, she used a scanner like what had been outside the patient room I had been held in. This time when the door opened, there was a grand office.

  It seemed out of place with the rest of the building. It was filled with dark wood furniture and nicely decorated. It was well maintained and smelled as much of death as it did of cleaning products.

  “This is Hamilton’s office here. There are files and notes stored and hidden in this room that could put him away for life. Let him spend the rest of his days in a maximum security prison. Let the people there tear him apart and unmake him as he has done so many here,” Nurse Fleiss said unremorsefully. “He has a medical bag in the bottom of the closet, the unmarked door there beside the bathroom. Grab it, and we will stuff it with anything incriminating that we can find and carry.”

  I opened the door and saw several white, medical coats hanging with a few suits. On the floor was a pair of shoes and a medical bag. I grabbed the bag and held it open as she filled it with things that were hidden in his books, inside vases, behind framed paintings and more. Everything in the office seemed to be hiding something. Eventually, she began pulling random folders out of the desk. Many looked like stolen files from other companies’ research labs. Others looked like documentation of illegal medical practice of even more illegal medical acts.

  “How has no one been here before? How has none of this ever surfaced?” I asked. “The authorities should have known and shut this place down before it could do this much damage.”

  “Hamilton is rich, and as much as people complain about Big Pharma, it is only getting bigger. He has the money and lawyers to get out of anything. His industry controls everything,” Nurse Fleiss said, scanning the room like she was making sure she hadn’t forgotten anything. “But we have undeniable evidence that will condemn him. We can leak it on the Internet and to the press
. Bring down his name, his reputation, his company. By the time he has charges brought against him, we will have already lost the few materialistic things he does care about.”

  “A guy like him will probably enjoy prison though,” I said, thinking out loud.

  “Maybe, maybe not,” she said, appearing to weigh the possibility. “He might enjoy it for a little while, but I don’t think it would last. I imagine, eventually, he would be in solitary confinement. He wouldn’t be able to harm anyone else or vice versa. He would lose everything and then be alone.”

  “So, why do you need me?” I asked. “Seems like you could have done all this from the inside at any time or partnered with another guard to help you.”

  “I can’t do it alone because I don’t always know when I’m hurt. If I make any mistakes, I need to have someone there to keep an eye on me. Anyone who comes here is already afraid of Hamilton, indebted to him, or on his kill list. I needed someone that would be able to escape and truly get free of him,” she said, making her way to the door to leave. “I think that’s you.”

  She paused to look at me. Her expression seemed very plain, but for a moment I thought I saw the corner of her mouth attempt a smile.

  To leave the room she had to do another retinal scan. She checked the hall for us and began leading the way through the building again. I followed until she brought me to another room marked security. She hesitated before opening the door.

  “How do you feel about collateral damage?” she asked.

  “Have they done anything wrong or do you want to risk the lives of innocent people?” I asked.

  “There will be one or two guards in here monitoring the cameras for the main hospital,” she explained.

  “I say knock them out and let them be dealt with later,” I replied.

  “Fair enough,” she said, placing her thumb on another scanner.

  The door opened, and two guards were watching several televisions, each with a multiscreen view. They saw Nurse Fleiss and smiled until I stepped from the side of the wall into their view beside her. They immediately pulled out their guns as she and I ducked lower and sprung into the room. We each attacked a man bringing him to the ground.

  I managed to wrestle the gun away from the man I had. I hit him in the temple with the butt of his gun a couple of times until his head rolled sideways and he was unconscious. When I looked to my left, I saw that Nurse Fleiss had incapacitated her target as well.

  “Okay, this is the security for the building. There is a way to unlock every room and every exit from here. We need to let everyone out and leave among the fray,” she said firmly.

  “What about your chip?” I asked.

  “Well, I guess we might not have been the right word,” she said, handing me the bag she had filled. “When you get out, make sure everything in that bag becomes public knowledge.”

  “I can’t just leave you after you have done this much for me. What if the escapees hurt you? What if Hamilton returns and you are the only one here, or he figures out what you did to set this all in motion?” I said.

  I felt guilty leaving her to die one way or another after all she had done. Had she not been chipped, she could have single-handedly ridden the world of the psychopath that was Perry Hamilton.

  “I’ll be fine,” she said. “Nothing could be worse than what I have been through, not even death.”

  She returned her focus to the monitors, and I did the same. There was little else to be said on the matter.

  “Okay,” Nurse Fleiss said, looking at the screens before us. “The system covers everything from the lobby to the roof, except the halls we are in. They can only be accessed by the bookshelf, and there are no cameras in the area to prevent audio and visual of Hamilton ever actually doing anything illegal on site,” she explained.

  “Doesn’t he ever interact with the patients upstairs?” I asked.

  “If Hamilton wants someone from upstairs, they are brought down under the pretense of signing exit paperwork. Then they are escorted to the door behind the bookshelf,” she explained. “They never go back upstairs once they have been behind the bookshelf.”

  “I see,” I replied, imagining how many people had killed here.

  “The camera in the lobby has an obstructed view that only catches the door leading in and out of the main facility and my desk. The footage from there might be useful to save. I bet lots of people who have passed through here have been reported as missing persons,” she said. “Plus, the condition people have been brought down in, to move to Hamilton’s hall, holds a gruesome story all its own.”

  “I don’t exactly have a flash drive on me, but I can give you an email for anything you could attach,” I replied.

  “That would work.”

  “But that doesn’t really work for me,” a familiar voice said from behind us.

  Chapter 20

  Annie

  “You don’t know half of what you think you do. You have known my brother a few days. You have known me a few minutes. Appearances aren’t always what they seem. That goes for people and situations,” Ali replied, standing and walking over to the large floor to ceiling windows that were the walls of his office.

  His gait was still shaky, as it had been coming into the room. His face showed determination and repressed pain. Catarina looked clearly pained for him. She restrained herself from stepping toward him, as he nearly stumbled.

  I wanted to feel bad for him, but I couldn’t. If he was anything like Tarek and what I imagined, he probably brought his ailments on himself.

  “I know that I saw Tarek being beaten and taken into one of Perry Hamilton’s buildings. I know that Perry Hamilton was in a conference room on the top floor of that building waiting for him. I know that somehow Perry Hamilton was behind the attack on the gala and had access to do other things over the course of similar events,” I said, challenging Ali to deny the validity of what I knew.

  “Then you should know I was a step ahead of him at all times,” he replied.

  “Then why did you let him take your brother? Are you planning something against him?” I asked. “Are you setting Tarek up?”

  “I did not let him take, Tarek!” Ali yelled. “You did! You inserted yourself into his life, and things have been off course since then because Tarek had to account for you. He knew, however, that you did not need to know about me - his connection to me. No one should. It’s safer for us both that way.”

  “I don’t understand,” I said, reeling myself back in.

  I was curious about finally getting some answers.

  “Before, most knew him as a contact and worker of mine. Hamilton had only recently realized that I had a brother,” he said, placing a hand on the window hold himself up.

  “After the TRU Body Gala, your little friend, Graham, couldn’t find you and went running to Perry Hamilton about it,” Catarina finished for him. “From what we heard, he begged Hamilton to send men to search for you.”

  “I’m just a nobody. They were after your brother,” I said, raising a finger. “I didn’t know Graham was involved in all this until after I called him to pick me up.”

  “Your description matched the description of a woman seen leaving the event with Tarek,” Ali said, removing his hand from the window and facing me. “Perry Hamilton was able to not only determine which of my men was my brother, but he was able to follow the two of you to more than one of my properties and get you to give up my brother to him.”

  I hadn’t known that Graham had been looking for me. If Tarek escaped on his own that night, he might have been safe right now. Guilt settled heavily on my shoulders. It must have shown because Catarina gave me a consoling look.

  “I didn’t mean for any of this to happen,” I offered, “but I can’t fix this alone. I can’t get him back on my own.”

  Ali sighed heavily. “Tarek has always been able to handle himself against anyone, physically,” he began to explain, “but Perry Hamilton is not your regular fight. He enjoys hurting and b
eing hurt. I mean, he really enjoys it. He will torture Tarek until he cries out in pain. Then he will continue as if the sound is music to his ears. Right now, he thinks I have something worth him fighting for.”

  “Whatever it is, give it to him. Your brother’s life is at stake,” I replied, feeling more roused again.

  “I can’t. I don’t have what he thinks,” Ali said. “My research was unsuccessful, but he will never believe that. I have nothing to exchange for my brother’s life except a bunch of temporary fixes with side effects worse than what they were meant to cure. I would give my life, but it is too short to be worth anything to Hamilton once he learns about the short life expectancy of people with my condition.”