My movements are still sluggish and uncoordinated, but I attack that door like a kickboxing champ on fight night trying to get some attention. What’s the worst that can actually happen at this point anyway?
I’m trapped in a fucking box, a dirty one from the rat droppings I see. I’m totally defenseless. If this guy—whoever he is—is intent on killing me, then there’s not a freaking thing I can do about it but try to put up a good fight.
I will not, however, cower in the corner and wait for him to make his next move. I’ve got some self-defense training. The city sent a bunch of us to classes last year when a social worker was attacked by an angry father.
I am in no way a match for the bastard, but if I can at least get in one good ball breaker, I can try to take control of this situation.
“Hey asshole! Open the door you stupid prick!”
I keep banging and yelling obscenities, words that would make my mom’s perfectly straightened hair curl into corkscrews. I make such a racket that I finally run out of steam and collapse against the wall, my arms burning, chest heaving with the strain.
It could be the residual drugs till in my system, or the fact that I am crashing from my adrenalin high, either way I slump to my left and hit the floor on my side, feeling my body weigh down and sink into numbness like concrete in water.
I can’t even muster myself when I hear something scrape outside the door or when it slowly swings open, revealing not one, but two hulking men.
One has a terrified Liv clamped to his chest, one arm pinned against her throat as he levels a gun at her head. The other smiles darkly at me and waves his own gun my way, his message clear.
“Get up, bitch.”
I whimper, not even able to work up the energy to tremble when my muscles refuse to cooperate. I feel everything going on in my body, but it just will not respond.
And I start really panicking then.
The guy snarls something and stomps forward, pulling me up by the hair and one arm. Pain ricochets through my scalp and I cry out, my voice coming out in a creaking moan that has Liv’s eyes bugging with rage.
“What the fuck did you give her, asshole!”
My entire body is so hot right now. I feel like my skin is swelling and on the verge of busting open. The feeling is so foreign, coupled with my inability to move, that for a split second I try to convince myself that this is a nightmare. That this feeling is one and the same as those running dreams you have. Those dreams where you’re running from something and everything is in super slo-mo, and no matter how hard you try to speed up or even scream, nothing happens.
It’s the same, yet so intense that I know that it is in fact real.
And that whatever gave me that burst of energy before knocking me on my ass is not good. Not good at all. In fact, as the hairy behemoth half drags me behind him like a rag doll, I feel everything inside me start to slow down. My breathing pattern goes unnaturally slow along with my heart rate and I feel my vision dim and blur a bit, despite knowing that my eyes are open.
“Oh God! Remy?” I hear Liv struggling somewhere behind me but the sound comes at me as though we’re going through a tunnel, all wah wah wah and distorted. “What’s wrong with her? Remy! Oh God, she sounds weird. Please, she needs to get to the hospital!”
More struggles sound behind me before I hear a hard thud and what sounds like a hand slapping skin. Liv grunts and then cries out, and I will myself to respond, anything to help her.
Nothing.
My eyes are bleary but I make out a large warehouse-type room when we stop, and then he drops me into a chair and quickly starts winding rope around my body, pinning me up when I almost slump and topple to the floor.
Liv is dumped into a chair beside me and I note her lack of struggle when the process is repeated and the men stand back, grinning down at us.
“Why?” the word is nothing more than a breath as I flop my head back to see them both.
“You need to tell your boyfriend to stop taking what isn’t his, Miss Harrow. A lot of people aren’t too impressed with his coming into our city and fixing what ain’t broke. You got me, sugar?”
I can’t nod but blink my eyes instead, feeling a little hopeful for Liv at least. If he wants me to carry a message, then we’ll be allowed to live and walk out of here. Won’t we? Well not me, I think, taking stock of the gradually slowing rhythm of my heart and the still raging heat that bubbles beneath my skin.
I can’t say for sure I’m going to be okay, but if Liv can make it out, I’ll die with a smile.
“Unfortunately, I have to send a message.”
The second one nods and smiles before ambling my way, his hand coming out from behind his back with some sort of pipe. I scream when he brings it down on my right leg in three, four, five successive strikes that are delivered with so much force I feel the exact moment that my bone gives up the ghost.
I’d scream if I could, wincing when Liv more than makes up for my lack of voice, her curses and empty threats filing the air around us.
They die a sudden death, drowned out by a shriek when he brings the pipe down on her right arm with such force I see her whole body jerk and stiffen before she cries out.
“That’s for his right hand man. If you two bitches can get out of those ropes, you live. If not, well the rats in this neighborhood need to eat too.”
They turn as one and walk away, leaving us trapped and hurting. I’m probably not making it out of here. And then the lights go out and we’re plunged into inky darkness.
Liv doesn’t whimper again and I’m done. My eyes slide shut and I welcome the numbness.
Chapter 15
Chase
I’ve never been this terrified in my entire life, and I’ve been in a plane that lost an engine and hit turbulence at the same time. I’ve gone into war-torn countries and dodged bullets to get to meetings while rebel forces unleashed hell around us.
I’m by no means a squeamish man, but when I got the call from Brick that Hensley had tracked the women and that they were both being airlifted to the hospital, I’d almost lost my lunch.
He didn’t even finish the sentence before Gabe and I were in the car and he’s hitting the gas so fast the car fishtails before gripping and leaping forward. We made it to the hospital in a record-breaking nine minutes and thirty-one seconds, and then I leapt out of the car yelling Remy’s name.
Silly, but I’m frantic now that I know where she is, not knowing what the hell that bastard did to her. The nurses jump and start, glaring at me, but I really don’t give a bloody damn at this point. I need to know, need to—
“They took her up to surgery.”
Whirling fast I feel Brick grip my shoulder to keep me upright as Gabe barrels into my back.
“Surgery?”
Brick nods once and looks around, and then nods to three other men leaning against one of the walls. They follow him with nothing more than a flick of his head and I hear Gabe trudging behind us. Brick keeps hold of my arm and pulls me into an elevator.
We remain silent the whole way up because as soon as I open my mouth, Brick stops me with a quick shake of his head and a glance at the camera.
Somehow, I manage to wait till we reach a long, deserted corridor and a door being guarded by one of the biggest human beings I have ever seen. The man is literally about six nine and looks like he eats other people. He has huge arms that can hardly meet as he folds them against his chest and a set of legs that suggests he bench presses trucks. For fun.
“This is Fig, short for Figueroa. He’s on Liv right now. Calm down Gabe, your girl’s okay, just knocked out. They had to set a break in her right arm.” Brick warns, planting a palm in Gabe’s chest to stop him from barreling into the room. “Listen up, my man, that woman was in some serious pain when we found her. Her arm was broken, but she still managed to squeeze her way free of the ropes she was tied with and try to drag Remy out of that warehouse.”
Gabe pales and I see him swallow a few times bef
ore nodding and stepping back to lean against the opposite wall.
“Tell us.”
I see the other men settle in against their own spots before Brick sighs and starts talking.
“When we got there, we found Liv dragging Remy out of the warehouse. The poor woman was in some serious pain but she’s got heart, I’ll tell ya that. They were alone and Liv immediately told us the whole story when she found out who we were. Remy was drugged, punched, and knocked out. They were both kept in separate rooms till one of the men—yeah, there were two when Liv woke up—decided it was time to get cracking. Remy apparently was making one hell of a ruckus before whatever they injected her with started shutting down her nervous system.”
That makes my heart stop, and I think Brick can see how totally unhinged I’m about to become because the guy grabs the back of my neck and squeezes soothingly.
“They had to drag her out of there to get her to the warehouse where they tied both women up and took a steel pipe to them. To Remy’s right leg and to Liv’s right arm.”
Something in his tone catches my attention and I see his eyes dart to Gabe before one of his guys take position beside him to intercept if necessary.
“Look guys, I’m gonna be dead honest here. The fact that both girls were taken—not just one—tells me that this was a message. Also, Liv said they broke her arm, and I quote, ‘for his right hand man.’ Whoever hired those goons is sending a message. Not just to you, but to Gabe as well. You pissed off someone powerful.”
My mind starts whirling and I barely register that Gabe has gone nuts and would no doubt start trashing the place if not for the hulking brute keeping him pinned to a wall; his voice is a rough, soothing growl that eventually gets Gabe to calm down and sink to the floor with a groan.
“I have a lot of enemies, Brick.”
“No shit, man. Dec’s already checking you out to start weeding leads.”
I’m not worried about finding those responsible, not with Brick and his team on it. No, as one of the nation’s most deadly black-ops teams, and by that I mean the blackest of the black, the motherfuckers who most don’t even know exist—at least not on paper or until they show themselves, which usually only happens when you’re as good as dead. I know I can entrust this to one of my oldest friends and it'll get done. What worries me is the fact that Remy was so badly off.
“What did they give her?”
Brick grimaces and casts a look at one of his men, a blond named Hensley who has the deadest blue eyes I’ve ever seen.
“They gave her…a very strong anesthetic to knock her out, and then injected her with a high-grade heroine, meth mix. You’re lucky she’s still alive, man. She should have stroked out from the dose alone. The doctors say they can only presume that the two drugs had a small neutralizing effect on each other, so it hindered respiratory failure.”
“She could have died?”
My heart almost hits clear through my ribs at the news and I feel my legs weaken at the thought that, if not for these men, I could even now still be searching, or worse, identifying, the body of the woman I…care for.
“No. She should have,” he says clearly, his eyes going even colder if that is even possible. “Whoever did this wanted her dead. Liv was a tool, a warning. Your girl was not supposed to walk out of that warehouse, and if I’m being honest, once the culprit finds out she’s alive, I have no doubt they’ll try again.”
Fury. It’s all I feel as I watch Gabe stand and meet my eyes, his message clear before turning and slipping quietly into the room, his hands clenching at his sides to control the anger I know he feels.
“What’s the plan?”
Brick smiles slowly and cracks his knuckles. The other men I see are smiling just as savagely and I feel my own face crack into a snarl.
“We’ll find the goons. With enough…incentive, they should give up a name and then, well, we cut the head off the snake.”
Translation: someone will die, painfully, for this.
“Mine,” I growl, looking each of them in the eye, my own gaze as cold and hard as any of theirs.
I’m not military, and I may not be as badass as these guys, but I am no pansy. I fucking cage fight as a hobby and know ten ways to kill a man with my fist, never mind any other part of my body. I can and will do what I must to protect what’s mine.
“We get to rough up the two heavies at least?” Henley growls, looking put-out as all hell at the loss of the head honcho.
“Rough, not dead. I need to throw Gabe something or the guy will go fucking postal.”
They nod and go silent, the subject dead as we wait for someone to tell us if Remy made it through surgery. I know one thing; they’ll die if she doesn’t.
Who am I kidding? They’ll die anyway.
Chapter 16
Remy
“Ow.”
I hear a clamor and grimace at the sounds of Liv sniping at someone. The woman gets shrill when she’s annoyed, I can tell you that much. And I’m not feeling it since I’m struggling to wake up despite Thor’s hammer having a go at the inside of my skull.
Not to mention the very unpleasant burning sensation I feel below the equator in the region of my vagina.
“Stop, Liv.”
Gabe. That sounds like Gabe snapping at Liv, and for a brief second I wonder what his deal is before everything comes streaming back in nightmarish images of fear, pain and finally the acceptance that I would die.
“Remy? Babe? Open your eyes my darling.”
I hear that husky murmur and feel a smile touch my lips, almost curling the corners. That accent—not quite British, not quite American—still has the power to send tingles to my bits, burning sensation or not.
“Thirsty,” I whisper, my eyes still closed because, as aware as I am, they just won’t cooperate and open no matter how hard I try.
“Okay, babe. I’m putting the straw in your mouth. Slow, babe,” he croons, letting me drink my fill before wiping at the water that dribbles out and down my chin.
No wait, that’s not a napkin.
He’s kissing the water away, softly murmuring to me, telling me how much he needs me, cherishes me, as he patiently waits for me to open my eyes.
By the time I slowly raise my lids, blinking rapidly to clear my vision, I already know lots: that Chase has already moved all my stuff into his house, and that Gabe has taken Liv’s stuff to his place.
Oh, and apparently I’ll be going on a leave of absence, already approved by the mayor himself until Chase is completely convinced that I am safe. Liv too, but that is Gabe’s cross to bear.
Am I annoyed that my whole life has once again been ordered for me according to what a man wants? Not even one iota, because while I had successfully stopped myself from thinking of Chase while those animals had Liv and me, I admit that I’d raged at the thought of never seeing him again.
Never looking into his strangely beautiful eyes, never kissing his lips or holding him. Okay, and maybe I’d also reeeeaally miss the sex, ‘cause far as I know, you can’t do that stuff in heaven.
Where I was going? Definitely—I think…hope.
Hell, I should probably give a shoutout to church sometime for this miracle.
“Hey there, darling.”
I blink and grin when I see Chase smiling down at me, his eyes a mixture of gentleness and a fierce intensity I know he doesn’t mean for me to see. No, we’re not on the ‘love train’ as yet. It’s way too soon to even be thinking love, never mind saying it, but I know that he truly cares for me and that my getting hurt and almost croaking is not sitting well with him.
“Hey, Money Bags,” I tease, seeing him grin before his eyes narrow.
He loves the nickname as much as he hates it and always laughs when I say it in a singsong voice.
“You feeling okay?”
I nod only because if I tell him how shitty I feel, he’ll have the doctors and nurses in here medicating me and I don’t want that, not so soon after that horrifying experience
of not having any control over my body.
I doubt I’ll even take aspirin after this.
Or not, since my leg then makes its state known and I remember why it feels like my bone is shattered—because it is.
“What happened?”
I look away from him to see Liv glaring down at me. Gabe is there smiling slightly, looking all kinds of relieved. And there are five other men, all freakishly huge, smiling at me with affection.
“This crazy woman dragged you out of there with a broken arm and a whole lot of determination. We found you, but I’m pretty sure she’d have saved you anyway since it looked like she was getting ready to throw you over her shoulders and powerwalk to get you help.”
The man who says this is massive, and hot in that dangerous way that I think military guys have and, wowza, with that dark brown hair and steely gray gaze, I’m practically drooling. And I’m not even getting started on the other four hunks of hotness behind him. My jaw is on my chest as I lay there and just take them all in.
“Wow.”
“I know right?” Liv cooes, giving them all the once over and turning to me with big eyes. “Girl, when I saw these five coming my way I just about forgot my arm was broken and you were two breaths away from death. Major man candy!”
Gabe grumbles and pulls her close, his eyes blazing at the men, and I hear a distinctly inhuman sound coming from Chase the longer I stare.
The men chuckle and come forward and introduce themselves one at a time, all taking my hand, kissing my cheek or forehead, or in the case of the blond, kissing my hand and totally ignoring Chase’s grousing.
“Babe,” he barks, stepping into my line of sight, his brow furrowed.
“Sorry? Who are they?”
“The big fucker to your left, Brick, is an old friend. The rest of the men are his team. The men I called as soon as I realized that you were missing. They tracked you and Liv and got there just in time to have you airlifted here.”
He pauses and swallows, his jaw ticking so hard I hear his teeth grinding.
“Bad, huh?” I say sympathetically, lifting a hand to stroke his stubbled jaw and bring him down for a kiss.
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