by Isabel Wroth
“Alright, we can’t be far from Ripley’s shop. Ghost wouldn’t have been able to haul us far and risk one of us waking up too soon. Shit’s rollin downhill, North, which means we’ll find a street access in about a mile or so. You good to go?”
“Yeah.”
“Good. If you puke, don’t do it on me. This is going to be bad enough as it is.”
The next hour Saint wanted to wipe from his memory forever, wading hip deep through a river of shit and things he couldn’t bear to identify. He had to force himself to just stare at Damon’s back and put one foot in front of the other, one careful step at a time, refusing to lose his footing and go down.
“Think I got a ladder ahead.” Damon finally announced, his voice strangling as he struggled to keep from breathing too deeply.
Saint couldn’t imagine what they were going to look like to the people walking around up there. Half naked, bleeding, covered in sewage. Fuckin monsters from the brown lagoon.
“Thank fuck. Hurry up.”
It was indeed a ladder and getting up to it was a hell of a thing. The quagmire of crap sucked at their boots and made it hard to get up on the concrete ledge, but once Damon managed, he reached down to help Saint up and both of them looked up the long tunnel to where a few pinpricks of light could be seen.
“Let me climb up first and make sure we can get out.”
Saint didn’t argue and leaned against the disgusting wall of the sewer. “You’re a beast, man.”
Damon’s chuckle echoed as he started his climb. “Not leaving my woman one minute sooner than I have to.”
Ripley. God, what he wouldn’t give to have the sweet smell of her gardenia perfume in his nose right now. He fought off the grief, not sure where Ripley had been when Ghost had set fire to the compound. He had no reason to believe she was dead. Ghost would have made sure he knew.
The pleasure that sick fuck had taken from Saint’s hysterical bellows of rage to see his home, his brothers, being burned to the ground, shone out from his dead eyes. Ghost had just stood there and watched, smiling while Saint thrashed.
No. Ghost wouldn’t have been able to resist telling him if Ripley was dead.
A metallic scraping sound drew his attention upwards, but Saint didn’t dare look up.
“Good news. We’re not on a main road and won’t get run over,” Damon called down.
“Bad news?”
“Don’t see any people with cell phones handy. Looks like we’re inside a construction zone. Come on up.”
Saint rolled out of the manhole and lay on his back, gulping in as much fresh air as he could, trying to purge the coating of filth on the inside of his lungs, but sloppy and covered in shit like he was, there was no escaping it.
“There’s gotta be a hose around here somewhere,” Damon panted, looking as green and queasy as Saint felt.
He got up, weaving like he was drunk and followed after Damon. Some hipster cruising by on a bike (too small and too retro to be Ghost or one of his crew) saw them and nearly fell over in shock, proving that there was some humanity left in the world when he rushed over and asked if they needed help. Poor kid gagged a few times at the smell of them, but he didn’t run away.
Boldfaced, Damon lied his ass off. “Kid, I’m a cop. I don’t have my badge, and as you can clearly see we’ve been through some shit. Literally. I need your cell phone.”
The kid handed it over without question and Saint continued to look around for a hose. He just knew he was going to contract some kind of flesh-eating bacteria and die from all the shit packed into his open wounds.
“It’s me. This a clean line?” Damon grated into the phone, looking around furtively while he got an affirmative from whoever he was talking to. “Honestly, I have no idea where we’re at. Construction site-”
“Fifth and Brazos,” the hipster announced helpfully and Damon repeated that.
“Construction site at Fifth and Brazos, we’re next to the dumpsters. Gonna use them as cover for now. Are you safe? No, don’t give-” Damon’s entire expression softened and for a second he squeezed his eyes shut tight. His voice dropped to a deep rumble and Saint just knew he was talking to his girl.
“I’m okay, sweetheart. I know you were. No, no. I’m not lyin. Dani…Dani, babe, I love you and I’m sorry, but we don’t have time for this. Saint and I are out in the open. I need Stone to get Veracruz to us now. I’ll be with you soon, okay? Okay. Give the phone back to Stone.”
Damon was quiet for a beat, then his features got hard again and he was all business. “Yeah, he’s right here. Busted up, but not critical. Wait, what? You’re where? Jesus. Okay. I’ll tell him. See you soon. Tell Veracruz we’re walking bio-hazards. We had to go through the sewer to get out.”
Damon hung up the phone and offered it back to the hipster, who weirdly enough had put on a latex glove and put the phone in a dog shit bag for later.
“Text that number later and we’ll get you set up with a new phone. Appreciate it, man,” Damon instructed the guy.
He gave a flippant wave and shrugged it off like it was no big deal. “I’m due for an upgrade soon anyway. You want me to wait until your ride gets here?”
Saint shook his head, “No, thanks though. You saved our asses.” To Damon, Saint said, “Don’t know how the girls will ever be able to touch us again, smelling like this.”
“Lemons!” The hipster offered cheerfully.
“What?”
“I work in the city morgue. You guys smell like the decomp bodies we get down there. Smell clings to your follicles and the fat in your skin cells like glue. The acid in the lemons will wash it off. But uh, you’re gonna need a lot of lemons.”
With a wave, the hipster took off on his bike and Damon grunted. He didn’t say anything for a minute, his eyes bouncing around the open space, looking for Ghost, both of them listening for the sounds of motorcycle pipes.
“Everyone is alive. They got down into Nasa’s panic playroom in time. Ripley, the rest of the girls, and the kids are with. They’re all safe and they’re going to meet us tonight at Teague’s place.”
The breath whoofed out of Saint so hard he saw stars for a minute, half bent over, legs threatening to give out as the relief hit.
*****
Hours of arguing and coming up with plans followed, plans that were discarded one after the other. The women had all retreated across the room, exhausted, to pile onto Nasa’s bed to rest. The fire was still raging overhead and Nasa had reported not long ago that the fire department was having trouble putting the flames out, but he made no effort to alert the authorities that they were down here and alive.
Wren was hunched up against the headboard, hugging her knees to her chest while her dark eyes followed every move Pen made with a regretful sadness that hurt to look at for very long. Athena and Dani were laying behind Ripley, talking softly.
Ever lay facing her with baby Harper still in her arms. Lyon had let go of his daddy long enough for Ripley to take him and snuggle down with him on the bed. Four women and two babies and there was still room for a few more bodies on Nasa’s monstrous bed.
“Why do you think his bed is so big?” Ripley asked Ever, unable to sleep or rest, wondering what Ghost was doing to Saint. The image of him hanging from dirty pipes burned on the back of her eyes. She wasn’t sure she would ever sleep again and not see him like that.
Ever lifted a shoulder carelessly, rubbing her lips over her daughter’s tiny hand. “More room to roll over and let the wet spot dry?”
Ever’s suggestion had Ripley, for the first time in hours, smiling. “Gross.”
“Practical, actually. We’ve got a Cal-King and sometimes it doesn’t seem big enough.” Ever didn’t give Ripley long to enjoy the tiny burst of humor before her voice grew serious and soft. “It’s going to be okay, Ripley. No matter what happens, we’ll be okay.”
Ripley cuddled Lyon, the scent of the lavender baby wash Ever used for him, sweet and innocent. Calming. “I hope so.”
She licked her dry lips and looked up into Top’s scruffy, wrinkled face and found him smiling down at her. Something in his smile sent her heart rate into overdrive and she sat up, bracing herself for the worst.
“Damon called in just now, Ripley. He and Saint are alive, little banged up, but they’re okay. Got a guy on his way to get them now and take them to another location. We’re going to meet them there tonight after it gets dark.”
It took less than two seconds for Ripley to understand what Top was telling her and burst into tears. Top gathered her up and rocked her like a baby in his lap, rumbling some gruff nonsense into her hair.
“Alright, alright, girly. It’s okay now. He’s safe.”
Ripley nodded with her face buried in the older man’s shoulder, but she couldn’t stop crying. The release of so much worry and fear of the unknown, gushing out of her in gut wrenching sobs.
“Take a deep breath, it’s gonna be a long day and we got shit to do.”
*****
“Fuck me!”
Saint shouted in agony as one of Damon’s old buddies poured pure iodine in his wounds. Damon was next to him getting the same treatment.
Their little trip through the sewer with open wounds meant a whole new level of decontamination. Veracruz had picked them up in a van with plastic covering the empty floor, kept the windows up front rolled down the whole hour ride out to the warehouse, and didn’t say a word about how horribly they smelled.
He had been all business, updating them on the plan to get the members of Perdition, along with the women and kids, out to this previously undisclosed location. Stone and Damon’s team had gathered up ten of the twelve Leviathans who had set fire to the compound last night and had them securely locked down.
Saint learned he and Damon had been strung up in the sewer for just over eighteen hours and, had they not escaped, Ghost’s plan had been to lure Ripley and Damon’s woman downtown to take them too.
Part of him was rabid with the unfulfilled desire to kill Ghost, but he wasn’t worried about the psychopath taking off. He had planned so carefully, been so patient, that he would be unable to leave his job unfinished. Which gave Saint and the rest of the club time to recoup and prepare to meet the murderer head on if he came at them.
Their jeans and boots were in the dumpster at the construction site, Veracruz had brought them a pair of sweats to change into and a couple of gallons of water to get the worst of the shit off.
At the private club, two black plastic troughs had been set up next to the hose bib out back along with about a hundred gallons of lemonade, fifteen pounds of lemons, hydrogen peroxide, hospital grade sanitizing scrub, and lemon scented dish soap to get them clean. They had bathed three times outside, then had gone inside to the impressive locker room to have a hot shower with more lemons and more dish soap.
Saint still felt dirty and sore, his shoulder hurt like a bitch, his stomach was on fire from the iodine, but he couldn’t stop smiling. It seemed to unsettle Veracruz because he asked what the hell was so funny.
“I’m imagining that fucker coming down to dick around with us and finding us gone. Sitting wherever he was this whole time, watching us slip his trap because Damon’s such a badass.” Damon hissed from beside him as he got another round of iodine. Saint only had one open wound, Damon had over a dozen. Damon slanted him a sideways look, lips quirking, then blanching white as the iodine soaked his chest again.
“That trick with the pin in the cuff of your jeans was good.”
Damon shrugged like it was no big deal what he’d done. But without him, Saint knew he’d still be hanging from a sewage pipe with a dislocated shoulder.
“Yeah. Can’t believe this whole time it was Toad.” Damon’s voice went hoarse, no doubt thinking of all the times he had ridden with Toad, learning the ropes from the other guy.
Saint was struggling with it himself, the betrayal of someone he had trusted was almost as bad as imagining Ghost, acting as Sam and going on dates with Ripley. He had to think of something else. Anything to take his mind off of imagining having been too late. Of coming into Ripley’s place one night to find her body.
Stomach heaving, Saint pressed the bag of ice to a new spot on his shoulder, using the pain of that to distract him from going down that dead end road. Ripley was alive, she would be with him soon. He just had to hold it together a little longer.
His grin felt more like a grimace, but he faked it anyway.
“Ghost’s been relying on deception, disguises, his six P’s, and you fucked it all up with a safety-pin, Damon. Soon as someone tells the girls how you did that, Athena’s gonna show up and start making us all do hot yoga.”
That got Damon and Veracruz to grin.
“Couldn’t hurt.” Was Damon’s answer. “I was expecting him to be more of a pro.”
“He’s a pro alright,” Veracruz grunted. “These cuts are precise. He found and nicked larger capillaries, not veins or arteries, to make it appear you were bleeding more than you actually were. Saint’s wound is purely tissue trauma. The scalpel didn’t penetrate past the epidermis at all. This Ghost has some kind of medical training, can’t say if it’s human or animal, but he’s got some working knowledge of it.”
Two more of the eight-man team of retired SEALs walked into the luxurious locker room. One of the two looked like he had wrapped his arms in ropes of fire. From his wrists to biceps, thick red scars spiraled around and around his arms. He had this look about him of being one cold son of a bitch.
The other guy looked like the quintessential representation of a guy who spent his life on a surfboard, white-blonde hair that brushed his shoulders, a deep tan, and bright blue eyes. His smile was his first line of offense, wide and easy. Saint was willing to bet not a single human being would ever accuse him of being able to kill a man ten different ways with a dull spoon.
Veracruz was a Hispanic mix of something, dark hair and eyes, coppery skin. Damon introduced the man with burn scars as Tobias. The surfer went by Duke.
“Glad to see you in one piece.” Tobias told Damon.
Duke’s grin took on a teasing edge. “Took you long enough to get out of there. We were expecting you a few hours ago.”
Damon threw one of the bloody gauze pads at his former teammate. “Fuck you, dude. Been up to my ass in shit all morning, don’t need any more from you. Where’s Matt and Kris?”
Tobias tucked his hands up under his armpits and took a wide stance, his eyes running over both of them, critically marking every injury and wound they had sustained.
“Kris is on the roof watching from the nest he made. Tate and Nate are at the hospital with the kid. Frankie and Milo are with Matt tracking down the other two stragglers we missed when we scooped up the whales downstairs.
“Called Matt to tell them about the fire, Frankie and Milo wanted to come in, but Stone told them to just keep acting like shit was normal, so they won’t come back until tonight. Eric is down in the dungeon keepin an eye on our prisoners. ”
Damon lifted his chin at Duke, “You get any info out of them?”
Duke’s disarming smile took on a shark like edge, a nearly predatory smirk. “Sure did. You want the report now or when the rest of the club gets here?”
“No point in wasting time retelling it multiple times. Wait for Top.” Tobias looked from Damon to Saint, but nodded in agreement.
Duke was grinning almost gleefully now. “Stone and Teague must be rubbin off on Eric. He’s gone and trussed the gang members up like a rump roast fresh from the butcher. Suspended a couple of them up by one leg. Hog-tied another one. Made a very creative harness for another one. We’ll have to buy Teague some new butt plugs, they’re all currently being used as gags.”
Damon guffawed.
“I gotta see this. Saint?”
“Fun as I’m sure that would be, I want Ripley here ASAP. How much longer before everyone gets here?”
Duke checked his watch. “Six hours till dark.”
Saint gritted his teeth against the furious growl that built inside him. He knew Ripley was safe, hidden away beneath the remains of the compound, surrounded by his brothers. He also knew that Ghost was going to have to scramble now. The entire club knew him as Toad, but only Saint and Damon had seen his actual face.
They had put a hefty wrinkle in Ghost’s plans, and neither Ripley nor Dani would be walking into his clutches any time soon. His backup team was ten shy, but Saint was pretty sure that wouldn’t slow Ghost down by too much.
It stood to reason that Ghost would start actively hunting Ripley and Dani down. Tracking them like a rabid bloodhound, because as soon as he had the women, Saint, Damon, and Stone would willingly walk naked into whatever trap Ghost set to get them back.
Ghost wouldn’t go to Ever’s or Athena’s place, because no doubt the fucker thought he had burned them alive with the rest of Perdition. Ghost wouldn’t think of them then at all, so what would he do? What was his next move? He’d had months of close contact with Ripley. Multiple opportunities to take her or kill her, but he hadn’t. What the hell was going on?
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Ripley ignored Stone’s order to stay in the car.
She didn’t say it, but both Stone and Dani had gotten to speak to Damon. Ripley had only the assurance that Saint was okay and, until she saw Saint alive and in one piece with her own eyes, orders be damned. Stone had been able to get in touch with his people and got a car to get himself, Dani, and Ripley to where Saint was waiting about two hours ahead of everyone else.
As soon as he pulled in and put the SUV in park, Ripley was out and running towards the warehouse. Someone pushed open the glass doors from the inside, but in her rush, she didn’t even make eye contact. Saint was coming through a door on the other side of the large foyer and when their eyes met, the relief that tore up from her toes was so intense she felt sick.