by Lily Harlem
“Real. I’ll tell you what’s real. She’s enjoying it and that isn’t a real fucking badge.”
“I’m afraid it is,” I said, also flashing mine. “Drop the cane and get her down. She needs medical attention.”
“No fucking way.” He took a swing for Jonathan. A sharp right hook.
Jonathan stepped to the right and batted him away as though he was an annoying gnat.
The man gritted his teeth. Spittle had formed at the corners of his mouth and his nostrils flared. He was clearly furious at being interrupted.
“You want to try that again, asshole?” Jonathan made a bring-it-on gesture with his hands. “Because I’m all for it.”
“Motherfucker.” Cane Man shoved at the curtain, billowing it to the right, and disappeared.
His friend with the camera was quick to follow.
Fleetingly it crossed my mind to give chase, but the sorry sight of the woman hanging on the cross urged me to her.
Quickly I removed the gag.
She was gasping and her face wet with tears, sweat and saliva.
“It’s okay,” I said. “We’ve got you, it’s okay. It’s over now.”
Sobs wracked her chest. “I don’t know them. They pulled me in here…from out there. I was just…”
“Shh, it’s okay.”
“You don’t know them?” Jonathan crouched and released her ankles.
“No, I came here alone…looking for a Dom.” She paused and sniffed. “I’ve done it before, lots of times, no problem. The Dungeon is usually a safe place to kink.”
I slipped the straps from her wrists.
As soon as I did that she started to slither to the floor.
But Jonathan was there, a large blanket at the ready. He wrapped it around her and lifted her up.
She yelped as the material touched her welts.
“Shit. Sorry,” he said, grimacing and holding her against her chest.
“No, it’s okay. Thank you.” She closed her eyes. “Thank you for saving me.”
“No thanks necessary. Doms like that shouldn’t be here.”
She clasped her hands beneath her chin. Her bare feet stuck from the blanket. They were spotted with blood.
“Come on,” Jonathan said to me. “We need to get her some help.”
I held the curtain back then followed him through the main arena and back towards the reception.
Just before we got there he stopped at a door and used the flat of his foot to push it open.
It hit the wall with a bang and he strode in.
I followed.
“Madam Gutard,” he said, standing feet hip-width apart and seeming to fill the small, purple-walled room.
A woman, slim, grey-haired and with huge gold hooped earrings stood from a chair. She had a cigarette in a holder between her fingers. “Master Jonathan. What have you here?”
“This,” he said. “Is unacceptable. I just found this woman being abused and filmed. Where the hell are your security?”
Her expression changed from one of surprise to horror. “What? Where?”
“Out there, in a private booth.” Jonathan carefully set the woman on her feet.
She held onto him as though her legs weren’t working.
“Look,” he said, lifting the blanket to expose her bloody ass.
“Oh my.” Madam Gutard looked at me and touched her temple. She drew on her cigarette. “That’s against the rules.” Smoke filtered out with her words.
“Of course it fucking is.” Jonathan pointed at Madam Gutard. “I know that. Every other fucker here knows that.”
“Please calm down.”
“No, I will not. And you shouldn’t be calm either. The Dungeon has a good reputation. The fact this woman came here alone proves that. But look what’s happened. She was accosted and caned until her blood flowed with no chance of giving a safeword or gesture.”
“You poor dear. I’m so sorry this happened to you here.” Madam Gutard stroked the woman’s hair, then wrapped her arm around her. “I will see to her. See that she gets what she needs.” Her face darkened. “And I can assure you, no, I promise you, my security staff are going to have a stern speaking to.”
The woman allowed Madam Gutard to pull her into an embrace.
“Shh, there we go dear, all better now.” Madam Gutard looked at Jonathan and a flash of anger went through her eyes. “Find whoever did this.”
“He’ll be on your security camera when he arrived in Reception.”
“Perhaps he wore a mask, the way you like to… Officer.”
Jonathan paused. “Can I look at your register?”
“I’m afraid that’s all I have for you, the camera went down yesterday, it’s getting fixed tomorrow.’
“Damn.”
“I’m sorry, but do look at the book and please.” She led the woman to a low sofa. “Catch him and cane his ass like this.”
“I’ll do more than that.” Jonathan reached for my hand. “I’ll put him behind bars. Goodbye.”
He tugged me from the room. His strides were long and determined and his wide shoulders tensed upward around his ears.
Once at Reception he didn’t speak, just took the book.
Anouka, still sitting behind the desk, reached to pull it out of his hands. “I’m afraid that is private and—”
I flashed my badge at her. “This is evidence.”
“Oh, okay.” She sat back, her eyes wide and stared between the two of us. She’d clearly had no idea Jonathan was a cop.
“Anything?” I asked, also bending over the book.
He ran his finger down the list of names. “Nothing of use, but we’ve seen the asshole’s face. I won’t forget it.”
“Neither will I.” I pulled out my phone and took a shot of the book, just in case it came in useful. “He’ll pay for what he did.”
Jonathan and I met Ricardo, Sean and Balko in the precinct lot the next morning. We’d shared a ride after spending the night together. I’d slept well—several orgasms and his strong arms around me had ensured that.
“Hey, guys,” Balko said, looking between us. “Car pooling?”
“Something like that.” I shrugged and patted my vest, checking everything was in its place.
Ricardo grinned at me. He knew where we’d been the night before. “How was your evening, boss?”
“Nothing out of the ordinary.” I made a point of not looking at Jonathan and continued to stride towards the precinct, the morning sun already heating up.
“First day out in Miami,” Balko said, walking alongside me. His T-shirt was tight on his shoulders, his beefy biceps bulging around the sleeves and his vest, like each of ours, was loaded with equipment. He wore black combats and sturdy boots, and his cap sat backward on his head.
“Yeah, and you’re going to get a whole load of weird shit thrown at you,” I said with a huff. “Get ready for it. You ain’t in Boston anymore.”
“Don’t I know it.” He pointed at the sun. “Hot enough to melt a nun’s candle.”
“A nun’s candle?” Ricardo said.
He shrugged. “They’re not allowed to play with cocks and there’s plenty of candles on the altars. Stands to reason that’s what they’d substitute the real thing for.”
His sideways glance at me was telling. He wondered if I’d be offended or laugh at his crudeness.
I laughed. Being one of the boys wasn’t a new gig for me.
We wandered down into the basement to get our morning update from the chief.
Our team room was large, windowless, and in the centre was a large desk at waist height with several computers placed on it. There was a huge whiteboard covered in scrawling snippets of information, and a projector and screen.
The chief was already there. A crisp line ran down his smart black pants and his short-sleeved white shirt had the Miami Police Department logo on the chest pocket.
“Good, you’re here,” he said, looking up from one of the laptops.
“Mor
ning, sir,” I said with a nod.
He returned the gesture then swung his gaze over Balko and Sean. “I hope you’re ready to get thrown in at the deep end.”
“Only way we like it, sir,” Sean said, clasping his hands behind his back and raising his chin.
He reminded me of a Hollywood actor arriving on set. He was damn cute in the clean-cut, clean-shaven way. His SWAT outfit hugged his body to perfection and enthusiasm radiated from every pore and every breath. His blue eyes were the colour of the ocean on a sunny day and shone with intelligence.
The chief ran his gaze over him.
I wondered what was going through his mind. New team members always disrupted the status quo for a few weeks, until it was proven everyone was competent and had each other’s backs. We had to become family—there were no lone riders here. Team meant together, no matter what.
“This guy.” The chief flicked on the projector. “Who is it?”
“Walter Riley,” I said, looking at a politician whose face had been all over the papers for weeks and who we’d been to protect at the courthouse the day before.
The chief set his hands on his hips and turned to me.
I didn’t like the line that had formed between his eyebrows.
“I’m glad you know exactly who it is, Officer Sweeny, because he will apparently be brought to justice…by you.”
Oh, fuck.
I straightened my arms at my sides and resisted the urge to look at my team.
“This.” He flicked a switch and another image appeared on the large screen. It was a newspaper headline.
Female SWAT becomes vigilante. RILEY will face justice says female SWAT officer.
Beneath it was a grainy photograph of me, all in black, visor down, and holding a gun up to the ceiling. The shoulders of my team were hustled against me, the back of a few female heads at the front of the shot.
“You thought it was okay to blow a hole in the courtroom and promise justice to an angry mob?”
I swallowed.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
He tipped his head and studied me. “Wildly unconventional crowd control.”
“I know, sir. I’m sorry, sir. It just seemed like the best thing to do at the time.”
“And it worked,” Balko added. “They were out for blood.”
“As is often the case with an angry crowd.”
“They were all women, all feeling the pain of the victims,” I said. “And let’s face it, that asshole is going to be found guilty.”
The chief sighed. “I dare say he will be, but that art deco mural is going to take a chunk out of our budget to repair, so you’re going to have to work super efficiently.”
“Yes, chief. Sorry, chief.”
Damn it.
“There was new evidence in court yesterday,” the chief went on. He fiddled with the projector.
“What kind of evidence?” Sean asked.
“The jury were shown some particularly nasty hardcore porn, clearly non-consensual, and in all cases horribly violent.” He paused. “Sick from what I understand and all on Riley’s computer.”
I wasn’t sure where this was going.
“But one good thing came out of it from the defence. A name and a face of Walter Riley’s supplier of filth.”
Again the screen flashed. Another image came up. Of a man—a man with a short brown beard and mean slitty eyes.
“Fuck,” I muttered, glancing at Jonathan. He was staring at it, his jaw set tight and his lips a flat, straight line.
“This is Mark Sands.”
“Mark Sands,” I repeated.
“What the fuck?” Jonathan muttered, stepping up to the screen.
“What?” the chief asked. “You know him?”
Jonathan was silent.
My heart flipped and my mouth dried. There was no way we could confess to where we’d been the night before. The last thing I wanted was for the chief to know my kinks. Nor Balko and Sean for that matter. Ricardo, I didn’t care, he knew I could be way out there, and a trip to a BDSM club wasn’t unusual.
Jonathan swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. “I recognise him.”
“From where?” The chief frowned.
Jonathan didn’t speak, but glanced at me.
I shook my head a fraction, almost imperceptibly.
Ricardo sent me a quizzical look. He knew something was up.
“I can’t recall,” Jonathan said, shoving his hands into his pockets and turning away from me. “But he looks a mean motherfucker.”
“He is.” The chief flicked his notebook open. “Which is why I’m pleased we have an address for him.”
“We do?” Good. This was getting us somewhere. I wanted the bastard to pay for what he’d done the night before and to every other woman he’d encountered and tortured just so he could sell their pain and misery to other creeps.
“Yeah, we know exactly where he is.” The chief nodded. “And you guys are going to get him. Now.”
Chapter Eight
I climbed into the back of the sun-heated van, the air sticky and clinging to my skin.
“Get the aircon on,” I called to the front and buckled up the strap on my helmet. I slipped on my shades.
Balko did as I’d asked, then set the GPS. He wore fingerless, non-slip gloves with a strap around each wrist. His forearms were coated in light brown hair. “It’s four and half miles to this ass-wipe’s trailer park.” He glanced over his shoulder at me.
“I hate them,” Ricardo muttered, turning the engine on. “Damn rabbit warrens.”
I agreed with him, but felons loved the maze they offered so it wasn’t unusual for us to execute a raid there.
We’d studied a detailed map, knew which trailer we were headed for. Now it was just a case of getting on with the job and causing as little ruckus as possible.
As Ricardo drove, Jonathan, who sat to my left, leaned close. “Didn’t expect to be seeing him again so soon, did we?”
I shook my head. “No, but it seems the stars are shining down on us. Let’s get this pervert.” I glanced at Sean, wondering if he was listening. He didn’t appear to be, he was tapping on his iPhone.
Jonathan squeezed my knee.
I frowned—gestures of affection on the job weren’t our style. And it definitely wasn’t okay on the job. “What?” I shifted away from him.
“He’s a woman-hater, don’t forget that.” He set his clenched fist on his thigh. It was as though he was having to force himself not to touch me.
“I should think he’s a cop-hater too, which puts us all in the same boat.” I gave him a look that dared words to spill from his mouth that suggested he didn’t think me as capable or tough as my team.
It seemed common sense reigned after all, and he was quiet as he shifted his attention to the road ahead.
I glanced again at Sean. His head was bowed to his phone, but I had the distinct feeling he was very much listening to us, watching us. You didn’t get on a SWAT team without being alert to everything and everyone around you.
We edged through several sets of lights, then hit the one-way system. After passing the airport, the easy banter Balko and Ricardo had set up dampened down. We were getting into the zone. Putting ourselves in the headspace needed to think and act fast…to survive.
Eventually we pulled up a block away from the trailer park. No point advertising our arrival with bells and whistles.
“Right, let’s get this piece of shit.” Sean released the safety on his weapon and stood.
Balko jumped from the van and we all followed suit.
Once again the heat of the day hit me—it really was going to be a scorcher. Not that I should be surprised, it was mid August.
After a quick check of my gun and adjusting my glove straps, I led the way, my men following.
There was a small, clumsily-fashioned gate in the perimeter, no doubt made by kids or dog walkers. We slipped through it, our footsteps silent, sticking to the shadows the hedging provided.
As pre-arranged, we sectioned off at the trailer. Myself, Jonathan and Balko at the main entrance. Ricardo and Sean beside a large window which would be an obvious second exit point.
“Position set,” I said, then heard Sean’s reply in my earpiece. “Go.”
Balko used the sole of his boot to ram the door open. It flew easily on its hinges as he stepped back and regained balance.
Jonathan rushed in. I was so close behind him as he turned right and I turned left, weapons poised, our torsos slid against each other.
“Clear,” he shouted, obviously eyeballing the kitchen and living area.
“Going in.” I stepped forward, heart thudding, but my nerves steady. All my attention was on spotting movement—a face, a gun pointed my way.
I scanned a grubby-looking bathroom to my left, then continued towards a closed door.
Jonathan had my back. I sensed Balko also in the trailer now.
“SWAT! Show yourself, hands up!” I kicked the door. Again it flew open.
Jonathan had turned and we stepped in together, sweeping the room with our gazes and guns, fingers on triggers.
I spun as movement to my left captured my peripheral vision.
A small window. Curtain flapping.
“Shit, he’s gone through there,” I shouted, rushing up to it.
The window was at the opposite end to where Sean and Ricardo were. “Suspect exited through rear of trailer,” Jonathan shouted. “Get round there.”
“On it.” Through my earpiece, heavy breathing as Ricardo and Sean ran.
I can’t let this bastard get away.
I went out the window. I was small enough, even with my kit on.
Landing in a crouch, on dusty ground littered with cigarette butts, I saw my mark.
He was running, his bare feet kicking up behind him. I clocked the pistol he held in his right hand.
“I’m giving chase,” I said, breaking into a sprint, gun aloft.
“Freya,” Jonathan shouted, then muttered, “Damn it.”
I knew he couldn’t get through the window. He’d lose precious seconds backing through the trailer. But I was on it, my legs pumping, feeling like I was flying, my surroundings passing by in a blur.