Domenico snorted and pulled out the knife, making blood slowly spill out of the cut. “I still have many techniques up my sleeve, Freddie,” he said and pushed the knife under Fred’s shirt, ripping it on him for easier access to flesh they could all see. “Where is Mark?”
“I don’t know. Please don’t do this. I would never want anything bad to happen to him,” Fred whined, all red-faced, with a tear spilling down his cheek.
“We don’t either. So we need to find him,” Seth said, leaning a bit closer. “I’d love to just leave this house now, but this won’t end until you tell us the truth.”
Dom frowned as he noticed a few fresh scratches on Fred’s shoulder, and a bruise on his arm. His blood boiled over, and he punched Fred right in the stomach. “Was that him, you fucker?” He grabbed Fred by the throat and hit his head against the floor. Not hard enough to knock him out, but certainly enough to rattle his brain and confuse him.
“Please, I can’t…” Bloodied saliva dripped to the floor from Fred’s mouth. Now they were getting somewhere.
“You can’t?” Domenico gestured at Dana, and she dropped to her knees, helping him hold Fred down. “I tell you what you can’t,” Dom said, making a shallow stab into Fred’s pec. “You can’t fucking afford to lie.”
The flesh stretched around the knife, and Fred gave a breathless cry, watching his skin move, as if there were a parasite underneath. He was lost between squealing and trying not to move at all.
“They’ll kill me if I say. I was blackmailed into this.”
If only Domenico got a dollar for every time he’d heard that...
“And if you don’t tell me, I’ll kill you. And believe me, Freddie, you don’t want that,” said Domenico, slightly more at ease now that he knew Mark was alive. He moved the knife gently below the surface of the skin, parting it from flesh, as if he were preparing meat for cooking. He didn’t usually enjoy this, but this time, he was fucking ecstatic that he could make that piece of shit pay for what he’d done. Just like when he had tortured Vincente, this felt righteous and godly.
“Stop, please, stop, I’ll tell you, just promise not to kill me,” Fred cried, wheezing in Dana’s grip and blinking back fat tears. Domenico watched him. Fred’s eyes were glazing over, his skin shone with sweat, and the faint smell of urine teasing Dom’s nostrils were all quite convincing. Fred couldn’t take much more without fainting, and that would not help them find Mark.
Seth touched Fred’s arm gently. “It will be fine as long as you tell us what happened.”
“Just get on with it,” hissed Dana, immobile like a statue. In the back, Dom could hear the door opening as Jed and Ryder entered the house again.
“Talk, Freddie, or I’ll flay you. I’ll wake you up every time you’re gone and continue until I’m even done with the skin between your toes.”
Fred wasn’t wearing shoes or socks, so Dom could clearly see him curling his toes. Good.
“Jesus, fuck…” Jed hissed and covered his mouth, but to his credit, he didn’t turn away.
“I sold him off. I know it’s wrong. I know, I know,” Fred whined. “I was so in debt, I had medical bills to pay, I didn’t know what to do.”
At this point, he’d probably say his whole family had cancer just to gain more sympathy.
Domenico smiled and cut a bit farther into the twitching body Dana held down. A dark patch grew on Fred’s shorts as his bladder gave up, but Dom could take that. “I don’t care. Where is he?”
“He’s in this former military base, an hour away. It doesn’t have an address. I can show you on the map, just please keep me out of it.” Fred had to stop to breathe a few times, but when he finished talking, the atmosphere in the room became thicker than his blood.
Seth and Ryder looked at each other, but everyone knew what base Fred was talking about.
Domenico could swear his heart stopped for a few seconds. “The one in the woods?” he uttered, stiff and cold in the joints.
“Yes… the one where they have a cult... that’s what they made everyone here believe…” Fred closed his eyes, but it wouldn’t help with his pain.
Domenico slowly moved his knife out and looked at the red-stained blade. He couldn’t believe this. “Dana, patch this fucker up,” he said and sat back on his heels. Only now could he breathe deep.
Seth looked up at him with a frown. “What do we do?” he whispered.
Domenico shook his head and quickly walked to the sink to clean himself up. His eyes trailed to the grim faces of the brothers, to Seth, to the emotionless Dana. “We need to go in.”
Ryder scowled. “We’re not ready for this yet. Not everyone has arrived.”
“And we can’t go in there undercover again looking for a boy who just got snatched. It would be too suspicious,” Seth said, inching away from a trail of blood heading his way on the floor.
Domenico shook water off the knife and then wiped the remaining wetness on his pants. His mind was racing at accelerated speed. Perverted fucks were cutting people’s arms off at that base. This couldn’t just wait. “Freddie will help us,” he said in the end, casting a glance at the wet, deathly pale face.
“Please, it was a mistake. I don’t want anything to do with this anymore…” His eyes were wide with fear, but he wouldn’t be getting off the hook so easily.
“Freddie? Are you familiar with the Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation?” asked Domenico, putting the knife back into its sheath at his calf. “You confessed your sins, but you need to atone for them now.”
Ryder hissed and pulled out his phone. “I’ll talk to Ripper,” he said, walking off to another room. At least someone was willing to move their ass.
Fred whined as Dana started patching him up without much gentleness. “I will help, but you have to promise not to kill me. I will make up for this, I swear.”
Seth got up without a hint of expression to his face, and Domenico called him over with a gesture. “Only if you help. I will not hurt you after that,” he said, not even caring whether he was lying or not. This rat was not worthy of Domenico Acerbi’s word. There needed to be mutual respect for that, and the fucker kept lying through his teeth. Unlike Domenico, he was not a man of honor.
Seth walked up to Dom and put his head on his shoulder in silence.
“I’ll help,” Fred whispered and sobbed when Dana pushed a bandage against his skin.
Domenico turned his eyes away, not even willing to look at the sick fuck. How low could a man fall?
His eyes met Jed’s as he hugged Seth tighter, absorbing his warmth. There was nothing more relaxing than holding Seth close.
Jed wrapped his arms around himself and looked away. “I’ll help as well, of course…”
“You will?” asked Domenico slowly, not so sure about Jed’s assertion after all the blackmail that he definitely deserved.
“It’s not like I have much choice, do I?” Jed groaned. “But I don’t want the guy raped and maimed by some sickos either.”
Domenico’s lips twitched despite the horror of the truth behind Jed’s words. “That’s penance and reconciliation right there. I’m proud of you,” he said, feeling like a paternal figure to the lost gay man.
Jed rolled his eyes. “Jesus Christ. You don’t have to make it weird.”
Dom could feel Seth’s smile against his cheek, and he got a tighter hug.
“He’s always doing that. Get used to it,” said Dana, who’d apparently listened despite seemingly being completely absorbed in her task.
“See? At least your woman’s smart,” said Dom with a wide grin.
Ryder walked back into the room. “Ripper’s given it a green light. We’re to come over to the club. More men are arriving in the next hours, and we can speed up the process.” He walked over to Fred and kicked his ass. “It’s showtime, motherfucker.”
Domenico couldn’t have said it better.
Cold air rushed the scent of gunpowder, blood, and crushed bones straight into Domenico’s face
as he looked out of the helicopter, into the darkness lit up by outbreaks of bright orange and red among the trees. Even through the noise of the rotor above, he could hear the continuous gunfire, but a sudden burst from a bazooka made him laugh loudly. It had been a while since he’d seen something like this. Having mostly worked in undercover missions, he wasn’t that familiar with full frontal assault, but after the fence of the base exploded on both sides of the vast enclosure and the Coffin Nails swarmed inside the base, it was a sight to behold from above. The club members carried all the heavy weaponry they could gather from the neighboring chapters and associated gangs and were making their way into the base like medieval cavalry after storming the walls of a castle. The fact that so many of them were on motorcycles only added to that impression as the bright lights moved through the darkness below.
At some point, Domenico did a double take, spotting the tank making its way across the rushed fence. An actual freaking tank, like a giant in the ranks with human soldiers. It was one of the first vehicles to arrive, and its driver, Axe, shot at the tall fences, making them explode into pieces of flying concrete. The tank drove over the rubble and into the base, wreaking havoc in the ranks of security guards, who were ready to shoot, tackle, kill and maim, but not to fight a tank.
Dom needed to know the story behind the thing, and Dana would research that for him if she wanted to be on the inside of his operation again. Her obsession with Domenico was the one flaw in her robot-like personality, and he wouldn’t be shy about using it. His skin tingled at the mere thought of getting contacts to people who smuggled this kind of heavy arms. It was big business, and even though he was retired, he couldn’t help but think about a new venture that he could be a part of once he got his hands on the capital he kept safe in Colombia.
Dom had to admit that as crazy as the Coffin Nails were, their determination was admirable, and the assault plan, though simple, was an effective way of luring most of the manpower the traffickers had at their disposal away from the center of the base, where Fred told them they would find the human cargo.
Armed to the teeth, their small party flew past the chaos beneath their feet and straight for the buildings in the middle of the base, visible from above like fluorescent bubbles in the dark sea of trees. Ryder pressed an assault rifle to his chest, looking down like a hawk, ready for action if anyone endangered his precious steel baby.
Dom had been reluctant to leave the piloting to Dana, but if he had chosen to be in her place, he would not be able to follow Jed inside, so he made his choice, as hard as it was. It soon turned out Dana was just as good of a pilot as she claimed. Dom had scraps of information about her activities in South America, but clearly, she’d become very proficient at handling a helicopter during her time there. Now that she was holding the cycling control with one hand and the collective with the other, a bright smile he rarely saw on her lips lit up her face, as if she were a kid gathering bounty at a toy store. Grease, who sat next to her, seemed enamored by her skill.
Seth and Jed sat opposite Domenico, their faces focused, but while Jed kept looking out the window to assess the situation, Seth seemed to only be interested in Dom. Dressed in an armor of Kevlar that made him look even bigger and meatier, he would be a scary sight to any man who dared confront them on the ground.
Domenico himself had chosen a light bulletproof vest to not restrict his movements, but even at Seth’s insistence, he refused a helmet. If there was something he needed to use down there, it was his instinct and senses, and he would not block those abilities at the cost of extra protection. Seth caught Domenico’s eyes and smiled, streaming all the warmth and confidence he needed.
“Check your weapons,” said Domenico, casting a glance at Fred, who sat next to him, immobilized by handcuffs at the back and the tight-fitting safety belt.
Seth checked his weapon once more, but Dom also had a look at the three guns Seth got before they even went up into the air. He wouldn’t take unnecessary risks, but trying to leave Seth at the club was not an option, and as much as it stressed Dom out, it was high time for Seth to test his combat abilities. At least if Seth knew he had a purpose in the action, Dom could control what he did more efficiently. They agreed that with Seth’s armor comparable to riot gear, he would serve as backup, and not go into combat if there was no need for it. Telling him that he’d be Dom’s second pair of eyes seemed to really make Seth understand his role, and Domenico hoped it would also make him be extra cautious, for both their sake.
A loud staccato of bullets tore through the air, and the helicopter made a rapid jerk as Dana pulled it up to escape the assault fire. Ryder was the first to react. Eyes on the target, he answered with an even greater amount of firepower and effectively silenced the foe on the ground.
“Now’s the time,” he screamed toward the pilot seat, threads of his long hair floating in the moving air, and Dana responded with a gentle glide downward.
Ryder gathered the bundle of thick rope and looked out. A bright glow was teasing the edges of Dom’s vision as Dana lowered the helicopter’s position over the main building he and Seth had visited. Fred claimed that the flat roof was accessible, so they chose to use that as an asset, instead of approaching the structure on equal ground with their armed opponents, as there surely would be some men left to guard the prisoners and documents. Domenico was certain that in an event of a police raid, the instructions would be clear about burning of the analogue catalogs.
The moon was bright in the sky, and they were getting a lot of extra light from a fire that was blazing somewhere to their right, in a building close to the fence, further taking attention from Dom’s stealthy operation.
Ryder whistled at Dana and pushed the rope down. “Jed, after me,” he yelled and slid down, as if he’d been trained all his life to do just that.
Domenico hissed and looked into Fred’s tense face, red from the stress and impending infection. “Don’t try to act funny, or the guys down there will shoot you,” he muttered, unbuckling the seat belt on him. He uncuffed one of the bastard’s hands and prompted him toward the rope, right after Jed disappeared in the open door.
Fred shook his head but said nothing and pulled closer to the edge of the cabin. Now that he had only air under him, all cockiness was gone, as if it had spilled out through his wounds. Clearly, jumping off a hovering helicopter was not in his repertoire.
“What about a ladder?”
Domenico got to his knees and pointed his Beretta at Fred, nearing the end of his patience. “Go down or I will push you out.”
Fred bit his lip, and as the moving air sent most of his hair into his face, he looked at his naked hands.
“No gloves. Get your ass down there,” hissed Domenico, moving so close, so abruptly that Fred actually flinched back. True terror emerged on his face as he tipped back, and only the handle at the side of the door rescued him from falling to his death.
“Fucker,” he wheezed through his teeth, but he seemed to finally get the memo. Even with the vision of imminent doom crawling into his pale eyes, he finally rushed down the rope.
Domenico exhaled in relief and looked at Seth before casting a glance down. Fred rolled to his back, holding his burning hands to his chest, but Jed was right there to cuff them back in place. Domenico smiled.
“Follow me,” he said and rolled straight down. The heat of the friction created on the edge of the rope and glove was palpable, but the height was not great enough to tear through the leather. Domenico exhaled in relief when his feet hit the tiles of the roof, and he quickly stepped back, getting down like everyone else, just in case some crazy asshole wanted to shoot them from one of the other buildings.
Seth appeared over their heads first as an irregularity in the dark shape of the helicopter, but then he was speeding down, as efficiently as a soldier of the special forces. Domenico rushed to his side and pulled him to his knees before tugging at the rope three times. He smelled the Kevlar on Seth’s chest, hardly stopping himself from tryi
ng to bite into it. Above their heads, Grease started pulling up the rope, and with a wheezing sound, the helicopter was off.
Dom had a phone on him to let Dana know when they needed her back and a pager that Axe had pulled out of his box of old equipment as backup. The buzz of adrenaline over leading everyone was slightly unexpected but so intense that it went right into Dom’s bones. He was used to hunting as a lone wolf, but it turned out leading a pack could be in his nature just as much.
He was glad his man was here with him, as safe as he could be in the black Kevlar and helmet, holding a riot shield, yet able to be a part of the mission even despite the slight limp. Seth wanted to get the shield in the first place, and Domenico had been skeptical at best, but they agreed Seth would just leave it behind if things got too heated, and for once, he believed Seth would do as asked instead of making a brash and stupid decision. Seth had been affected by the evil he’d seen at this base, and he wanted be a part of its demise. Dom could understand that. And they were both here to find Mark. It wouldn’t have been right to push him away from helping.
There was a concrete shaft looming at the edge of the roof, and as soon as they spotted a door in one of its walls, Domenico led the way. With Jed leading Fred by the neck and Ryder and Seth playing the roles of heavily armed shooters at the flanks, Domenico confidently rushed to the entrance and opened it, ready to shoot. There was no one there, and so he switched on the flashlight fastened to his shoulder and moved down the stairs made of raw concrete. It was clear this area wasn’t used much, as no one had taken care to plaster the walls, and Dom only hoped leaving the shaft would not prove too difficult.
“Where to?” he asked Fred, taking every turn of the stairs with caution. They were narrow and spiraled around what had to be a ventilation shaft.
Fred took a deep breath. “Third door down. Then I’ll lead you further along the corridor.”
Guns n' Boys: Swamp Blood (Book 3) (gay dark mafia erotic romance) Page 33