“Happy now?”
“I’ll be really happy later when I get you home,” he whispered and then released her. He got a high-five from Jake and congratulatory comments from the locals at the bar. Oh yeah, he was definitely going to have to kiss her behind the bar every so often just to keep the male patrons in line. Smiling, he headed to the corner table where Cobra, Ford, Max, and Turbo were, along with Magnum and Cavanaugh.
“What was that all about?” Cavanaugh asked with concern and that same pissed-off expression that was his normal face unless Precious was in his arms.
“Just needed to make it clear that Precious is our woman,” he said, and the guys chuckled.
“She’s gorgeous and has a great personality. Where did she live before here?” Turbo asked. Carlyle looked at Cavanaugh and Magnum.
“Boston or something,” Magnum said and looked away.
“You sound unsure,” Max added.
“No, she came from that area,” Carlyle added.
“She’s very well trained and seems pretty smart. Classy, too. Not really typical bartender personality,” Ford pointed out.
“What’s a typical bartender personality?” Carlyle asked and smiled.
Ford smirked and looked toward the bar. “I don’t know, it’s just something about her. I’ve worked out with her in the dojo in Magnum’s class, and she even took the self-defense class we started yesterday. She was badass,” he added.
“She does know her shit,” Max added.
Carlyle looked toward the bar and saw a few guys flirting with her. She was shaking her head and chuckling, and he wondered how she did it. How she kept up this happy personality after all the crazy dangerous events she went through. She didn’t show fear, that was for sure.
“Just throwing it out there because we’ve known you guys for years. You’re like brothers, you know that, right?” Cobra said and got their attention.
“If she’s got a past, or is in any kind of trouble, you let us know. We got your backs and hers, no questions asked,” he told them.
Carlyle looked at Magnum and Cavanaugh, who was straight-faced.
“We appreciate that,” he said, and then Carlyle waved over to the bar for one of the waitresses to bring them another round of beers.
* * * *
“We have to get rid of some of these boxes. Where the hell is Marvin? He’s supposed to break these down and toss them out back,” Jake said, and Precious smiled.
“Give him a break. He’s new, and he’s running around like a chicken without a head. I’ll throw them out.”
“No, I’ll do it in a minute,” Jake said.
“We’ll take turns. I get the first load and then you get the next. Then we’ll tell Marvin he needs to get his act together.”
“You’re too fucking nice,” Jake said to her.
“You like that I’m nice.”
He eyed her over. “And pleasurable to look at.”
She gave his arm a slap and shook her head before she gathered up the empty beer boxes, broke them down, and brought them out back to the dumpster. She came back in for the second load, enjoying the cool night air and getting away from the bar for a moment.
She was heading back inside when suddenly some guy appeared.
“Hey, is it really crowded in there? We had to park out back and walk this way,” he said.
She backed up, closer to the door. “It’s crowded, but this isn’t an entrance. Just go around the side and follow the sidewalk—”
She gasped, felt the prick to her neck, and turned to see another guy.
“Too fucking sweet,” he said, and she swung as he grabbed her, but whatever they stuck her with paralyzed her body. She felt herself lifted up and struggled to scream. Her eyes got heavy and her vision blurred as she heard them talking.
“Call Duvou and Swan. Let them know we got her.”
Oh God, no!
* * * *
Magnum saw Jake looking around, and the bar was getting more crowded. One of the other bartenders who took the table orders was now helping out. He locked gazes with Jake.
“Where is Precious?” he mouthed, and Jake shrugged.
“What’s wrong?” Carlyle asked.
“Precious isn’t behind the bar,” he said and headed toward the bar along with Carlyle, Cavanaugh, and their friends.
“Where is she?” Cavanaugh demanded to know from Jake, as he caused a scene.
“She was taking boxes out back,” he said, looking upset and confused. They hurried through the back hallway to the exit door. It was wide open.
“Fuck,” Cavanaugh yelled out and started to pace. He took out his phone.
“She wouldn’t take off,” Carlyle stated.
“Not unless she got spooked, or taken,” Magnum added.
“Now would be a good time to let us in on who she really is and what the fuck is going on?” Turbo said as Cavanaugh yelled into the phone.
“Darius, something is wrong,” he said.
“I’ll go check the surveillance videos for back here,” Carlyle said, and Max followed him inside. They were gathered in the main office several minutes later along with Darius and Caspian.
“Son of a bitch, they fucking took her. Look, he stuck a needle in her neck,” Magnum said as they watched the whole thing transpire on the video.
“She got a shot in. Look at the guy’s fucking nose,” Cobra said.
“Do you know who they are?” Ford asked them.
“I’m calling Benson and sending him pictures of the guys now,” Caspian said, and then his cell phone rang. He put it on speaker.
“Son of a bitch. I don’t fucking believe it. One guy, the big dude, is one of Duvou’s guys but the other one, this is fucking bad. That’s a guy we connected to Swan,” Benson told them.
“Swan? Who is he?” Turbo asked.
“Who is that?” Benson asked.
“Good friends of ours. Military guys. We have to find these assholes, Benson.”
“I think I know where they’re taking her,” Benson said.
“What?” Cavanaugh asked.
“Who is that?”
“One of her fucking boyfriends. You’re not doing a very good fucking job tracking these men. You know who they are and you didn’t have them tracked?” he asked.
“Not them specifically. They fell off the radar until now, but we tracked down a private jet that left for the Dominican Republic yesterday morning. An associate of Swan’s owns the plane. It’s a long shot, but these men could be taking her there to meet up with Duvou and Swan if they’re together. We had lost track of Swan, or so we thought, but turns out we had an additional rat in the bureau,” Benson told them.
“Are you interrogating the shit out of that rat?” Caspian asked.
“Working on it, and now that we have this information, we can see if he knows where Duvou and Swan’s men are taking her. I’ll call you shortly.”
“You keep us updated. We want in on this and so do our friends. We don’t need to go through red tape, if you understand my meaning, Benson,” Magnum stated firmly.
“Understood.” He ended the call.
“Motherfucker. They’re going to kill her and probably do worse to her first. Duvou wanted her,” Carlyle said.
“Explain the situation so we can help. We have connections in the D. R. We can get there fast. Really fucking fast,” Turbo told them, and Caspian and Darius explained.
* * * *
“She is even more beautiful in person than in the photographs,” Swan whispered. He stroked her jaw as she slept, then trailed a finger along her large breasts.
“I know. She’s super smart, unbelievable with computers, and even ran numbers in the past,” Duvou said to him.
“We need to wake her up. She needs to do the money transfer.” He tapped her cheek several times, and she moaned and then blinked her eyes open. They widened and she tried scooting back, but the biding’s on her wrists kept her in place. Swan smiled softly at the sight of her.
“I told you that you would always belong to me,” Duvou said, and Swan watched Duvou lick his lips as he gazed over her body in the tight tank top and short shorts. She was exceptional.
“I don’t belong to you. I did what you wanted me to do.”
“You told the Feds,” he replied.
“The Feds were on your ass from the start. Did you not know that I was betrayed, too? I don’t owe you shit. Why can’t you just leave me alone?” she asked, raising her voice. She had spunk. Swan liked that.
“I know Benson betrayed you, just as your sister had.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “You did, as well. You tried to kill me several times.”
“Ah, that wasn’t Duvou, but me,” Swan told her. Her lips parted but she didn’t say another word. He reached out and stroked her jaw. She pulled back only for the bindings to tighten. She gasped.
“I didn’t know you would become such an asset. Duvou hadn’t shared your capabilities and was being rather selfish,” he said, and she just glared at him.
“I don’t know what you want or why I’m even here. I didn’t tell the Feds anything they didn’t already know,” she replied.
“We know that. We need you for something else,” Duvou said and then reached for the bindings.
“What?” she asked.
“A money transfer,” Swan said and reached for her other hand.
“Are you kidding me? You abduct me from the bar, drug me, bring me to God knows where—”
“The Dominican Republic. You’re going to love it here,” Duvou said very casually.
Her eyes widened. “Go to hell,” she yelled at him and pulled her hand free and slugged Duvou in the nose. His head shot back, blood splattered, and Swan chuckled. But then she swung toward him and Swan straddled her waist, grabbed her wrists, and held them above her head. He squeezed tight, and she cried out in pain.
“You can live or you can die. Those are your two choices. All you need to do is your handy work,” he stated forcefully.
“You’re lying,” she replied.
He smirked. “You really don’t have much of a choice, but if all goes well, I won’t need to kill you,” Swan told her.
“I’m going to teach you about respect and discipline,” Duvou said as Swan released her arms and got up off her. He offered her his hand. She took it, but when she stood, Duvou smacked her hard across the face. She immediately fisted her hands and Swan stopped her.
“Do the job, and you live,” he said to her, noticing that her cheek was already red and swelling from the strike of Duvou’s hand.
She fixed her top. Her sexy body would make any man drool and act stupid. He waved toward the set of computers.
“I believe you’ll have everything you need right there,” he said to her.
She eyed him over. “I do this, and it’s over, right? No more drugging me and abducting me from a new life?” she asked.
“Yes,” he told her, thinking that it was somewhat true. Just not the life she had control of, but rather he did.
She looked over the stuff, giving Duvou the evil eye.
“This is secure Internet?” she asked, and Duvou nodded.
“You have the other things I needed the last time?” she asked him, and Duvou pointed to a box on the floor as he held a cloth against his swollen, bloody nose. Under his eyes and the bridge of his nose were already turning black and blue. This beauty had a hell of a left hook.
She bent down and started taking out different items and hooking them up to the Internet connection and the backs of three computers. She moved things around to her liking and then pushed the chair over and adjusted it to her height.
“The codes, and the information and location of transfer?” she asked.
“Everything is right there in the yellow folder,” Duvou told her.
Swan watched her type away and bring up different screens on all three computers.
* * * *
Precious was shaking. She couldn’t believe this was happening to her again. And worse, she didn’t trust these men to keep her alive. If she was going to die, to never see Magnum, Cavanaugh, and Carlyle again, then she was going to let them know she loved them and was going to die making things right. These men were evil. So when she started to organize the transfer and saw the indicators that the accounts were currently under surveillance, she was able to send a code to the ones monitoring without Duvou or this guy Swan, who looked like one badass son of a bitch, knowing. Swan was about six feet tall, thin, Hispanic, and had an air of arrogance around him. The diamond pinky ring he wore was worth an easy million.
She typed quickly, making screens pop up and then disappear. She opened and closed her mouth a few times, feeling the ache in her cheekbone and her split lip. She was going to kill Duvou if she got the chance.
She had to string them along in order to buy time and make sure the Feds would figure out where these men were keeping her.
“Shit,” she said and typed faster, making bullshit windows pop up and letting the security warning flash a few seconds so they could see it.
“What’s wrong?” Swan asked.
“You got people watching these accounts.”
“The fucking Feds,” Duvou said.
“Can you trick them?” Swan asked.
She leaned back and gave Duvou the evil eye.
“You can do this. You did it before.”
“I know I can. I want you to let me go, though. I do this for you, and that is it. I owe you nothing else.”
“Done, just fucking do the transfer,” Duvou said with annoyance and kept glancing at Swan. He looked scared. This Swan guy was more powerful than Duvou.
She went back to typing.
She shoved the paper at Duvou. “Start at the top and read off the numbers on the first account.”
He started to read off the numbers, and she typed away and then did the transfer. The screen chimed.
“What was that?” Swan asked, and his hands were on the back of her chair.
“That was the first account. The money has been transferred.”
“Just like that?” he asked.
“Look for yourself, and not just like that. It isn’t easy,” she stated with attitude.
Then she felt his hands on her shoulders massaging her. “You’re a very talented woman, besides beautiful,” he said, and she swallowed hard. Her gut clenched. Why did she think she was digging herself a bigger hole here? She prayed someone was getting all this.
* * * *
“That’s my girl!” Benson yelled out as he stood over one of the guys on his team typing away on the computer screen. Cavanaugh gave him a dirty look.
“What is it?” Darius asked. They were all gathered around the large hotel room in the D. R. They didn’t know where exactly Duvou and Swan were keeping Precious hostage, but monitoring the bank accounts seemed to have worked.
“She is so fucking smart,” the guy at the computer stated as Benson explained it to all of them, including Cobra, Ford, Max, and Turbo, who were all there to assist in a raid once they confirmed Precious’s location.
“Right now, we have to assume that Precious is the one working the computers and trying to transfer large amounts of money from several of Duvou’s accounts to overseas accounts. She was able to send a message to us, indicating a signal, which allows us to see an illegal transfer is taking place and document it. It also pinpoints a location of the computer and Internet location,” Benson said.
“Precious is amazingly fast, and the last time she did this type of transaction there wasn’t a trace of anything, just the fact that she copied everything to a thumb drive and made copies of that to give to us. That broke the case wide open. She is purposely slowing this transaction down and probably hoping that we’re monitoring and can help her,” the computer guy said.
“Holy shit, you really do have y
ourselves a secret weapon,” Cobra said to Cavanaugh and his brothers.
“Can you pinpoint a location?” Magnum asked, and Cavanaugh knew that Benson calling Precious his girl really pissed his brother off. They were all on edge. He was itching to tear the fucking men who took her apart. He wasn’t even military, but Magnum and his friends were. They did this type of crazy all the time, and he trusted them more than the Feds.
“Working on it,” the guy at the computer said and then he yelled out, “Bingo.”
“It’s thirty minutes from here, according to the information I’m getting. There’s a lot of land, a private estate on the water, a heliport, and I can get satellite images, even security and guard positions at that location.”
“How do you want to do this, Cobra?” Magnum asked as he pulled on the gear and readied his weapon. They were all preparing.
“Wait, this is a federal investigation, and we can have a team here in an hour. They’re already on their way,” Benson told them.
“In an hour she could be dead. She’s dragging those transfers along to buy us time to get to her. Remember, no red tape for us,” Turbo told him.
Benson looked at them. “Fuck it. Let’s do this your way just in case there are any other rats in the bureau,” he said.
“Now, you’re thinking,” Max said, and they prepared to go save Precious.
* * * *
“Why is it taking so long?” Duvou questioned her.
She shot him a look. “Do you want the money and to be able to actually spend it, or do you want the Feds to get it?” she snapped at him.
“You better not be fucking us.”
“I’m not stupid, Duvou. I want this behind me and to be done, plus by doing this I’m committing a shit load of federal crimes that can put me in jail for life.”
“You won’t be in jail. Get the rest transferred, and then we can be on our way,” Swan said.
She knew she needed to finish up. She stalled enough and hoped that the Feds were monitoring and got the message. She hit several buttons and the last computer screen rolled, and a series of beeps sounded off. “There you go. All finished,” she said and pointed to the screen.
Love at Carlyle's [Love on the Rocks 8: Special Edition] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) Page 15