The Devil's Beauty (Crime Lord Interconnected Standalone Book 2)

by Airicka Phoenix

  “Be careful what you wish for, myshka.”

  The shriek of rusted hinges ripped Ava from the memory. It tore her from the cocoon of warmth and security and thrust her back into the metal coffin with the cold and the fear. In the silence, the sound reverberated like the caw of death. It slammed into the walls, shaking everyone awake.

  Ava lifted her head off the arm she’d been using as a pillow and squinted at the five men that ambled into the space.

  They held no baskets of bread. No buckets of water. The hum of the engine continued vibrating beneath them so they hadn’t docked. The group said something to each other in low murmurs Ava couldn’t hear, but every nerve ending in her body prickled. A cold fist closed around her stomach. It spread through her veins. The other girls must have sensed it too because they all began to move, to shift and sit up. The older ones knew what was happening. The younger ones glanced at the older ones for answers.

  Ava reached for Ilsa. The girl hadn’t moved from her curled position next to Ava. Her skin felt like ice where Ava took hold of her arm. She gave a gentle squeeze of warning to keep quiet, to not move.

  Ilsa gave a rattling gasp, a sound between a choked sob and a breath. Ava squeezed harder.

  It was ridiculous. Not moving wasn’t not going to draw attention to them. There was nowhere to hide in the open space, but God help her, she prayed it would be one of the other girls. It was horrible and selfish, but it had to be someone. It would be someone. She just didn’t want it to be Ilsa.

  The men moved away from the door and began making a path through the crowd, stepping over legs, brushing up against bodies and snickering when the girls flinched. The terror they were causing built their resolve. It fueled their hunger. This was what they lived for, the domination and control of those weaker than them.

  One broke away from the others and started towards their corner. Ilsa shrank back into Ava the closer he drew. Even Ava held her breath, her heart a drum pounding between her ears.

  He grabbed a girl nearby by the arm and yanked her up. The girl immediately burst into tears, begging and pleading in a language Ava couldn’t understand. The man laughed as he dragged her from the room.

  The others followed. The door slammed behind them like a final gong. And Ava had never felt so sick. Her insides roiled and for the first time since waking up in that nightmare, she openly wept.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The jet tires hit the tarmac at Isla Grande Airport, San Juan, Puerto Rico with a squeal of rubber and a rattle of glass. The impact had Dimitri’s attention reverting from his phone, his message to Erik forgotten as he took in the pale, blue waters of San Juan Bay in the near distance and the skyline of Old San Juan beyond it. He’d never been there before, but he’d spent the last seven hours reading about the island and its splendid beauty. There hadn’t been much else to do short of pacing and snapping at the overfriendly stewardess offering him hot towels every chance she got.

  It was after one in the afternoon when the jet pulled into the terminal. Dimitri rose out of his seat before the prompt to unbuckle and stalked down the aisle. He hadn’t packed anything. The most he had on him was his wallet, his phone, his keys, and the guide to the city he’d grabbed at the airport. There was nothing he needed he couldn’t pick up after he had Ava.

  His phone buzzed as he was crossing the terminal. He fished it out and pressed it to his ear.

  “Yeah?”

  “Your mother keeps calling me,” Erik said before Dimitri even finished. “You’re not answering her calls. She’s becoming concerned.”

  Dimitri stopped short of rolling his eyes. “Concerned about what?”

  “That you’re not answering her calls,” he repeated slower. “She seems to think you’re cutting ties after your arrangement.”

  “There is no arrangement,” Dimitri bit out.

  “There is always an arrangement. That’s how your mother works. What did you promise her?”

  He hadn’t exactly promised anything, but Erik was right. His mother never did anything without getting something in return.

  “I told her that I would allow her pipeline to run underground through the north.”

  “Have you changed your mind?” Erik prompted.

  “Of course not. I never go back on my word.”

  “Good. Your mother is not the right person to get on your bad side right now … or ever,” Erik added as an afterthought. “Call her. Appease her. You’ll be thankful for it later.”

  Erik hung up.

  Dimitri considered ignoring the advice; he had more important things on his mind, but he called his mother.

  Elena picked up on the third ring.

  “I was beginning to wonder when you call me,” she said with a razorblade edge. “It figure that you listen when Erik tells you, but not your mother.”

  Dimitri chose to ignore her. “I’m not going back on our terms. You can open your pipeline underground when I become elected.”

  Elena sucked her teeth, a habit Dimitri hated. “Is good, but should you double cross me, Dimitri, son or not, I will cut you at the knee, understand me?”

  “Thank you for flying with us,” said a woman as Dimitri reached the doors of the airport.

  He gave her a nod and quickly passed through.

  “Where are you?” Elena demanded.

  “I have business,” Dimitri answered simply.

  “Business where?”

  Dimitri glanced up and down the asphalt, searching for the car that was supposed to be waiting for him.

  “Business,” he repeated. “I will see you when I return.”

  He hung up before she could prod.

  No sooner had he stowed his phone away when a sleek, white town car rolled into view. The sunlight glinted off the chrome grill and the steel horse hood ornament.

  The car slowed to a stop right in front of him. The tinted window rolled down and a pockmarked face half hidden behind designer glasses peered out.

  “Dimitri?”

  Dimitri gave a curt nod. “Hector?”

  “Si.”

  The driver rolled out of his seat and hurried around to get the door. Dimitri climbed in, but not before noticing the bulge under the man’s blazer.

  “Marcus said to expect you,” Hector said once the door had been closed and the driver behind the wheel once more. “He did not tell me why, but to trust you.” He motioned the driver onward. “This is a problem,” he continued as the car turned out of the airport. “Trust, in my line of work, is … tricky.”

  “I don’t care about your operation,” Dimitri stated simply. “You have someone in one of your shipments that belongs to me and I want her back.”

  Hector thought about this as they turned out of the parking lot, drove past a freight lot and continued down a long road. Dimitri didn’t notice the scenery, too caught up in the man seated next to him and the armed driver who had let him into the car.

  “Marcus told me this,” Hector confirmed.

  “I thought Marcus didn’t tell you much,” Dimitri countered.

  Hector chuckled. “He told me enough.”

  The car continued onto a highway and over a bridge overlooking a marina.

  Hector reached into the inside pocket of his blazer and pulled out a slim, gold case. He freed a cigarette and lit it. He offered the pack to Dimitri, who shook his head. With a shrug, he put the pack away.

  “This someone in my shipment, she is someone special, I am assuming.”

  It was a task keeping himself from stiffening as his senses prickled, his mind already knowing where this was going.

  “Yes,” Dimitri murmured through stiff lips.

  “Of course.” He waved the hand holding the cigarette, sending tendrils of pale, gray smoke swirling into the air. “You don’t come to San Juan for the cocina criolla, eh?”

  Dimitri had no idea what that was, decided not to ask, and waited for the man to continue.

  “She your woman?”

  He thought of his pro
mise to John Paul. “No.”

  Hector’s brow furrowed over the gold rims of his glasses. “Sister?”

  “No!” he said a little more forcefully.

  Realization dawned and dark eyebrows lifted into a shiny, black helmet of hair. “Ah, a lover.”

  “I told you—”

  “A woman is a woman whatever she is,” Hector concluded, seemingly tired of his own game. “But you want her. I have her.”

  “What do you want?” Dimitri interjected.

  Hector sucked on his cigarette, enflaming the rosebud at the end until it blazed a startling red. He exhaled, spilling plumes of tobacco scented smoke through the car.

  The driver wordlessly drew down two of the three windows. All the windows, except Dimitri’s.

  “Marcus tells me you will be joining his Syndicate, in a seat of power.”

  Dimitri said nothing.

  Hector didn’t need a comment. He continued. “I can use a friend.”

  Dimitri looked at the hand the man offered him, but didn’t take it. “I’m already friends with Marcus.”

  Hector chuckled. “My cousin is a good man, but one day, you will need a bad man to … confide in.”

  Dimitri weighed his options. He could tell the man to go fuck himself. Loyalty was an important, tenuous truce. To break that trust could mean many things, including bloodshed. Marcus could see it as an act of betrayal. However, to refuse Hector could mean he never saw Ava again.

  He took the man’s smooth, dry hand. “I would like a friend.”

  Hector smiled around the cigarette. “Good.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  The girl was never brought back. The men didn’t return either. Not for a while. Just long enough to allow the false sense of safety to set in. When they came, two girls went with them.

  Then, five girls.

  Each time, none were returned.

  Their numbers were dwindling. Ava wondered if that was deliberate. Drug peddles never touched their own product to keep their sales numbers high. Maybe human traffickers didn’t follow that rule. They certainly weren’t trying to keep as many girls as possible, which made Ava wonder what they were going to do with them if not sell them. In no way was the thought comforting.

  Someone coughed. The deep, guttural sound turned Ava’s head. It wasn’t the first time she’d heard it. A few of the girls had been coughing and tossing in their sleep. It wouldn’t have been anything unusual, except each time, it was somehow deeper, thicker, almost wet in the lungs. She prayed to God no one was getting sick. There was no telling how much longer they would be trapped together and she didn’t want to die from something as common as a cold. It didn’t help that there were no windows and the air circulating was filthy and—now—contaminated. There was a girl not far from where she and Ilsa sat who Ava wasn’t even sure was still alive. She hadn’t moved in days, not even to cough or shift in her sleep. If she gave off a smell, it was masked by the buckets that hadn’t been cleaned in longer than was sanitary and the fifty unwashed girls. But she hadn’t started decomposing, so Ava had hope.

  “Should we check on her?” Ava wondered out loud.

  Ilsa glanced at the girl, then shrugged. “Won’t make a difference if she’s dead.”

  Willing to risk it, Ava shifted over and lightly touched the girl’s shoulder. Gingerly, she reached past the collar of her t-shirt and lightly pressed two fingers to the girl’s cold, clammy neck. She held her breath and waited.

  The patter of her own heart masked the beat she was searching for. The vibrations around them did the rest. It took some fondling and readjusting until she found what she was searching for.

  “She’s okay,” she told Ilsa, returning to her spot.

  “For now,” Ilsa mumbled.

  Ignoring that, Ava turned to the girl staring vacantly at her tattered sneakers. “Tell me about where you’re from.”

  Ilsa barely glanced up. “Frankfurt.” She took a deep breath and went on a bit dryly. “It’s a city in Germany.”

  Ava already knew that. It was the same thing she’d been told the first time she’d tried to draw the girl into conversation.

  “I think it’s awesome that you don’t have an accent.”

  Ilsa tugged on her filthy laces. “My parents moved to America when I was five for my dad’s work. We moved back last year when they promoted him.”

  “Do you like Germany?”

  Ilsa shrugged. “German is hard.”

  Ava chuckled. “My stepdad tried to get me to learn French when I was younger. I learned five words in six months. I was very impressed with myself.”

  Ilsa’s head lifted. “Which words?”

  Ava squinted off into the distance. “I have no idea.”

  Ilsa snorted what could have passed for a laugh. “My dad says I’m young and I’ll learn, but…”

  “You will. I didn’t really learn French until I moved to Paris and heard other people talking.”

  Green eyes lifted. They shone in the dimness.

  “What if we never leave this boat?”

  Ava reached over and took her small, cold hand. “It’s going to be okay.”

  Ilsa sniffled. “How do you know?”

  “Because Dimitri will never stop looking for me.”

  The girl swiped at a stray tear. “I just want to go home.”

  Ava squeezed her fingers. “I know. Me too.”

  They returned that night. They pushed through the door in a cluster of five and stood surveying the room. The one in the middle, the tall, lanky one, stepped forward. His hands clasped in front of him as he addressed the room.

  “I’m happy to announce that we will be docking in a few hours. It’s been a long journey, but we made it.”

  He made no mention of where they made it to or how many days it had been or what would happen to them once they docked. He merely smiled as he surveyed the terrified faces peering back at him. He rubbed his hands together once before he spoke again.

  “To celebrate, we will be selecting a small group of you to join us in our quarters for some light entertainment. The rest, we will see later this evening.” He rubbed his palms together again. “Gentlemen?”

  As before, they fanned out. Ava shifted her position slightly, not too fast, until she’d successfully blocked Ilsa from view. The girl had balled herself into the corner, head buried against her raised knees. Her breathing was so loud, Ava heard it. Fear of being heard kept her from telling her to stop.

  A girl cried out on the other side of the ship. A tiny Asian with enormous eyes. She was hauled up by her elbows and forcibly dragged to the door. Her screams echoed for what felt like hours before something banged and immediate silence dropped.

  Ava tried not to think about what was happening to her, tried not to imagine that being all their fates. She was still having a hard time believing it was all actually happening, yet, when the second girl cried out, there was no denying it. But they just had to hold out this one last time. Then they’d be on land and the possibility of escape would increase. They just needed to…

  One of the men spotted Ilsa. Ava didn’t know what had alerted him to her, didn’t know what could have possibly caught his eye, but his fat, bald head turned as though Ilsa had jumped up and started singing at the top of her lungs. His stubbled face broke into a grin, delighted by the girl’s terror. He pivoted on his heel, away from the others and started forward.

  Ava couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t even move. All she could do was sit there and watch as he grew closer, her mind stuck on an endless loop of how? How had he seen her? How could he possibly know she was there? How could he be doing this? How could he not have a shred of decency? So many questions and still, she was frozen. Frozen until Ilsa’s sharp cry broke her.

  Ava jolted just as Ilsa was being dragged to her feet. The girl’s struggles meant nothing to a man three times her size in height and weight. Her hair came undone of its braid, something it hadn’t done since the beginning and something about that spur
red Ava into action.

  She grabbed Ilsa and smacked at his hand on her.

  The crack momentarily silenced everything. Heads turned in their direction, all in surprise and wonder. Ava felt a jolt in the pit of her stomach, that sensation that she’d royally just fucked up. But she met the man’s stunned expression with venom.

  “Let go of her!”

  The man seemed as stunned as everyone else by her bravado. He stared at her with the look of someone, well, slapped. But he came out of his shock with a bellow. He spat something at Ava in Spanish that definitely didn’t sound friendly. He wrenched Ilsa from her and started away.

  “No!”

  With a scream that tore from the very depths of her soul, Ava sprung to her feet and tore after them. Adrenaline pumped in wild waves through her, shadowing her exhaustion, hunger, and fears. She leaped into the air and launched herself to the man’s back. Her arms circled his fat, sweaty neck. Her bunched fists rammed into his Adam’s apple, just like Dimitri had taught her, fully prepared to kill him. She pressed until he was choking and flailing and had released Ilsa from his grip. She screamed into his ear, a high, deafening wail that was sure to have been rattling his eyeballs.

  He bellowed. His body twisted violently from side to side, a desperate attempt to shake her off, but Ava wasn’t letting go.

  Someone grabbed her from behind. Angry hands fisted into her clothes and she was dragged off. She hit the steel floor with a crash that sang up her entire side. The steel toed boot connected with her ribs, flooding her with excruciating pain. Another one caught the back of her thigh. She might have cried out. But the third blow was right in her jaw. Her teeth cracked together. Her head snapped back. Everything flickered. All the sounds muted, except Ilsa’s scream.

  Then there was nothing.

  “We’ll backpack across Europe first.”

  Reclined across her rumpled sheets, bare chested and beautifully tussled, Dimitri took the post card she handed him and peered at the two backpackers trudging up the side of some mountain.