Victor rounded her, coming up behind her and pressing his length to her back. “Look, mi amiga,” he whispered in a husky chuckle. “Here we are again. You and me. As you can see, I invited your friends. I’m still not sure that was a good idea. The one with the dark hair has a big mouth. One I want to shove my gun into and pull the trigger.”
Jeannie fought a shiver and reached deep inside for calm. This time would be different. Please, God, let this time be different. “So what do you want, Victor?” she asked evenly, her breathing slow and sure.
Charlene and Betzi shot confused eyes in her direction. They clearly hadn’t known she knew their attacker. But they did now.
“I want you, daffodil. There was no other way to get near you. Seems you always have friends around you. Friends and him,” he spat in her ear, the greasy smell of his breath wafting into her nose. “Is he your lover?”
Jeannie remained silent, silent but for the crash of her heart. To deny who Sloan was would only evoke more suspicion in Victor, and that would incite him. Because everyone had a dirty secret as far as Victor was concerned. But to tell the truth would enrage him just as much.
“Is he your lover?” he repeated, tightening his hold on her neck until she almost couldn’t breathe.
She twisted her head. “He’s just a friend.”
With a hard jab of his knee to her back, he asked, “Since when do your male friends sleep over?”
Jeannie coughed, her lower back almost crumbling. “Since I became a lesbian.”
Charlene and Betzi’s heads popped up, but her eyes directed them to stay silent with a flash of urgent warning. Victor’s grip loosened at her confession, but only for a second.
She put a hand on his forearm, the one with the snake tattoo, and lifted her chin, easing the pull of the skin on her neck. “So, yeah. Gay. I’m gay. Sloan is, too. We have gay sleepovers. You know, in celebration of us coming out of the closet? Nothing to get excited over. In fact, why don’t we just leave everyone here and go somewhere we can talk? Because you don’t really want them, Victor. You want me. Once Sloan wakes up, he can untie everyone, and they’ll all go home and forget this ever happened.”
Wrapping his arm around her waist, he pulled her hips to his, grinding against her. Victor jammed the barrel of the gun to her temple, driving it against her skin. “You lie, bitch. You lie.”
She tried to shake her head. “Nope. No lie. Look at how pretty Sloan is. Are men that pretty ever straight? No. I know. It cuts women deep far and wide, his gayness. It’s like the Village People all over again or Ricky Martin. I, too, felt your brand of disbelief, when I found out Ricky wasn’t straight. I can’t tell you how many times I lived la vida loca in my bedroom mirror while I danced around and dreamed he’d come whisk me off and marry me. God, that news was such a disappointing time in my life. But there it is. So I decided Ricky must see something I was missing. That’s when I decided no more men.”
He reached upward, rested his elbow on her collarbone, then snatched her hair, yanking her head back so far her neck strained until it felt like it would break. Victor jammed his face into hers. “You were always with the funny, petunia. Shut the fuck up. Now!” he screamed, making Charlene and Betzi cringe.
But Jeannie didn’t cringe. She fought it with every fiber of her being. Fought to hold on to the anger she felt instead of allowing her fear to preside.
As Victor gazed down at her, his eyes wild and glassy hot, Jeannie realized he was no longer the dealer. He was the addict. Through the FBI, she’d found out that almost all dealers, including Victor, didn’t touch the stuff they sold. They collected the money and left the sad journey of addiction to everyone else.
But that was no longer the case with Victor. He was using. She’d watched Intervention a time or two. She’d seen all the signs of an addict. His face, once so beautiful and exotic, had been lean, but chiseled to hard perfection. Now, it was hungry lean, sagging at his once sharp jaw. And his eyes, so dark they were like hot fudge, were now just dark holes in his head surrounded by darker shadows beneath them.
Jeannie’s hands reached upward, gripping the fistful of hair he had as her feet began to slide out from under her. She fought to get her footing, refusing to utter even a gasp for air.
No. This time, Victor wasn’t going to use his intimidation tactics. Even if he forced her to do whatever it was he planned to do with her, she would not scream or beg.
Her eyes locked with his and she waited, silently accusing him with her cold stare. Waited for what was next while she looked for a way out.
His eyes, so dark and clouded by whatever he was on, went wide for a moment. As if, in that very second, he realized she was no longer the girl he’d known twelve years ago. As if he sensed the change in her.
He threw her to the ground, driving her face into the floor with his hand at the back of her head before kicking her so hard she had only a second to tuck inward and roll toward Charlene and Betzi.
And then her tormentor was staring down at her past the barrel of a gun. “You fucking bitch!” he screeched, saliva spraying across the room. “You took everything from me, and now I’m going to take everything from you! So choose, whore. Choose who dies first.”
Jeannie bit the inside of her cheek to keep from screaming her pain. His blow to her side left a searing trail of an agonizing throb in her ribs and her nose bled profusely. Huge drops of crimson fell from it, dripping down her face and splattering on the floor.
Yet, she would not fear him.
And if she had to have another rhinoplasty to fix her nose, she was going to rip off his face, because that shit hurt and took forever to heal.
She scrambled to sit up, using Charlene and Betzi’s bodies as leverage. The room tilted and swayed before righting itself. The nerves of her face were on fire with a ravaging sting.
Betzi’s fingers connected with hers, touching them briefly before flitting away. Her harsh huffs of breath made contact with Jeannie’s ear. The short pants, choppy and wheezing, were raspy.
Damn you, Victor Alejandro Lopez. Damn. You.
Show no fear. No. Fear.
Jeannie didn’t budge. Instead, she glued her narrowed eyes to his face and refused to look away. Even though it hurt like a motherfucker, she lifted her chin in defiance.
Victor, clearly unnerved by the silence, moved in closer and circled her neck with his big hand, slamming her back against the two women and holding her in place. “Choose, whore! Who will it be? Maybe it should be the gay boy, huh, mi amiga?”
Sloan, still prone against the wall, helpless and crumpled in a heap, hadn’t stirred. It incited her. Made her pulse race and her fury rise to a new height.
And still, she didn’t look away when she said with cold calculation, “Victor. I swear to you, on everything I have, I’ll kill you if you hurt them.”
Victor laughed, letting his head slide back on his shoulders, cackling with a deep gurgle of lunacy as he jammed the gun under her nose. “How will you do that, tulip? With your Mr. Miyagi brand of karate? I have a gun, whore!” He held on to her neck and reached around her, jamming it into Charlene’s temple, making her whimper while tears streamed down her face.
Okay. Point. Could she wish for a gun of her own? Was that considered wishing for something in the personal-gain category? She decided to bargain, forcing her words to find a calm execution from her trembling lips. “Aw, c’mon. It’s not them you really want, Victor. You know that and I know that. You really want me. Remember what you told me while you bashed my face in? You said it was for my own good. So take me, Victor, and let them go.”
He leaned back, his eyes filled with hatred, but there was a slight tremor in his hand—one she hoped to take advantage of. “No one’s going anywhere, you slut. Choose. Choose now or I’ll choose for you.” He gave her a hard shake before shoving her back against Charlen
e and Betzi again.
“So who’s it going to be, rose petal? The bitchy brunette with the big mouth or the whiny blonde? On the count of three . . . One.” He smacked his lips, then grinned in the way only the truly insane did. “Twoooo . . .”
Do it now, Jeannie. Do it like you fucking mean it. Do it before someone eats the barrel of that gun again. She closed her eyes, clamping her lips shut, visualizing Victor’s exact position and seeing in her mind’s eye exactly how she’d strike.
“Three, whore!” he bellowed with twisted glee.
A surge of howling anger thrust her upward as she steamrolled him, barreling into his gut and knocking him to the floor. The gun clattered to the cement, falling out of Victor’s hand and sliding sideways toward Charlene.
Jeannie threw herself on top of him, straddling his large body. She grabbed his shirt with one hand and put every last bit of power she had into balling her fist up and landing a clean blow to his nose.
Victor’s head jolted backward, blood spraying from it and spattering her in the face. The moment his head snapped back up was the second she struck again, screaming, “I’ll kill you!”
Her breaths came in sharp gasps when Victor fell limp against the floor. She leaned forward and bracketed his head, almost unaware his eyes were closed. “I hate you! I hate you!” she sobbed, hoarse and raw. Tears splashed on Victor’s torn flannel shirt, tears of shame, tears of finality.
Jeannie planted her hands on his chest and pushed herself back upward, gagging on his booze-riddled scent.
She forced air into her lungs while she stared down at the man who’d ruined her life. The eerie silence of the room met her ears, stifling her urge to smash Victor’s face in. To kick him, tear at him, scar him the way he’d scarred her.
Wiping the back of her hand across her mouth, she lifted her leg to move off him and locate the gun. She was going to tie Victor up like a trussed turkey and duct tape him so securely he wouldn’t be able to move an inch. Then she was going to set everyone free, send them home, and call Fullbright. And her nightmare would be over.
Forever.
Jeannie fell backward on the floor as a wave of dizziness accosted her, ignoring the humming noises Charlene and Betzi were making. She held up a hand, still trying to catch her breath. “Hold on. I’ll untie you. Lemme just catch my breath.”
But instead of her words quieting them, their muted noises grew louder, more urgent.
Jeannie’s eyes popped open.
Okay, so using the word forever in terms of ridding herself of Victor just moments ago had been maybe a little rash.
And, Jesus, she was really crappy at picking up signals lately. Warehouses that belonged to vendors who didn’t exist, muffled screams of warning—all missed signs. Missed in a big way. A relearning of the girlfriend code was in serious order when this was all over.
Victor’s howl resonated in her ears, high and enraged as he slammed into her again, hurling her to her back just as she’d fought to sit upright.
Seconds before he took his first blow, before the huge ball of his flesh slammed into her face, she caught sight of the gun out of the corner of her eye and memorized its position.
She let his fist connect with her face. Heard the bones crunch in her cheek. Welcomed the ire it drew from deep within her soul. Jeannie fell limp for a moment, allowing Victor to think she’d passed out just as he’d played her.
Her hands flattened on the floor on either side of her to give her leverage, and she counted in her head, waiting for Victor to relax. Letting him think she was once more, his prey.
Three, two, one!
Rearing upward, Jeannie lifted her hips, crashing upward against Victor’s groin and catching him off guard. He lifted off her just enough for her to roll out from under him and tuck her legs to her chest, giving her the kind of force she needed to ram the soles of her feet into his gut.
She drove upward hard, sending him flying backward. Jeannie didn’t waste time in scrambling to her haunches, reassessing where she was in the room, and making a dive for the gun.
With an infuriated Victor hot on her ass.
* * *
SLOAN woke to the sound of muffled cries and Jeannie, flat on the floor, a man sprawled on her back, yanking at the back of her head, wrapping his fist into her hair and preparing to slam her face to the hard ground beneath him.
There was no time to think. There was no time to plan an attack.
His shift, in all its raging fury, took care of that for him.
Sloan keened a howl, low and feral from his throat, when his clothes split and tore at the seams. Buttons from his shirt flew in every direction, fabric arced in the air in swirling colors, his change was so fierce.
As his bones twisted and morphed, Jeannie clawed her way across the floor to something he couldn’t see for the red haze of his change. So intent was her focus, she didn’t even turn her head at his howling screech. Determination, palpable and agonizingly raw, filled his nose. He felt it. Tasted it. Cheered it.
The man on her back, greasy, bloodied, his stench of disease and despair, clawed with her, racing her to get to something . . . Sloan’s blood coursed through his veins, hot and pulsing, while thick patches of hair sprouted from his body. He fell forward, moving from his human position of erect to that of his animal half on all fours. Sloan sniffed again and finally pinpointed the scent.
Victor. Ah. At last. That was who he had smelled when they’d first entered the warehouse. His scent had been all over Jeannie after the first attack. Anticipation, greedy and hungry, swelled in his chest.
For all he’d done to Jeannie, for all he’d stolen from her, Sloan would see to his death. And it would hurt. It would so bloody hurt.
A gun. Oh, Jesus Christ, there was a gun. Sloan spotted it moments before the last vestiges of the shift roared through his body.
“Shawty!” someone bellowed, as something dark and musty flew overhead.
Nina. He recognized the voice as Nina’s. Fuck. If she rushed into the middle of this and let her anger take control without realizing Victor had a gun, humans could die.
Sloan’s shift completed just as Victor reached for the gun while Jeannie tore at his fingers, trying to keep his hands from latching on to it, her nails leaving thick lines of blood in his ravaged skin.
Sloan lunged for the gun, launching himself in the air in a smooth leap, intent on keeping Jeannie within his sights.
As Victor’s fingers peeled Jeannie’s from his, he reached forward with his other hand and made contact with the gun. He reared upward and aimed at Charlene and Betzi, who slammed their eyes shut and cowered in the corner.
Helpless. They were helpless to even move to defend themselves, and it sent raw fury through his veins.
Jeannie’s scream, mingled with a hovering noise, was the last thing Sloan saw before he collided with something fuzzy and smelling of mildew.
Mat—it was Mat, aimed right for Victor’s head until he’d intercepted him.
Sloan crashed into the wall, breaking the cement blocks like they were made of cardboard. Chunks flew about the room, pelting the two women in the corner. He howled his outrage when he righted himself on all fours and saw that Victor had managed to get away from Jeannie, and he still held the gun.
Victor waved it wildly, his breath coming in harsh wheezes from his chest as he aimed it directly at Jeannie. “You fucking whore!” he raged, his teeth clenched and his legs wobbling as he stumbled backward.
And then Jeannie was using her hands to pull her bloody body across the floor, screaming, daring Victor in a white-hot rage that filled Sloan’s nostrils. Taunting him, daring him, while spreading her arms wide to block Victor’s view of Betzi and Charlene. “Do it, you fucking pig! Do it! Take me, you animal! Kill me! I dare you!” she ranted, driving forward, crawling, inching toward him as
though her body were made of cement. She rose up on her knees, pitching to and fro, unsteady, enraged. “Do you hear me, you fucking spineless coward? Do iiit!” she bellowed, spit spraying from her mouth as she pounded her chest with her fists.
That very gesture on Jeannie’s part, the beating of her hands to her heaving chest, created a maelstrom of activity. Empty cardboard boxes rose up from the floor as if on two legs and leapt to the air, dancing in frenzied circles. Lavender smoke swirled in small tornadoes while wood pallets clacked together as though they were head butting. Paper soared like birds in a blue-hued sky, diving and twisting, attacking Victor’s head and making it difficult for him to see.
Nina took advantage of the storm Jeannie created and raced across the room toward Sloan, rearing up short when she caught his eyes. He felt the slight nudge of his brain where she rooted around to read his intent and then she screamed, “Midget! Duck!”
Sloan ran, directing his simmering hatred in one snarling leap at Victor, aiming for the gun.
Victor’s finger poised at the trigger, twitched erratically. Sloan heard the click of the first barrel loading with an eerie slow motion of sound and movement.
Victor hesitated as his wild eyes took in the scene before him, and his hesitation, the crazed uncertainty in his eyes, was exactly what Sloan needed.
“Invisible!” Mat screamed in a rumbling rage.
Sloan watched below him as Mat crashed into Jeannie, knocking her to the ground and covering her with his entire surface just as he arced over them and drove into Victor, pounding him into the ground.
He landed on Victor with a heavy grunt, driving him so firmly into the cement flooring Victor’s eyes rolled to the back of his head.
And now, he would die.
The Accidental Genie Page 26