by J. L. Drake
Frantically, I searched for any possible place to hide, and then it hit me. I nearly vomited with the mere of idea of it, but if I wanted to help Gus, it was my only choice.
“Eww.” I cried inside and gagged as I pulled the bodies to the side and tucked myself into a ball beneath them then dragged them back over me. They were heavyset men, so it took a lot of effort to move them, and the rain didn’t help either. Their clothes felt like paste. I squeezed my eyes shut, turned off my nose, and prayed to anyone who could hear me for help.
It didn’t take long for the drone to find me, or at least I thought it did. It hovered above for what seemed like ten minutes before it moved away and began to run systematic paths to hunt me down. The sound of its blades cutting through the storm was eerie and sent a triple dose of fear through me.
“You can do this,” I whispered to myself over and over. I needed something to hold on to.
Maybe it was the stress of the past two weeks or the emotional roller coaster I had been on, but somehow, I managed to fall asleep.
I peeled my eyes open at the vibration of a closing door. The last twenty-four hours came rushing back, and I shot straight up in…bed?
What the hell? I tried to process where I was.
The room was small, and there was a thin layer of dust covering everything. The bed and a two-drawer dresser were the only items in the room. There was a bathroom in the corner and a closet on one wall.
Call me crazy, but I thought I’d be in some basement chained to a wall, not waking up in a bedroom that smelled like—I sniffed deeply and placed the scent—pancakes.
I flipped the covers off and looked down at my clothes. Nothing had been removed but my shoes. I quietly moved around the room checking things out. I leaned down and pulled open the top drawer of the dresser to find a set of clean clothes.
Weird. They were my size.
I couldn’t help but think this was much like Savannah’s moment when she awoke in the safe house, only she was actually safe. I was not.
Or was I? It was a giant mind-fuckery of an event.
I raced to pull on the fresh clothes and hopped on one foot to the window and tried to push it open. Two nails stuck out on the sides, keeping it locked it in place.
I tried the window in the bathroom, and it was the same. Locked.
Shadows moved under the door, alerting me I was about to have company.
I looked around for something to use as a weapon, but all I came across was a bottle of water on the dresser.
Slowly, the door handle turned, and there stood Allen in his church collar.
“Holy Lucifer,” shot from my trembling lips as I fell captive to his stare. Part of me wanted to cry. Allen was like an older version of Trigger, but just as you felt remotely comfortable, the devil would flicker across his pupils and remind you of the darkness that filled his soul.
“No, not Lucifer, but if you care to bare your soul, I’m listening, Tessa.”
“Tess,” I corrected him.
He tugged on his collar before he stepped into the room. He looked around like he was approving how nice it was.
“Look,” he bent down and sat on the arm of the chair, “I’m not in the business of kidnapping. Never really cared for it, so most were dead by hour four.” He shrugged. “But what I do care about is taking back what’s mine.”
“Which is?” I folded my arms to hide the shakes.
“Devil’s Reach and to return the favor my son so lovingly did for me.” He raised his head, and a smug smile played across his dry lips.
“So, how do Gus and I fit into this?”
“Gus doesn’t. He was just being Gussy. Always had a moral probe stuck up his ass for the ones he cared about. He’s like a tick that burrows into your skin and attaches itself to your veins and never leaves unless you either cut off its head or force it from your body.”
“And me?”
His eyes widened. “You, Tessa,” he slowed my name down, “you’re my son’s weakness, my ace in this game. You,” he pointed to me, “will be mine.”
“Ha!” burst out of my mouth before I could stop it. “Not a chance. I don’t do seniors.”
He licked his lips, annoyed at my comment. “As flattered as I am you thought I would consider you, I don’t do hand-me-downs.” He brushed the arm of his jacket free from dust. “When I say mine, I actually mean…” He paused and glanced at the door. I followed his line of sight to Zay standing there in jeans and a fisherman’s knit sweater, wearing the same blank expression he always did when he was around me.
What?
“Now that we have that cleared up…” He stood, and I saw the blood on his cuff. He noticed and raised his cuff to get a better look. “Rick was a fighter.”
Nice.
“Tessa,” he purred out my name, “don’t bother running. You have no shoes, and the cornfield will slice your feet to pieces.” He smacked Zay on the shoulder as he left. “All yours.”
Not a chance.
“Hungry?” Zay asked quietly.
“No.”
“Can I get you anything?”
“A lift to town.” I dripped with sarcasm.
He gave an amused smile. “We’ll grow on you.”
“Like a tapeworm, maybe, or a tick.”
He unfolded his arms and dropped them heavily to his sides. He stepped into the room and stopped a few feet from me. “He’ll only take so much lip, Tess, and me too.”
“Good to know.” I folded my arms.
“Trigger might like it—” I slapped him across the face with my open palm. Trigger’s name was too hard to hear right now. I sucked in a sharp breath, anticipating his reaction. He closed his eyes for a moment, waiting for the sting to pass. I knew because my hand hurt like a bitch.
“I won’t sleep with you, Zay,” I muttered to fill the silence.
He stepped back and stood in the doorway. “Like I said, we’ll grow on you. Now, let’s go.”
“Where?”
“Gus.”
The feeling of cold earth stuck to my face, and the stink jolted me fully awake. I tried to shift back from the bodies on top of me.
Panic rippled through my bones, and my mind spun out of control. I forced myself to count to ten so as not to move too quickly then wiggled my way out from under the human remains. I looked around and stood on shaky legs.
“That’s so fucked up,” I hissed to help loosen my nerves. I paced the little clearing in the corn and tried to focus. “That’s some dark shit right there.” I took some deep breaths and thought of Gus.
“You can make that,” Gus whispered from across the picnic table. He angled his head so I could see the reflection of the truck leaving the driveway through his sunglasses. “Truck goes out and swings left every time.”
“Which means the main road must be just over there.” I didn’t point. He knew I understood.
“Follow the path straight down, and it should dump you on the road. Tonight.”
“What?” Panic rippled through me. “Your knee isn’t any better. How would you keep up?”
His lips formed a hard line, and I knew what he was about to say.
“No, Gus. What about the—”
“The only way I’ll get back to my boys is through you.” He lowered his voice and started to use a rock to dig into the soft wood. “Here’s what you’re going to do.”
A tear slipped down my face. I needed to keep moving. I would never forget the look on Gus’s face when I returned with my hands tied, being pulled out of the cornfield by Fox the first time I tried to escape. They made me watch them take a piece of wood to Gus’s knees.
Monsters.
Chapter Two
Trigger
“Vineyard,” a guard barked at me, “this is you.”
I glanced at Brick, who was being ushered into the cell next to me with Rail.
“You get one hour to freshen up, then lights out.” He laughed.
The door slammed behind me as I chucked my sheet
s on the nasty cot. Easing onto the mattress, I rubbed my face and looked over at my bunkmate. He had his eyes glued to a book. I knew he felt me staring because his leg shifted uneasily.
“We gonna have trouble?” I grunted.
The kid peeled his eyes over to me and slowly twisted to a sitting position. “No, sir, we will not.” His thick southern accent rolled off his tongue.
I eyed him curiously. “What’s your name?”
He extended his hand, but I didn’t move to shake it. “Wes.”
“Trigger.”
“I know.” He gave a tight nod before he went back to his book.
It didn’t shock me that he knew my name; most did in prison. I’ve been in and out of them my whole life. Besides, my club was international, so we owned many chapters. I was proud I had grown the club from just Santa Monica and LA to stretch as far as New Zealand.
I pushed the sheets into a thicker pillow and focused on where else I could send my men to look for Tess.
“Nolan Vineyard, I sentence you to three life terms in Terre Haute State Prison,” broke through my thoughts and made the creatures inside beat at the bars of their own cages.
Links better come through.
“I can hear them.” Rail’s tired voice filled the dark, damp cell from next door. We were all a bit wired from the kitchen duty we were assigned today. “They can smell me out.”
Fuck me, he was always so dramatic. Rail was smaller, his body a little slimmer than the rest of us. Prison was hard on him, but he always made it.
“I miss the garage, the smell of the steel and oil.” The mattress squeaked as he flopped to his side. “These shit sheets feel like sandpaper.” He paused. “You’re awake,” I heard him say.
“No,” Brick grunted.
“How you can sleep on the first night is beyond me.”
“Shut up.”
The first night was always the longest. It weeded the weak from the strong. I was no stranger to inmate life, but I never stayed long enough to make it my own, and I sure as shit wasn’t about to now. I closed my eyes to tune them out and thought about the mole in my clubhouse, eating my food, drinking my whiskey. Fire licked the hairs on my arms as I felt the need to snap. I somehow willed my head to clear and fell into a restless sleep.
The morning came too quickly. I blinked my eyes to focus and swung my feet to sit up. Once the doors scraped open on the tracks, I made my way downstairs, signaling to my men I was skipping breakfast and headed in the opposite direction.
The line for the phone wrapped around the corner and down the hall, but one look at me, and most scattered. My reputation in prison had traveled far.
I caught the eye of a Stripe Back I sent here last year. Kale had murdered a gas attendant for his initiation and tried to pin it on Morgan, who happened to be there at the same time. With a little pressure, I got the proof I needed to clear Morgan’s name and sent Kale away for life.
It didn’t help that I spread some rumors so he would become someone’s bitch in a matter of days.
“Nice limp.” Rail nodded. “Rough night under the sheets?”
Kale shot him a death look but was more focused on me.
“Tell me something.” He rubbed his crew cut and leaned against the wall. “How is it that you’re in here while your old lady is shackin’ up with your old man out there?”
Rail shifted and blocked the view of the guards while Brick appeared from the cafeteria and stood on the other side. I stepped up closer so we were nose to nose, and slapped my hand down on his pencil dick.
“I will be out of here before your next date with your cellmate,” I twisted him tighter in my grip as he struggled to keep his composure, “peeling the clothes off your sister, just like I did the night you were sentenced.”
He tried to lunge, but I squeezed with all my might. He stifled a scream as his veins bulged. He couldn’t afford to get put in the hole again, and he knew I knew that.
“Vineyard!” a guard yelled. “Do we have a problem here?”
I raised my hands and stepped back. “Just getting reacquainted with an old friend.”
The guard gave a red-faced Kale a questioning look. “That true?”
“Yeah,” he muttered.
“Good. Move on, then.” He waved us off as I stood back in line for the phone.
Three rings after I stated my name to the stupid recording, someone finally answered.
“Helmond’s Bar, Peggy speaking. Trigger, is that you?”
Why is she questioning me?
“Peggy, get me Morgan.”
“Oh, my God, Trigger! I thought maybe it was Brick or Rail. It’s been so jacked up without you here—”
“Peggy,” I snapped, “where’s Morgan?”
“No clue. I figured you had him dealing with somethin’.”
“Find me Cooper.”
“Do you know how hard it is to run this bar myself? The till doesn’t add up right. I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. Morgan keeps throwing Tess in my face. He really can be an asshole—”
“Peggy!” I shouted, and a guard glared at me. “Cooper.”
“Fine!” she huffed and screamed for Cooper, who must have been in the bar, as he yelled back at her. “Trigger is on the phone.”
There was bickering before he tore the phone away from her.
“Hey, man, you okay in there?”
“Where is Morgan?” I didn’t have much more time.
“I don’t know. He left the day before yesterday, said he’d be back tomorrow. Maybe his dad is back?”
Morgan wouldn’t leave unless something came up, but why not tell Cooper or Cray?
“You heard from Links yet?” he asked. The bar must have picked up, because he started yelling over the noise.
“No. You?”
“He was here poking around yesterday, but he wouldn’t share anything.”
Really?
“Find Morgan.”
“Yeah, boss.”
I hung up and went to find Brick. Something didn’t sit right.
***
“Stop!” the guard shouted, clearly new and nervous. Sweat rode across his lip and down along his sideburns. His day didn’t seem to be going very well. The pits of his shirt were damp, and he smelled like a jock strap.
His hands shook as he removed my handcuffs. I stepped too close as I passed him and heard the air get sucked from his lungs. He was the guard I would target when I needed something.
Three chairs over, I located Sam and went to sit across from him. He was as white as a ghost.
Tess.
I brought the receiver to my ear and watched as he mirrored me through the glass.
“What?”
His lips parted, and he let out a small sigh. “Links won’t talk to me, only Morgan.”
“And?”
“And Morgan is gone, won’t answer his phone.”
Now Morgan wasn’t answering Sam’s calls? What the fuck?
“And?”
“And I can’t find him. Cooper is a mess trying to run everything. Cray is coming to help. That stupid blonde behind the bar can’t count to ten, and Links wouldn’t even give me a moment of his time when he was at the club yesterday.” Sam tugged at his red tie. “Fuck forbid he answers his phone today. He won’t even text me.”
My thumb rubbed over my ring finger as I thought about what the fuck was going down at my club. A bright red head caught my attention. I glanced over and saw Brick ease in two seats down from me. He gave me a questioning look when he caught my grim expression.
The guard smacked his shoulder so he’d focus on Minnie. He picked up the receiver, and his jaw locked in place when Minnie slowly shook her head.
No sign of Tess yet.
“Sam,” I grunted, darkness escaping from my tongue, “find Links, or I will find another lawyer.”
I heard him call out my name as I slammed the receiver down and yelled for a guard.
We were done here.
I saw the stress
that hung heavily in Minnie’s eyes when her gaze moved up to mine. She looked drained. She forced a weak smile, and I waited a beat before Brick and I stepped through the door.
None of this was supposed to happen. I always had a plan, and this wasn’t it.
“Inmate number 909576, Vineyard.” The young guard tried to sound scary, but his voice cracked when he met my gaze. “You have, um, yard duty.”
I stared blankly and waited for him to lead the way. Fuck, I needed to kill someone.
The yard was mainly hard-packed dirt. The few little sprigs of grass that tried desperately to survive were slowly being choked to death under the boots of hundreds of inmates. It seemed like random groups at first glance, but each cluster was in a specific spot divided by race.
I glanced at Rail as he rolled a cigarette like it was the fifties, and Brick eyed the Koreans, who felt we didn’t belong here.
A guard with shiny black boots stepped into the yard and walked the inside perimeter. He didn’t carry a gun or a baton, and his unmarked hands were a dead giveaway that he wasn’t a fighter. Once he completed his rounds, he eased down onto a bucket and started to drum a song. It was Otis Redding’s “Sittin’ on the Dock of the Bay.” I noticed the leaders of each gang tuned in to him and stopped what they were doing.
A dark chill filled the yard, and the scruffy hair on the backs of the wild beasts inside me stood to attention as they started to hiss.
A big Hispanic man cast a shadow over my face and cracked his knuckles like he was about to fight. “Heard you take out some of my men.” His English was broken, but I understood enough.
I nodded and blew a puff of smoke toward him.
He snapped his fingers, and the rest of his gang joined him.
“You die now.”
Flip.
***
Tess
I woke to a tightness in my lungs. My body was nearly frozen, but what caught my attention were the little drops of rain that tapped my face. A storm was coming; the clouds were low and heavy. When I moved, I felt it, a thick, heavy chain wrapped snugly around my neck. I was attached to the trunk of a tree.