DAX: A Bad Boy Romance

by Paula Cox

  “Dad?” she whispered, voice quivering. Fat tears rolled down her cheeks, and she forced herself to look away for a moment, taking in the state of his office. His desk was a mess. Blood splattered the computer screen. His journals were gone.

  A raspy breath, loud yet weak, brought her back to him, and Eliza crouched over him when he whispered her name. At least he was conscious, but she couldn’t imagine the horrible agony he must have been in. His face had been bludgeoned, obviously, but what else was broken and beaten?

  “Dad, t-try n-not to move,” she stammered, a hand on his shoulder as she unlocked her phone. Where was she supposed to touch? Was anything broken? “I-I’m going to call for help.”

  “What are you doing here, Elizabeth?” her father murmured. A hand suddenly settled atop hers, and her eyes widened to see the knuckles so bloodied and damaged. He’d fought, at least. Her father, always the fighter. “Y-You should be s-sleeping… What time is it?”

  “Try not to talk too much,” Eliza urged. In that moment, she knew she had to be the calm one, the rational one. Right then and there, Eliza knew she needed to be the parent, the one who cleaned up the mess. “I’m going to get us some help so we can get you cleaned up, okay?”

  “Elizabeth, you should go. They might come back.”

  She ignored him—and the fear his statement brought that clawed up her throat like an unwanted scream—and dialed for the emergency services. The second the responder answered, she cleared her throat and said, “Yes, I need the police and an ambulance to Blackwoods University. There’s been an attack in the dean’s office…”

  Chapter 39

  Nash had been in darkness so long that he’d lost track of the time. After Phillip Crest and his squad of meandering goons hinted at Eliza’s dire situation, they’d left him to stew in his guilt and in his anger. With no windows anywhere around the warehouse, darkness had been his only companion, and he’d lost track of just how long he’d been tied to that fucking chair.

  All he knew was that he needed to piss, but he wasn’t going to give any of those fuckers the satisfaction of wetting himself. When the pain became too much, he forced his mind elsewhere, somewhere far away and comfortable so that he wouldn’t focus on the agony in his bladder, the fracture in his nose, and the throbbing ache pounding slowly and constantly across his face. Forgetting it all was the best he could do. It was the only thing he could do.

  Forget and picture Eliza’s face, though imaging her face reminded him that that scumbag had his hands on her in one way or another, and then the cycle of guilt and rage started up all over again.

  He’d lost the feeling in his hands. They might not have been tied up and over his head, but the tape had cut off his circulation a little while ago, and every time he moved his fingers, that pins-and-needles feeling skittered through each digit. Another thing to try and forget.

  When the door eventually cracked open and let in a beam of sunlight so blinding that it physically hurt him, Nash did his best to seem unfazed. He doubled over, eyes pressed shut, then straightened up as soon as the door swung shut. Bright spots danced across his vision as he blinked rapidly, squaring his shoulders and readying himself for battle.

  Moments later, the bright white lights overhead flickered to life, bringing with them an incessant buzzing sound that irritated his ears. He’d grown accustomed to the silence. It hadn’t been a comfort, but it had let him focus on what he needed to—on forgetting. Now, his brain was swirling out of control, gaze jumping from place to place around the warehouse, until it eventually settled on Phillip Crest.

  The man was wearing something different than he’d been the last time they talked. A polo shirt and khakis with an off-white jacket hung over his arm. If Nash hadn’t known any better, he would have thought that asshole was on his way to play a very stimulating round of golf with other academic types.

  Maybe he was.

  “And how are we feeling, Mr. Reeves?” Phillip asked as he approached, once again stopping just out of reach of Nash’s long legs. As if he would try to kick him. What good would that do? They’d left his ankles loose to fuck with him. If he wanted to, he could have gotten up and tried to run. But it would have been a fruitless endeavor—a waste of fucking time. His hands were bound so tightly that he couldn’t even wiggle his arms away from the chair. He would have been running with a fucking chair attached to his body.

  Like he’d get very far before someone saw him, someone who probably worked for the asshole grinning at him with a perfect set of bright white teeth.

  “Doing just swell,” Nash insisted, his voice even, conversational. “Got a good night’s sleep for once since, you know, it’s dark as Hell in here. Really. Thank you. I’ve never felt better.”

  “Really? Because you look like you’ve been hit by a train.”

  “Probably because one of your guys clocked me in the face, remember?” Nash cocked his head to the side, smirking. “Or did you forget you had them do that? Jump me when all I’d done was follow directions.”

  “Ah, but you didn’t follow directions, did you?” Phillip said lightly, raising a finger at Nash to stop the impending rant. “I asked for a specific amount of cocaine, and you only delivered half, all the while knowing that I had the power to hurt the woman you love.”

  “I don’t love her,” he snapped, but the words tasted false, even on his tongue. The way Phillip grinned at him made his hands curl to fists, the pins and needles fighting back full-force. Licking his lips, Nash simply looked away, knowing this was a fight he couldn’t win. “Is she okay?”

  “I’m not at liberty to say, unfortunately,” Phillip told him, “but I can assure you she will be okay when you make good on your promise and deliver the other half of the drugs you owe me.”

  “I don’t owe you shit, Crest.”

  “I’m afraid you do,” Phillip mused, “if you want her to survive the day, you’ll deliver the rest to me in a timely manner with no further delays.”

  He bit the insides of his cheeks to keep from snapping. The rational side of his brain knew exactly what Phillip was doing. The guy was goading him, pushing and pushing at Nash’s triggers until he finally snapped. It was obvious by now that Eliza and her safety was the only thing that mattered to him. It would have been better if Phillip knew nothing about her, but it was too late for that now. He knew, and he’d use it against Nash without hesitation.

  Nash just needed to be stronger. He had to be tough. He had to survive this and save her.

  “If I go back in today and get the rest of the coke, the guys will know something is up,” Nash reasoned with a slight shake of his head. “People saw me get it last night. They know I’m not the guy who does the runs. It’ll look suspicious. Maybe I’ll be tailed—”

  “Oh, Mr. Reeves,” Phillip said, chuckling. He then let out an unnecessarily dramatic sigh. “You really are a disappointment. Given your reputation, I thought you’d be better than this.”

  “Well, given your reputation, I thought you were a stand-up guy, but apparently we’re both in for some disappointment today.”

  They stared at one another like they were in some cheesy Western showdown, a tumbleweed blowing between them and eyes twitching on the close-up. Nash knew he’d have to get the drugs, especially if Eliza’s situation was as precarious as Phillip made it out to be, but he sure as hell didn’t want that rat bastard to think he was going to be his errand boy willingly. He had to put up a little fight. He owed himself that much.

  “Now you listen to me, Nash Reeves,” Phillip started, his words uttered in a low, dangerous tone, one that actually made the hairs on Nash’s arms stand up. “You are going to get me the rest of the drugs that I asked for, and you’re going to do it without a single fucking complaint. Then, when you’re done with that, maybe you’ll get me some more. Maybe you won’t. I haven’t decided what I’m going to do with you yet, but just know that I get to decide. As long as Eliza’s mine, you’re my fucking servant until I say otherwise. Is that cle
ar?”

  Nash wasn’t exactly proud of what he did next. Holding Phillip’s gaze, Nash reared back and spat at him. The spittle didn’t quite make it onto that asshole’s polo, but it said more than words could.

  “That was a mistake,” Phillip growled, his eyes narrowing, bushy eyebrows deepening. “A big one.”

  “I’ll do it,” Nash called just as the round little man turned to stalk away. “But fuck you, Phillip Crest. You deserve to rot for all the lives you’ve taken.”

  Phillip continued onward, sparing a glance over his shoulder to shout, “Oh spare me your dramatics, Mr. Reeves.”

  And then he was gone, soon to be replaced by a trio of hulking men, none of whom were quite as muscular as Nash, but it was three against one in a fight Nash wasn’t interested in entertaining.

  “You try anything stupid,” one of them growled, as another crouched behind Nash to remove the tape, “and I break your skull this time.”

  “I’m not an idiot,” Nash muttered. His eyes danced from man to man, wondering if he recognized them from anywhere. After all, he’d been in the underground drug world for quite some time, especially in Blackwoods. Most of the drug dealers, and the muscle they brought along, were familiar by now. But none of their faces raised any flags in his mind. None. Must be out-of-towners, because locals weren’t stupid enough to mess with the Steel Phoenixes.

  “Up,” one barked, hauling Nash to his feet. Every muscle screamed and protested at the movement, and he gritted his teeth as he staggered forward.

  “Before we go anywhere,” he said as he held his ground, “I gotta take a wicked piss.”

  “Keep moving—”

  “Look, man,” Nash snapped, facing the guy who seemed to be the ringleader, the one doing all the talking, “you either let me piss in the bushes or I do it in your car. Pick one.”

  The three seemed to confer with one another silently for a moment, a whole conversation had with looks alone, and suddenly they were moving again, one of them muttering, “You’re a fucking animal.”

  “Takes one to know one, brother,” Nash said with a sigh, rolling his eyes and bracing himself for what was coming next.

  Chapter 40

  Phoenix Rises looked pretty sad during the day. For the most part, the only people who went there were friends and family of the Steel Phoenix Motorcycle Club, and, of course, the members themselves. However, not even friends and family could just stroll in unannounced. You couldn’t give a vague reference at the door and be welcomed to paradise. There was an approved list of day visitors who made use of the bar, which didn’t open until the late evening to the general public anyway, which meant Phillip’s goons would have to find their own way in.

  Or not come in at all, apparently.

  As they pulled up to the curb on the opposite side of the street, parking in front of the liquor store who’d floated the idea of once connecting their basement to Phoenix Rises’s for the sake of running illegal shit between the two. The idea of eventually been turned down, mostly because this wasn’t the 1920s and they didn’t need underground bootleggers filtering in and out of the motorcycle club’s bar. Still, despite the falling out, everyone was still on pretty good terms for the most part.

  “You’re going to go in and get the shit,” the driver announced, and Nash glanced down at the gun—one that looked suspiciously like his, honestly—pointed at his thigh from the guy seated next to him in the backseat. “We’ll wait here. You’ve got a time limit, Reeves. You aren’t back in time, we start deciding which one of your girlfriend’s pretty fingers we chop off first.”

  “Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Nash muttered, going for his seatbelt. These assholes weren’t quite the conversational wizards that Phillip Crest prided himself on being. They were out-of-towners, sure, but not much different from the guys whom the Steel Phoenixes employed to do their dirty work. Not exactly the brightest stars in the sky. All they had to piss him off with were threats against Eliza, and even though each one was like a dagger to the heart, they were getting old. They needed some fresh material to keep the threat alive. “How much time do I have?”

  “Five minutes.”

  “Takes about that long to get down to where we store the coke and punch in all the passcodes,” he sneered, frowning. “What? Do you guys just leave your shit sitting out on a table for anyone to take? We actually keep ours locked away.”

  The trio exchanged looks, once again having a whole silent conversation without him, and Nash let out a long sigh. He wasn’t thrilled to be in this situation, but once he had the coke, he’d hopefully be a step closer to finding out where they were holding Eliza. Nobody needed to drag her out and parade her around in front of him—all Nash needed was a location, then it was time to start cracking skulls and getting the hell out of dodge.

  “Fifteen minutes,” the driver said, seeming pleased with his revised numbers. “Fifteen minutes to get in, grab the shit, and get out. We’ll give you a leeway of thirty seconds if we can see you making an effort.”

  “Well, aren’t you just saints,” Nash said, a hand to his heart. “I’m so lucky to be stuck with you.”

  “Just get going,” the guy beside him growled, shoving at Nash’s leg with his gun, “before I give you a fucking reason to put some pep in your step.”

  “Okay, okay, I’m going…” Nash shot each one of them a look, one of those if-looks-could-kill looks, then stepped out of the car. Just as he did, a police car drove by, slowly, as if scoping out the motorcycle club’s bar on the other side of the road. In that moment, it would have been easy to flag him down and bust this whole thing wide open, but then what would happen to Eliza? He couldn’t risk her life just to save his—not when all of this was his fault.

  So he waited for the car to pass, then darted across the two-lane street and made a beeline for the door. As always, the cleaners were in, scrubbing the grime off the tables and floors that were missed by the folks working the shift before. Upstairs Nash heard familiar voices in a heated discussion, but he didn’t have time to engage. He was on a timer, after all, and since he had no clock or phone to monitor himself with, it made the most sense to just get in and get out.

  Just like last night—this morning, more like—Nash made no eye contact with anyone. He returned smiles halfheartedly to the cleaning crew and tried to mentally get across that they needed to help him somehow, but didn’t dwell.

  Given the state of the holding cell in the basement, it seemed that no one had been in to add or remove any more bags of coke since he’d done so hours before. Grimacing, he started scooping up the rest of what he “owed” to Phillip and tucked them carefully in the reusable grocery bag he’d been forced to carry. That in itself should have tipped off anyone who knew him. Nash Reeves didn’t use reusable grocery bags like a fucking hippie.

  He handled each bag filled with white powder cautiously, not wanting to tear the thin plastic and cost the Phoenixes more than he’d already done. As soon as he had the proper amount, he turned and hurried for the door, climbing the wooden stairs three at a time because he had no idea how long he’d been down there for.

  Eliza. I’m coming, baby. Hold on.

  Nash almost made it to the front door too, but something stopped him. Well, someone stopped him. It would have been easy to ignore just about everyone there, especially the cleaning crew, but Micky was a little harder to evade.

  “Nash, man,” Micky shouted. If he kept going, Micky might have known something was up, and he couldn’t afford a shootout in the street right now. So he stopped, chest heaving and brain aching at the thought of what these seconds might do to Eliza.

  “I can’t stop, Mick,” he said as his old friend approached. “Seriously, I gotta get going.”

  “Don’t get your panties in a twist, kid,” Micky said, his jog slowing to a painfully languid stroll the closer he came. “Just wanted to give you your phone. And by the way, you look like hell. What’d you do, get in a fight with a freight train?”

  His ey
ebrows knitted together, his permanent frown deepening. “My what?”

  “Doreen found it here last night,” he stated as he extended his arm out. Sure enough, Nash’s phone was there, untouched and free from Phillip’s grasp. When he’d woken up in the warehouse, bruised and bloodied, he’d assumed Phillip had taken it along with his gun. He’d memorized the address and the punch-in code to the seedy apartment where he was supposed to initially meet the guy, so he hadn’t bothered to check his phone after he got the coke earlier that morning.

  “Must’ve dropped it,” Nash mused as he grabbed it, though his voice wasn’t as strong as he would have liked. “Thanks, man.”

  “It’s been ringing like crazy,” Micky told him with a chuckle. “I think your girl is on the warpath. If you don’t call her back soon, she’ll probably blow an ulcer or something.”

  The ringing sound in his ears was suddenly so loud he thought he was having a stroke. His head felt momentarily empty. Nash’s arms fell to his side, and he gawked at Micky blankly for a moment, trying to process the information. “W-What?”