by Julia Swift
A girl can dream, right? Hah.
I think all this, but I can’t help the churn in my gut as the door shuts behind Gage, and I’m left alone with these thugs. Four of them plus their boss, a short, muscular-bordering-on-fat man with greasy dark hair slicked over a balding plate. When the door closes, he turns to me, his fat tongue wetting his already damp lips, a sick sparkle in his eye, and my whole body clenches in anticipation.
It doesn’t help that I already feel more broken than anything this man could do to me. Hearing Gage say he used me, made me love him, so I would do this. Watching him leave without so much as a single look in my direction. It feels like having my already-busted heart torn out of my chest and stomped on.
I have only myself to blame. Hurt me once, shame on you. Hurt me twice, well, I should have fucking seen that coming.
I swallow hard as Aaron approaches the couch. Time to face the music. He rips the cloth from my mouth, and I can’t help but gasp in a grateful breath of untainted air.
He laughs. “How are you feeling, my dear? Comfortable?” He nods at one of the men standing around, who bends over at the gesture and grabs the rope binding my hands. A few rough jerks later and it falls away.
I grit my teeth and resist the urge to spit out the rest of the bad taste in my mouth. Preferably straight into his face. “I told you when I came in here, I’m surrendering of my own free will.” Which I did. I let him know that Gage had kidnapped me, but that he’d made me see sense, and realize I needed to turn myself in to save my brother.
At the time, I thought I was saving Gage too. Now the betrayal stings.
“Oh, I know you did, doll.” His gaze wanders over my body as he says that, taking his time to linger on my chest, my legs. I suppress a shudder, because I don’t want to let him know much I hate him. And definitely not how much he scares me.
“Thank you for doing that, Ms. Casey,” he continues, his eyes not quite making it back up to my face, locked on my chest instead. “I’m glad that you, at least, see sense. I’ve told your brother a dozen times by now; all I need is my money back, and we can all move on our separate ways. There’s no need for this situation to get ugly.”
“You mean any uglier than it already is?” I can’t help but mutter, in spite of my fear.
His teeth bare in a wide smile. “Now, Sloan.”
I repress a shudder. Somehow, I hadn’t thought this creep would actually bother to learn my name. Him knowing even that much about me suddenly makes this all feel so much more real. What the hell do I think I’m doing here?
“Would you call this ugly?” He spreads his arms wide at the office. Monotone wine-red carpet, black leather couch that feels far too sweat-slick beneath me, this short, balding ass, and his tall, leering goonies, each of their faces as blank and nondescript as the next, they’re so out-of-touch with the world. They might as well be robots hulking in the corners waiting to attack at their master’s command. Dogs on a leash.
“For one thing, the company isn’t my first choice,” I say, keeping my voice purposefully even. I’m surprised I can manage it. Who knew I’d turn out to be decently cool under pressure?
But there’s something almost freeing about this. I’d been afraid of this all coming to a head for days now. Now, I’m the one who took the leap. I stepped off the cliff toward certain doom, and I might be falling, but at least I’m not stuck up there staring at the drop, afraid I’ll be pushed.
“Ah. I see your point there.” Aaron snaps thick, meaty fingers, and the bodyguards all snap to attention, eyes locked on him, awaiting orders. “Leave us,” he says, and one by one they file out of the room, no questions asked, not an instant of hesitation in any of them.
Is this how Gage acts around Aaron? Mindless and groveling? Somehow I can’t picture that. Even earlier, when he was stabbing the knife in my back, twisting it in deep, he sounded defiant still. Disdainful of Aaron. He might not care about me, but he doesn’t give a shit about his boss, either.
I’ll take whatever crumbs of reassurance I can scrounge at this point.
“Better?” he asks with that same leer on his skinny, pale lips.
“Not much,” I reply.
His eyes narrow. “Sloan, have I not treated you well?”
“You tied me up and gagged me on a couch the minute I got here,” I point out.
He spreads his hands wide, shaking his head. “Details. I needed to be certain of where someone else’s loyalties laid.”
Gage. He was using me as bait for Gage. My stomach does all kinds of strange things then. Turning itself inside-out. I ignore it, and the wrench of chest pain that comes along with it.
Doesn’t matter anymore. It’s all in the past now. This will all be over soon, one way or another. Probably not well for me. The least I can do is go down with my head held high. “Well, you’ll forgive me if it didn’t put me in the most charitable mood.”
He barks out a laugh. “You know, I like you, Sloan. You’re nothing like your brother. I’m sorry that you’ve been saddled with a family like that. A woman like you . . . you deserve better. You deserve to be treated right, by someone who knows how to do such things.” He steps closer, and I fight the urge to cringe back against the couch. It takes all my willpower to sit still as he leans over me. His scent makes me cringe. I swallow hard against a sudden gag reflex.
“Tell me, Sloan, did my boy Hunter treat you right?” He leans over me, and I keep my eyes locked on his, so that I don’t have to look too closely at his unbuttoned shirt collar, the black wiry hairs that spring out from his pale chest, or the stereotypical-to-the-point-of-ridiculous fat gold chain around his neck.
“Using someone to blackmail their sibling is hardly treating them right, wouldn’t you agree?” I reply.
“Fair point. But, you know, Sloan.” His hand touches the top of my head, and I can’t help it—my entire body flinches in shock. He runs his fingers through my hair slowly, almost gently, his rings catching and snagging in my hair. He breathes in deep, and I can practically hear the drool accumulating in his breath.
Fuck. I should’ve seen this coming. I knew he was awful, Gage warned me. But I expected an interrogation, maybe to be shoved around or hit a few times. This is somehow so much worse. I swallow again, but my throat’s gone dry as the desert.
“You know, business and pleasure don’t need to be separate things. You can mix them together. Our night together, waiting for your brother’s arrival tomorrow, it needn’t be a waste.”
“I’d rather waste it, if it’s all the same to you.”
That gentle hand clenches hard around my hair. Wrenches me back against the couch, so his whole body looms over me now. I can’t help but glance down, and I grit my teeth at the sight of the hard bulge in his pants.
Shit shit shit.
“I’m trying to be nice to you, Sloan. I’m trying to offer you pleasure rather than pain. And this is how you treat my offer? With disdain?”
“It’s hardly an offer if I can’t refuse it.” I jut my chin out, lock eyes with him. “It’s just another threat painted in nicer words.”
To my surprise, this makes his face crack into another smile. “I understand your point, Ms. Casey. See? I’m not an unreasonable man.” In direct contradiction to this, though he lets go of my hair, he starts to unbuckle his jeans as well.
I cast my eyes around the room. I could slide sideways on the couch, make a break for the door . . . . Would his men be on the other side of it, though? All four of them waiting to jump me? Probably.
Maybe if I could hit him with something first. But there’s nothing on the walls, no paintings, just cheap faux-wood paneling. No bookshelves, an empty desk with a single leather briefcase beside it. Unless that briefcase has a brick in it, it wouldn’t be hard enough to do any damage if swung at someone’s face.
Aaron unzips his fly and draws his cock out. Short, fat, veined and bulbous, it looks like a mushroom. An unwashed mushroom, as a fresh wave of his personal stench hits me strai
ght in the gut.
Never mind running away. I’m going to incapacitate myself with vomiting first. I clench my fists so hard my nails dig into my palms, as he leans closer, his cock inches from my stomach.
“I will give you a choice, then,” he says, his face close to mine, his breath reeking of day-old meat. “Service me here, now, with no one watching. Fifteen minutes of your time. And you can have this whole office to yourself until tomorrow. I won’t even tie you up when we meet your brother. You can walk freely over to him and explain that you’ve been good to me. You’ve treated me well, and he can breathe easy now. He’ll give me my money, and we’ll all go our separate ways.”
“What’s the other option?” I reply in a deadpan voice, my eyes fluttering shut.
There’s a long pause. I don’t look at him, but I can imagine how he’s reacting. How angry he is that I don’t want to take him up on his generosity.
“The other option is I tie you up again, shove the gag so far down your throat you’ll probably choke on it in the night, and my guards will escort you to the basement. There are no pleasant leather couches there, I can assure you. Concrete floor. Stone walls. No heat. No water or food for the night. We’ll see if, come the morning, I forgive you enough to let your brother see you one last time before he pays me what I’m owed.”
Some choice, I think. Because really it isn’t. Not at all. I only need one thing from him, and it’s not comfort or care. “What are you going to do to Freddie, in that case?”
“That depends on what he brings me. All five hundred thousand that he owes me, plus an extra hundred thousand interest, and we’ll be fine. We’ll be square.”
“An extra hundred?” I gape. “You didn’t tell him—”
“Don’t worry your pretty little head about the math, Sloan. You’ve heard your options, I’ve given you a fair chance. So what do you choose?”
I clench my jaw hard. “I’ll take the dungeon, thanks,” I spit.
I keep my eyes shut, so I don’t see it when he hits the wall. But I can hear it, the smack of his flesh on the boards. I can feel it, the floor vibrating around me as he stomps away again. By the time I open my eyes, he’s already zipped himself up, and he’s wrenching the office door open.
“Get this slut out of here,” he shouts at the nearest guard, and next thing I know there’s two of them on either side of me, dragging me off the couch.
Shit.
I struggle, then. Try to wrench myself free from their muscular hands, but it’s no use. One of them alone could overpower me. Two? I don’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell.
This time it’s not ropes that wrap around my wrists. Cold hard steel clicks around them. Handcuffs.
They lock them tight. My elbows can barely flex, my arms pinioned behind my back the way they are. On the far side of the room, I hear Aaron talking to the other two. “Take her down the back exit. Basement level.”
“But sir, we’ve got men posted there for tomorrow in case—”
“Just take her. It’ll be fine. We’ll be disposing of her and her brother long before they can make any trouble down that route anyway.”
My heart beats faster in my chest, even as the bodyguards attending me stuff the dirty sock-flavored gag into my mouth again. For once, it’s not beating from fear this time. I expected him to dispose of Freddie and I all along. It’s hardly a shock to hear him admit as much out loud.
No, my brain has snagged on another line of his speech.
Back entrance.
Men posted there in case . . . in case what?
In case someone tries to bust in here tomorrow?
My head reels. I double over, pretending to thrash against the guards again, and screech in the general direction of the wire embedded in my bra. I can only hope it picked up those words, and that whoever’s listening to this will hear it and realize.
That could be our saving grace.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Gage
“What the fuck did you let her do.” I don’t phrase it like a question, as I crash through the door of Freddie’s apartment, fists clenched. He’s huddled over something on his kitchen counter, back to me, though at least he flinches when I barrel inside. Least he could do, when he seemed utterly unsurprised after I called him an hour ago to tell him about Sloan being kidnapped, and he just calmly invited me over to his apartment.
“I didn’t let her do anything. If you know my sister at all, you’d know that she does what she feels is necessary, whatever the situation.”
“You don’t know Aaron like I do—”
“I know him plenty,” Freddie snaps.
“You don’t even fucking sound concerned. She could be dying in there right now, and you’re—what are you doing?” I stop short at the edge of the kitchen, having just crossed over to it ready to throw Freddie off his stool.
Until I see the mess of wiring spread on the table before him. What looks like a short-range radio, attached to his computer, and a few other bits of metal equipment everywhere.
“Of course I’m concerned. She’s my sister, Gage. I’m fucking scared shitless right now. But freaking out is not going to help her.”
I grit my teeth. Mostly because there isn’t a way to help her, not that I can figure. Short of going back to Aaron and killing him. I’d die in the process, but I could trade myself for her. My life for hers.
I could bust in there guns blazing, but I wouldn’t make it farther than the front door. I clench my fists, because I fucking hate feeling so helpless. Especially when it’s Sloan at risk.
“Help me with this?” Freddie says, and I finally realize what he’s doing.
“Is that . . . ?”
“The wire radio the FBI gave me. Sloan stole the wire this morning, from my car. Left me a note at the motel, which I found when I brought back lunch for both of us. It’s transmitting.”
“Let me hear her.”
Freddie shakes his head. “There’s nothing now. I think they’ve gagged her.”
I shut my eyes tight. It takes me several slow, deep breaths to recover from that memory. The sight of her on the couch, eyes wide and frightened. “They had her gagged from the minute I got there.”
“Well, they had one conversation, between gaggings, then.” Freddie hits a few buttons on the computer, and her voice pours through the speakers.
I wrench a chair around and drop into it beside him, leaning over the laptop to listen to every word she says.
And every word Aaron says.
I didn’t think I could hate him any more than I already did. Oh, I was so wrong. I will tear that man’s head from his neck the next time I see him. Fuck his goonies; I’ll destroy them all. And if they kill me in the process, so fucking be it. But I’m taking him down with me.
“There,” Freddie says, hitting pause, just as a high-pitched, muffled scream shoots over the microphone, and makes my whole body turn to water.
Sloan. Fucking hell. What are they doing to her?
“Right before that scream. I think she’s calling our attention to something, but it’s quiet.” Freddie taps a few more buttons, and the background sounds amplify to a much higher volume.
Take her down the back exit. Basement level.
My eyebrows furrow as I listen. Back exit. The Revel doesn’t have a back exit. Not on the floor where Aaron does drops like this, the second story, away from the casino floor and wide windows of the first floor. He’ll use one of the private rooms, probably the big one so that he can post his hit men in every corner of it.
But if there’s a second entrance on that floor, another way in that I don’t know about—and that less people would be watching . . .
Freddie and I exchange glances.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” I ask.
Freddie dips his head into a nod. “I think I might be. Just got off the phone with my contact, though. He can get me the money—not the additional hundred thou that asshole is suddenly demanding but at least the base fi
ve hundred K.”
“But no backup,” I reply. It’s not really a question. I’ve worked in the underground for long enough to know how incompetent and under-resourced the FBI are. There’s a reason crime lords like Aaron keep their thrones as long as they do.
“No backup,” Freddie confirms.
I nod a few times. “Well. Then we’ve got some planning to do.”
It takes us the better part of the afternoon. It’s already sundown by the time we shake on the final plan. And now comes the hardest part.
I’ve pulled a lot of tricks before. Lied and cheated and gambled my way through dozens of dangerous, even deadly situations. But I’ve never dared to try those lies on the man who taught me everything I know about crime.
I’ve never used Aaron O’Malley’s own tricks on him.
First time for everything, I guess. I hole up in Freddie’s back room, perch on the edge of his bed, the door locked, all distractions shut down. And I dial Aaron’s number from memory, on the burner phone we picked up during a Taco Bell run at dinner time.
“Aaron speaking,” he answers. Same way he always does to strange numbers. No last name, common as hell first name. Give no identifying features that you don’t have to.
“It’s me,” I say, my voice gruff with annoyance.
“Why, Gage. I didn’t think I’d be hearing from you so soon. Aren’t you halfway to Cuba by now, buying a beach house somewhere unreachable?”
I bark out a laugh. “Like I can travel. You know what ties me here.”
“You should let her go, Gage,” he says, and I swear to god the fuck almost manages to sound sympathetic.
“This isn’t about her,” I snap. Then I mollify my tone. Dial it down. He’ll be suspicious if I sound too generous right now. Too nice. I’m doing this out of duty, not any sense of affection, and he’ll damn well know that. “Not directly, anyway. It’s . . . ”
“What’s the matter, do you miss me already?”
I scowl. “I would like nothing more than to see you swing this, Aaron.”