Jaxon - Bad Boys of New York Book #1

by Mackenzy Fox

I snicker. “In the flesh, though I wouldn’t expect somebody like you to give a shit, after all, you did make most of my childhood miserable, you know every day was like dread having to walk the gauntlet of the corridors to my locker, I was a nobody back then, obviously, a loser, I didn’t know how to put up a fight, now I do, to which I’ll be repaying the favor once this meeting is over.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” he says, he’s trying hard to seem like he’s a tough guy but tough guys don’t rape innocent women, I don’t care how long ago it was. I’m curbing my anger but I’m barely holding on.

  “Just shut the fuck up and answer me.”

  “How the fuck would I know who she was?” he barks. “Some nutcracker trying to blackmail me.”

  “I’ll give you one more opportunity,” I say, cracking my neck from side to side. “Somebody knew about what happened at prom, Morgan told somebody, who was it?”

  I need this. I need to break his face.

  What’s more, I think I’m going to enjoy fucking him up good and proper and I’ll hold no remorse for it.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, I’m calling security, now get out of my office!”

  I move so fast, he doesn’t even get his hand onto the phone. It won’t matter if he does, I’ll ruin him before security even get here.

  I punch him square in the nose and he goes down like a sack of spuds. He holds his nose, wailing as blood spurts out everywhere. I know just how to break a nose in the shortest time possible.

  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” I say calmly, I lean on the side of the desk and cross my arms over my chest. “Now, let’s try that again…”

  “You broke my fucking nose!” he screams, clutching his face with both his hands as he sags to his knees, spluttering like a girl.

  “And there are two hundred and twelve other bones in the human body aside from your nose and I know how to break every one of them, some are more painful than others.” I smile levelly. “So, we can make this fast or we can make it really, really slow, the choice is yours.”

  “Helen Saunders!” he spits, pulling his handkerchief from his top pocket to try and curb some of the bleeding.

  I frown. Helen Saunders? She was one of Morgan’s best friends in high school. So, Helen Saunders is Ellen Moore. This just gets weirder.

  “Tell me everything,” I state calmly. “What was she bribing you for?”

  He tries to move away from me but I waggle my finger to indicate that’s not a good idea.

  “She came around here asking for money,” he blurts out. “Thieving little bitch she is, said she’d sell this bogus story to the papers and ruin me, ruin the both of us if we didn’t pay up, she’d fallen on hard times and wanted to make a quick buck.”

  “What bogus story is that?” I ask, though I already know the answer.

  “Fuck you,” he spits.

  “Wrong answer, asshole.” I move over him and uppercut him in the solar plexus, he grunts and gasps for air as I pull my fist back for another hit and he holds his hands up in surrender.

  “Okay, okay! She tried to say that I assaulted Morgan on prom night.”

  Assaulted? I love how these assholes try to sugar coat everything.

  “And did you?”

  Of course, I want to hear him admit it before I hit him again.

  I’m enjoying this immensely, it would have been so much better if he’d put up a fight instead of cowering like a little boy. I hate one-sided fights, they’re uneventful.

  “No, I didn’t, she wanted it as much as I did, she knew what we were there for, then apparently, I went too far and she turned around and tried to say I raped her, the bitch is on crack.”

  “You fucking bastard.” I punch him in the jaw and he momentarily falls back, stunned. I almost think he may pass out but I didn’t put all my weight into it, I want him to feel every second of this.

  “Stop fucking hitting me!” he screams.

  He’s making a hell of a racket. I don’t have long.

  “Call off security,” I tell him, I probably have a few more minutes at best, I know the secretary would have called them.

  “I don’t have…”

  I lunge toward him and he flies backwards, trying to get away from me. I pull him by the lapels of his suit jacket, now splattered in blood, and drag him over to his phone. I pick up the receiver and hold it to his ear.

  “It’s in your best interests, Thomas, trust me, two hundred and twelve more bones and I like ribs the best.”

  He speaks into the monitor. “Sophie, call security off.” I shake him and hold him in place. “I’m fine, there’s just a little misunderstanding; please make sure I have no interruptions.”

  I slam the phone down.

  “Perfect. Now, where were we? Ah, yes, what happened after Helen came to see you?”

  He holds his nose with his sodden handkerchief and speaks through the cloth. “Nothing. I told her to piss off and not to come back, if she showed her face around here again, I’d have her arrested.”

  “So, you didn’t pay her?”

  “I didn’t give her shit, said I’d ruin her if she ever set foot back in here again, she left empty-handed.”

  I try to reign in my temper. Clearly, he’s delusional.

  “And that’s it?”

  “I heard she called Morgan too, she was hanging around trying to get money, got charged for stalking and got arrested!”

  This is crazy, un-fucking-believable.

  “Where do I find her?”

  “I don’t know…”

  I go to move to him and he holds his hands up.

  “Wait!” he shrieks. “She came to the office, I never had her number or an email or anything, you have to believe me, I’d give her to you if I knew where she was.”

  “Right, like I believe that you didn’t rape Morgan James on the night of prom.”

  His eyes go wide.

  “I know what you did, fuck face, this isn’t over.”

  My phone rings, making Brandon jump in the air. I like that he’s on edge, he better stay that way.

  “Zane,” I say, swiping my phone open.

  “She’s got several aliases it seems, I’ve got an address, it’s across town.”

  Perfect timing.

  I glance up at Brandon; he’s hanging on my every word, probably wondering if I’ll throw him out the window before I leave; now there’s an idea.

  “Email the photos to Brandon Thomas, please. To his work email.”

  Brandon’s eyes go wide.

  I hang up.

  “W-what photos?”

  I crack my neck again in an intimidating manner as I smile at him. “The ones from the gay strip club you like to frequent.” I shrug walking over towards the window and help myself to a scotch from the decanter on the far side of his office. I take a moment to look at the magnificent view down below. “I never picked you for an in the closet kinda guy, Thomas, frankly, I’m disappointed.”

  “What the hell do you want?”

  I can hear the fear in his voice.

  “Open your email, you’ll see.”

  I watch the traffic below as I hear him fumble around at his keyboard, clicking the mouse and pressing buttons.

  “What the hell is this?” he cries.

  “Assurance,” I tell him.

  There is an array of different photos of Brandon having a lap dance, a muscled half-naked stripper straddling him, and then a half-dozen shots of them very close indeed. Not bad evidence for a straight guy with a very pregnant wife. I decide I’ll string him along a little bit since I’ve got him hook, line, and sinker.

  “The video I was holding off to send to your wife.”

  I don’t need to look up to know he’s gone a whiter shade of pale. There is no video, my resources only go so far, but he doesn’t know that.

  “I’m sure she, along with all your work colleagues, will be thrilled to see that footage, not to mention her parents as well as your own and all th
eir lovely friends at the country club.” I let that settle in before I rub it in even more. “It’ll be hard on your wife, she’ll be devastated, not just humiliated when I email all her fellow work colleagues at the school and all the parents on the P&C committee, all I have to do is initiate a group email and voila, your life as you know it is over, just like Morgan’s was when you took her innocence away and tried to make out nothing even happened and got away with it.”

  He stares at me like I’ve gone insane.

  “You sick son of a bitch,” he spits, anger and mortification animating from him.

  I laugh without mercy, downing the scotch. “I’m a sick son of a bitch? Don’t you have a heavily pregnant wife about to pop? Does she know about your weekend escapades and your penchant for young, hot dudes? Better still, does the New York Times?”

  “Leave her out of this.” I can tell in his tone he’s defeated, and he is, he has no choice. I will ruin him. “Please, just leave her and the papers out of it and tell me what you want.”

  “What I want is simple. If it were up to me, then Morgan would testify against your ass and put you in jail.”

  “She can’t prove anything,” he has the gall to say.

  His admission disgusts me on so many levels, it makes my stomach churn that he’s just admitted it outright, and what’s more, he’s gotten away with it.

  I want to break him, slowly.

  “Maybe not, but the bad publicity wouldn’t be great for a man such as yourself with this empire that you’ve built. Brandon Thomas, the family man with the world at his feet, I bet your shareholders would even reconsider your place on the board if this got out…” I state calmly. “Then there’s all the footage I have. God knows what else you’re into but I’ll make it my mission in life to find out…”

  He actually looks more worried about me ruining his precious career than going to jail for raping a minor.

  “Get on with it, what the fuck do you want from me, Westbrook? What’s in it for you?”

  I smile and walk towards him. “You’ll donate two million dollars annually to a charity called Hope Floats for the rest of your natural given life, and in return, I won’t send the footage to everyone you know.”

  “You can’t do this!” he stammers. I don’t know why he keeps saying that, I am doing it.

  I laugh. “I can and I did. See, unlike some people, I don’t just follow through with my threats, I deliver them on a silver platter. You’re a piece of shit to me but ‘somebody’ to a lot of other people who don’t know any better, including industry executives, so believe me when I say I will make your life a living hell, in fact, I can just see the headlines now…”

  “I can’t afford that!” he cries. I know for a fact he can, he can more than handsomely pay for it and then some. “Two million dollars a year?” His face pales as he comprehends it.

  “Shut the fuck up or I’ll double it,” I growl. He has no business even trying to negotiate this, it’s happening. “So, do we have a deal? Or do I get Zane to start sending emails?” I reach into my jacket pocket for my phone, not before looking over at him pointedly.

  He looks at me like I’m the devil; it’s exactly what I wanted. I want him to feel fear, to be scared. Even if it is just for himself because he’s a selfish son of a bitch.

  What’s more, I need to get out of here pronto, but I need him to know my threat is real. I will be following up on this, on him, on that he can be sure.

  “Yes,” he says through gritted teeth like he has a choice.

  “A little louder, didn’t quite hear it.”

  “Yes!” he bellows. “Now get the fuck out of my office!”

  I step forward, triumphant. “There’s no need to shout, I will expect the anonymous donation in the bank account I’ll send you by the end of the tax year, and don’t even think about trying to find me or involving the police or anything stupid, Thomas, you don’t want this footage ever getting out if you want to work in this town again or if your lie of a marriage means anything to you at all.”

  “What assurance do I get that you won’t leak this?” he croaks. He’s at my mercy now and he knows it.

  “You don’t,” I say. “The assurance is, you stick to your end of the deal and that footage won’t get out, it’s really very simple.”

  I wish I could do more for Morgan but it’s up to her if she wishes to take this further or not. Personally, I’d love to see the guy rot in hell for what he’s done.

  “I said yes, now get out.”

  “If I have to come back here,” I warn, walking towards the door as I turn to look back at him. “Then you’d better believe I won’t leave you breathing next time.”

  His eyes go wide as I leave his office, satisfied that he’s bleeding, hurt, and terrified. Good, now he knows how it feels to be violated and that wasn’t even a patch on what Morgan has had to endure.

  I only hope to God I can get across to the location as fast as possible but there is no doubt now the police will be involved. There is no other way around it. I just want Morgan found by any means possible and Helen is the only lead I have right now.

  I just need more time but time is the one thing I don’t have.

  Please, let her be alright.

  I’m out of my depth because I care too much, I know that now. Morgan was never really ever a job, even the times she drove me crazy, I knew it was all bravado. I only hope I get the chance to tell her how I feel, not that I’m very good at that part, but I’m willing to try.

  I love her.

  Everything else pales in comparison.

  26

  Morgan

  I wince as I open my eyes. All I see is darkness and some God awful pungent smell evades my senses. I’ve no idea where I am and I realize that I’m bound and gagged the minute I try to move.

  I glance around desperately trying to get my eyes to work, and after a few moments, I can see I’m in a dark house, there appear to be windows smashed and floorboards ripped up, by the look and smell of the place, it’s some kind of abandoned house. I wince in pain as I try to move. My hands are bound behind me and my legs are bent with my feet roped together.

  I try to move in a sudden panic but wince when the rope burns my skin. I try to remember what happened and the last thing I remember is someone grabbing me from behind in the elevator. The back of my head throbs and my entire body aches.

  It’s then I hear something crash close by, it could be a door, the house seems to rattle momentarily. I slump back against the wall and roll my head to the side and hope faking at being asleep looks believable.

  I hear footsteps then the door creaks open.

  Someone is talking into a phone.

  “I know that… you think I haven’t fucking thought about that?” the male voice barks. I try not to shake with fear. “Well, you’d better hurry up and work it out, my patience is running thin… I don’t care! I’m the one taking all the heat… she’ll wake up soon and I’ll get the rest of the money obviously… well how the fuck do I know? When she wakes up! I gave her a lot, she didn’t go quietly.”

  I hear him cuss some more and he ends the call and his pacing. I hear his boots cross the floor closer to me, oh, please leave me alone. He kicks my legs with his foot as I pretend to be out cold.

  I hope he doesn’t realize I’m actually awake.

  He bends down. “Pretty little thing, aren’t you?” He smells like bourbon and cigarettes and not in a good way. I want to puke. He runs a finger down my cheek as I try not to shudder under his touch. “If they didn’t want you unharmed, my precious, then I might just have a little fun with you myself.”

  My skin crawls at his proximity and it takes all my might not to open my eyes and try to fight. There’s literally no point, I can’t go anywhere.

  He sighs as if regretful, then stands again. I hear him cross the floor and leave the room, slamming the door behind him as the whole house rattles in his wake.

  As soon as I’m sure he’s really gone, my eyes fly
open. My heart is beating so fast I’m sure you could hear it a mile away.

  I glance around the room in panic. I need to get the hell out of here, but how?

  I don’t know what that conversation was all about and I sure as hell don’t want to find out. I also realize that my head is pounding and I feel a sense of exhaustion come over me, I guess that’s from being hit in the face and drugged. Asshole.

  I struggle with the ropes but it’s no use, they are bound tight. I glance around for something, anything, I can use to cut through the ropes. I have no fricking idea how I’m going to get out of this but adrenaline pumps through my body.

  The room is a write-off, old bits of crap laying around everywhere, all that I can see in front of me is an old fireplace with broken bricks laying around all over the floor, it’s a risk and I’m not even sure I can move but before I can stop myself, I start bunny hopping across the floor on my ass. I move slowly and with every single movement, my wrists and ankles sing out in pain but I surge on. As I get closer, I see some of the bricks are broken, I don’t know if it would be sharp enough to cut through rope but I don’t have any other option, so it’s worth a shot.

  I turn in a circle and back up onto the broken hearth and begin to saw over the sharpest brick moving my bounded hands back and forth. It’s exhausting, I stop to catch my breath and I listen out in case the man is coming back again, I don’t hear anything so I keep going. I don’t know how long I saw away at the rope and my flesh but I know I’m cutting through my skin just as much, as after a little while, I can feel blood trickle down my wrists. This is good, it means it’s working. I keep at it for what feels like an eternity, I reach with one of my fingers and feel the frayed edges and begin to pick away at it, it unravels slowly and I tug some more as I curl my finger around the rope and pull, I need to keep sawing. Hope surges in my chest. I’m so scared he’ll come back and find me that I work furiously, my legs ache from being in a crouch but I don’t relent, if I can get my hands free, I have a chance, it may be slight but it’s something. Finally, I’m able to curl another finger free then I wiggle a bit more and manage to get one hand free. Hardly able to believe my luck, I quickly pull the rope and clumsily and unsteadily untie my other hand. The pain soars through my body as I shudder when both my wrists are free, they are red raw and bleeding. I glance around and see the windows are boarded up, what kind of hell place is this? By the state and smell, I’d say someone has been squatting here. It’s then I hear the same slam of a door. Shit. He’s coming.