Authors: Morgan Ashbury
Searing pain ripped through her, tearing her eyes, tightening her throat. If his pleasure would come from her screams, then she could not scream.
She would not scream
.
* * * *
Richard felt his thoughts wander, away from the dining room in Jordan Fitzpatrick’s apartment, out there into the night, somewhere.
He opened his mind and wished he possessed some psychic ability, some way to know where Molly was so he could go to her, bring her home. Bring her to safety.
Because there was one thing he knew beyond a doubt.
“Richard?” Alan’s voice, calling him back to the present, broke into his thoughts.
He turned to him. “He’s hurting her.” He focused his eyes back on the computer-generated list before him. Then he looked up at Alan, Jordan, and Marcus. “I don’t know how I can be certain of that but I am.” He blinked and looked down at the lists again. “We have to hurry.”
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“After a time the printing blurs, as does the data. Names, addresses, phone numbers. They don’t mean anything.” Marcus Jones looked up at Richard. “I feel helpless.”
“It’s here. Somehow, I know it’s here. One of us is going to find it.”
Richard worked his way down the list, reading each entry, taking a moment to think, to focus on the information. Then he moved on to the next.
“I’ll make coffee. Chastity will be home from college in a few minutes. She’ll help. Maybe a woman’s eye will see what we’re missing.”
Richard didn’t want any coffee, but he kept that to himself. The situation felt impossible and his emotions soared off the scale.
Some bastard was hurting the woman he loved. When he got his hands on him, he’d be so dead.
Shaking his head, he got back to work. Urgency ran hot through his veins and his heart pounded hard and fast.
They meant nothing. One or two names he’d recognized and wondered, in that recognition, whether there might be something there, something tied to him or to Alan, some past history or forgotten slight, but no. Whoever brutalized and killed those two women, whoever took Molly had to be one sick fuck. Richard would like to think he’d know a sick fuck when he saw one.
He moved on to the next name and froze. “J. B. Horner. Why does that name sound familiar?”
“The Horner family is fairly wealthy and well known for their philanthropy. Art endowments, the like,” Marcus said, returning to the room.
Richard looked over at Alan. “There was something else about that name…”
“Horner?” Jordan repeated. “You likely don’t know him from the club as Brian Horner. You’d know him as Bacchus.”
“My God.
Brian
Horner. Bacchus. That’s it!”
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“The Brian that’s been harassing her at work?” Alan asked.
Richard got to his feet, opening his cell phone, dialing Brady’s number even as he headed for the door. “Bacchus. He wanted her, offered to take her off my hands after—Tom! We have something.” Richard quickly read off the man’s name and address.
“Come on. I’ll drive.” Jordan followed close on his heels, fishing out his keys as he ran. The elevator was waiting—one of the perks of owning the building and living in the penthouse, Richard thought.
He put away his cell phone and said, “Tom’s already dispatched two black and whites. He’ll meet us there.” Richard sat beside Jordan in the front seat as that man expertly and swiftly negotiated traffic. “Horner owns a house in a moderately nice neighborhood in the West End,” Jordan said.
“Not where I would expect the son and heir of the Horner fortune to live,” Alan said.
“He’s been cut off by his mother until he can make something of himself. The last thing she did to help him out, according to gossip, was get her brother to hire him.” Marcus said.
There were two cop cars in the driveway and the front door of the house stood open. Tom’s Buick was on scene, driver’s door hanging agape, engine still running. Richard didn’t wait for Jordan to completely stop the vehicle before he opened the door and vaulted from the car. When Tom came to the door of the house and looked as if he’d bar the way, Richard’s heart sank and he feared the worst.
“Molly!” He could no sooner hold back his anguished cry than he could stop breathing.
“No!” Tom grabbed him by the shoulders. “She’s not here. Rick, she’s not here!”
Richard blinked, inhaled deeply.
“The place is deserted but it looks like we have our guy. I’m calling in forensics, so I don’t want you guys in here mucking up my crime scene. There are some things lying about, but I don’t think this is where he brought them.”
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“The factory?” Alan asked.
Richard met his gaze and knew he’d gone through the same brief hell. “Too many people there. But maybe his uncle knows where else he could have gone.”
“I know where Norman Nicholson lives,” Jordan said.
“I’ll follow you,” Brady said.
Richard felt his impatience rising. Every minute they weren’t with Molly was another minute of pain for her. He tried to push away his fear, but the emotion wouldn’t be pushed aside.
Five minutes after leaving Horner’s house, they arrived at his uncle’s.
Richard wanted to rush the house, punch the man in the face, then shake him until he told them everything they needed to know. It killed him to hang back, to let Tom do the talking.
At first, Norm didn’t want to believe what Tom said and kept repeating that there must be a mistake, that Brian might be a screw up but he wasn’t evil, couldn’t be evil.
They all saw the moment when the knowledge, the certainty, penetrated. The man seemed to age ten years before their very eyes.
“Mr. Nicholson, is there some place else your nephew would go, someplace where he could take these women, someplace where he would feel safe?”
Norm stared at Tom as if he couldn’t process the question. And then he nodded, slowly.
“Yes. Yes, I think there is a place. A house, just outside the city.
My aunt Sophia passed away last year. She always had a soft spot for Brian. She used to say—”
“Mr. Nicholson, what’s the address?”
“Out on Larkspur Road. About five miles out. Number twenty-one seventeen.”
“I’m calling the state boys. Get them to go in, no sirens, surround the place. This time you follow me,” Brady said.
“Hurry!” Richard said.
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* * * *
Bacchus flexed his right hand, stretched his arm. His sub was proving to be just as headstrong as he’d suspected she would be.
Two sessions with the paddle and she had yet to scream.
Part of him, that unschooled part he showed the world, wanted to rage in frustration. Yes, her screams would be a comforting balm, a sweet sound to please his soul.
But oh, how much more significant his victory would be when he finally broke her! He’d shone a spotlight on her ass as he worked, the sight of the reddening flesh its own pleasure. It didn’t displease him that in a couple of places her flesh showed spots of blood.
It wouldn’t be long now.
He looked at the clock on the wall. It was time to return to his brave little slave. She wept silently and now she bled silently.
Third session, and time for him to use the polished ebony. This time she would break.
He opened the door, stepped into the bedroom then pushed it closed behind him. The woman made no sound, but her face was tear-ravaged. She lay, eyes closed, her luscious, naked body bound by
his
hands, her ass red and marked by
his
hands.
He stepped up to admire the work he’d done so far and felt his cock stiffen. “You look good with my marks on your flesh, slave. You look very good. Perhaps I’ll fuck you now.” He reached forward, stroked her cunt. He inserted one finger, just a little, frowning because her moisture no longer coated her passage. It didn’t matter. He’d use lube if he had to.
But, no. He’d said how it would be. He would wait for her to beg him to fuck her, and in his waiting Molly would know that her master was a man of his word.
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She’d said nothing so far, not one word, but she’d stiffened just now. Some spark of defiance lit her eye, defiance and hatred that nearly had him stepping back.
“My Master will kill you.”
Bacchus did step back then, those words worse than cold water at dousing his arousal. She would throw that weakling Richard Grant in his face?
Anger filled him. He stormed to the head of the table and picked up the board.
“I’ll be using my left hand, and so I am likely to miss my target a little, land this lovely piece of ebony on your legs. Your fault, of course. The price you pay for being obstinate. It’s only a matter of time until you call me master and beg me to fuck you. We both know that.”
He raised the board, admiring the way the spotlight glistened on the black wood.
He spun on his heels away from her when the door crashed open.
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Molly braced for the blow, no longer certain she could hold out against the pain and the fear. She had no sense of time, and a part of her, a tiny part of her, felt as if she was sliding away.
The explosion of wood against plaster, shouts, curses, and the sound of fist meeting flesh again and again echoed as if in a bubble.
Molly closed her eyes, and tried to make sense of the sounds.
“
Oh God, sweetheart
.”
Molly opened her eyes to encounter Alan’s tortured expression as he worked to unfasten her left wrist.
“Richard?”
“He’s beating the hell out of Brian right now.”
“There’s Tom. He’ll likely stop him.” Marcus worked on her right wrist. “Or maybe not.”
Sound filtered through the haze of pain. She heard Richard’s voice and that, more than anything, told her the nightmare was over.
“You son-of-a-bitch. You fucking bastard, you hurt what is mine.
This one’s for Molly. This one’s for me and this is for the women you killed you sick, perverted prick.”
A sick kind of whimpering assured her Brian would never touch her again.
She felt her ankles being freed and then something soft being placed over her to cover her.
“Richard?” Molly needed him more than she needed her next breath.
“Richard, Molly needs you,” Jordan said.
“I’ve got him. See to your woman.”
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She didn’t recognize that voice.
“Call an ambulance,” that unknown voice said.
“Don’t bother. We’re taking her to the hospital ourselves,” Richard said.
“Not for her. For Horner, here. You beat the bloody hell out of him.” That voice again, and Molly decided it belonged to a cop.
And then Richard was there, his hands lifting the cover, looking, she knew because he hissed, then setting it back on her. He scooped her up gently. “Molly. Darling. I’m here, sweetheart.” She threw her arms around his neck, held tight, and the first loud sob since her ordeal began escaped her.
“He wanted me to scream but I didn’t scream. I didn’t scream.” She thought she’d shouted that, shouted it loud enough so the bastard would know she’d defied him. But she heard Alan ask what she’d said.
“I hope he fucking chokes on the blood from his broken nose,” Richard said.
And then she felt his face nuzzle her neck. “Come on, angel.
We’re taking you to the hospital.”
“He didn’t rape me. He wanted me to scream and beg him to fuck me, but I didn’t. I didn’t scream.” She felt his arms tighten, then ease up.
“No, you wouldn’t. I’m proud of you. Oh, God, Molly, I’m so proud of you.”
“Take me home, please? I just want to lie in that big bed of ours between you and Alan.”
“Hospital first, baby,” Richard said.
Something cool covered her, something that smelled a little funny.
Then Alan kissed her cheek. “Hospital first, love. That’s a clean sheet, brand new, just out of the package. He had a few packages of them on the bathroom counter, but he never touched it. ” Bless Alan to understand that she didn’t want anything Brian might have touched to touch her.
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Richard carried her outside. She opened her eyes, looked around.
Though dark, the moon shone and she saw fields and trees and the house she’d been in, one that seemed too nice for what had happened inside.
“Jordan’s going to take us to Mercy,” Richard said. “Alan’s going to hold you until I get in the car. Then he’ll pass you back to me.”
“Okay.” She wouldn’t protest and insist she could walk.
Truthfully, she thought she might be able to, but her bottom and the tops of her legs burned with pain and she really didn’t know for certain that she could.
Alan held her close, cradled in the same way Richard had. “Thank God we found you,” he whispered. When he laid his cheek on the top of her head, she felt his tears.
“I knew you would. Somehow, I knew you and Richard would find me.”
Alan laid her on Richard’s lap. He secured the seatbelt around them both. Molly sighed, her arms going around Richard’s neck again.
“I’m so sorry.”
Molly heard the words and didn’t understand them. When she looked up, the regret she read in Richard’s expression nearly broke her heart.
“You have nothing to be sorry for. You saved me. I knew you would.”
“I’m your Master. I’m supposed to keep you safe. I should have been with you, watched over you.”
“Not your fault. I never should have unlocked the door. I looked, saw that it was Brian. He held a file folder and I was pissed that Norm would send him with work when he knew how I felt about him. As soon as I threw the locks I realized that I shouldn’t, because how did he know where I was? He pushed his way into the house before I could reach the locks. He had a gun, and I planned to escape once he
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got in the car but then I think he drugged me or something because I felt a sting, and then everything went black.”