Exquisite Danger (39 page)

A light, hesitant touch brushed my shoulder then slid down to the exposed curve of my cleavage. I braced myself for the crawling sensation to come, but to my surprise, whoever was touching me wore some type of gloves, leather I think. That could mean one of two things, either he didn’t want to leave prints, or he knew enough about me to realize what the touch of his bare hands would do. A thick sob escaped me before I could stop it.

“Where’s Smoke? Is he alive?” I said in a voice with a small tremble in it.

I hoped Chief thought it was fear instead of rage.

“For now.”

The floor creaked as he moved around me, his hand running over my upper chest. Then he paused and swept my hair over my shoulder, continuing to touch every inch of me he could. When he moved from my shoulder down my arm to where my sleeve was still pulled up to expose my vein, I swore I could feel a sudden tension fill the air. He took in a sharp breath, then his fingers were grasping my elbow. When he touched the sore injection site his breath hissed out in a rush.

“What the fuck is this? You doin’ drugs now, Swan? Smoke got you hooked on that shit?”

Before I could censor myself I blurted out, “What? No, it was my mother, asshole.”

As soon as those words left my lips I knew I’d made a mistake. His growl reinforced that notion, and I quickly said, “I mean, it’s from donating blood a couple days ago.”

“Billie,” he said in a low voice, “get the fuck out of here. I’ll deal with you later.”

My mother let out a whimper, “But I—”

Then the sharp crack of leather contacting skin rang in my ears and my mother let out a shrill scream.

Oh no, oh fuck. “No, no wait, she didn’t—”

“Get out!” Chief roared.

The door slammed and I knew my mother had left me alone with a monster.

“Please don’t hurt her—”

Pain lanced through my chest as he cruelly pinched my nipple, stopping me in mid-sentence as I struggled to get out of the hold he had on me. “Shut your fuckin’ mouth and listen. Just ’cause I don’t want Billie turning you into a junkie doesn’t mean you’re gonna get away with any shit with me. Either you reel that attitude of yours in and be nice or I’ll cut Billie’s drugs off and let her die of withdrawal, locked in this room with you. Understood?”

“Yes.”

“And you will respect me or Smoke will pay for it. I would love to spend the next five years torturing him until he begs for death, but if you’re very, very nice to me I’ll keep him alive and relatively comfortable. He might be missing his legs so he can’t run, and his arms so he can’t hit, but we’ll take care of his torso. All you need to do is be as sweet as sugar and never tell me no, understood?”

Hate wasn’t a big enough word for what I felt for this man.

But my fear for Smoke was so great that it wiped away any idea of resistance. “Understood.”

His touch gentled and I hissed as my nipple stung. “I don’t want to hurt you, Swan, really I don’t. Of all the things that Smoke has that I want, you’re at the top of the list because he loves you more than anything. Seeing you in my arms is going to hurt, real, real bad, in a way that physical pain can’t. And that cunt sister of yours will be in misery for the rest of her life at the knowledge that she failed you. Fuckin’ uppity bitch. She’s throwin’ a fit about you back in Austin right now, keepin’ Beach occupied tryin’ to calm her ass down. Stupid bitch thinks Los Diablos has you and she’s about ready to storm their compound.”

I didn’t say anything, not trusting myself to let one word pass from my lips. This son of a bitch was going to destroy everyone and everything I cared about, and I was too shackled by my love for Smoke from trying to stop him. My feelings were so explosive, I knew I’d fuck up and say something that could get Smoke—and my mother—hurt. I cursed myself for caring about her after everything she’d done and wondered where she was right now, if maybe she was going to try to call for help. Surely she could see how wrong this was.

Okay, I needed to regroup. Obviously, help wasn’t coming from my mother, so I was on my own. I should have been gathering intelligence, asking the guy leading questions, dissecting his answers for some clue as to who he was, gathering information for when I escaped, not if. The weird electronic hum to his voice revealed he was using a voice modulator, so that might mean he was afraid I would recognize him. Or that he was hiding who he was from whoever else was here. Why would he do that?

The chime of a cell phone sounded and the man left the room for a few minutes, leaving me wondering how long I could sit here before real pain set in from being in one position for so long.

To my relief, and dismay, the mystery man’s voice came from behind me. “I need to go, but first you need a little object lesson, and I need something to make me smile. You and your sister really fucked things up for us, so knowing that when Smoke sees you he’s gonna hate you for being sweet to me, I’ll eat that shit up. Fuck around and screw up, and I guarantee I’ll make you both hurt.”

“Wait,” my mind scrambled for some way out of this. “You said you wouldn’t hurt me.”

“And I won’t, at least not physically, but I do plan on breaking you.” He gave another cruel pinch to my nipple that made me hiss in discomfort before I could bite the sound back.

The squeak of the door opening interrupted whatever else the monster casually touching my breasts was about to say.

“You called, Chief?” A man’s unfamiliar voice came from behind me.

“Yes. Take Ms. Swan to use the bathroom and freshen up, but do not remove her hood. I want her out at the shed in five minutes.”

“Understood.”

The man with the odd voice leaned down and whispered, “You’re going to want to hurry, because if you make me wait, I’ll take out my boredom on your man.”

There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that he would, so instead of trying to escape, I allowed the new man to lead me across the room, and he was a real dick about it too. He let me bump into the doorframe, trip over a loose board, and all kinds of bullshit so he could have an excuse to grope me. Thank God he was touching over clothes, but even that was bad enough that I was shaking with the need to rip his balls off. Whoever he was, he had that familiar smell of motor oil to him that most bikers did, and when he crowded me from behind, his beard brushed against my ear.

I counted steps, fighting to remember how many paces it was from one spot to another when I was thrust into a small room.

“Don’t move,” he said in a cold voice. “I’m gonna cut your zip ties loose, then I’m gonna handcuff one of your hands to mine. Hope you ain’t shy ’cause I’ll be right inside the doorway while you take care of business. Give me any trouble and I’ll personally fuck Smoke up. I would love to have an excuse to get my hands on that arrogant, hypocritical bastard.”

“Understood.”

I took care of business one-handed as quickly as I could, ignoring his lewd comments about golden showers and other sick shit. After I stood and buttoned up, I decided that now was probably my best chance for dealing with this situation. “May I wash my hands please?”

“Sure, take all the time in the world, princess. It’s Smoke whose gonna have to entertain Chief. And let me tell ya, that is one sick, creepy bastard with a real hard-on for your man.”

I wanted to scream in fury at the knowledge that my rapidly forming escape plan would mean Smoke was going to suffer more pain.

My escort pushed me forward a couple steps with a firm shove to the back and my fingertips came up against cool porcelain that was probably none too clean. I pretended to feel for the taps and braced my free hand on the wall in front of me. When the smooth, silken texture of a glass met my fingertips I smiled, unconcerned about my triumphant expression hidden by the hood. There hadn’t been any sounds from anyone else in the house and I hoped they were all either sleeping, or outside, anywhere but here. I was pretty sure my mother was still here, hopefully out of her mind, and I could only pray she wouldn’t raise an alarm at the noise I was about to make.

After I rinsed my one hand off I pulled the other, which was handcuffed to my captor. I was just about to yank forward and use one of the nastier moves my dad taught me to send this asshole’s head right into the glass and hopefully snap his neck, when I heard footsteps approaching us. The man behind me shifted, not so gently dragging me out into the hall with him. I cursed that I hadn’t been just a little bit quicker, then dismissed that thought. As long as I was alive there was always another chance.

“Cruz and I have some business to attend to,” Chief said from maybe a foot or two in front of me. “Buck, Weed, Custer and Flea are comin’ up and should be here in about twenty minutes to relieve you. But don’t worry, sweet Swan, I’ve left you with some incentive out in the shed. After she’s been properly motivated, bring her back here and lock her up in the closet.”

“Will do.”

Hands grabbed at my breasts again, and I had no idea if it was just Chief or Chief with one hand and the guy behind me with the other. I held my breath, and fought the screams that were so close. The sense of violation and helplessness made me mad. No, I couldn’t give into my instincts. I had to hold on…had to fight to remain calm.

With one final, hard squeeze the hands were gone. “Have fun, sweetheart. I hope you like my present.”

The sharp tang of blood filled my mouth as I bit my lip and strained not to fall into mindless panic. I still had one hand free, and if I could somehow get this stupid hood off my head, I’d have a much better chance at survival. While I could fight relatively well without sight—my Dad is a big
Star Wars
fan and had me train blindfolded more than once—I couldn’t do it well enough to ensure a victory, especially when I had no idea how many people were here with me or my surroundings. A misplaced kick could send my leg into trouble instead of a soft stomach.

My arm was rudely jerked, and the man leading me dragged me after him until I was able to catch my balance and walk properly. We went down a set of stairs and I was trying to figure out if we were still above ground when a guy’s thick voice from somewhere to my left shouted out, “Motherfucker!”

The guy leading me stopped and I bounced off his back falling until he wrenched me back to my feet. “Baldy? What’s up, man?”

Baldy—no one I knew—yelled back, “I think Billie’s OD’d. What the fuck do I do?”

“Son of a bitch,” the man that I was cuffed to yelled. “Go get the adrenaline kit out in the shed. I’ll be right there after I secure this cunt.”

“I don’t think the kit’s gonna help her.”

“Just get the fuckin’ kit!” the man next to me roared.

I was stunned in that moment, frozen in time at the idea of my mother dying just a few feet away. That shock lasted right up to the point where my brain realized on some level that the cuff next to mine had just been removed. In an odd way, my mind felt split into two parts. One part was methodically going through scenario after scenario of ways to escape while the other, childlike part of me was wailing in grief.

“Shut the fuck up,” The man who spoke was jerking at my cuff.

It took me a moment to realize that the part of me screaming in denial and pain wasn’t inside my head, but what was happening to my body. A primal need to protect my blood overcame me. I had to help my mom, I had to save her. My scream abruptly cut off as I felt him trying to fit the cuff on something.

My body and thoughts caught up to each other in the calm dreamscape of my killing space.

I braced myself on his shoulder like I was feeling faint and quickly calculated where his throat was. In one smooth move I lifted the hood enough to free my mouth, then sank my teeth into his flesh as hard as I could. I tried not to let the sensation of his beard against my face and in my mouth bother me, or the metallic tang of his blood. My teeth sank deep into the meat of his throat and I bit down hard enough to crush most of his trachea and esophagus. He tried to scream and shove me away, which only made it easier to tear out a nice size chunk of his throat.

The moment I was free of him, I jerked my hood all the way off while spitting out his blood. I turned in the direction of the horrid, wet sucking sounds the guy made as he tried to breathe. In a surreal moment, our eyes met, and I watched in morbid fascination as he tried to stop the bleeding with his hands. He stumbled away from me while the hard pump of his heart sent surge after surge of blood pouring past his fingers. One thing my father never told me was how fucking messy death could be.

When one of his blood-covered hands fumbled at his lower back, I realized he was probably drawing a gun, and that snapped me out of my daze. I crossed the room in three steps then reared back and kicked him right between the legs like a soccer pro going for a goal. If he’d been able to make any sound he probably would have been shrieking loud enough to break the windows, but the only sounds he made were those disgusting sucking, gurgling noises. He was nearly unconscious from blood loss as I pushed him with my foot onto his stomach then grabbed the gun from his lower back, a loaded Smith and Wesson .38 Special.

With one threat essentially eliminated, I focused on where the guy looking for the adrenaline kit had gone. Once I got rid of him I could get to my mom. My shoes squished through the growing puddle of blood flooding the small, empty foyer. I glanced around and found nothing to indicate that anyone actually lived here. This place must be outside of town because my screams would have been enough to alert any neighbors or people walking by. The house vibrated slightly as a door was thrown open. I hid behind the edge of the wall, and stole a quick peek at the man who must be Baldy running down the hall with a look of panic on his craggy face.

Taking advantage of the element of surprise, I stepped around the corner and placed a bullet right between Baldy’s eyebrows, the gore of the shot blending into the darkness whirling around my mind. He hit the ground with a thump. I crouched down and waited fifteen precious seconds for someone to come investigate the sound of a shot being fired.

My ears were still ringing from the gun blast, but I decided that it was safe enough to scoot forward and grab the backpack from the still warm grip of the body that was now a corpse. The harsh rasp of my breath halted when I saw my hands were coated in blood. For a hysterical moment, I freaked out about having the bearded man’s blood all over me, but I managed to fight past my disgust and fear to focus on the pack.