Killer: A Bad Boy Romance (27 page)

The junkie shrugged. “She’s been around for a long time, man, I just hadn’t seen her ’til now. I thought she was a fuckin’ legend, man.”

I swallowed hard. “Fine,” I said after a moment. “Thanks,” I added. The junkie held out his hand.

“So you’re going to help me now?” he asked. I sighed and stuffed a wadded up twenty in his pocket. He grinned like a schoolboy and ran out into the alley, presumably to wind up in a dope coma. I shook my head once he’d gone.

“I can’t believe this,” I said slowly. “Where am I supposed to find these people?”

The bartender looked up at the clock on the wall. “She comes around in the early afternoon,” he said. “Hang out and wait for her car. Then you can follow her back to wherever she’s going. She’s a tough broad, but you could take her. I bet she’ll spill where the boss is.”

I thought it over. It was risky, but so far it seemed like the best idea possible. “Fine,” I said after a beat. “I’ll do it. Throw me a beer while I’m waiting.”

The old man looked at me before uncapping a bottle of Coors Light and passing it down the bar to me. “That’s two fifty,” he said in a slow tone. Leaning forward, I dashed some of the beer on his face.

“Fuck you,” I replied. “You could have helped me earlier and you didn’t. I’m not paying for shit.”

The old man seemed to accept that and he puttered away, going into a back room. I sat and thought hard. If I was going to catch this bitch, I had to be sneaky about it. I imagined she probably had some kind of sleek black car with a driver and tinted windows. Something that would really stand out around here.

With the rest of my beer in my hand, I moved to the window.  The street was deserted and I could hear the junkies moaning loudly in the alley. It sounded like they were all about to die. I wondered how they got money for a fix whenever no one was around to give them cash. Then I remembered what the bartender had said about all of them helping The Manticore hide bodies.

A black Mercedes with tinted windows glided past the front window of the bar and I pressed my face to the glass, forgetting for a moment to be subtle. It was the most gorgeous car I’d ever seen. I imagined propping Lacey on the hood and spreading her legs, letting her pussy juice leak down the hood. Between my legs, my cock twitched and stirred and grew into a half state of arousal.
Damnit, Chase, pull yourself together,
I ordered myself.
You know better than this
.

Draining my beer, I sprinted out the back exit of the bar and ran to where I’d parked. My car took a few tries to start and I thought about that rich cunt’s Mercedes with envy. I bet she never waited freezing for her engine to turn over in the cold Detroit winter. Finally, my car sprang to life and I guided it down the side street. I could see the reflection of the Mercedes’ headlights on the brick wall. I decided until she’d gone to start following her. It didn’t take long; I was only idling for ten minutes or so before the Mercedes gunned out of the alley. It was an extremely quiet car for something with so much horsepower and I had a feeling that it could easily outpace my little beater.

The windows were so dark that I couldn’t make out the shape of heads in the backseat. The Mercedes effortlessly weaved through traffic. Following it wasn’t a problem; there were simply no other cars around that looked that fuckin’ good. It wasn’t hard for me to stay three or four cars behind. The Mercedes stood out like a sore thumb among rust-spotted cars that were at least fifteen years old. We pulled onto a highway and cruised out of Detroit, out of the city limits, and finally through the country. I was just starting to worry about gas when the Mercedes turned off onto a country road, marked with a green sign. Not wanting to follow them down the private gate, I ditched my car in the shrubs and followed on foot.

There was a loud crashing noise as I approached and I darted into the trees nervously.

“Fuck,” I said softly. This was going to be harder than I thought.

Chapter Thirty Six

I held my breath and snuck around the side of the property, breathing hard. Through a tangle of trees, I could see the black Mercedes parked outside an elegant house. It was built of wooden slats painted white and there was even a yard with flowers out in front. I felt supremely confused; maybe I’d followed some rich benefactor back to their house.

Three gunshots rang out in the air and quickly dispelled me of that notion. Crouching down behind a tree, I waited and watched as three black guys ran across the front yard and knocked on the front door. It opened a crack—I couldn’t see who was standing inside—and they let themselves in, whooping and hollering. Narrowing my eyes, I slowly made my way up to the side of the house. There was a lot of noise coming from the backyard and I reached into my pocket and fingered the handle of my knife. I swallowed nervously and kept going closer and closer. The smell of chlorine hung in the air and I heard bubbles and splashing. It was too cold for a pool, and when I got closer, I realized there were some people in a hot tub in the back yard. I watched intently as one of them reached to the side and came back with a mirror and some white lines. Everyone sitting in the hot water laughed and they passed the tray around, each snorting two lines.

One of them sneezed and sent the others into big spasms of laughter. One of them was crying because she was laughing so hard. Figuring this was my chance, I stuffed my hand inside my jacket and pointed my finger out so it looked like I was carrying a gun. I walked up to the group and stared them in the eye.

“Direct me to the leader,” I said, staring at them with menacing eyes. “Take me to him, now.”

One of the kids in the hot tub narrowed his big eyes at me. “Are you foolin’?” he asked, nudging the gorgeous, topless girl next to him. Her breasts bobbed in the water as she giggled. “Are you a fuckin’ moron?”

“I’m not fucking around,” I said in a deep voice. “I’ll fucking kill you all and string you up in the driveway if you don’t pay attention to me.”

One of the girls shrieked in fright and ducked under the water. The kid who had spoken to me rolled his eyes. “Fine,” he said. “Come with me, asshole. And you better not fuckin’ touch my girls.”

“They’ll be safe as long as you don’t fuck me,” I spat. The kid nodded and appraised me. When he was out of the water, I saw that he was about a head shorter than I was. I kept my hand in my jacket and snarled at all the kids as we walked past. Some of them cowered but one of the other girls gave me a saucy look and licked her lower lip. I rolled my eyes and followed close behind the kid. He led me up the back porch stairs and into a sleekly modern kitchen. Everything was chrome and black, and I mentally tried to calculate the cost of all the fancy shit in there. It was mind-boggling. After we exited the kitchen, the kid took me to a door in the hallway.

“This is the basement,” he said. “You can go down there. I’ll let Boss know you’re waiting.”

Narrowing my eyes, I started to say, “Hey, this wasn’t the plan!” when the kid reached forward and pushed me with both hands on my chest. I fell backwards down the stairs. The kid laughed hysterically as I bounced down, wincing in pain with each fall. When I landed in a heap at the bottom of the concrete, he looked down at me and smirked.

“You might be waitin’ for a long fuckin’ time,” he told me with a grin. “Boss likes to keep people on their toes.”

“Hey, fuck you,” I yelled, getting to my feet. I felt like I’d twisted an ankle during the fall, but everything else seemed to be in proper working order. “Fuckin’ wait! Don’t leave me here!”

The kid laughed and then slammed the door. I heard a lock sliding into place and the light patter of retreating footfall.

“
Fuck!
” I screamed, looking at my surroundings. At first, everything was too dark to see. When my eyes started to slowly adjust, I saw that I was surrounded by broken equipment. There were stereos that had obviously been ripped out of car dashboards and rendered useless, along with some other kinds of machinery that I couldn’t even recognize. Some of the things were identical to what was inside Peyton’s shitty hideaway, and with a sinking feeling I realized that he and the Boss must have been more interwoven than ever.

Footsteps above me walked over the floor and I screamed but no one came to my rescue. I figured that I might be able to break down the door, but I wouldn’t be able to do it without attraction a ton of attention.

“Fuck,” I said again, softly this time. I didn’t want to kill my phone battery by using the light; the phone was the only thing I had that might save my life. Bitterly, I remembered telling Lacey that she was no longer in danger. Now I realized she was probably in more danger than ever.

Finally, I spotted a rusty crowbar in one corner of the basement. Gripping it in both hands, I walked up the stars. When I was sure that there was no one on the other side of the door, I began hacking away at the metal hinges. Luckily, the door was old. It only took about two whacks on each one before they crumpled and fell to the floor. I was making a ton of noise, but I hadn’t heard footsteps the whole time I was working. With a deep breath, I pulled at the door until it came loose from its frame. The weight was more than I’d expected, and my muscles strained with the effort of carrying it down the stairs without making any noise. Wiping the sweat off my brow, I took a deep breath and climbed back up. When I poked my head into the doorframe, I half expected to be shot. But there was no sound, no voice crying out and giving me away, nothing.

Satisfied, I paced quietly through the room. There was a big dining room to my right hand side with guns on the table. In disbelief, I grabbed a semi-automatic and made sure there was a clip loaded inside. I didn’t want to fire it to test, so I stuck it in the back waistband of my jeans and sent a silent prayer upwards.

I’ll show you, you little brat
, I thought with a nasty grin as I paced through the kitchen. There was a window directly overlooking the backyard. When I listened, I could hear splashing and giggling. I rolled my eyes. Sure, they were just kids. But I was just a kid once; maybe if someone had taught
me
a lesson, my life would be a completely different story.

Taking aim, I shot through the window, right above the hot tub. The kids screamed and screamed, and it wasn’t more than a few seconds before I heard the thundering footsteps of them all running into the house. The kid who had shoved me in the basement was at the head of the bunch, and he eyed me with hatred.

“How the fuck did you get outta there?” he asked. When I didn’t answer, he looked around the room with his mouth gaping. When he spotted the open basement door, he scratched his head. “Are you some kinda superhero?”

I shook my head. “More like supervillain,” I said coldly. “Haven’t you learned a thing or two by now? If you fuck with the wrong person, that shot would have been in your chest instead of the trees.”

Instead of looking humbled, the youth snarled at me. “Yo, fuck you!”

I threw my head back and laughed. “That’s the best you can come up with, kid?” I looked him in the eyes. As if seeing me and my bulk for the first time, he seemed to cower.

“Alright, I’m sorry,” he mumbled, kicking at the hardwood floor with his bare toes. There was a puddle of water on the floor from his wet trunks. “I’ll take you. Come with me.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’m not fucking falling for that line again. You tell me where to go. Now.”

He shook his head and for the first time I saw a glimmer of fear in his eyes. “No,” he said in a shaky voice. “Trust me, you can’t go in alone.”

Cocking the gun, I pressed it into his neck. ”Okay,” I said in a cheerful tone. “Lead me!”

The girls in the group giggled as we walked out together. I could hear the kid whining, and every time he complained, I jammed the gun further into his neck. Finally, he quieted down to a dull whimper. He led me up a big spiral staircase and then into a tight hallway with low ceilings and dim lighting.

“This is where she is,” he said in a hushed voice. “You better let me check and make sure she’s awake first.”

I narrowed my eyes. “She? What the fuck?”

“Shh!” The kid whirled around with a finger on his lips. “Shut your mouth!” he whispered fiercely. “You gotta be silent right now”

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever, kid,” I said loudly. The kid’s eyes opened wide with fear and he clapped a damp hand over my mouth. I knocked it away with the flick of a wrist as though he weighed nothing. When I glanced down, he was glaring up at me with hurt in his eyes.

“Hurry up,” I said, making a show of tapping my foot on the ground. “I’m waiting!”

The kid jumped just as a powerful female voice came through an opening in the wall. “Waiting for what?”

I opened my mouth to speak but no words came out. When I shot the kid a confused look, he gazed back at me as if to say, “I told you!”

“Well, what are you waiting for, mystery man?” There was a low seductive laugh and I felt a chill run through my bones. Never had I imagined that the boss of The Machetes was a woman. All this time, I thought I’d been looking for some thug like Peyton.

“I need to speak with you,” I said loudly, clearing my throat. There was no reply. “It’s urgent,” I said. “Can I have a moment of your time?”

“Well, let’s see what you look like, honey,” came the reply. It was in a long seductive purr, almost like someone running their acrylic nails down the back of your neck.

I shook my head. “Fine,” I said. The kid pointed towards a set of curtains at the back of the hallway. They were done in lush black velvet and I swallowed nervously as I pushed my way through. It looked like something out of a B-movie about a bordello.

“You’re fine, honey,” said the woman in a deep, amused voice. “But I have to ask you a little favor first.”

“What is it?” I stepped through the curtains and immediately, two sets of strong hands clamped down on my biceps. I yanked back, but they were stronger. Before I knew it, I was being dragged to the middle of a dark room. The walls were painted a deep red and all of the lampshades had red and black scarves thrown over them. Sitting in a chair towards the back of the room was one of the most stunning women I’d ever seen. Her skin was the color of coffee with too much cream, and her hair cascaded down her back in long, raven-black curls. She wore a pair of black sunglasses and was dressed entirely in black leather.

“Honey, we’re going to take a little look at you,” she said, simpering and giggling. “I want to know that you’re safe.”

I frowned. “Of course I’m fucking safe,” I spat. “I need to speak with you. About The Manticore!”

“Later, baby,” she said with a wave of her hand. Turning to the guards that held me in place, she said, “Strip him.”

I protested but the men were too strong. In a second, they’d stripped me of my shirt and they were tugging my jeans down around my ankles. The woman stood up—in heels, she was almost as tall as I was—and she walked over to me slowly, inspecting me from every angle.

“I don’t see any wires,” she said delicately, flicking her fingers on my chest. I glared at her.

“I’m not fuckin’ wired,” I said. “Didn’t you fuckin’ hear me? I need to talk to you about Peyton.”

Her dark red lips curved into a shiny smile. “Of course you do,” she said sweetly. “And you’re here, aren’t you?”

“Yeah,” I muttered.

“So start talking!” Her last words were delivered sternly and they landed like a blow. When I attempted to pull my hands back up, her guards grabbed me by the arms and held me firmly upright. “You’re not allowed to get dressed,” she said in the same sweet voice as before. “Not for as long as you’re with me.”

The woman kept her eyes trained on me as she stalked backwards and settled herself comfortably down in the ebony chair. “Now, what was it you wanted to talk about?”

I rolled my eyes and reached down for my pockets. “I need to pull something out of my pants, is that okay?”

She shot a look at the guards and they grabbed my arms once again. Between this and being pushed down the stairs, I was pretty fucking sick of being manhandled by this cunt and her cronies. The woman clicked her tongue and a third man came out of the shadows. She jerked her head at my fallen jeans and he mechanically stooped down and began to go through the pockets. I kicked him in the face, hard.