“Dressing room.”
I race toward the changing room with my phone to my ear. Trixy, the stupid bitch, should have called Ace! “Brother, get to the club.”
“Veep? What's wrong?”
“Now, Ace! Something happened to Tessa!” I don't give him the chance to say anything in response, I just end the call and push the door to the dressing room open.
Tessa's sitting on a white hardback chair. Saint, another dancer, is crouched down beside her, holding her hand. “Angel, talk to me.” I grab another chair and pull it up in front of her and drop down in it.
“I don't know what happened.” She seems out of it. Her eyes are out of focus, and her lip is split and bleeding. Christ, her kids have to see her like this!
I lean forward and grab her hand. “Sweetheart,” She groans and closes her eyes, her head leaning against her shoulder. She needs to be home and lying down, but in all honesty, I'm not sure she doesn't need a doctor.
“Saint, tell me what happened?”
“Well, everything was going okay like normal, then this man came in. He looked like he was getting on in years, but he was smartly dressed, looked like he had plenty of money. Some of the girls offered him a dance, but he didn't want one. He sat at the bar for a while, asked me who was in charge. I didn't think anything of it, I thought he might want to book a private dance, so I told him Tessa was.
“I carried on dancing because it was my turn on stage. Then I saw him follow Tessa to the back. I was worried, but I couldn't get anyone's attention to tell them to follow her. I was dancing,” She hangs her head. She blames herself. She can for all I care. If she knew something was off, she should've wrapped her fuckin' dance up and alerted someone.
The trouble with these women is they don't want to lose one fucking dollar. Yeah, they probably need it, but they all fucking know that if something like this happens, they are well compensated!
“By the time I got here, he was smacking her around and tellin' her that she best tell him how to get to...”
“To who?”
She shakes her head. “I don't know I didn't hear a name. Just Tessa telling him that he'd have to kill her first. I yelled when he threw her across the room. He saw me and took off out the back. I'm so sorry, Jett.”
What the fuck is all this about? I have to find out who the guy was and whom he was looking for. Why come here, and why attack Tessa? It isn't making sense to me right now.
“Tessa! Shit, baby!” Ace grabs her before I can ask her anything. I need to know what that guy said to her, whom he was looking for.
It doesn't look like that's going to happen yet, and I'd be a real cunt if I tried to force her to talk right now. She needs to be checked over; she could have a concussion.
“Saint, go home. We'll sort your pay tomorrow. Same goes for Trixy and Jimmy. The place is closed as of now.” She nods and grabs her things before rushing off. “We need to get her to Taylor, Ace. She'll check her over, make sure she's okay.”
“What the fuck happened, Jett?” Ace cradles his wife against his big body. He holds her so effortlessly. Strange how strong a man will become when someone he loves is hurt.
“Some old guy. Look, I'll fill you in back at the clubhouse. Just as soon as we know, Tessa's okay.”
“I wanna know who did this, Jett. I want their fuckin' heads!”
“You'll get it, brother. Believe me; you will.”
“What do we do about this, Prez?”
“I'm not sure yet, Red.”
Having looked at the CCTV from the club, we found the culprit. Joseph Vidal. Maria's father. Shit.
It's undeniable the motherfucker was there looking for information on how to find Maria. Luckily, Tessa didn't tell him anything. She's damn loyal to this club.
Shepard called Church as an emergency. Ace didn't want to leave Tessa, so Shepard allowed him to stay with her. Taylor checked her out, and there's no lasting damage. Few bruises, split lip, bruised ribs. She'll need to rest, but she'll be fine.
Thank God. This MC has seen enough of its women getting hurt in ways that can't be repaired.
“We need to find the piece of shit and kill him, that's what we need to do.”
“What we need to do, Blaze is let Vidal know what his father has been up to. That cunt is lookin' for Vidal's sister, trust me when I say, Joseph Vidal is a dead man walking.” Blaze is an older member of the club. He's also a cunt who likes nothing more than killing at will. He's loyal but hotheaded.
“And let him take all the credit?”
“He'll do what needs to be done, and I'm gonna help him!” Hammer yells.
“Suddenly you're the best big brother in the world?”
“Shut your fuckin' mouth, Mike!” Tank yells in retaliation. What the fuck has this shit got to do with anything?!
“I don't give a fuck about any of that!” I slam my hands down on the table. This isn't about who gets the credit or the glory for killing that old bastard! Nor if Hammer is a fuckin' good big brother to Maria, this is about keeping my wife safe! “He cannot get his hands on Maria!” Maria! “Shit!” I'm out the door faster than anyone can tell me to wait. I have to get home. I have to make sure my wife is right where I left her.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Maria
I feel like a balloon today. I'm aching everywhere. No one told me I'd feel like a whale at this stage in my pregnancy. I do not like it at all.
Feeling this way hasn't stopped my husband from fucking me six ways to Sunday every night and almost every morning if I'm up for it, which I usually am.
Take this morning, for instance. I was making breakfast when Jett came up behind me, slid my silk robe off my naked body, and kissed my neck so tenderly my pussy flooded.
“I want you inside me.” I groaned while winding my hips against him, feeling his erection and the fact he was naked behind me.
“Do you know how badly I want you?” He groaned in my ear.
“As badly as you always want me? As badly as I want you?”
He didn't answer me. He gently bent me over the kitchen island, spread me open and entered me in one push. Sex feels so different being this pregnant, I don't know how to explain it, but it makes me feel fuller, hotter, hornier, my clit swells so much that it feels like it's going to explode.
I begged Jett to fuck me harder. I wanted it rough. I wanted to feel his fingers digging into my hips, bruising me. He did fuck me harder, but not hard enough. That's why I pushed back against him, harder, faster.
“Fuck, Maria! That's right, baby, fuck me.” I did, I fucked him as he stood there watching my pussy swallow his fat dick.
“Jett,” I sobbed his name as I clawed at the countertop. I needed him to hold me, fuck me. I needed it so bad I screamed.
He laughed, grabbed my hips and fucked me so hard I came screaming his name, and as he fucked me harder, faster, I came again, squirting all over his dick as he came hard inside of me.
He pulled me up and back against him. I smiled as he wrapped his arms around me, his dick still deep inside of me. He always seems to be hard for me. Like, literally. He'll come, keep his dick inside me, harden within seconds, then he'll fuck me all over again.
“I love you like you wouldn't believe.” He told me with a kiss to my head.
I laughed happily. “I love you so much more.”
I giggle to myself at the memory as I switch on the dishwasher. It's been a good day so far. First the hot morning sex, then after my shower, I met with my best friend, that's precisely what Brooke is. We went baby shopping, had lunch, then met up with a couple of the other girls from the MC, Coral, and Tammy. We had a girly chat, and then Brooke dropped me home.
Lorenzo is parked outside with Leon, another of my brother's men. They're out there most of the time if they're not following me. The only time they don't follow me is when I'm with Jett. I don't even mind anymore that they do, and I don't mind that they're out there looking out for me right now.
To be honest, it mak
es me smile that so many people care about me the way they do. Lorenzo and Leon have known me since I was a little girl, friend's of my brothers before he was the Don. Just like Tony. That's how I know I'm safe with them, even if Lorenzo does get on my nerves sometimes.
Don't get me wrong; there is nothing my brother's men wouldn't do to protect me, they would lay their lives on the line for me, just as they would for my brother, but there is only a handful I would trust my life with completely, and two of them are outside.
A knock on the door has me shuddering. Ever since Draven demanded I keep away from my father, I've been jumpy. Even the slightest sound when I'm alone makes me jump. I still don't understand why Draven is so adamant that I have nothing to do with my father, but my dreams tell me so much. I have them so often now that they're scaring me half to death.
I'm scared that what I see in those dreams is, in fact, the truth, that they are playing out a memory of what really happened to my mother. That frightens me so much, and yes, I am terrified of my father because of it.
I want to tell myself that it's just a dream, that there's no way my father would have killed my mother like that. However, it's hard to believe.
If my father really did kill my mother, then why the hell is he still alive?
Shouldn't he be dead?
Wouldn't my uncle have killed him for what he did?
However, thinking about it, I don't believe he would have been killed for murdering his wife. My father was a made man, but it makes sense as to why he was stripped of his title and outcast like a nobody.
That doesn't explain why Draven let him live. Unless my uncle made it final that my brother wasn't to touch Joseph, but again, why didn't he get rid of him when he became head of the family?
Ugh. I'll drive myself crazy if I keep thinking about this.
I open the front door, thinking it could only be one of the guys needing something, or checking on me. No one else would get past them. Well, no one that would mean me any ill-will.
Or so I thought.
The second my eyes land on the man on the opposite side of the door, I try to slam it. He pushes it open with force, sending me stumbling back. “Don't be a silly girl, Maria.” He says as he kicks the door closed with his foot.
“How did you find me? How did you get past Lorenzo?”
“I have my ways, and the idiots outside didn't even see it coming.” He laughs.
I swallow hard, walking backward slowly. Trying with all my mite to think of a way out of here without him catching me, but what are the odds of that in my condition?
Not likely I'd wager.
“Did you kill them?”
He's coming closer. I feel my stomach turning, my baby girl kicking me. She can feel my fear. My back hits the wall, and I let out an involuntary small scream.
“Yes, they're dead,” He tells me. “And screaming won't help you right now, baby girl.”
“Daddy, please don't hurt me.” I'm not sure that he won't hurt me. He killed my mother, after all. I know it's not just a dream. I don't know how I know, I just do.
He did something to her, something terrible. Something that made the coroner believe she died of a heart attack.
“That all depends on you. Doesn't it?”
I swallow hard.
“Are you going to give me trouble? Or are you gonna come with me like the good girl you are?” I shake my head. There is no way I'm going anywhere with him!
“No?” He tuts while scratching his jaw with his thumbnail and shaking his head. “That is most unfortunate. I didn't want to have to do this.”
“Do what?” He takes something from his pocket. My eyes widen. Oh god! “No, Daddy, please!”
He presses the rag over my face and tells me, “Don't fight it, principessa.”
I wish I could fight. I really wish I could. I'm grabbing at his hand, trying to pull it from my face, but my eyes are rolling. My legs are getting weaker. I can't feel my body. I can't...
Chapter Twenty-Four
Jett
I know. I know before I've even entered the house from the mess outside that I'm too late. Both of Vidal's men are riddled with bullet holes, and there's blood everywhere. One of them is hanging half in and out of the Audi they were parked in outside of my house. The other one, Lorenzo, he's lying flat on his back right outside my front door.
I step over him and push the door open. I don't even need to look inside to know Maria isn't here. Still, I look through every room of the house. Nothing seems out of place, and there's no sign of a struggle. She must have gone willingly, which doesn't make any sense. Why would she walk past Lorenzo and not scream for help?
“Dammit!” I hiss and slam my fist against the kitchen island. Of all the things for me to notice it's the dishwasher clicking off after finishing its cycle.
Wait. The cycle is thirty minutes long. I've been here five. Maria couldn't have been gone long. I grab my cell from my jeans pocket. “He took her.”
“What? When? What the fuck happened?!”
“I don't know, Draven. Your men are dead, and Maria is gone. I need all the help I can get to find her!”
“Shit! Five minutes!” He hangs up without another word, and I'm left pacing the fuckin' floor like a madman not knowing what the fuck to do!
How the hell could this have happened? I thought she was safe here. How the hell did Joseph find out where she was if Tessa didn't tell him anything?
Fuck it! None of this makes sense!
I have to find her, no matter what it takes, because I can't lose her. I don't know who the fuck I am anymore without her.
I'm seconds away from pulling my hair out when a bloodied up henchman – and not one of mine – stumbles through the front door. Shit!
I rush to him, catching him before he falls. I lower him to the ground. It's Lorenzo. How the fuck is he still alive? “Lorenzo, talk to me.”
“I tried... to stop him.” He gasps for breath. He's bleeding from his side, I press my hand against the wound, my eyes scanning his body for more. I can't see any, but his face is ashen. “She begged me... to help... her. I swear... I tried. She was... so out... of it.”
“I know, man. I know. How did Joseph get past you?”
“Snuck up on us... Killed Leon... Shot me.” He winces in pain. I ain't never been shot, but I can imagine it hurts like a bastard. I can see he's scared shitless for his life as well. He needs help, and I'll get him that just as soon as he tells me what I want to know.
“Why did he leave you alive?”
“Said I'd bleed slowly... To death. Jett,” He grabs my bicep as tightly as he can, his body shaking and sweating in pain. “I know...” He closes his eyes and winces in pain. He opens them again and breathes deeply. “I know where he took her.”
“Where? Where, Lorenzo?” I shake him, but it's no use, he's passed out. He's not dead I can feel his pulse. I need to keep him alive. I need to get him to the hospital. I need this motherfucker awake. I need him to tell me what he knows!
My house quickly fills with people. I can't make head nor tail of it. Everyone's speaking at the same damn time, but this isn't helping Maria!
I move away from Lorenzo, letting his men deal with him. I don't even feel like I'm with it, but I know I won't lose myself, I will find Maria, I will bring her home safe. There ain't no doubt about that!
“We're gonna find her, Jett.” Tank tells me while squeezing my shoulder.
“I know. I just want to get out there and look for her. There must be some clue as to where that cunt took my wife!”
“Calm down, Jett.” Who the fuck is Hammer to tell me to calm down? “Keep your head on your shoulders, brother.”
“What the fuck would you know about it?!”
“A lot.” He folds his arms around his powerful chest. He's right he does know a lot about this kind of thing and how it feels.
Men are standing around us, making plans, without me! Maria is my wife. It's me they should be talking to, me they should be a
sking where we go from here, not Draven Vidal!
The trouble is, I don't know where we go from here. I don't know where I go from here. I can't lose the woman I love. I don't know what the fuck I would do without her. Jesus, anything could happen to her, she's heavily pregnant, God knows what this is doing to her and the baby.
I can't say her father wouldn't hurt her, he killed her mother, Tank and Hammer's mother, too, not to mention Titus.
I just hope he loves his daughter enough not to do anything that would cause her physical harm. He's a dead man anyway, but if she's unharmed, I might not tear him limb from limb!
“I've been in the same situation you're in right now.” Hammer continues. “Twice. Cindy and Willow. Both women I loved, both taken from me. I lost one and saved the other. So trust me, I know what you're going through, and believe me, you have to keep your head, don't let the fear rule you.”
“Hammer's right.”
“I know, Tank! I know. I can't lose her. I just can't.” I'll fuckin' die without that girl. She's everything to me.
Tank squeezes my shoulder. “You won't lose her, I promise.”
“Jett,” Vidal. So now he comes to speak to me? I couldn't give a fuck about his dead man outside. I couldn't care less about Lorenzo and whether or not he makes it, well, just long enough to give us the information I need to find my wife. “We need to leave.”
My ears prick, “You know something?”
“I managed to get out of Lorenzo where that fucker took Maria. We go. Now!”
I'm coming, baby. Hold on; I'm coming.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Maria
I woke up a little while ago tied to this very uncomfortable wooden chair, with my hands behind my back, and rope around my wrists and ankles. My own father did this to me.
Is he crazy?
He has to know he won't get away with this?
Never Give You Up (Snakes Henchmen Book 3) Page 18
