by Riley Ashby
The floor creaked outside my door.
“Can I come in?”
“Would I be able to stop you?”
He didn’t answer.
I threw up my hands. “Just fucking come in.”
He opened the door but stayed on the other side of the threshold. “What’s gotten into you?”
“Do you have any idea how embarrassing this is?” I put my head in my hands, thinking about the look on that woman’s face. “She walked in on me looking like I just rolled out of your bed when I’m supposed to be a prisoner. As if I didn’t already feel conflicted enough about this whole thing.”
“Well, you did roll out of my bed.” Soft hands encircled my wrists and pulled my hands away from my face. When I opened my eyes, his face was so close to mine he barely had to move to kiss me. “I’ll tell her to keep her opinions to herself. But you need to pull yourself together. You’re stronger than this; you’ve shown that time and again.” He squeezed my ass.
“Gunner!”
He sighed and kissed me lightly on the lips. “Let’s go before she comes up here and finds me groping you.”
He followed me down the stairs, a respectful distance behind, but Parker still frowned.
“Where are your shoes?”
“Um …” I shuffled. “They weren’t in any of my things.”
She squinted at Gunner. “You didn’t get her fucking shoes? How did she not—”
“Shut up.” Gunner silenced her with a glare. “She doesn’t need shoes.”
Parker shook her head. “I was counting on her having basic clothing available. She can’t go outside in socks. We need to go downstairs.”
Gunner shook his head and crossed his arms. Maybe they really were siblings; they certainly bickered like it. “Absolutely not. You know that.”
“I’m not leaving until I do this. Either you give her some shoes she can work in, or we go in the basement. Your decision.”
“Why can’t you do it up here?”
“No boys allowed,” she quipped. “I need to talk to Quinn alone. So I’ll tell you again: either get her shoes or let us into the basement.”
They stared each other down for a few seconds, but eventually, Gunner muttered something under his breath and stomped over to the basement door. Something akin to a smile flickered across Parker’s lips, and she winked at me, but it was gone so quick I wasn’t sure she didn’t just blink. Gunner entered the code to the door, then opened it, turning to me as he did so.
“You can’t let anyone know I let you down here without a blindfold, okay? That’s very important.”
“Oookay,” I said. I didn’t know why it was so important, but it didn’t seem like a bad secret to keep.
He nodded and looked at Parker. “After you.”
Parker darted down the stairs, not bothering to wait for me. Gunner and I followed on her heels. Rather than leading me into the small room I had been held in initially, we walked past it into a larger room that took up most of the rest of the space in the basement. There was a large mat in the middle of the floor like those used in high school wrestling meets.
But that wasn’t the big secret.
Cages filled with weapons covered every inch of available wall space. Handguns, semi-automatic rifles, shotguns, and other weapons I didn’t know the names of. Some large pieces on one wall looked like missile launchers, but I wasn’t sure. There had to be at least fifty different guns. I gasped and clapped my hand over my mouth.
“Seriously, Quinn, tell no one.” I turned around to look at Gunner. I’d never seen him so serious, not even when he was staring down Vin or beating Colby into the ground. He didn’t want me down here.
Why the hell do they need all these weapons?
Parker jumped in before I could say anything. “Fuck, Gunner, she’s not going to. Now go upstairs and let us work.” He frowned but did as she instructed.
Once we were alone, Parker beckoned me onto the mat. I stepped forward warily.
“Tell me what happened,” she said, hands on her hips.
“What do you mean?”
“Yesterday. Tell me what happened with Colby.”
I recounted the events as best I could, leaving out some of the details that still stung too deep. My description of how I slammed his head into the wall earned me some raised eyebrows, but that was her only reaction.
“So you’ve taken self-defense lessons?”
“Yes, since I was a child.”
“But no one has ever taught you how to use a weapon?”
“Like a gun?”
“Like anything.”
“No.”
She nodded. “That’s what I figured. Okay, come stand in front of me.” I took half a step toward her. She smiled out of one side of her mouth, reminding me of Gunner. “Closer. I’m not going to bite you.”
When I got within touching distance of her, she held out something black with a ring at one end. She pressed her thumb against a small point at the opposite end of the ring, and a blade curved like an eagle’s talon popped out.
“This is called a Karambit. It’s more advanced than I’d like to give you, but it’s the best I can do right now. Quinn”—she put her hand on my shoulder—“do not reveal you have this unless your life is in danger. Do you understand?”
I nodded, watching the overhead light glint off the blade as she turned it side to side. “It looks sharp.”
“It is. One or two well-placed slices with this, and your opponent is down for the count. Possibly dead.”
Her hand dropped as I stepped back in horror. “I don’t want to kill anyone!”
“Then let’s hope you never have to use it.” She flipped it closed and put it in her pocket, then handed one to me. “We’re going to practice with the dummy knife. Once you’re decent with this, I’ll give you the real one. You’ll need to practice on your own.”
“Does Gunner know how to use one of these?”
“Don’t tell Gunner you have it.”
She wanted me to keep a secret from Gunner? “How come?”
“Because if he doesn’t know you have it, he won’t be obligated to take it from you, and he won’t get in quite as much trouble with his bosses if they ever find out.”
“I don’t think he’d take it from me,” I said.
“He does seem to trust you a lot, but I’m not 100% sure where his loyalties are. Maybe it’s you, but I don’t want to bet your life on it.”
“Why would he—”
She cut me off as if I wasn’t speaking. “First thing we need to practice is getting it out of your pocket. You’re going to need to wear long shirts, something to cover it up so the guys don’t notice it. If all else fails, put it on the waistband of your pants instead of in your pocket. Clip it like so.” She placed it in my pocket for me, with the ring facing up. “When you need it, you want to pull away from your body, not straight up.” She demonstrated with her own trainer. “That’ll open it for you. Then you spin it around and catch it in your fingers.”
She drilled me on removing the blade from my pocket and fixed my grip until I had it down pat. It was terrifying to fling a blade around and trust myself to catch it, but at least I couldn’t cut myself with the trainer.
“Now spin and catch it both ways a few times. Get used to how it feels whether you’re holding it with the blade facing up or down.”
I nodded, testing the weight of the weapon. “Why would I hold it upside down?” I didn’t like the idea of the blade pointing toward me. It seemed like taunting fate to stare at that point head-on and expect the other person to get hurt.
“You’re not going to be stabbing anyone. This hook lets you control your attacker.” She demonstrated with her trainer, pressing it against my collarbone. “Imagine this went through your skin and hooked on your bone. See how I could send you any way I wanted?”
I swallowed. The thought of dragging someone around using a knife stuck against their collarbone made my stomach turn. But I didn’t want to di
sappoint this woman for some reason. “Yeah. Makes sense.”
“Are you going to throw up? You look a little green.”
“No.” I straightened my shoulders and spun the trainer in my hand again, practicing catching it both ways. “Show me more.”
We practiced cross-body cuts that would attach the clavicle bone and ribs and what to do if someone grabbed me from behind or the side. She had me practice attempting to hit her arms, chest, and neck, sometimes letting me get off a hit and other times grabbing my wrist so I had to attack her lower body. She encouraged me to actually try to hit her and always caught my hand or stepped aside at the last second. I was frustrated.
“This doesn’t seem very effective.”
“Trust me, the men who Gunner hangs around are not the fastest guns in the West. If you can’t nail their faces, you’ll get them below the belt. Let’s practice more if someone comes at you from the front; you hesitate too much.”
She grabbed my shoulders to turn me around, but I jerked away. “Why are you doing this?”
She didn’t react to my words at all. “Gunner said there was a problem.”
“Do you often give self-defense lessons to your brother’s hostages?” I scoffed.
She laughed once under her breath. “No, that’s not exactly routine.” Across the room, a large machine gun glinted in the fluorescent lighting of the cages. Parker turned her back on me to examine it. “This wasn’t supposed to happen to you. We honestly didn’t think things would be going this long, and we don’t have an end in sight yet. I know he’ll do everything in his power to prevent this, but he’s worried Vin is going to try to separate you two. If that’s the case, you need to be able to put up a bit of a fight. Even once you two get out of here, this won’t be over. You might have people after you for a long time.”
I folded my arms, practicing hiding the knife without cutting myself. “‘You two?’”
She shrugged and looked at me over her shoulder. “Yeah. When this is over, wherever he goes, he’s gonna take you with him.”
I didn’t know how to respond to that. She turned around to face me head-on again. “Are you blind? I saw you two together for five minutes, and it’s beyond obvious.”
I glared at her. “I’m being held captive for ransom, and I was assaulted last night. I haven’t thought much about whether or not my captor likes me.”
“Honey, you were wearing his clothes when I got here.” She stared at me, and this time, an actual smile played across her lips. “I’d say you’ve done more than thought about it.” She laughed out loud. I heard the door to the basement open as my cheeks flushed hotter than the sun.
“Park? Are you okay?” Gunner said.
“Yeah, I was just laughing.” She rolled her eyes.
“That’s what made me worry,” he muttered, closing the door again.
She scowled, and I had to laugh myself. “I don’t believe for a second that you two are related, but you certainly know how to act like it.”
“Gunner and I have a long history. He may as well be my brother.” She gestured for me to come closer to her. I did, keeping my hand upon the training knife in my pocket, ready for a surprise attack to test my skills. “I know you’re confused about what’s going on right now, and I can’t tell you that things will be easy once this is all over. But I can tell you that I wouldn’t be saying this if I didn’t think it was true. He cares about you. I knew it before he even admitted it to himself.”
“What am I supposed to do with that information? What does any of it matter? I’m not even convinced I’ll make it out of this alive.”
“Do you think he’ll let anything happen to you? He’ll give up his own life before they give you so much as a paper cut.”
My heart chilled with an equal rush of excitement and fear. Not for the first time, I wondered what would have happened if he’d just been as cold and callous as the rest of them. If he never got a chance to break my heart, maybe the aftermath of this situation would be easier to take. Instead, I had to battle whether I could bear to leave him behind … or everyone else.
Parker drilled me over and over on different moves for over an hour. How to target nonlethal areas that would still incapacitate my opponent, or where to cut if I needed to go for the kill. If I was being honest, I only gave her a half-hearted effort on those drills. I didn’t want to have to kill anyone, so I refused to think about it even being a possibility.
Finally, I refused to do any more, watching sweat drip off my face onto the mat as I doubled over, trying to catch my breath. “I’m hungry, I’m tired, and I’m thirsty. Anything else is going to be wasted.”
Parker checked her watch. “You’re right. I need to get going. I’ve already hung around longer than I should.” She had barely perspired. She traded out my trainer for the real knife, and I slipped it into the waistband of my pants so my shirt would hide it from Gunner. “You need to practice this stuff. Do it at night after he goes to bed. It would be better for you to practice against a man, but like I said, it’s best if he doesn’t know you have this.”
Practicing while he’s asleep will be difficult if he’s holding me. “You’re not coming back?” I asked, standing upright. She was my only link to the outside world right now. Maybe, if I could convince her to help me …
She shook her head. “It was too much of a risk for me to come up here today, but Gunner kept calling me back every time I hung up. It was pretty fucking annoying, actually.” She didn’t look annoyed. “I doubt we’ll see each other again until this is over.”
“Wait.” I grabbed her arm as she started to walk past me. I couldn’t just let her leave. I had to ask, even if I knew the answer was no. Even if I knew it was hopeless. “Can you help me? Get me out of here?”
She showed absolutely no compassion for me. The camaraderie I thought we’d built over the past hour evaporated. “This situation is out of my hands. Like I said, it’s risky for me to be here even now. You’re going to have to wait it out.”
Tears stung my eyes. She could teach me self-defense 101 but was useless against the real threat. Exercise had lightened my mood, but I felt crushing depression settling back over me. No one was going to help me.
“Please stop that.” She blew out a breath and rubbed her forehead. “You’re making me feel bad. Shit, okay. Come here.” She tugged my hand, pulling me back across the room to a workbench in the corner. “Before I show you this, you have to absolutely promise me that you will not use it unless either your life or Gunner’s life is in danger. If you can’t do that, I’ll lock you back up myself.”
So many secrets today. What world was this that I had discovered? The Blood Diamond Disciples, a character who held my heart as surely as he tied my hands, lessons on how to kill a man with a single slice. Enough munitions to take out a small town. And now …
“What is it?”
“Promise. Swear on your sister.”
I frowned. “That isn’t fair.”
“I don’t care. Swear on your sister, or I tell Gunner to confine you to a bedroom for the rest of your time here. You don’t want that, right? You like spending time in his library?”
“How do you know about that?”
“I knew he wouldn’t be able to help himself. Do you swear?”
“Fine. Yes.”
“Say it.”
“I swear!”
She pointed. “Get on your back and slide under there, head in the corner.”
I did as she instructed. “I don’t see anything.”
“Look carefully. It’s hard to see, especially if you don’t know what you are looking for. Let your eyes adjust.”
I tapped my fingers against my belly as I stared directly above me at the underside of the counter. Was she trying to make fun of me? I was about to kick her in the shins when I saw it. A blinking red light. Only once every ten seconds or so, and so faint I thought I imagined it at first.
“What is that?”
“If your life is in danger, or
something happens to Gunner and you can’t help him, hit that button.”
“What does it do?”
“Hopefully, you won’t find out. If you do, it means shit has gone sideways.”
Press it now. The thought was so forceful I had to clench my hand in a fist to keep from doing it. It must have made Parker nervous because she tugged on my ankle.
“Come on out. You said you were hungry.”
“I don’t see how this helps me.” She helped me to my feet, but I pulled away the minute I had my balance. “What if I never get the chance to hit it? I don’t even have the code to come down here.”
She shook her head. “I’m sorry I can’t help you more. It’s not going to be that much longer. You’ll be out of here soon and in one piece. This is just an interlude.”
“Well, it’s gone on too fucking long already.” These excuses meant nothing to me. “How can you be okay with this? You come here and joke, chat with him like it’s a Saturday afternoon and you’re here for beer? I don’t even know what day it is. I’m being held against my will. You just taught me how to kill someone. I don’t want this to end soon. I want it to end now.”
She rubbed her forehead; I had a feeling I was wearing on her last bit of patience. “I can’t give you the answer you want. I’m sorry. I don’t know what else to say.”
“Then what even was the point of coming here?” I didn’t wait for an answer. I brushed past her, knocking her aside with my shoulder, and took the stairs two at a time back to the main level. Gunner jumped off the couch and walked toward me, but I offered him only a glare as I started up the stairs to the second level. I was going to my room, not his. I was done with this game.
Even behind the closed door, I could hear him clear as day asking Parker, “What the fuck did you do?”
Parker wouldn’t tell me what she and Quinn talked about, despite pleading and threats. She barely looked at me as she gathered up her belongings, patted the dogs, and ran out the door. I knew she was eager to get away from the house before someone stopped by unexpectedly and saw her car, but all I really cared about was figuring out why Quinn was upset. If she was going to drop by unexpectedly and upset my hostage, the least she could do was tell me why.
