by Taylor Lee
The governor’s eyes widened and he reached out to her his gun pointing at her face. Elena dropped down in a fighting stance. With a wild spirit cry, she whirled in a circle and sprung from the floor. She drove her heel at the gun in the governor’s hand and caught his wrist with her foot. To her shock the gun exploded with a loud blast. It ricocheted from the governor’s hand, flying across the room. With a quick turn, she drove her elbow hard against his ribs and heard a satisfying crack. He screamed in pain as he fell to the floor. She jumped up and stood over him, assessing the damage and gave a grunt of approval. He was writhing in pain holding his wrist at an angle. She could only hope it was broken.
Without a word, Elena turned and with a fierce shriek headed to the two men coming at her. She heard Greg warn them not to hurt her and had to believe they wouldn’t shoot, but from the looks on their faces she knew they were going to take her down. She caught the man called Chris with a driving kick to his jaw knocking him to the floor. Hank dove for her, but she jumped aside. As he flew by, she crammed her elbow against his shoulder joint, wrenching a piecing scream from the surprised man. For the next several minutes, she alternated between the two men, using every skill she spent a lifetime learning. She pummeled the two men with a barrage of flying kicks, elbow and knee strikes until both men were crouched on the floor begging for mercy. She eyed the guns they’d dropped and was moving to get them when she saw the shadow of a man pointing a gun at her from the side door to the office. She whirled to charge him when she heard a familiar shtick and saw the man drop the gun. His hands flew to his neck, too late to retrieve a nine inch blade from his throat.
~~~
Bai heard the gunshot and covered the length of the corridor to the governor’s office in seconds, followed by Wyatt and Nianzu. He burst through the door in time to see Elena drive the governor to the ground and challenge the two men in front of her. Only when he saw the blond haired man in the side doorway did he act. He threw the knife and watched the man sink to the floor, then turned to Elena. The gunshot terrified him. He was still shaking. Even the sight of her rushing toward him did nothing to stop the waves of fear coursing through his body. He had never felt fear like this. Only when he held her tight in his arms did his fear begin to turn to fury.
She pushed him away and stepped back. Her face was flushed with anger and exertion but her voice was shaking and her body was trembling.
“I could have gotten him, Bai. I had it under control.”
“Ah, yes, cherie. You most certainly did have it under control. But why be so greedy? Isn’t three enough? Did you need to get all four?”
Elena tossed her head and then collapsed against him, pointing to the governor writhing on the floor.
“Bai, it’s him. It’s Governor Sampson. He killed Martin. I don’t know about Greg…something isn’t right, but it was the governor…”
Wyatt picked up the guns from the floor as Nianzu tied Chris and Hank back to back with a drapery cord. He pulled the knots tight and said with a harsh groan, “That’ll hold you fuckers until the sheriff gets here.”
Meanwhile, Bai reached the governor. He picked him up and bodily threw him to his back on the floor. Bai knelt on his chest straddling him. He grabbed his shirt front in one hand twisting it tight. With the other hand he held his blade up against the governor’s throat.
“You have thirty seconds. Tell me the truth. If I find out you are lying, I’ll cut you in pieces, starting with your dick. Now. Tell me!”
The governor’s face was grey, his body shaking. Only Bai’s weight held him in place. He was blubbering like a baby, gasping for air.
“Oh, God, Bai! Oh my God! I promise you…I’m telling you... it wasn’t me. As God is my witness…I didn’t do this. Please… Please, Bai! You have to believe me. It was Greg…He killed Martin…Shot him in the face. He pulled my gun out of my drawer, walked over and…oh my God…he shot him in the face.”
Disconsolate sobs wracked the governor’s body. Bai released some of the pressure on his neck and held the knife back away from his throat.
“Why? Why, Brad? Why did he kill Martin?”
The governor shrieked, “I don’t know. I don’t know. And, God, Bai. I think he killed Louie Sinclair. Oh, Jesus. What is happening?”
“How do you know he killed Sinclair?”
“He said you did. He was like a crazy man. Said it was you. He said you were evil, taking over the state, the country. Holy Christ, he was insane. And he killed Martin, just fucking shot him… and Louie…Oh my God.”
Bai stood over the sobbing man and exchanged looks with Wyatt and Nianzu.
“Get the sheriff in here. Have him take him into custody. We’ll sort this out later.”
At that moment, Quitin rushed in the room followed by three other men.
“Bai, I just saw Greg in the corridor. Is he dirty or clean?”
“Given that he is our Chameleon, I’d say he’s dirty as they come.”
“Oh Christ, Bai. He’s got Alex. I should have stopped them, but they looked like they were walking and talking to each other. I was concerned about Elena…Christ, I’m sorry…”
Bai nodded to Nianzu motioning him to pick up the governor. Nianzu dragged him to his feet and Bai moved up against him. Remembering the blueprints they had studied, he pushed his face up next to the governor.
“Where would he go? Where is the door to the tunnel to the basement? NOW, Brad!”
“It’s around the corridor, the…the opposite way you came. It…it looks like a service door.”
“Is there another entrance?”
“No. But…but…uh, but the tunnel splits…splits at the bottom of the stairs. There are rooms…rooms at both ends of the corridor.”
Bai turned to Wyatt and Nianzu.
“Wyatt, you and Nianzu take the left wing. I’ll take the right. They won’t kill Alex. Once they see that we have Elena, they will need him to trade. The rest of you branch out in the hallway and come to whoever yells for you.”
~~~
Bai moved away from the governor and pulled Elena with him.
Elena had seen him angry. In fact, she thought she had seen him furious, but she had never seen him like this. His grip on her arm was so tight his knuckles were white and his fingers left indelible marks on her skin. His face was grim; his eyes were hard, cold with a level of anger that shot fear through her gut. He pulled her even closer and when he spoke his voice was a hiss.
“Elena, when we get home, you and I will discuss what happens to very naughty girls who disregard carefully laid plans and go off on their own. Do you hear me, cherie? You could have been killed, you came as close to being killed as you ever have. All because you refused to follow the plans that you, your father, Nianzu, and I created to protect you – especially you. When we are alone, Elena, I will show you how strongly I feel, how angry I am.”
Elena swallowed hard. She had never seen Bai like this. A hard shudder hit her. She knew he wasn’t talking about the erotic spankings that titillated and aroused them both. No, Bai was furious--at an elemental, primal level. Still holding her arm in a death grip, he turned to Quitin.
“Quitin, I want you to take her out to the ballroom where there are at least a hundred people milling around, including all of our men. And, goddamn you, I want you to keep her there. If you have to tie her to a post, blindfold and gag her, do it! Do you hear me? If she follows me, so help me God, there will be murder. And it won’t be hers. I will kill you and send your remains in a box back to your mother with a note telling her how I enjoyed killing you. Do you understand?”
Quitin blanched and nodded.
Bai turned back to Elena.
“Do you understand?”
She whispered “yes” and looked down.
Bai nodded to the rest of his men. With a final glare at Elena and Quitin, he turned and followed his men running down the corridor.
~~~
“What a worthless piece of shit you are. Look at you. Too frightene
d to stand up to him, you let him take your sister. How could you? How could you let a Chink, a goddamn yellow animal, take your sister? Have you no pride? Don’t you care that a fucking Chink has his cock in her cunt? What kind of a man are you?”
Greg slammed the butt of his gun across Alex’s face and, for good measure, swung at the other side leaving a matching mark. Alex slid to the floor. His feet and hands were tied and he was groggy from the doped gag and the pain of the beating.
He tried to turn away when Greg crouched down on his haunches in front of him, but Greg held his chin in his hand and spit the words in his face.
“I despise you, Alex. I despise your weakness. You could have helped me. What kind of a fucking white man are you? The only thing you are good for now is bait. Because no matter what, he will come after you. He won’t leave you here. You are family. And by God, when he does, I will have him and the last thing you see before I kill you is me fucking your sister. Fucking her the way she should be fucked for giving herself to a goddamn Chink!”
Alex watched Greg stride away and heard the door slam after him. From the musty smell, he knew he was in a basement or a dungeon of some kind. Every bone in his body hurt from the beating Greg and his men gave him. But the physical pain was nothing compared to the shame swamping him. When his father challenged him in the ballroom he was furious, but as Bai and Wyatt rushed off something snapped and he knew he had to help them find Elena. He grimaced, remembering his stupidity. He thought Greg was his friend when he met him in the hallway. And when Greg offered to take him to Elena, he followed him like a fucking lamb to slaughter.
Only when Greg turned on him did Alex understand the enormity of his mistake. That was when the shame hit him. Alex shook with anger, remembering the hideous things Greg said about Elena. And, for Christ’s sake, about Bai. The idea that Greg hated Bai because of his race was repugnant to Alex. Cut him at soul level. But Alex knew Greg was wrong. Bai would never come after him. Why should he? This was a perfect way to let him go, to allow Alex to face the chaos he created.
Alex drifted off in his half drugged state and woke when he heard a rustling noise. He thought it was the guards at the door who were laughing and talking paying no attention to their drugged bound prisoner. Alex heard a shtick and a large thump like a body hitting the ground. One of the guards muttered, “What the hell…” and then another shtick was followed by a similar thump.
To his surprise, Alex felt someone tug on his bindings, freeing his hands and feet. He heard Bai’s voice low in his ear.
“Easy, boy. I’ve got you, boy. I’ve got you now. Can you move? I can smell the crap they used to drug you. Can you stand?”
Alex felt relief, only his shame was stronger. Christ, Bai did come for him and was willing to risk his life to save him. He couldn’t fight the tears flooding his face and sobbed out loud when Bai put his arm around him.
“It’s okay, kid. Understandable. But you have to pull it together. There are at least five of them out in the hallway and they’ll be checking up on you any minute. Here, lean on me. Try to stand. Bien, that’s the way.”
The door swung open and light flooded the cellar walls.
“What the fuck? It’s Sammy and Ted. Christ they’re both dead!” the first man in the door shouted to the men behind him.
He took one step, but then pitched forward, a knife in his throat, as did the man behind him.
Bai yelled, “Okay, Alex! That’s the end of my knives. Take the one on the left!”
Alex leapt forward at the sound of Bai’s spirit yell. He caught his man’s arm and twisted it up behind his back, hard. He smiled when he heard the snap.
“That’s the way, brother,” Bai called out. “That’s a hell of a good sound. Let’s hear a few more of those!”
Only after he had his man flat on the ground his foot on his back did Alex realize that Bai had taken down two men, and like a good savate fighter had kicked them both to death. Like Alex, he had his foot on the back of a third. He yelled through the doorway and to Alex’s relief Nianzu, Wyatt, and four Chinese men rushed in.
Wyatt went straight to Alex and the two men held each other for a long moment, neither of them speaking.
Bai pointed to the man he had pinned to the floor and chortled “This is Peter, Greg’s key man. I don’t know who Alex is standing on, but we need them both alive.”
They heard a stampede of footsteps and Liang yelling for Bai.
Liang charged in the door, followed by Manchu. The stricken look on his face stopped their celebration cold.
“They’ve got her, Bai. Greg got Elena. We don’t know where he took her.”
Bai stared at him.
“Quitin?”
Liang shook his head and didn’t try to hide his tears.
Bai didn’t speak. He felt the rush of fury turn to the icy cold he had depended on all his life. The Frenchman reached down and yanked Peter to his feet. Ignoring the blubbering man’s pleas, he pressed him against the wall and held his arm at a right angle and drew a ten inch blade from his boot.
“I lied, Alex. I always save this one for emergencies.”
With that, he drew back his knife and smashed the cutting edge of the blade against Peter’s wrist severing his hand in one blow. Peter screamed a hideous agonized scream as blood spurted from his naked wrist.
Bai yanked him up by his other arm and held it hard against the wall. Switching the blade to his left hand, he pressed his face inches from Peter’s horrified face. Ignoring his screams of pain, Bai’s voice was ominously soft.
“Thirty seconds. Tell me where they are or your other hand goes. Next is your prick. Counting now.”
Peter cried out, “I don’t know, I don’t know.”
Bai nodded to Nianzu.
“His pants.”
Nianzu grabbed Peter’s belt and ripped open his pants. Peter screamed, a terrified sound echoing through the room.
“No, God, no! He took her to his office. Second floor in the private quarters. Third door on the left. Senator Sinclair is there, too, dead.”
“Is there more than one entrance?”
They could barely understand the bleeding man’s choked words.
“His bedroom …is connected. Door in the back…fourth door on the left.”
Bai nodded and with a quick flick of his wrist, slit Peter’s throat and dropped him to the ground.
He took off shouting orders to his men as he raced up the stairs.
~~
Chapter 33
Elena and Quitin made their way to the ballroom. Beautiful sounds and sights greeted them as if the fairy land of gorgeous people, dancing, chatting, eating, and drinking was not steps away from murder and mayhem.
Elena slipped her hand in the crook of Quitin’s elbow and gave it a little squeeze. He smiled down at her and held her close to him.
“You know he is angry because he loves you so deeply, don’t you, Elena?”
She sighed and nodded.
“And you know he is not angry with you, Quitin.”
“Yes, I know that, Elena. It is my great honor that he trusts me with the person he loves more than life itself.”
They moved toward a crowd of people and Elena saw Quitin exchange glances with a man she didn’t know, but was sure he was one of Bai’s men. She forced herself to smile and appear relaxed. She chatted briefly with several of the men she knew from the university, then saw Dr. Oleong on the edge of the crowd. She waved to him and moved to join him when she felt a firm hand grasp her elbow and a hard brace of steel in the middle of her back. Even before she turned to the man holding her, she knew it was Greg.
“That’s right, Elena. Don’t make a scene. Not only do I have a gun resting on your spinal cord, but the four people around you will die if you make a sound.”
Elena looked to her left and right and saw hard eyed men standing close to the people surrounding her—all oblivious of the danger they faced. She glanced over her shoulder and saw two men holding Quitin’s
inert body upright. His glazed eyes staring straight ahead confirmed what she already knew. He would never let anyone touch her if he was alive.
Only then did Elena allow herself to look up at Greg. Elena shuddered a deep hard shudder. He was glowing. An unholy light gleamed in his eyes; his lips were curled in a victorious smile. He looked like a madman. A triumphant madman.
~~~
Elena looked around the room, trying to understand where they were. She knew it was Greg’s office, but it was in another building. He blindfolded her outside of the ballroom and the men with him dragged her across a pebbly path and up a flight of stairs. She felt a momentary rush of fear, wondering how Bai would ever know where to look. But then she quieted. Bai would find her. If he had to tear the mansion apart, he would find her. She knew that in her soul. She just had to keep Greg from killing her before Bai came. Or, she thought, facing the more likely and more hideous truth, she had to keep him from raping her before Bai got there.
The office was spacious, floor to ceiling windows looked down on the verdant grounds below. A fire burned low in the fireplace and small electric sconces cast a pleasing glow across the room. The door to the adjoining bedroom was open, a large four poster bed was visible from the doorway. The rooms were pleasant, appealing.
