by Sophia Gray
I clenched my fists.
“Are you angry because I stole from your boyfriend again or because I used someone else to do it?” he asked.
“All right,” I sighed, “how is this going to go?” I asked.
“Well, you and I are going to sit down and talk, and hopefully we’ll come to some kind of agreement before the night is out,” he said slowly.
“And if we don’t?” I asked.
“You’d better hope we do,” he said.
“What I don’t get is this, though,” I added. “If you wanted to talk, why did you send these worthless men to grab me? If you wanted to talk, you would have come alone. You would have picked me up at the park, and we would have handled our business.”
“I don’t handle business with you, Clara. You must have yourself confused with some of my other girls.” I could hear the sleazy smile on his perverted little face while he spoke to me. His voice sounded so greasy.
“You’re disgusting, Skull,” I told him, and he just laughed. It made my skin crawl to think he might have had another use in mind for me. He might have been thinking about giving me an alternative way out of the mess I’d caused. It was gross to think about. I couldn’t even imagine what it might have been like to be with him. He probably liked all kinds of degrading, kinky sex. I shuddered.
“Well, if you do decide you want to handle business in a different way, you let me know,” he said, and my stomach churned. He was thinking about it.
After everything we’d been through together over the last five years, I couldn’t imagine that he could even look at me and think that way about me. It was appalling to think I was just a piece of meat to him. At the end of the day, I was just another girl.
“When I look at you sometimes, Clara, I still see the same young girl I picked up off the street, so forgive me if I expect a little more gratitude out of you sometimes.” His tone was growing darker.
I knew what he meant by gratitude. He meant sex. He wanted me to show him how thankful I was for everything he’d done, and he wanted to think of me as the same nineteen-year-old girl I had been when he found me on the street. There was no telling what thoughts and images were running through that sick mind of his while he looked at my backside in the rearview mirror.
I closed my eyes against the horror. I just hoped Mason showed up soon. I hoped I hadn’t burned that bridge by leaving the way I did. I hoped that when he saw I’d taken the gun, he would know I was concerned for my safety.
Keep your promise, I thought. Protect me, Mason.
I should have stayed at the apartment. I never should have made that call. I didn’t care how cocky Skull wanted to be about the whole situation, pretending he’d planted the address of his hideout on the street so Mason and his men would go to the wrong place. If I hadn’t called to tell him that Storm’s Angels were on their way to kill him, Skull might have been there when they showed up.
I wouldn’t have been in the back of his car. He would have been shot, and all of this would be over. I could quit and go to live a quiet life with my new man. Mason would take care of me and protect me, and Skull’s organization would have crumbled to the ground as his body fell, limp and lifeless, as Mason’s feet. There wouldn’t have been anyone to track me down, because everyone would have known that I was under the protection of Storm’s Angels.
I would have been untouchable, but most importantly, I would have been free instead of lying in the back of Skull’s black sedan, tied up and listening to him make perverse advances at me after treating me like his daughter for so long.
What the hell had I done?
Chapter 21
I managed to roll over so I could see out the windows. We’d been driving a long time, and it seemed like we should have been wherever we were going pretty quickly. Nothing downtown was ever more than five or ten minutes away, but we’d been driving for what felt like an eternity.
The light outside was beginning to fade. I tried to sit up, but it was difficult with my wrists and ankles tied. “You think I could get a little help here?” I asked the man in the black suit sitting with his hands on my leg.
“Yeah, sorry,” he said quickly. He let go of my legs so I could put them underneath me. Then, he leaned over and pulled me upright by my arm.
“Thanks,” I said curtly. I could finally sit up and look out the windows. Where the hell were we?
The city was gone somewhere behind us, and in the dying light of dusk, trees rushed by on either side of the interstate. The light outside had already gone from the amber light of sunset to the blue-white light of the coming night. I looked behind us for any single-headlight vehicles, any obvious signs of Mason and his men, but I saw nothing. This stretch of the interstate was never that busy to begin with, but tonight it was simply vacant.
“Your knight in shining armor didn’t show,” Skull taunted me. “I guess my guys back at the hideout must have taken care of him.”
I could see his dark eyes in the rearview mirror now. He glanced away from the road to meet my stare in the reflection. I could see his smile in the corners of his eyes.
“You bastard.” I spat my words at him.
He laughed in response.
“Have you figured out where we’re going yet, Clara?” he asked me.
I looked around the highway again in the quickly fading light. “We’re heading north?” I checked.
“Last time I looked, we were,” Skull told me.
“We’re heading to your hideout upstate,” I said, nodding. I knew about his upstate hideout deep in the woods. From what I’d been told, it was an old cabin, nothing special, but he used it as a retreat or a place to take people who weren’t coming back. I was pretty sure I knew my place in that equation.
“Yeah, we’ve got to get out of Dodge for a little while, let things cool down a bit before we go back,” he said with a smile. He was cruel. Everything he said was intended to taunt me now.
“And you and I have to talk, right?” I said, looking out the window.
“Right.” He laughed.
“Do we have to have an audience for our little discussion?” I asked him. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I couldn’t believe I was playing along with his twisted little fantasy about me.
“We don’t, unless you want one.”
“Up to you. You’re the boss,” I reminded him.
“Yes, that’s right. I am,” he agreed.
I knew we were just playing at this point, though. He didn’t want me to work things out with him some other way. I’d been kidding myself with those thoughts of him wanting me the way he wanted those other girls, or wanting to work out a deal where he took whatever frustrations he had out on my ass. If we were heading towards the cabin upstate, it meant my time was up. I was going to be one of those people who didn’t come back.
The air in car grew heavy as the realization weighed on my conscience. It seemed Skull could also sense that I realized what we were doing. He grew quiet and stared at me with a thoughtful look in his eyes. We rode in silence for a few minutes as the air hung over us. The only sound was the wind outside as we sped down the interstate.
“I’m very disappointed in you,” Skull said to me after a few minutes of dark silence. His tone was even heavy at this point.
I knew he was talking about more than just my getting caught by Mason. I could hear it in his voice. He was being serious with me now. The whole mood of our ride had changed. He wasn’t just messing with me now, taunting me with his words. If things went the way he had planned them to go, this was very likely to be our final conversation. It was time to air things out.
“I expected more professional behavior from you,” he continued. “Even after getting caught, I expected you to continue treating this business with Storm’s Angels as a job.”
“But I was,” I argued. “From the moment I walked in that room and saw that it was empty except for Mason standing against the opposite wall, I could tell he desired me. So I decided to use that desir
e against him, and that’s what I’ve been doing.”
He kept his eyes straight ahead as the light beyond his headlights faded almost completely away.
“I was trying to seduce him to get intel out of him. I knew the best way to get him to open up to me was to play into his desire for me, and that’s what I’ve been doing. He didn’t want to torture me. He barely even tried to interrogate me. He took me under his wing almost immediately,” I explained.
“What does that mean to me?” Skull asked me.
“That means I played along so I could find out that he was coming after you. That meant I knew he’d moved his drugs elsewhere. I knew where he was at all times. I knew who was at their headquarters at all times. I’m in, Skull. Or I was. Now that I’m gone—”
“Now that he’s dead, you mean,” Skull interrupted.
“Anyway, it doesn’t matter. I’m no longer in. I ran away to try to get back in with you, but it seems like you’ve got other ideas,” I told him.
“I do.”
“I figured as much. When I realized where we were going, I realized what you were planning. I’m not going home, am I?” I asked finally, getting straight to the point.
“Well, Clara, you tell me what you would do. Put yourself in my position. You’ve got someone who’s been working for you for years. Normally, they do a damn good job. Occasionally they get off track a little to make things work faster, better. Like they might let themselves get caught so they can get information that wouldn’t otherwise be available. Maybe they sleep with a mark to get what they want out of them. Stuff like that. Now people know who your person is, and they can keep an eye out for them, making it harder for them to do their job. Sound familiar yet?” he asked.
“Getting there,” I said flatly.
“So, when I see what I saw with Mason, naturally, I get suspicious. I decide I need to keep track of my investment, because that’s what you are, Clara. You may work for me, but don’t forget how much time and energy, or how many resources I’ve put into you, into helping you hone your skills.” Again with the accusing tone.
“If you’ve got something to say, Skull, just say it,” I told him.
“Okay, I’ll say it. I had someone follow you and report back to me everything he saw. I’ve got recordings, photos, videos.” He paused to let that last word sink in. “I’ve seen you two on his balcony. I’ve seen you two prancing around naked in his apartment. I’ve watched the two of you fuck. Several times, Clara.”
I felt my face flush, and I was thankful it was dark enough in the car now that no one could see it. I was vaguely aware that the man in black next to me turned to glance at me. Even through those damned sunglasses that he never seemed to take off, I could feel his eyes undressing me to help him imagine what watching me in bed must have been like.
“Okay, so you saw me working,” I said, trying to keep my voice even and hide the fact that I was quite shaken by this revelation.
“I even saw him toss a guy out for you,” Skull added, and I knew he wasn’t just grasping at straws, but I wondered. How did he know it was for me unless his guy was planted somehow on the inside?
I didn’t say anything. I figured I’d let him keep talking and give up more secrets. He may not have thought much about what he was saying—after all, I was going to be out of the picture soon—but I wanted to know everything I could about his little tail that he’d put on me. It sounded like it might have been more than one person because someone on the inside would have been noticed near the apartment.
“You seem pretty loyal to Mason, Clara, and that bothers me,” he added.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I mean, it takes you days to call me sometimes. You can’t pull yourself away from your new boyfriend to make time for your boss, your employer, the man who brought you off the fucking street and gave you a place to stay. No, instead, you’re out there sleeping with my top rival when you’re supposed to be helping me take him down!” His usually calm tone was gone. He ripped it to shreds right in front of me as he let his anger out. “You’re a traitor,” he added.
“I’m sorry, what?” I asked.
“You are a traitor. Yes, you may have called to let me know he was on his way to the hideout to take me down, but that was only after you’d told him where it was. Did he fuck that information out of you, or did you give it to him willingly?” He spat his words out in the darkness.
“He found out from people on the street, Skull. He told me as much himself that morning. He told me one of his guys called to say they had located you, and they were getting ready to go after you. So, of course I called you to let you know you were in trouble,” I defended myself. “I didn’t have to do that,” I added under my breath.
“No, and maybe you shouldn’t have. It might have saved you your life, but tonight, I’m going to handle you the way I’ve always handled traitors,” he threatened me.
“Skull, there’s got to be another way we can resolve this,” I said.
“Oh, all that sex talk from earlier? I could tell I was making your skin crawl. You didn’t like thinking about me having fantasies about you, did you, sweet little Clara? No, I was just messing with your head. I would never touch you,” he said.
I didn’t know whether to be thankful or offended. He said it like he found me disgusting.
“You were never the right type,” he continued, insulting me even more. “You were always too rebellious and headstrong. When I picked you up on the street that day, you weren’t even attractive. You were a ratty little tomboy with a dirty face, matted hair, and dirty, grubby little hands. I’m impressed you turned out the way you did, but I guess it’s pretty amazing what a bath can do.”
I looked down, away from his hurtful words. I knew he was just saying them to be mean. The man I’d known for the last five years had been nothing to but kind and gentle with me. The man driving this car was a hateful asshole.
“Even once you cleaned up, you were still too headstrong to be attractive,” he continued.
I could feel uneasiness growing as the two other men in the car seemed to grow tired of listening to him insult me. We had been in such close quarters for so long that even the slightest shift in someone’s mood had become noticeable to everyone, even in silence. Especially in silence.
The silence in the car had become another passenger. It seemed to eat the rest of Skull’s words before he could say them, leaving him speechless in the dark and giving me time to recover from what he’d said. I knew he didn’t mean it, but, still, he knew those could have been some of the last words he said to me. Once we made it to the cabin, he and the other two were going to take care of me, and I was going to be put down like some wounded animal.
I carefully glanced out the window. Hope sparked briefly as I saw headlights in the distance. They didn’t look like motorcycles, though, so my excitement passed pretty quickly.
“Still think there’s another way to work things out?” Skull asked me.
I didn’t answer. I looked at my ghostly reflection in the window and let that be my answer.
“I mean, I might take you up on the offer,” he continued. “You have turned into quite the nice young woman. I liked what I saw in those videos I received of you. Maybe I will see for myself what’s driving all these other bosses crazy about you. And if you’re lucky, it’ll change my mind.”
I shook my head. He was so sleazy, and he just wouldn’t quit.
Suddenly glass shattered as one of the windows was shot out.
“What the…?” Skull jerked the wheel and the car darted off in one direction, then the other, slinging me side to side in the back.
More shots rang out and I ducked down.
Suddenly, shots were ringing out all around me. Glass was shattering everywhere, letting air burst into the car. I could hear motorcycle engines outside. They were here! They’d made it! But we hadn’t seen any headlights.
Of course, I wouldn’t have put it past Mason and the rest of Storm
’s Angels to ride up on us in complete darkness without headlights. That definitely seemed like the kind of thing he would have “had the balls” to do, to use his words.
Skull cursed as the other two men drew their weapons and fired blindly into the night.
Then, there was a shot, and something blew out in the front of the car. It sounded like a tire, but the next thing I knew, we were flipping over onto the shoulder of the highway.
Glass went everywhere. I knew I wasn’t going to make it to the cabin at that point. I didn’t know if I would even make it out of the car unless I was thrown out by the flipping, and that seemed like a distinct possibility with my hands and feet tied together and no seatbelt holding me in place.
