Annie Young had wanted to save people by giving them peace.
Me? I felt like making the people who deserved it die with a little dash of hell on the side.
Not exactly the best ethos for a doctor, but fuck it. Who’d know except for the MC?
When I took the few steps toward the structure, the door opened, and the stench that hit me had me blurting out, “Jesus Christ. You torturing his nose as well?”
Rex huffed, but Steel ground out, “What the fuck are you doing here, Stone?”
I grinned at him, even though that smell was no small thing to smile through. Christ, I could feel it in the back of my mouth, that was how pungent it was. “I’m the doctor. Aren’t you lucky?”
“You shouldn’t have brought her here.” he growled at Rex. “She might catch an infection or something.”
That wasn’t exactly how this kind of thing worked, but I wasn’t going to tell him that.
I liked that he was trying to protect me, and after a lifetime of him ignoring me, I’d deal with moments of him being overbearing… just until the novelty wore off.
Taking a few more steps toward him, I was cautious as I climbed the wooden stairs to the outer walkway which led to the door, because they were rickety.
“I can deal with whatever you’ve got going on in there.”
Sadly, it wasn’t a lie, even if it was gross as fuck.
I’d seen worse during my time in the ER, but this was definitely a close second.
The man in the Fridge didn’t actually resemble a man anymore. They’d kept him here for…fuck, I couldn’t even guess. His face was one big swollen mass, and his body wasn’t much better.
He was naked except for a pair of grimy, bloodstained boxers, making me wonder if he had a dick behind them or not, and on the floor, there was a dog bowl with a water bowl beside it.
My stomach twisted at that, even if I got it.
Somehow, though, understanding wasn’t enough to deal with the evidence of psychological and physical torture ahead of me.
The state of him was one thing, but knowing my brothers could do this to someone?
Another matter entirely.
I flinched when Steel touched the small of my back, and he stiffened in return, but I shook my head and muttered, “It’s okay.”
It was the opposite of okay.
The guy on the floor was barely breathing, and though the space was black, pitch-black in fact, so dark that the corners of the room were covered in shadows, he didn’t even flinch at the sight of the light coming in from the door.
Light which enabled me to see maggots—
Okay.
I breathed in slowly. Exhaled deeply. Figuring out where the stench came from wasn’t a pleasant discovery.
“Where do I fucking start?” I rasped.
“Just keep him alive,” Rex ordered, and I cut him a look, shaking my head at him as I saw the stoniness on his face.
He knew I was disgusted, knew what I was thinking, but he didn’t care.
I wasn’t used to that from him, was used to my opinion mattering, even if he’d sometimes give me shit for it.
“Why? He’s nearly dead,” I muttered.
“Because Lily needs the chance to end his life,” Link rasped.
He popped up out of nowhere, like Link usually did, and I tilted my head to the side.
“You think Lily could end her father’s life?”
“That was her goal before we got together.” He shrugged. “I at least want to give her the opportunity.”
“The opportunity to vomit,” I muttered.
Nyx grabbed my arm at that, then twisted me to face him. I was used to him looking glum, used to him looking as though the four horsemen of the Apocalypse were riding across the Earth for him and him alone, but this?
It was nothing like how he usually was.
I could see the cold in his eyes, the sheer block of ice that he’d turned into as he snapped, “That bastard raped Lily for years. Throughout her childhood. When she was little. He psychologically tortured her just as badly as what we’ve done to him.
“He’s singlehandedly behind one of the largest human trafficking rings in Asia because he’s the money man, and without him, every single one of those circles dies. He’s done shit that makes how we treated him seem like a benediction, so don’t fucking judge—”
I snapped at that, shaking off his hold on my arm and grinding out, “I’m a healer. It’s what I do. You can’t bring me here, expect me to look at a still breathing corpse that’s being eaten a-fucking-live by maggots, and expect me to just click my tongue and tell you I’ll heal him up in a jiffy.
“I get that you don’t want my opinion, and I understand that you don’t care what I think. But don’t tell me to be a fucking robot, Nyx. Don’t you fucking dare.”
Steel cleared his throat. “She’s right, Nyx.”
“I know she fucking is,” was his reply, but he was still scowling at me. “Can you keep him alive or not?”
I rolled my eyes. “I can do my best.”
“It needs to look like he’s fucked up, but that her killing him is the final stroke.”
“You got a goddamn makeup trailer out here to pretty him up? Maybe you can get the fucking funeral home onto him, get some formaldehyde to make him beautiful,” I snapped. “If you want to hide most of the shit you’ve done to him, then you cover him up. No way can I heal some of this with a first aid kit.”
“More extensive than that.” Rex shoved something at me, and my brows rose when I saw he had, somehow, purloined a fucking paramedic’s kit.
Before I could grumble and wonder at his connections, Lancaster started seizing.
And that was the tip of the iceberg for this bastard.
He was being granted his living hell, and while I was glad for it—this was just a lot more than I’d anticipated.
Steel
When she stormed out an hour later, having loaded Lancaster up with more drugs than a pharmacy, she didn’t look back, didn’t try to connect with me in any way, shape, or form.
I’d admit that hurt.
It hurt because I knew she was judging us for what we’d done, and to be honest, I couldn’t blame her.
I hadn’t been involved this time, but I had in the past. It wasn’t the first time we’d used techniques Mav had learned in his days overseas to our benefit, and it wouldn’t be the last.
But the way she’d looked at him, then us, and I’d seen her opinion of her brothers fall?
It had gutted me.
But I didn’t have time to be gutted.
At the same time as Stone was being rolled out in an SUV, another was incoming.
I could see Lily’s white face through the windscreen, saw Link’s lips moving a mile a minute as he tried to shore her up.
I wasn’t sure if she’d be able to do it, even if he was most definitely on his deathbed right now. I hoped for her sake that she had the strength to do what she needed to for herself.
Closure came in many ways. I had to figure she’d know which option was the best for her.
When she climbed out of the SUV without waiting on Link to open the door for her—because, unlike Stone, she was a lady, a thought that had my lips twitching—then strode over to us without waiting on him?
I was surprised by the fire in her eyes.
“Is it true?” she demanded, staring Rex down.
He peered up from his cell phone, then shrugged. “I don’t know what Link has been telling you.”
Her Old Man cleared his throat. “Been telling her that he’s come to the end of the road. His usefulness has reached its limits.”
Rex cut Link a look, then arched a brow at Lily. “Have at him, honey.”
She licked her lips, then surprised me by taking a shaky step back.
Her gaze flickered over to the Fridge, fixated on the door, and the rest of us just stayed there, not moving, watching as she reached her decision.
When she began to move, act
ing like she’d been instantly defrosted, I watched her climb the same stairs Stone had stormed up before she flung open the door.
The next few minutes were passed with her puking up her guts as she dealt with the stench and the sight of her father. Twice she vomited, twice Link had to hold her as she trembled like a leaf.
It was a testament to how much we respected Link, how much we knew he loved her, that we stuck around, waiting on her to make a decision.
She didn’t know it yet, but she didn’t have only the one knight in rusty armor.
We kept our backs to her, letting her do what she had to do, but when she stopped puking and made her way through the door, I wasn’t the only one to peer over my shoulder to see how things were going to take shape.
She headed inside, eying him like a puma that was caught in a bear trap, one that was ready and willing to snap at the slightest provocation, then she surprised me—she let her leg fly back and she kicked him.
Hard.
Enough for Donavan to start coughing, loud enough for me almost to miss her words, “That was for me.”
He rolled over, thanks to the drugs Stone had pumped him with, and lay curled on his side as she did it again.
“That one is for Ghost.”
And again.
“For Amara.”
“For Tatána.”
She kicked him until I knew her leg had to hurt. “This one is for Sarah.” Then she snapped, “Give me a knife, Link.”
Her voice, however, this time, triggered something in Donavan.
A snort escaped him, and a laugh followed it. “Lily, Lily, Lily,” he rumbled, before he started slurring, “Should have known you were a treacherous little cunt. Just as bad as your mother.”
His words were barely audible, and I was used to translating the nonsense torture victims came out with, but somehow, she knew what he was talking about and she hissed at him.
“You’re the treacherous bastard. I can’t wait until you’re dead. Until you’re not even a memory.”
“Dead or not, alive or not, I’ll always haunt your nightmares.” Lancaster cackled. “I hope I do. I hope I make your life miserable—”
She kicked him again, this time harder than before, so hard that my eyes flared as I watched him lift up with the momentum and sail away across the room.
“That was for Mom.”
When he landed and started sputtering, it was clear he had a death wish.
I couldn’t blame him, not after what he’d been through. He could see the end was in sight, had been forced back to the land of the living just for this moment, and I knew the fear that Stone would work to keep him alive just for us to carry on pumping him for information had to be a strong one.
Maybe there was more to learn, but when Jaxson had contacted us, telling us that Lancaster was nonresponsive—and when he said that, we all knew he meant nearly dead, because nonresponsive was pretty much how it worked when you were as badly beaten as Lancaster—we’d known the writing was on the wall.
“You don’t have the guts to do it,” Lancaster sneered. “Always was a pussy, just like your mom. I want your soul to be stained with me,” he said with a gasping laugh. “I want my blood on your hands, Lily—it’s the one thing you can do that will ever make me proud of my cunt of a child.”
Lily gasped at his words, but my brows rose as Link stormed forward, gun high as he took a single shot at Lancaster’s head.
At this close of a range, it wasn’t pretty. Lily gasped, then whipped around to spy who had done the job for her, and though it blew my mind that we’d gone to all this effort to keep the fucker alive just so that she could kill him…I got it.
I did.
No way was he going to have that power over her, not if Link could help it, and he’d made damn sure she’d have nothing to repent or to regret.
Even if she wished she’d been the one to fire that gun, she could never regret not taking the killing blow because a few more kicks like that, and the already damaged body would have likely given out.
She didn’t rail at him, didn’t even wail at him making the kill on her behalf.
Instead, she peered down at herself, at the blood that spattered her, at the way her father’s brains decorated the wall, then rasped, “Is there a hose anywhere?”
I arched my brow, but I muttered, “Yeah, but there’s a bathroom too.” A tiny outhouse attached to the back, nothing fancy…
She shuddered. “I have no desire to know what a bathroom in this place would even look like, never mind smell like.”
I snickered, unable to stop myself, and wasn’t surprised when a few of the others joined in too. Wasn’t like we could blame her. There was a shitter and a sink, even a bath! But the tub was definitely forged in hell. While it was pearly white at the moment, soon enough, it would contain the pink gunk of Donavan’s rotting corpse as we melted it down with boiling lye and water.
Ah, chemistry. It hadn’t been my favorite subject back in school, but it sure as fuck was now.
She straightened her back, shoved her nose in the air, and swanned out of the torture chamber as though she was wandering into a ball in a fancy gown.
I had to give her points for that—she had goddamn gumption.
When she was outside, she allowed herself to be sprayed down with a hose. The blood disappeared into the soil, and later on, one of the Prospects would be out here, destroying any potential evidence, but she watched it go, watched it leave her body as we got her clean.
When she was standing there like a soaked rat, Link approached her, his arm coming around her shoulders. She didn’t tense up, didn’t say shit, just stated, “I’d like to go home now.”
He nodded, but I sensed his worry. Even though I knew he was concerned about her and her response, I knew he wouldn’t have changed a thing.
Deep in his eyes, I saw his resolve.
And a happiness that was impossible to feign.
Yeah, a happiness.
He’d saved her soul, and if that wasn’t the end of a romance book right there? I didn’t know what fucking was.
As they drove off, I turned to Rex and muttered, “That didn’t go down how I expected.”
Rex just smiled at me, a tiny half smile that was cocky as fuck, while also just telling the tale of how well he knew us… “I knew that was how it would go down all along. Link’s a fixer, Steel. Always was, always will be.”
And like always where we were concerned—he wasn’t wrong about that.
Twenty-Seven
Stone
The wake was loud, raucous, and contained way too many naked bodies for my liking.
For any of the Old Ladies’ liking.
Lily had disappeared, and I had to think that Lancaster was dead now and she was at home, mopping up her life as she came to terms with what had just happened. As for the rest of us, we were sitting around just shooting the shit.
What else could we do?
It wasn’t like any of us were going to get on the pool table and start an impromptu striptease like Peach, was it?
Or that we’d decide that it was an appropriate time for us to be eaten out on the counter of the bar like Jingles.
I’d always hated those two more than most, especially because Peach was Rex’s favorite, and that meant she got away with a lot more than the others.
I couldn’t wait for her to turn thirty-three, which was when club sluts were ‘retired.’ I had one more year to wait, one more fucking year, and I’d be happy as shit.
With the bottle of beer in my hand, one that I’d been nursing all night because I had no desire to get lit with the meds I was on, even though what I’d done today would probably weigh me down for a good long while, mostly, I was watching shit.
Keira had turned her back on the bar so she couldn’t see what the women were doing, and Giulia kept eying them up. I knew she was formulating a million different jobs for them to have to do tomorrow—I’d be along for the fucking ride.
It was hard to
believe this was the celebration of someone’s life, and the brothers were just okay with destroying that.
I felt bad for Sarah, felt even worse for Ghost. Amara and Tatána had returned to the bunkhouse the second a set of tits had popped out, but Ghost was sitting here, watching everything unfold like she was watching porn for the first time in her life.
She wasn’t exactly disgusted, nor was she reviled or upset, mostly, I sensed she was curious.
A thought she confirmed with her question, “They have little respect for themselves, don’t they?”
My lips twitched, and I shot Giulia a look. The pair of us started snickering, but it was Tiff who muttered, “Self-esteem issues, the lot of them. Sin’s already warned me off trying to get them to change. Says the MC likes their daddy issues just fine.”
My nose curled in disgust at that answer. “Fucking pigs. The lot of them.”
Giulia sighed. “As venomous as that sounded, Stone, and I don’t think they’re that bad, I agree with ya.”
If she’d seen what I had, she’d think the same way, but I wasn’t about to tarnish her view of the family she had here.
To be honest, my own opinion wasn’t all that tarnished. I knew what they were capable of, I’d just never seen it in the flesh before.
Or, I guessed, the rotting flesh.
Bleugh.
My stomach churned at that, just a little, but I quickly gulped down a sip of beer.
When the door to the clubhouse opened and the council walked in, a raucous cheer echoed around the bar, and I shook my head at the sight of them.
They were all wet through, all drenched, and I wasn’t surprised when they raised a hand in greeting and trudged off to their respective quarters.
Earlier on, if I hadn’t mopped up gangrenous sores and necrotic tissue, I’d have joined Steel, just like Tiff and Giulia were doing as they wandered over to their men, evidently wanting to help clean them up, but I wasn’t in the mood for that.
I didn’t even know what I was in the mood for.
“He’s dead, isn’t he?”
Ghost’s tone was conversational, and I cut her a look. “Do you really want to know the answer to that?”
Steel: A Dark MC Romance (A Dark and Dirty Sinners’ MC Book 4) Page 32
