by Nicole Fox
I dropped, banged my leg on an invisible table, swore, and then stood. It was pitch dark, so I fished around for the lighter that came with the coat, and flicked it on.
Even the basement of this place was enormous. It dwarfed every apartment I had ever lived in—combined. Antique furniture filled the section I was in, looking extra big and ominous in the flickering light, but as I looked down the opposite end I felt a breath of fear. There were metal cages, lined with everything from cots to shackles, dangling from the ceiling.
Thank God, Honi was not in one. I double checked that they were empty. I didn’t want any surprises.
Thinking that I might as well investigate the financial documents while I was down there, I looked around and spotted a tower of fancy wooden filing cabinets. I wasn’t sure if they would contain financial information, but they certainly seemed a good place to start.
I began digging, fascinated by this treasure trove of strange information. Ancient newspaper clippings, discussing disappearances. A framed picture of a restaurant on opening day. Tax papers—all legitimate at first sight—from fifty years ago.
‘Wow,’ I thought. ‘The Minghellis have been in power a long time.’
After about an hour of searching, I was pretty sure I was not going to find what I needed. I was looking at this point out of pure curiosity—and, if I was honest with myself, I was delaying deciding what to do next. No matter what choice I made, someone was bound to get hurt.
Then, a small chill went up my spine. I felt myself being watched. I turned. There, in the shadows, a pair of gleaming green eyes staring at me from the darkness. I bit back my gasp and leaned forward with my lighter. What was it? It certainly wasn’t a person …
“Ow!” I cried, wrenched my hand away as a four-clawed paw darted from beneath a table, swiping at my lighter. For a second, my heart pounded, and then I quieted a laugh.
“Silly me,” I mumbled. “Here, kitty, kitty.”
From its hiding place, a large, ginger cat appeared. It allowed me to touch its nose, and then continued to go about its business in the basement. I was sure there were plenty of tasty rats for it to chase in a place as old as this.
I resumed my searching. Awhile later, I heard a slight scratching sound from the top of the stairs, but I figured it was the cat. Later, when I heard the sound of something heavy touching on the stone floor, I again thought that the cat had knocked something over.
But when I heard a footstep behind me, clear as day as it crumpled a piece of paper beneath its heel, I could assume no more. I whirled to see who was behind me.
And found myself face to face with the barrel of a gun.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Connor
BOOM!
My finger pulled the trigger. It was reflex. Involuntary. Sudden.
Simultaneously, several things happened.
A face in the flash of light. Princess!
Christ! I thought, trying to pull the gun aside so that I’d miss her. Too late!
The bullet flew. As soon as her eyes saw the barrel, she staggered back. It, too, was natural. Reflexive. The move of someone who’d studied martial arts. Evading a punch.
Not enough to evade a gun.
It would have hit her. In the slow motion scene that followed, I saw, quite clearly, that the bullet would have struck between those lovely, piercing blue eyes.
It would have hit her. If not for the cat.
While we were sneaking up on Princess, it, too, had snuck up behind her. Perhaps to scratch her. Perhaps to rub against her legs affectionately. I would never know. I did not care. For as she took her meager, instinctive step back, her heel connected with the feline.
She tripped, falling backward with a cry against the open file drawers. The bullet flew over her, so close that it snipped a lock of hair that flew upward as she fell. It fluttered to the floor, like a candle flame severed from its wick.
The cat screeched in outrage and bolted from our sight. Princess moaned, squirming awkwardly where her body had impacted the open file drawer.
I dropped my gun and flew to her.
“Princess!” I gasped, scooping her up in my arms. Joey, at least, had the good sense to scoop up my gun and level it at the stairway, in case someone had heard and was coming to investigate. (The guns had silencers, thank Christ.) I brushed the mutilated lock of hair from her brow as she blinked at me, dazed.
“Connor?” she asked.
“Princess! Are you all right?”
She scowled and moved her body, apparently testing herself out. “I think so,” she said. “Bruised my hip, but that’s all.”
“Great,” I said, and suddenly my happiness vanished. I leapt to my feet and mercilessly jerked her up with me.
“What the fuck are you doing here, Princess?” I demanded, shaking her hard by the shoulders. “How the fuck did you get out? What the fuck are you doing here?”
“I … I …” She seemed unable or unwilling to answer.
Joey put a cautioning hand on my shoulder. “Connor,” he whispered. “I know Princess shouldn’t be here, but we don’t have time to question her right now. Someone is bound to have heard that gunshot, and we still have our mission.”
I glanced to see Princess’s reaction to all this, and was not at all surprised to see her looking anywhere but at me.
“You’re right,” I said. “But first, we need to get Princess out of here.”
I focused all of my rage, frustration, and fear—plenty of fear—on her, and hissed, “Come on, you whore. We’re getting out of here.”
“But, Connor—”
I raised my hand as if to strike her, and she winced and fell silent. I had not actually intended to hit her, but it was important she knew who was in charge here. I couldn’t have her fucking this up.
I seized her by the wrist, and together the three of us snuck back upstairs.
While we were creeping down the dark hallway, I got a message from the other Devil’s Wings. They said they had found a club room with a bunch of the Minghellis’ henchmen in it, but they hadn’t been spotted. They guessed that Minghelli’s bedroom—and most likely Minghelli himself—would be on the west side, where we were.
But where was Honi?
I didn’t have time to think about that. Instead, we half-led, half-dragged Princess out to our secret window and shoved her through. Then, we first went to Joey’s bike and then to the black sedan.
“What the fuck is going on?” Paul demanded as we showed up. “Is that her?”
“No,” I grunted angrily. “It’s not. But it’s now your job to make sure she fucking stays here. You got it?”
“Yes, sir,” he answered without hesitation. He obviously heard the rage in my voice.
I picked Princess up and roughly tossed her into the trunk of the car. She looked at me, affronted, but I was too angry to care. I then snatched from Joey what we had gotten from his bike:
A big ol’ roll of duct tape.
“You deserve this,” I told Princess as I wrapped it around her arms and legs, effectively trapping her in the trunk. “I told you to stay put and you snuck out. And for what?”
She couldn’t answer, because by this point I had put a big swatch of it over her pretty little mouth. She glared back at me, her eyes glittering with insult and pain.
I went to slam the trunk shut. “Oh, all right,” I said, and removed my leather jacket. Almost tenderly, I tucked it around her, so she would at least be warm.
Then, without allowing myself a second thought, I slammed the trunk shut and bid Joey to follow me back into the estate. Back into the Minghellis’ greatest stronghold.
Now that we knew the route, it wasn’t hard for us to sneak our way back in. We didn’t waste our time with the basement, as we now knew that no one was down there. Not even in any of the dungeons we had spotted. Instead, we ventured further down into the house, wondering, Where the bloody hell could she be?
At last, we heard voices. They were coming from the
end of a long, wide, and lavishly decorated hallway. Magnificently carved baseboards and ceiling boards increased the expensive look, and the door that guarded the end of the hall was at least half a foot thick of solid oak, latticed with designs and glimmering with varnish. It was so thick that I realized that it was strange that we could hear voices at all.
They must be shouting to make it through that door, I thought.
We drew our guns, put our ears against the doorframe, and listened.
“Interpret it, you stupid bitch!” someone roared. “Everyone said you could!”
“I’m sorry!” another voice sobbed. I recognized Honi/Farrah. “I’m sorry! I’m just … so scared.”
“Oh, please,” the voice growled. Despite the muffled quality, I was soon able to tell that this voice belonged to Tom Minghelli, the most dangerous man in the state. I took a deep breath, swallowing my fear, and mouthed his name at Joey. He nodded. He agreed.
Minghelli continued. “If I was going to kill you, you stupid whore, I would have done it already. I’ve decided that there are … better uses for you.”
Honi’s voice suddenly changed. It lost its hoarse gurgle and tried to become, at least from what I could guess, sexy. “Oh, well, Tom dear, if you’d just let me …”
“Get your filthy hands off me!” Minghelli roared. “Christ, I’ve never been so disappointed in my entire life! Here is the daughter of Sam Michaels—Sam Fucking Michaels—who's supposed to be some great money laundering genius, and all I have here is another stupid fucking whore!”
Even through the door, we heard the smack that followed. Honi’s crying resumed, and I looked at Joey, my suspicions confirmed. Minghelli didn’t believe it either. There was no way she was the daughter of Sam Michaels. Something else was going on here. Something big.
“I’m sorry,” sniveled Honi. “I just need … a little more time …”
“Oh, get out of here, you bitch,” Minghelli grumbled. “But if you don’t come up with something by nightfall tomorrow, I’ll turn you over to my men for their pleasure. And don’t you even think about trying to go back to the Devil’s Wings. Trust me. That sorry excuse for a motorcycle club is glad to be rid of you. Now get out!”
We heard the sound of a fist slammed on a table, and only had a fraction of a second to dart out of the way of the door. There was a flash of a giant canopy bed dressed in rich satin, a luxurious writing desk, and Minghelli smoking a cigar before Honi tumbled out and slammed the door behind her.
She fell right into our waiting arms.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Farrah
Pain shot through my wrists and ankles as the circles of duct tape bit into them. I wanted to cry, shout, rage, and scream, but I could do none of those things. For a few minutes, I had pounded on the interior of the trunk with my heel, hoping that the Devil’s Wing at the wheel would take pity and come let me out.
Of course he didn’t. The Devil’s Wings were cruel, horrible men.
Even as I thought that, I knew that wasn’t precisely fair. I was, of course, “Devil’s Wing property,” and Connor was simply ensuring that I stayed safe. The basement of the Minghellis’ estate was no place for a Devil’s Wing whore.
I still didn’t think he’d had to tie me up, though. If he had simply put me in the car and told me to wait, I would have waited. Right?
Come on, Farrah, I told myself. You know better than anyone that you would have been out of there as soon as he was out of sight.
I guessed that, in that regard, Connor was right.
There was also the strange fact that, as Connor bound me up, I had felt an undeniable rush of warmth between my legs. Some part of me—okay, a lot—of me, enjoyed it when he held me in his power.
Well, you’re in for a long life of enjoyment, I thought bitterly. He’s got you good.
But what about Honi? Obviously, I had failed to find the financial data she needed, and I knew, because I knew Honi, that she was still probably going on with that lie anyway. How could she be so stupid? All she had to do was tell the truth, and this would all be over for her. Was whoring really that bad, that she’d rather gamble her life with Tom Minghelli?
I remembered Leo’s sausage-like arms groping for me in the bunkroom, and I was forced to acknowledge that, yes, maybe Tom Minghelli was better than whoring. But not by much.
At that point, I heard the sedan’s engine spring to life. I tensed, wondering if something had gone wrong, if the driver was about to speed away without Connor. But instead of putting it into gear, he waited.
A few seconds later, there was the sound of the door being wrenched open.
“Take her!” someone cried. “Take her! Go! Go!”
There was a thump as something heavy was thrown into the back seat, a slam as the car door was shoved closed, and then the final roar of the engine being thrown in gear. The floor of the trunk began to shake, and I felt us tearing out of there.
But Connor! I thought. What about Connor? I wished desperately that I could see what was going on. Instead, I slowed my breaths, calmed my pounding heart, and listened.
“Hello, Farrah,” I heard the driver say. “Did they rough you up real bad? I see some bruises.”
A laugh followed, deep, knowing, and old—way too old for the woman emitting it. It was Honi. “No, not too bad,” she snapped. “Nothing I haven’t seen before.”
That, at least, was probably true.
Obviously she was hurt, but not enough to be serious. As I realized that, I felt a strong thrill of joy surging through me. Honi was safe! But what about the rest of them?
As if she was reading my mind, I heard her ask, “Where are the other men going? The ones who found me?”
“They’ve got their own bikes. It makes for a faster getaway. Look, you can see them starting up now.”
Of course, I couldn’t see, but I felt the cold hand of fear that had been squeezing my heart slowly loosen its grip. Connor was safe! They were getting away!
Which still left me tied up with duct tape over my mouth, locked in a fucking car trunk.
Determinedly, I began squirming, hoping to loosen the tape around my body. I couldn’t see anything in the dark, but, thanks to the tightness of the duct tape, I had a pretty exact idea of how I was bound. I soon found that by flexing my jaw, I was able to work free the tape over my mouth. I didn’t cry out though. I didn’t want them noticing me and then doing it up again.
Instead, I continued to wriggle. At one point, I heard a strange crinkling inside the pocket of the coat Connor had thrown over me. I felt for it, pushing with my bound hands until it was up near my chin.
The envelope! I realized. Christ!
As quickly as I could, not knowing how long we had until we arrived back at the compound, I worked the envelope free and then stuffed it, as far as I was able, down into my bra. I wanted it out of sight by the time the trunk was opened. It was hard work, but eventually, by flexing my neck, lips, hands, and even my knees and hips, I was able to get it properly hidden.
Literally seconds after the final corner of the envelope was hidden, I felt the car stop and heard the doors open.
“Johnny!” I heard Honi cry, followed by the clatter of heels on pavement.
“Oh, Honi, thank God! Did they hurt you?” I heard Montengo bellow happily back. In a way, his concern touched me. He might enjoy her only for her body, but about that he certainly cared. I could just imagine the pair of them as Honi was swept up into Montengo’s arms. An idiot and a whore. How romantic.
My greeting, however, was far less sweet.
Connor clicked open the trunk, his eyes glowering down at me as I winced in the sudden light.
“Come on, Princess,” he growled. “You’re coming with me.”
And with that, he seized me by my shirt, hoisted me right out of the car, and carried me back into the Devil’s Wings’ compound. Whether he wanted to fuck me or kill me, I couldn’t be sure.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Connor
Princess was still bound up good and tight as I carried her into the compound. This pleased me. Even after the ride back from the Minghelli estate, I could feel my anger thundering in my ears. Princess had almost fucked it all up. And for what? What was the stupid whore up to?
At first, I thought about taking her to the bunkroom. I knew she hated it there, and I wanted to revel in her discomfort. But then I decided against it. I wanted her alone, where no one would interfere with us. With her slung over my shoulders like a sack of potatoes, I carried her to my office. I felt her breasts bouncing against my shoulder, and sent my hand exploring the smooth shape of her ass. She squirmed, but I didn’t care. The heat growing in my loins only fed my rage, making me feel more and more powerful. I was excited. It was the same feeling I always got before a fight. Like when I beat up the skimmers.
