by Zoey Parker
Maybe I should have pushed harder. I stared into my tea, blaming myself again. So what if I’d pissed her off? I could have gotten through. I should have tried to get through. Now she was gone, and I knew the club must have had something to do with it. In that way, I was no better than the police, who had assumed from the get-go that the club was the culprit. There was a difference, though. I wasn’t going to let them get away with it.
I took a deep breath, reminding myself this was what needed to be done, as much as I dreaded the thought of it. I knew where the club hung out. I planned to go there and confront their leader.
As I got ready to leave, showering and dressing, I thought about the few times I’d ever laid eyes on Gabriel Hunt. I’d heard stories about him for years, and what I’d seen confirmed the rumors. He was a big, brutal-looking man. The type who made a person want to cross to the other side of the street when they saw him coming. An arrogant scowl on his face, like he knew the effect he had on people and didn’t care. It might even have pleased him for all I knew. His violence was legendary. He’d sent many men to the hospital, and those were just the ones who had the guts to admit it was Hunt who had put them there. Who knew how many more bloody, broken bodies were his doing?
He was also a notorious womanizer, handsome in a rough sort of way. Some of the girls I went to school with had slept with him. Even back then, more than ten years earlier, he’d been feared for his temper and lack of conscience. Still, these otherwise smart girls had fallen for him—at least for one night. All of them had sworn he was the best they’d ever had. They were only teenagers, though. What did they know?
I had seen his smirking face in town a few times. Once, he’d been coming out of the gas station as I was walking in. He’d looked me up and down, sizing me up, then grinned. Like I’d passed muster or something. He’d disgusted me. I shuddered just remembering the nasty look on his face.
I needed to face him. I wanted him to try to lie to me about being the last person seen with her, because that’s exactly what witnesses had claimed. They had seen my sister with the leader of the Crooked Souls just before she vanished. I wanted to watch his eyes when he made up a story, so I could catch him in a lie. I needed him to be honest with me. Somebody had to finally be honest with me.
I gripped the edge of the bathroom sink, forcing myself to calm down. The doctor had recommended I start on an anti-depressant, or, at least, something for anxiety. At the time, I’d turned him down, but in moments like this when I felt like the walls were closing in and my heart was about to burst from my chest I wondered if meds wouldn’t be helpful. Otherwise, I’d give myself a heart attack.
She’s out there. Only I can find her. I’m going to get the truth one way or another. I’m going to start with Gabriel Hunt. This was what I told myself, again and again, as I finished drying my hair. I was Sabrina’s only hope. I couldn’t let my anxiety get in the way now.
The bar was seedy, dirty, a dive which sat at the edge of town. I wondered how many fistfights, or worse, had taken place in the gravel parking lot. There was raucous music coming from inside, and the sounds of men whooping it up. I steeled myself, remembering why I was there. Then I squared my shoulders and marched into the bar.
It didn’t take long for me to find who I was looking for. Even in the dim light, made even dimmer by the thick cloud of cigarette smoke, there was no missing him. Gabriel sat at one of the tables near a makeshift stage, where a girl was dancing while men in leather kuttes with the Crooked Souls patch on the back cheered her on. Another girl was sitting in Gabriel’s lap, her hand massaging his crotch. What the hell went on in this place?
It didn’t matter at the moment. I walked straight up to the table, standing between Gabriel and the stage.
“Get the fuck out of the way!” one of the men seated behind him called out. I ignored him, my eyes focused squarely on the club’s leader.
“Where the hell is my sister, Gabriel?” The noise in the immediate vicinity cut off like somebody had flipped a switch. No more cheering, no more catcalling. Silence. All eyes were on me, and him.
“What are you talking about?” He was sitting back in his chair, his legs splayed. He was a big man, massive, all thick arms and long legs. A thin t-shirt was stretched to its limits over his broad chest and shoulders. The smirk on his face made me wish I had the nerve to slap him. What right did he have to look at me like this?
The redhead on his lap had stopped massaging his dick, so he pushed her off him. Then it was just the two of us, staring each other down.
“You know what I’m talking about. My sister, Sabrina Edwards. I know you were the last person to see her alive, and I want to know what you did with her.”
His mouth curved into a wicked smile. My mouth went dry as I wondered how much trouble I’d just gotten myself into.
Chapter 2
Gabriel
Who the hell was this girl and where had she been hiding? She made the girl who was just on my lap look like yesterday’s leftovers.
She was fucking stunning. Blonde, with blazing eyes that might have been green or might have been hazel—I couldn’t tell because of the dim light in the bar. Her skin was smooth and perfect. She didn’t need a lot of makeup, not like the other women in the bar who practically painted theirs on. She was classy, high-quality and gorgeous.
And she was pissed as hell.
“Sabrina? I don’t know any Sabrina.” I smiled at her, totally calm even though my dick was getting hard just looking at her. God, she was smoking hot. Maybe because of the way she was staring at me, like she wanted to kill me. Not like she could.
“You’re a liar!” She yelled so loud the rest of the bar went quiet for a second. I shifted in my seat, letting them know it was okay to go back to what they were doing.
“Nobody talks to me that way,” I said, keeping my voice down. People usually responded pretty fast to me when I spoke that way, quieting down because they were afraid of my temper. Not this girl.
“Am I supposed to be afraid of you? You’re pathetic.” She spat the words at me.
“I’m pathetic? You’re the one who’s way outnumbered right now, sweetheart. Maybe you should go home.” The other guys at my table laughed. I wasn’t laughing. I was staring at her, wondering how she’d like it if I took her in the back and fucked her right now. She’d be a great fuck, all that passion and fierceness with a hot little body.
“So you’re sitting there trying to tell me you have no idea who my sister is? Even though I know she was hanging around here with you guys? Even though there are witnesses willing to testify to seeing you with her?” Her voice got louder and shriller with every word.
I waved my hand. Witnesses could be shut up. “Who the fuck are these witnesses? They don’t know what they’re talking about, and neither do you. Get out of my face.”
“My sister is missing!” Her voice got even louder. “She’s been missing for over five weeks! At least two people gave signed statements saying they saw her with you the same day I last spoke with her! What did you do to her? I won’t leave this place until I get some answers, I swear to God! I don’t care who I need to talk to, I’m going to get my answers! You’re going to tell me where my sister is!”
I looked at her. She was serious. I couldn’t believe it.
“I’m telling you. I don’t know who you’re talking about.” The name only vaguely rang a bell. Five weeks? Who had I been with five weeks ago? Who the hell was saying they had seen me with a missing girl?
“Yes, you do.” She’d tired herself out already. Her voice was quieter. Now she just looked sad, and wiped out.
I got up, fast, and took her by the arm. I pulled her with me to the back room of the bar. I heard the guys behind me cheering. I knew what they thought I was gonna to do her. Sometimes I wondered what kind of animals they were. I liked to fuck, but not this way.
“Let go of me!” I heard her yelling over the cheers, and I knew from the way she was moving that she was trying to g
et away from me, but she was so small I hardly felt it. It was like pulling a little kid around. I had her by at least a foot, and at least a hundred pounds of mostly muscle. She didn’t have a chance.
I pushed her into a corner, blocking her way. “Listen,” I said quietly. “If she’s a girl who looks like you, and her name is Sabrina, yeah. I sorta remember her. She was around here sometimes, but not for very long. Right?”
“Yes.” The girl was panting, still getting over fighting me. I saw her chest rising and falling with her breathing, and I got hard again. I wondered what happened when she got excited in other ways.
“I haven’t seen her in weeks. The last time I did, she was alive and well. I don’t think I ever even said two words to her. That’s the honest-to-God truth, honey. Take it or leave it.”
“Then somebody else did! You’re not the only person here. Somebody has to know something, dammit.”
“That’s not my business.” I shrugged. I was trying to be as honest as I could with her. “I’m not in charge of everything my guys do after hours, if you know what I mean. They don’t have to report everything to me. If she was with one of them, whatever. But I don’t know which one, and, honestly, it would be best if you just let it go.”
“Are you kidding?” Her eyes were wide. “How can you say that?”
“Because if you keep poking around like this, showing up to places nobody invited you to and where there are a lot of big, bad men who wouldn’t care if you got hurt…” I shrugged again, smirking. “You see what I mean? Not everybody here’s as nice as me.” I kept smirking, staring at her. She stared right back at me. I saw now that her eyes were hazel, and she had a few freckles across her nose. She was beautiful, and she had balls. I had to give her that.
The women I was used to were in another class. The makeup thing wasn’t the only difference. She seemed smart, like she’d been to school and actually paid attention in class. The women who hung around here at the bar, with the club…they would never have stood up to me like that. They didn’t have spines. Either it had been beaten out of them a long time ago by their daddies and boyfriends or they’d talked back to one of the guys sometime and had learned the hard way never to do it again.
She wasn’t one of those girls. She wasn’t afraid. Or she was, actually, but she was standing up to me anyway. That took even more courage.
I moved closer to her, smelling her hair and perfume. She smelled clean, fresh. Her breath picked up again. She was either terrified or turned on. I got even harder.
“I can’t help you with your sister,” I whispered. My mouth was close to her ear. I could feel her hot breath on my neck, fast and hard. “But I can help you with the way you’re aching for me.” I pulled back, just a little, to see her face.
“What?” Her eyes flew open, wide. “You’re insane.”
“Am I?” I laughed a little, staring at her mouth. I could imagine all the things I wanted her to do with that mouth.
“Yes! You’re sick. Leave me alone. Let me go.” She tried to push past me, but she couldn’t move me. I laughed again, tilting my head so my face was in front of hers.
“Come on. Admit it. Your panties are wet, aren’t they?”
“You’re fucking disgusting, you pig.” She stopped fighting long enough to glare at me. Her mouth was just next to mine, so it wasn’t much work to lean in and kiss her.
At first, she fought it, growling and groaning like she wanted to scream her head off. I wouldn’t let up, though, smothering her screams. I kissed her hard, rough, pushing her lips apart with my tongue and shoving it into her mouth. I bet she’d never been kissed like this before. She bit my lip. She punched at my chest with her little fists. I wouldn’t stop. I pressed myself against her, letting her feel how hard she’d gotten me. I pushed my tongue in and out, thrusting my hips against her at the same time.
Then she relaxed, like I flipped a switch. She stopped screaming and sighed, stopped punching and took my kutte in her hands instead. She pulled me closer, groaning into my mouth.
I ran one hand down her side until I reached her ass, and squeezed hard. She groaned again, louder, pulling me closer. She could hardly breathe.
I pulled away, looking down at her. I was smiling, watching her lean against the wall to catch her breath. Then she leaned toward me, wanting more. But I pulled further away, stepping back to give her room.
I patted her on the ass. “Go home, little girl. Before you get yourself killed.”
The look on her face was priceless. It was a shame I had to let her go, because that was the hottest kiss I’d had in a long time.
Chapter 3
Kat
Damn him. I couldn’t believe he’d had that effect on me. And damn me, too, for letting him. He’d kissed me, smacked my ass, and it took all my self-control not to slap his face. Who did he think he was, the pig?
Yet there was no denying the effect he’d had on me. My knees were shaking, my panties wet. Holy hell, how did that happen? All because he was close to me? Because he kissed me?
No, that wasn’t entirely it. It was knowing he could do whatever he wanted to me at that moment. I’d been half wild with terror, panic…promise. I thought I’d gotten my weakness for bad boys out of my system. That weakness was another part of the reason I couldn’t be too hard on my sister. I knew how it felt to have the darkness draw you to it. I’d been through all of that before, and now I remembered why men like Gabriel used to appeal to me.
I got my act together and pushed my way past him, storming out of the bar. I ignored the whistles that followed me, the jeers and laughter. I didn’t look back, walking straight out to my car. I waited until I was inside with the doors locked before I buried my head in my arms and cried. All the tension and anger I’d felt in the bar came out of me in gusty sobs.
Along with all of that was fear for my sister. She seemed farther away than ever.
No, that wasn’t possible. Once the storm of emotion had passed and I was sniffling instead of sobbing, I rolled down the car window and took a few deep breaths. I needed to clear my spinning head. I still felt him on me, like a layer of grime. I smelled smoke in my hair and knew I’d need another shower once I got home. I felt nasty.
Nasty. That was a good way to describe Gabriel and his entire club. They were nasty, dirty, filthy pigs. All of them. And those girls! What the hell was wrong with them? Degrading themselves like that. The image of my sister dancing on that makeshift stage flitted through my mind, and I cut it off. No way she would do that. I’d raised her to have more self-respect. Then again, I’d raised her to have more common sense than to be hooked up with those losers. There was no telling how far she’d gone—it wasn’t as though she would have told me about it, knowing how I’d freak out.
Gabriel’s face floated through my mind. He’d been so close to me, so dangerously close. My heart quickened at the thought. He stirred something in me, something primal. A need I tried to ignore. I hadn’t been with a man in a long time, not since my last breakup almost a year before. It had to be the pent-up energy. That was it. No way he had gotten to me any deeper than that.
So what was with that kiss, then? He’d kissed a lot of women. That was all. He was good at it…very good. I touched a fingertip to my lips, which I realized were a little swollen, thanks to the roughness of his mouth. I’d loved the roughness, hadn’t I? I’d wanted more of it. If he hadn’t pulled away, I might have wanted to take things further.
It had to be the anxiety. I was feeling vulnerable. That was my excuse. Nobody would blame me.
He knew more than he was letting on. I felt it in my bones. He’d put on a good show, playing dumb. His arrogance wasn’t enough to hide what was happening behind his eyes when he told me he hadn’t seen Sabrina and that I needed to stay away. Something in his voice. I told myself I wasn’t just making this up. I was certain he was holding back.
“Sabrina, Sabrina,” I said, feeling helpless, pounding the palm of my hand against the steering wheel. “Wher
e are you?” I pulled out my phone, where Sabrina’s picture was my lock screen. I looked at her, remembering exactly when one of my friends took this picture for me. Last Christmas. We’d decorated my tree and filled the living room with gifts, and on Christmas day, we wore matching gaudy sweaters she’d found for us. We were standing in front of the tree, arms around each other’s waists. Smiling. Who knew that eight months later my world would fall apart?
“I promise you,” I said, staring at my sister’s smiling face, “I will find you. I will find out what happened to you, and I’ll make the person responsible pay dearly for whatever they did to you. Please hold on just a little longer. Hang in there. I’m coming.” I touched the screen, stroking the face of the image there.
With every day that passed, just a little bit of my hope died. The hope Sabrina was still alive. I refused to give up entirely, but it was becoming harder to believe. How could she survive this long, wherever she was? And she had to be in a dangerous, lonely place if she hadn’t been able to contact me. There was no way she would have gone this long without at least calling if she was, in fact, safe somewhere.
