by Marie James
We caravan, three Suburbans deep, to the front doors of The Golden Dragon. Tactical assaults on high rise buildings are a nightmare. Getting inside unnoticed, with as many men as we need, is an impossibility. Agent Jones sends two guys dressed in civvies in first to take over their command room. The last thing we need is to be ambushed in the stairwell.
I commit myself to taking my time at the gym more seriously as we reach the landing to the top floor. I’m more winded than I ever should be for this type of job, but not so much that I can’t function.
“Need to lay off those cigars,” Snatch snips playfully.
I’d flip him the finger, but training keeps both of my hands on my rifle, and if I’m honest, I don’t have the breath to waste on him. His bright blue eyes shine with mirth that can be seen through the shield of his tactical goggles. I despise the black masks we wear when we do domestic jobs to maintain anonymity because it blocks the smile I’ve come to love.
“Asshole,” I hiss as we get into position at the only entrance to SINdicate’s glorified whore house.
“Not my fault you’re turning into an old man,” he teases back.
“I’m a year youn—”
My words are cut off when the door is kicked in, and the concussion grenade reverberates all around us.
“You’re only as young as you feel, old man,” he continues as we push inside and make our way down the hall to clear all of the rooms.
“I don’t feel old, mother fucker,” I hiss into my mic. Snatch enters a room, and I go past him to the next one.
“Can you children kindly shut the fuck up?” Shadow’s voice booms into my ear.
“RAH!” I narrow my eyes at Ace’s agreement with Shadow’s command, but soon my attention is turned to the door I just kicked in.
“Get dressed,” I command the woman who’s standing in the center of the room, naked as the day she was born, with her hands on her hips like I’m not standing here in full tactical gear with a rifle in my hands.
“No,” she hisses. “Vito is on his way to see me, and I’ll be damned if I’m leaving without seeing him.”
Vito Barzini is Vinnie Sinclair’s right-hand man and the one we were told to be most cautious of. He’s quick to pull the trigger and has had enough arrests that they fear he’ll fight to the death before getting arrested again.
My eyes dart around the room, looking for a robe to throw at her, and I spot the prepared lines of coke on a large mirror beside the bed. Several streaks of residue let me know she’s been in here partying on her own for a while. It explains her defiance and lack of fear. Powered by powder.
“Vito’s tied up at the moment.” It’s not really a lie. I know the room Snatch was meant to go into after he grabbed McKinley was a woman by the name of Darby. She’s one of his favorites, and it was speculated he’d be with her. “Grab some clothes, and I’ll take you to him.”
Her eyes narrow as she tries to assess whether or not I’m being truthful. I tap the side of my rifle with my trigger finger, annoyed that my time is being wasted in the room with this chick. She’s hot, no doubt, but coke heads and whores really aren’t my thing. We were told the women are here voluntarily. They are contracted hookers, and even though they have limited access to the outside world, it isn’t unheard of for them to go to parties and high society functions on the arms of SINdicate soldiers.
I won’t however, take the risk of speaking down to her or roughing her up to get compliance because there’s always a chance the women here are either forced, manipulated into being here or are suffering from Stockholm Syndrome. We see it a lot in our missions overseas.
“I’m Courtney,” she purrs as she throws on a slinky little dress. “What’s your name?”
I let her walk past me into the hallway but follow close behind.
“Fred,” I mutter.
She stops when she sees all of the men in tactical gear and runs to the guy I recognize from the photo lineup as Vito. He’s knocked out cold, slumped in a pile on the floor in the middle of what’s being used by the women as the living room.
“Are we clear?” I ask Snatch, identifiable by his choice of weapon and the fact that he insists on wearing a tactical vest that he had custom painted to match his inked skin below.
“Yep,” he answers as we watch two FBI agents wrestle with Courtney and place her in handcuffs when she wouldn’t stop clinging to the unconscious Vito. “Fuck, she’s hot, too.”
I let my eyes rove over all the half-naked women. They look more agitated to have their night interrupted than thankful we’ve rescued them from indentured labor.
“If they’re working here of their own free will, and prostitution is legal just a couple of miles outside the city limits, what’s the big deal?”
“They abducted Aviana Maguire, fuckface,” Snatch answers the question I don’t even realize I said out loud. “There’s a good chance some of these women got here the same way. Besides, Jones said earlier that they think there’s money in the bank for them. Like some type of ledger is kept tallying all the things they’ve been doing with these guys.”
I nod. “That could be incentive enough to stick around for a couple of years.”
Snatch shakes his head, sighing, the nonverbal you idiot clear in his stance. “There’s no fucking accounts. Jones said they couldn’t find anything concerning the women here. Not a list of names, or services provided. They tapped into their computer system last month and have been keeping close tabs on it, but there’s nothing. It’s why they didn’t know this place even existed. So unless they find some hand written book with all this shit in it, there’s no money for these women.”
“I wonder if they know that and that’s why they’re pissed. At least here they were provided for.”
“We’ve seen much worse,” Snatch says with another look around the room.
Our conversation halts when Shadow waves us over to help the FBI escort the handful of men in custody out of the room and back down to be transported to a holding area until they can be interrogated.
I grumble to myself when I reach down to tug one of the assholes up from the floor.
“Don’t worry,” I hear Snatch’s voice in my ear. “You can take the elevator this time old man.”
This time I hear Shadow’s and Ace’s laughter in my ear.
Chapter 4
Snatch
“We got nine of the twelve we were hoping to capture tonight,” Jones says from the head of the long table at the FBI office. “The three we didn’t get our hands on are some of the lower ranking guys. They’ll either try to join ranks with some of the other influences in town, or they’ll scatter like the rats they are.”
We all nod in understanding. We don’t anticipate the guys who couldn’t even gain rank in such a shoddy organization to be much trouble from here on out. They just happened to luck out tonight. Knowing they’ll be caught eventually just means it’s likely they high-tail it out of town.
“Vinnie?” Shadow inquires.
Jones shakes his head. “He pulled on my guys the second they came through the door of the warehouse. They plugged him full.”
“Good,” Shadow says, voicing what everyone else in the room is feeling. He pulls out his phone when it chimes with a text.
“We have to figure out what to do with all of those women out there,” Jones says with clear frustration in his voice. “With the exception of Aviana Maguire and a friend she made, not one of them is happy about what went down tonight.”
“Do they know they weren’t making any money?” I ask. “That they were being lied to the entire time they were there?”
Jones shrugs while he taps the edge of a stack of paper. “When we told them they were even more pissed at us. Not one of them has anything to fall back on. They weren’t very talkative, but the ones that were willing to share a little told us they’re mostly from the streets. SINdicate providing for them was the best life they’ve had for years. It all crumbled when we blasted in there tonight.”
>
“We’ll take care of that,” Shadow murmurs not pulling his eyes from his cell phone as his fingers skate over the keys with quick precision.
Jones cocks an eyebrow at him. “Take care of that?”
I chuckle at the Agent, which draws his attention from my VP.
“I’m not sure what you boys are planning on doing with thirteen whores, but I’m not sure the FBI is just going to let you waltz out of here with them.”
I chuckle again and his eyes narrow. We get this a lot. Many people we work with who aren’t privileged to the work we do question our intentions. When you’re saving women, giving them new identifications, and protecting them from asshole scumbags, sharing exactly what we plan isn’t something we advertise.
Several long minutes tick by as Shadow ignores the obvious anger building in the misinformed agent. He doesn’t raise his eyes to the red-faced Jones until he’s completed his text message, no doubt to Blade, who does most of our organizing.
“First,” he begins with an edge to his voice that means business. “I think for a man who makes his living in Sin City, the use of the word whores is a little extreme. Everything in this city is just legalized skin. Second, it’s not like we’re going to take them back to our clubhouse and put them to work on their backs.”
I slide closer to Itchy because we both enjoy a good show when Shadow has been offended and feels the need to put an asshole in his place. I grin over at him, only to find him not watching but ignoring me. I sigh and turn my head back to the current entertainment.
“Arrangements have been made to house all of them in Kingman,” Shadow says before the chime of his cell phone pulls his attention from the now seething Agent Jones.
Kingman, Arizona is just about two hours away, and it gets the girls out of the craziness of the city. We’ve used one of the hotels down there before.
“We need to dig deeper into their backgrounds,” he counters.
Shadow shakes his head. “You ran every one of them. Besides the two with petty theft from years ago, they all came back clean.”
“They may be able to give us info on those assholes we have in custody,” he argues further.
It’s Shadow’s turn to laugh at his straw grasping. Itchy even drops the new asshole attitude he’s adopted over the last several weeks and laughs beside me.
“I don’t think those whores are going to give you any more than you’ve already gotten,” Shadow says just as Jones’ phone rings. “Might want to answer that. It’s your boss’s boss.”
Shadow walks out, but like usual, Itchy and I stick around and listen to him ‘yes, sir’ whoever is on the other line. He mumbles about jurisdiction and something about ‘whose dick do I need to suck to get that kind of pull’ before he walks out and leaves us in the room alone.
“That never gets old,” I say as I grip Itchy’s shoulder and turn him toward the door.
He shrugs me off, and I ignore the shitty mood that has already returned. That smoking hot girl that was in with Vito flashes in my mind. I’m not into the drug scene but seeing that douche bag snort a line of coke off her tits made my dick hard right in the middle of the fucking raid.
Exiting the room, paying no mind to Itchy who walks right out the front of the building, I find the blonde beauty across the room sitting with Aviana. She notices me immediately, speaking to her friend, but never pulls her eyes from mine.
She doesn’t seem fearful, which is nice. Many women are intimidated by the tats and piercings, assuming I’m a thug or criminal at first glance.
I walk toward her, reminding myself not to appear too anxious and overly excited at her response.
“Temptress,” I whisper offering my hand.
She takes it in hers, a sly smile playing on her pouty lips. “Darby,” she answers with a huskiness that makes my nuts ache.
“Snatch,” I say in introduction without releasing her hand.
Aware of Aviana beside her, I only stroke the back of her hand with a single, tattooed finger when I want nothing more than to pull my cock out and offer it to her on a silver fucking platter.
“I’m sure,” Darby says her voice laced with innuendo.
I smile down at her, barely keeping my tongue from snaking out and sliding over my bottom lip.
Satisfaction warms me when she turns to look at Aviana and says, “I think New Mexico is a perfect place to go.”
She offers the chair beside hers but never lets go of my hand.
“You’re coming along to the clubhouse?”
She nods, but it’s Aviana who answers. “We’re going to go there with you guys and after that head to Tampa. Darby’s never been to Florida.”
Darby bites her lip when she notices my inability to pull my eyes from her luscious tits. I nearly groan. “So I get a couple of days with you.”
“Looks that way.” God, I love a woman with a husky voice. It tells me just how rough it’s going to be after she’s been begging me to fuck her harder all night.
“You just made my year, baby.” She smiles and leans closer to me.
“What about your friend?” She tilts her head toward the exit.
I see Itchy coming back in, the last bit of smoke from one of his disgusting cigars trailing behind him. For a split second, I want to keep her to myself, knowing with his shit demeanor he doesn’t deserve someone this amazing, but I concede. I’d never deny him the chance to fuck a girl together. Honestly, sex is always better when we’re both in a room playing with a woman.
“Itchy?” I lean in closer to her ear as we both watch him run his hand over his thick beard. “Itchy will worship your pussy while I spend days reveling in your amazing tits.”
“Sounds like a great time,” she answers almost breathless as she squirms in her seat. “I can’t wait.”
Aviana has moved her attention from Darby as Bryan comes up and sits her in his lap, and I’m grateful not to have her listening in on our conversation. She doesn’t seem like the type that would be okay with a threesome, and I don’t need judgmental friends talking Darby out the fun we can have back home.
I’d be concerned about coercion, but Darby is the one who suggested we bring Itchy into the mix.
Trust but verify. “Only if it’s something you want to do, baby. We wouldn’t force you into anything. That’s not what Cerberus is about.”
“Are you going make me beg?” Her finger trails over my name patch on my cut. “I will.”
I lean back just a bit, suddenly uneasy without facts.
“Why were you at SINdicate?”
Her eyes find mine, and she shrugs. “Vito found me on the street. Made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”
“He had you tied to a bed only hours ago. I’m fucked up for even thinking about fucking you.”
She chuckles a humorless laugh. “You were one of the guys that came in?”
I nod.
“He gets angry sometimes. The coke makes him a little aggressive.”
“You were crying.” I push up the sleeve of the sweatshirt she’s wearing, turning her hand over, so the marks on her wrists are visible. “He did this. I saw all the other welts on your body. You were terrified when we came in there. He was hurting you.”
She bites her lip again before speaking. “I asked him to tie me up. He went a little far with the cane tonight, but it wasn’t past my limits. I was terrified because that’s a natural reaction when men with guns barge in on an intimate experience.” I shake my head and look away, but she reaches up, clutching my chin until I look at her. “I was crying because he wouldn’t let me come.”
I swallow the thickness in my throat.
“That’s so fucking wrong,” I tell her.
She hangs her head, ashamed and reading my words wrong. “That I asked him to do those things?”
It’s my turn to grip her chin. I shake my head when her eyes meet mine. “That he wouldn’t let you come. I promise you, sweet girl. You’ll always come like a train with me.”
Her eyes spark
le at my vow, and I once again hate being so far from home.
Chapter 5
Itchy
Wooing. There was no other name for what Snatch is doing with the woman across the room. My eyes find his the second I walk back in, and hers only a fraction of a second later. The smile playing on his lips is one I know all too well, one that speaks of the depraved things we’ll be doing later.
Only it’s taking longer than we expect as several of the girls from SINdicate refuse to get in the SUVs that are heading to Kingman. Courtney, the girl I evacuated, is the leader of the small group, who seem to have plotted and planned while we were debriefing with the FBI.
“I won’t,” she refuses once again, and I can see the pink at the top of Shadow’s ears, the only sign that he’s growing increasingly frustrated with her. “I want to go back to the hotel.”
He shakes his head, running an aggravated hand over the top of his dark blond hair. “I’ve told you more than once ma’am, SINdicate fell tonight. The organization no longer exists.”
“You should’ve just left us the fuck alone.” She points across the room to Bryan and Aviana, but they’re too snuggled up with each other, heads lowered, and talking softly to even be aware of the argument across the room. “You should have gotten that bitch out and left the rest of us alone. I want the money they’ve been saving for me.”
The other girls mumble their agreements.
“We can see about getting that for you,” Shadow agrees. “But it isn’t going to happen here, and it isn’t going to happen tonight.”
Not every woman we encounter feels like they need to be rescued, and from the way the hotel rooms looked that she came from, she was living a fairly decent life, if you take out the abuse, drugs, and inability to come and go as she pleased.
“Assholes,” she sneers, but she weighs her options and stomps out the front to the waiting SUV.
The other girls scramble after her, all piling into the same vehicle.
“Women,” Shadow mutters. “It’s chicks like her that keep me from settling down. I bet she used to be a sweet girl. I bet all women turn bitter like that as they get older.”
