by Ella James
“I was worried…he killed them,” I chatter. “When I agreed to come here. Gertrude is my grandmother. I’m not his girlfriend.”
Even in my terror-stricken state, it stings a little. I realize how ridiculous that is but don’t have time to dwell on it.
The man in front of me is nodding. “Girlfriend or not, you’re in a bad place. You’re part of this now, babe. It’s a good plan, too. We’re gonna hurt you some before we make it out like he killed himself.” To my horror, the man smiles. “He’s mean to his women. If I didn’t show you, he would do worse. Odds are, you lucked out with me.”
He pulls a knife from somewhere and holds it to my thigh, just above my knee. I wobble and jerk, panting so hard I’m afraid I will pass out.
The man in black looks troubled. “I hope you know, I’m sorry for this, babe.”
Then he drags the knife down my thigh.
CHAPTER FOUR
WOLFE
I wake up hyperventilating, my mind haunted by court. The cross-examination. How am I going to keep a neutral face with Cookie’s father five rows back? I’m going to fuck it up. Get life.
I think I’m hyperventilating, so my mind takes me back to that place. A few gasps later, I realize I’m not having a panic attack. I really can’t breathe. I grasp at my throat and realize I can’t use my hands.
My eyes flip open: Linn.
His sweat-streaked face is framed by trees and sky. I’m on my back, on the ground. Motherfucker is straddling my chest with his bony hand pressed against my throat. His other hand pushes the barrel of what I think is my own .38 into my forehead.
I try my hands again and realize they’re bound in front of me, under Linn.
I blink a few times, because everything is so hazy. The sting in my neck…
I look into his brown eyes.
“You…drugged me?” My throat is dry. I try to swallow and end up coughing. Linn hits me with the gun. The sky above him pinwheels. “Motherfucker!”
“You like that sort of thing, right?” he taunts.
My stomach spasms. I turn my throbbing head, because I’m worried I’ll get sick and would rather aim it at the grass. Where’s Red? I pray she’s safe in my stock room. Relief trickles through me, because I’m pretty sure she is. It would take a lot of force to break through the bookshelf.
Stay put, Red. Stay where I put you for once.
Linn sneers above me, and I struggle to think. My head aches, but it’s a faraway sensation. My arms and legs feel heavy, and I’m aware of every breath my lungs draw in. As if it’s an effort. As if whatever was in the dart was too much. I shut my eyes. Focus, asshole.
Did Bob betray me? I push the thought away because it’s so unlikely. I pay him well to run my business, but that’s not why I trust him. We were friends as children, brothers in college.
Bob didn’t answer his phone. What the fuck happened to him?
I try to swallow. Choke. Linn presses harder against my throat.
“Did…Robert send you?” I rasp.
“He didn’t need to. I’m here for Cookie!”
I close my eyes and grab another shallow breath. So much to say. So little energy.
“Smythson did it,” I try. It’s a long shot, but I’ve got nothing else. I hope the shock of the accusation will make him listen to me.
Instead, his eyes narrow and he snorts. “Your scum. If I had a little less self-control, you’d already have a hole in your head. I don’t even want to touch you right now. You’re scum.”
My spinning mind struggles to keep up. Did he say Cookie’s father sent him—or not?
“I’m going to hang you. Or rather, they are.”
Linn jumps off me with aplomb, and I see two large men dressed in black standing a few paces behind him. Neither is the guard I saw with Linn before.
One steps forward and smiles. Then he stomps hard on my ankle. I’m almost grateful for the pain, because it helps bring everything into focus.
“So this is the Dom Killer.” He grins evilly, and I recognize the look in his eyes. Righteous rage. I saw it lots of times in court. People who thought their hatred of me made them morally superior. People who felt they’d get a star on their cape if they encountered me on a dark night and did me in.
The goon is saying something else, but I can’t really hear him. I’m using all my power to roll over on my side.
Hands grab my shoulders. Someone kicks me in the back, hard enough to send a bolt of pain down both my legs.
I tug against the binds around my wrists, trying desperately to think. When the pain dies down a little, I’m able to discern that I’m still wearing my jeans. And that’s a fucking miracle, because I keep a cigarette lighter in the front pocket of my jeans—always. Survivalist thing I picked up when Cookie and I did a few courses, just after we were married.
Someone flips me roughly over on my back. I use my legs to turn back on my side, but there are three of them.
No, two.
I look up at the faces of Linn and one of the two goons—red-haired, with leathery skin and thin, pale lips. Behind them is some kind of movement, but I’m still too high to pinpoint what.
“I loved her!” Linn hisses. He slaps my face, and I grit my teeth. I schooled myself years ago to smile when I was hit. It doesn’t even hurt, not really. Not even when the bigger guy clocks me in the temple.
But I can tell he got a good hit in. Everything…spins.
He presses me to the ground, and someone is picking up my leg. Spreading my legs. A tingly sense penetrates my brain’s fog just in time for me to twist my hips. The kick Linn aimed at my balls hits the inside of my thigh.
I groan, because it fucking hurts, then follow that up with a howl and couple of fake dry heaves. I jerk myself up with my abs, cursing and swinging with my bound hands.
If he knows he didn’t get a groin shot, he’ll do it again.
Linn is laughing.
“This more fun than I thought it would be.”
“We’re not even to the good part,” one of the goons says.
The other one steps back into my frame of sight. I sag against the ground, folding my legs together and pretending to grab at my crotch. Really I’m trying to get my ring finger inside my pocket. Get the lighter. I can feel it there. I think I can.
Please…
“What do you say we have a little fun before the big event?” one of the muscleheads says.
“I like fun,” Linn croons.
I want to scream I didn’t do it, but there’s no point. I need to focus. I’ve got my pinkie in my pocket. I bend my hand a little, working to get my ring finger in, Linn leans over and spits on me.
“Fuck,” I grit.
“Fuck you,” Linn sneers.
I lift my gaze to him and see, behind him, one of the muscleheads doing something in one of the trees.
Threading rope through the limbs.
Cold seeps into my bones, locks my muscles.
“See that?” The musclehead at my feet jerks his thumb at the noose. “We’re gonna hang ya. Rough up your woman just a little and hang ya. Killers like you don’t deserve to breathe, ’specially not somewhere pretty as this.”
I hear nothing but ‘your woman.’
I sit partially up, lit by rage. “My woman? What the fuck are you talking about my woman?”
Linn grins. “Red! My ‘body guard,’ Tom, found your little Red. She’s part of this plan.”
“Part of it how?” I growl.
“Oh, don’t worry,” Linn says, waving. “We won’t hurt her badly. Just enough so it looks as if you did. Before you hanged yourself.” His mouth twitches into a grin he quickly shuts down. He drops down to the grass beside me. “I’ve got a team here to help me. We will kill you, James Wolfe. And if it doesn’t look authentic, if it doesn’t look like you did it yourself.” He shrugs. “Who will care?”
Red will care.
My throat knots up, mostly because it isn’t true. I hardly know Red. I played her with my hand
s and mouth—even with my cock—but she’s probably afraid of me.
I drop back onto the ground and shut my eyes. It’s hard to breathe.
“What are you doing to her?” I hiss. I open my eyes.
She’ll know it isn’t me hurting her, won’t she? I feel a moment of terror, wondering if whoever has her is masked. Has her masked. I can’t stand to think she might believe it’s me.
“Just roughin’ her up a lil,” the Southern-sounding goon says.
I lunge for him with my bound hands. “Don’t touch her!”
Sweat blooms on my neck and chest. Flop sweat. I wonder how much adrenaline I would need to break the rope around my wrists. I lie back, panting like a dog. My chest aches. My eyes are closed. I can’t seem to make them open.
“Please don’t hurt her. Please.”
All I can think of is the softness of that pale, pale skin. The color of the freckles on her nose: fine peach.
I open my eyes and find Linn’s impassive face in front of me. He digs my gun into my temple, but I ignore that and focus on his eyes.
“Let her go. She’s just like Cookie. Innocent.”
His mouth draws to the side, and he gives me a skeptical, accusing sort of look, the kind of look that says shame on you.
“So you do have a heart. A little piece of heart.” He eases the pressure of the gun off my forehead and shakes his head, like he’s disgusted.
I remember something suddenly. Something that changes nothing, but makes me feel like shit. When I arrived at the dock, the goon with Linn was just tying the boat to the dock. But I had heard the engine much earlier. They must have circled the island a time or two, scoping it out, dropping the others off.
“Where is Red?” I keep my voice casual, hoping that if I can get Linn talking, I can lead the conversation back to Smythson. Find out if he’s involved in this.
But Linn stands up. I feel too light without his weight to ground me. I didn’t even notice he was sitting on me again until he stood. I’m still high from whatever he used to get me here.
I watch in awful stillness as he joins the other two and grabs a thick rope hanging from one of the larger limbs. We’re on the south side of the island, I think. I shut my eyes. I know we are, because the trees are mossy like this.
I think of Red and lift my back off the ground again. Then I remember: The lighter! I work my pinkie and my ring finger into my left pocket, my eyes darting over to the tree to see if anyone’s watching.
Linn starts to whistle some song. I don’t know. Can’t seem to follow.
My heart is beating so hard. I can feel the lighter with my fingertip.
One of the goons looks over at me, and I pull my hands down toward my cock and wince.
He turns around again, and I watch the two goons string the rope around the limb. They seem to know what they’re doing. I strain into my pocket again, and this time, I bend my ring finger around the lighter. Holy shit, I draw it out.
At that second, Linn turns and starts to stride over. The air inside my lungs leaks out. No, no, no. He sits down beside me under the mossy trees, and I hold my breath, waiting to see if he’ll grab it away. Instead, he leans closer.
“I’m an honest guy,” he tells me, as I clench the lighter in my hands. “I never cheated in law school. I have a wife, you know? Where my parents are from, they arrange these things. She’s very pretty, but she nags.” His mouth twists. “Nags and nags. Nothing like Cookie.”
“How did you know her?” I rasp.
He sits up straighter, gives me a scowl that tells me he thinks I should know. “I’m the one who tried to help her avoid the marriage clause. Did she never tell you?”
I nod, making my head pound. “I remember now.”
“She didn’t want to get married. Nights and nights she was with me. In my office. We drank cheery soda, ate the roasted pork from the little stand just down the way, on Park. I tried my damndest to get her out of it, but the trust…it was airtight.”
“You loved her?” I ask. I’ve got the lighter hidden, I think, clutched in both my fists. I’m working on positioning it so I can open the zippo and strike the flint with my thumb. I’ll have to burn my hands to put the flame to the rope, but I don’t have a choice.
I listen as Linn drones on about his feelings for Cookie. How he cares for his wife, but she’s not what he needs. It occurs to me, ridiculously, that Linn seems about as straight-laced as they come. He thinks I murdered my wife, and still, he looks slightly uncomfortable in his work suit, sitting beside me in the grass. I watch him set my gun down as he talks, and hope fills me. He doesn’t know what he’s doing. I wonder why Smythson let him come here. If Smythson sent him here. No way Linn got here by himself—is there?
When his eyes flit over to the ropes, I can see his body tighten.
Good. I don’t know where the other two are but maybe they left. I have the lighter well-positioned. I clench my fists around it and I work on breathing deeply, wiping my mind clean, the way I used to when my father ‘disciplined’ me with his whips and clamps and paddles.
I’m pretty sure Linn’s finished talking about Cookie, because he’s silent for a moment.
I look up at him. “So Smythson sent you?”
Linn laughs. “No Smythson. I want to do you in.”
“He’s been looking for me for a long time,” I say, still not convinced Linn made it to me without some help from someone in high places.
“Not just him,” Linn says. “Everyone who loved Cookie, everyone who works for Robert—we all wanted to see you dead. Punished. Like you should have been.” He stands and walks quickly to the men, who have moved back into my line of sight and appear to be perfecting the knot.
I take a deep breath, spread the fingers of my left hand as far apart as I can, and wedge the tip of the zippo between my ring finger and pinkie. Memories fill my mind. Brutal details that I’ve worked to banish from my psyche. Cookie’s tights. The blood. I grit my teeth. Then, with my right thumb, I strike the flint.
The flame is agonizing. Sweat pops out all over my body, and my throat spasms with the urge to scream. Immediately, I can smell my flesh burning. I tug in a few huge, desperate breaths, and then look down. Beyond the haze of heat around my hand, I can see the rope turning black.
I grit my teeth so hard the world dissolves into a mess of stars.
Breathe, asshole! Breathe deeply.
I press my lips together to suppress a howl. It doesn’t work; I start to pant, but the rope is burning now. All three backs are still toward me.
Then one of the goons looks over his shoulder. He makes a face as if he smells my burning flesh and then his eyes widen.
I jerk my wrists against the rope. I feel it give in a burst of pain. I lunge for the gun in the grass, hefting it in my right hand. I wrap my fingers around it but the pain dazes me. Goon who saw me is charging. I’m fumbling with the gun. I expect the pain this time. Work past it. I manage to find the trigger. The bullet pops him in the gut. He goes down.
Number two whips around, gun drawn, and I get him in the chest. Linn’s face stretches. He puts his hands over his head. He’s got no weapon. Nothing. I’m up and moving through the grass as he starts pleading.
“No, please! No! No! Please, it wasn’t my idea.”
I reach him in another long stride and aim the butt of the gun at his temple. He goes down like a sack of flour, and I hit him one more time for good measure. One of the goons is silent now. The other is writhing. Crying.
I walk over to him. Roll him over. Grab a knife out of his belt.
“I got kids,” he hisses.
“Fuck your kids.”
Pain is closing in on me as I cut the rope down. My head feels too light. The fingers of my left hand roar their pain.
Tying the three men’s hands requires both of mine. My jaw locks and I start to shiver, but I get it done. I stand on shaking legs, drawing in shallow, humid breaths. The trees around me seem to move and chatter. I wonder dimly if they�
�re heckling—or if they’re glad I won.
Strong hands grab me by the shoulders, and I whirl around.
CHAPTER FIVE
RED
He drags a paint brush down the inside of my calf. It tickles. My brain knows this, but my body doesn’t move. I’m on lockdown. Gut-wrenching shivers have been reduced to a fine quiver, as if my body is on auto-pilot, just doing the bare minimum. And yet…my senses are on overdrive. The cold breeze. The sun washing out the luscious grass in Gertrude’s yard. The ropes cutting my wrists. The pain of all the cuts.
