by C. M. Allen
I was on the brink of going insane with worry over what was happening to her. While I was distracted with my thoughts, the snarling beast must have broken out of its cage because the next thing I knew I was smashing anything and everything within my reach. Nothing survived my wrath.
Once I’d calmed down and came to my senses, the damage I had done was going to take a lot of time to clean up. There were holes in the walls, broken lamps and the TV was now in the bathtub. All the mirrors had been destroyed and the bed ripped apart. This feeling of not knowing or being able to do more than what I had done burned a hole inside of me I knew wouldn’t be filled until she was back safe with me.
But was she really ever safe with me?
My phone ringing dragged my ass out of my fucking bitch ass pity party. “Yeah,” I answered, picking it up.
“Hey man, you need to get your ass back here to the hospital. Vultch has been wakin՛ up and askin՛ for you, but he’s not doin՛ well, Mav.” Before he even continued, I was out the door and on my way to the truck. “The doctors said that he’s havin՛ complications and needs more surgery, but he’s refusin՛ to go back under the knife until he sees you.”
“Why doesn’t he just tell you what it is he has to say?”
“You know Vultch man, he wants you to hear what he has to say first hand.”
“Fuck! All right, I’m on my way right now.”
Tossing my phone onto the front seat, I started up the truck and slammed my foot down on the accelerator. “Don’t you fuckin՛ die on me you motherfucker.”
CHAPTER
3
Harper
A loud banging noise next to my head woke me up. “Good evening, Miss Lancaster I hope I didn’t wake you from a restful sleep.”
Glaring at him, I kept my mouth shut, knowing I didn’t want to feel the back of his hand on my face or anywhere else again. “Sir, you have a call.” That Devin guy said, stepping into the room.
“Take a message. Can’t you see I’m busy chatting with my friend, Miss Lancaster, here?”
“Sir. Trust me, you’re going to want to take this call.”
When the Devin guy showed him the screen on the phone a smile split over Dekes’ face. “I do believe you’re right, Devin. Watch her. I’ll be right back.”
After Dekes walked out of the room, I looked at the man he left behind, who was just starring a hole in me right now. “What?”
“It’s pretty uncanny how much you look like her. I guess Trevor Reed has a type. Which is too bad for you.”
“What’s going to happen to me?”
“That’s not my call.”
Growling in frustration that he was of no help, not that I really expected him to be, I just ignored him the rest of the time.
The door banged back open and Dekes strode back in with the biggest smile plastered across his face. “Well, well, well. It would seem you mean quite a lot to Mr. Reed. So much so that he would actually go as far as to reach out to me, a DEA Agent, to help find you,” he boasted before practically bending over with laughter. “God, I just love it when a better plan comes along.”
Why is Maverick calling this guy? How does he even know him?
All these thoughts ran through my mind as I watched both Dekes and Devin talk over, by where I now noticed Worm sitting, in low voices. “Make the call and get him out here as soon as possible,” Dekes ordered, walking back over to me with a chair in his hand. He sat back down and folded his hands in his lap. After a few beats he leaned forward and drew in a deep breath. “I have a question for you, Miss Lancaster. Just how important is Miss Avanti Sabatini’s life to you?”
Hearing him say Ava’s full name caused my eyes to widen in fear that he was going to harm her. “Don’t you fucking touch her!”
“So, I would say that her life is very important to you then?”
“What do you want? Why are you even asking about her? She has nothing to do with The Deviants or The Slayers”
“Because Miss Lancaster, you and I are going to make a deal.” Leaning back in his chair, he continued to stare right through me. “You are going to be returned to your precious Maverick, but there’s a bit of a kicker. You’re probably not going to enjoy it as much as I will, but if you want your friend to live, you’ll do exactly as I tell you to.”
Hearing that I was going to be returned to Maverick had my heart grasping at hope. But I was reluctant to find out just what the cost would be. I knew he was planning something that was going to cost all of us in this vengeance he had against Maverick. “What is it you want me to do?”
“I really do love this more cooperative side of you, Miss Lancaster. You should show it more often.” The door opening drew both of our attention to the older man who shuffled inside with a duffle bag in his hands and Devin who entered the room right behind him. “Ah, just in time. I was letting Miss Lancaster here in on our little plan for her.” Looking at the man with the bag, he motioned towards Worm. “Get him cleaned up and do whatever you have to do to make sure he survives.” Turning back around, he looked at me with an evil glimmer in his eyes. “We can’t have our suspect dying on us now, can we?”
“You still haven’t told me what it is you want from me.” I snapped at him, frustrated with these games he liked to play with me.
When he stood up out of his chair, I recoiled into mine with fear that he was going to strike me like he had before when he lost his temper with me. Chuckling at my obvious fear, he informed me. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to hit you. See, Miss Lancaster the plan is simple, I’m going to be the hero that saves you from being raped by Mr. Hopkins over there,” he said, pointing at Worm as I watched, who must have been a doctor, tend to his wounds. Wondering how this whole increasingly dark nightmare was going to go down, I didn’t have to wait long for the answer. “This is how this is all going to play out. I’m going to tell Mr. Reed that I found you at a Slayers hideout and saved you from an attack by Mr. Hopkins. It really is a good thing I got there when I did because he was just about to rape you.” He proclaimed with an evil glimmer in his eyes, seemingly proud of his newest, twisted plan. “When Mr. Reed asks you if it’s true you are going to tell him that it is.”
“So Maverick will retaliate against The Slayers.” I finished his thought for him flatly, knowing just what he was trying to do.
Ignite a war between the two rival MC’s and let them wipe themselves out.
“Bingo! You catch on quickly, Miss Lancaster. I knew you were a smart cookie. Then I’m going to give him Mr. Hopkins over there on a silver platter to do his worst before sending him back to Skull in a body bag,” leaning in closer to me, his evil grin widened. “I bet you can’t guess what will happen next. Oh hell, I can’t wait for you to try so I’ll just tell you. The Slayers will retaliate against The Deviants for killing one of theirs. All this will happen while I just sit back and enjoy the show as they kill each other off one by one, and you know why that will be?” Not giving me any time to answer, he continued. “It will all be because of the little white lie you’re going to tell, Miss Lancaster.” Sitting back down, he leaned forward. “But I saved the best for last. You, Miss Lancaster, are going to rip that motherfuckers heart right out of his chest before he has to die when you tell him that you no longer want anything to do with him.”
After listening to his insane plan, I knew there was no way I could be responsible for so many deaths. “I am not going to be responsible for starting a war and breaking Maverick’s heart, so you might as well just kill me right now.” I said, praying that Ava’s family could protect her from this psycho if he really did kill me and tried to hurt her.
“I’m feeling some doubt from you that I will kill your friend if you don’t cooperate with me, Miss Lancaster. So, let me give you a little... shall we say lesson of how well I always follow through with my threats.” Feeling my heart begin to race, I almost conceded immediately when he stood up and walked out of the room.
He returned only a few minutes later with a file in his ha
nd. Sitting back down in front of me, he opened it up. “Like you, these two people were too nosy for their own good, and just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. See, they witnessed me meeting with one of my spies I have imbedded in the Deviant’s club on the docks one day and overheard our conversation about my plans to destroy them. So I tried my best to convince them that it was a DEA operation, and it was in their best interest to not tell anyone about what they had seen or overheard. But when my guy spotted them down at the police station the very next day talking to one of the Deputies... well, I knew that they had become a major snag in my plans. So, I waited.” Taking a picture out of the file, he held it up, the backside facing me. “And then finally the perfect chance to eliminate the problem they had become presented itself.”
When he flipped the photo around so I could see it, it took me a few moments to realize just what I was looking at.
My parents’ boat!?
Bile began to find its way up my throat as tears streamed down my cheeks. Unable to hold it in any longer, I bent over and emptied what very little contents were left in my stomach as I cried out, reliving the same agonizing pain I felt that day I got the news about my parents deaths all over again. “You... you... killed... them?” I barely got out on a sob.
Lifting my chin with his finger, he let out a heavy sigh as he wiped my mouth off with a towel. “I’m afraid so, Miss Lancaster. I even had to kill that Deputy they dragged into their whole mess, trying to be the good upstanding citizens they were. All because they couldn’t keep their traps shut.” Letting out another heavy breath as though having to kill the two most important people in my life actually bothered him in the least. “I tried Miss Lancaster, I really did, to convince them that what they saw had to be kept secret, but they just wouldn’t listen. Being nosy got them and that Deputy killed.”
I ripped my chin out of his grip and cried out in a voice I could only remember hearing once before. That awful day my world imploded on itself. “So as you can see, I will kill Miss Sabatini if I have to. Be smarter than your parents were, Miss Lancaster. Just do what I tell you to do, and she will live a long, healthy life right alongside you. Don’t, and I’m afraid you’ll leave me no other choice.” Getting up out of the chair, he griped my chin, pulling it up to meet his eyes. “I bet you would love nothing more than to kill me right now, wouldn’t you, Miss Lancaster?”
The thoughts that went through my head of what I wanted to do to this monster were so ugly that they terrified me. “Y... you have no idea what I want to do to you right now,” I practically growled at him like a wounded animal.
“Oh, I think I might have an idea, Miss Lancaster. You and I are more alike than you want us to be,” he said, motioning for the doctor to come over. “Now, I’m going to give you some time to think about your decision.”
Feeling a pricking pain in my arm, my world went black... again.
I WOKE UP THIS TIME to find myself in a bedroom, lying on a bed with my tongue practically glued to the top of my mouth from lack of water. When I tried to move my arms and feet, I found that I was able to. Sitting up quickly, I had to grab my head when I felt the spins come on. “You should take it easy. The shit they gave you kept you out for two days.”
Looking to the right, I saw the guy called Worm now tied to a chair and I got my first real look at him. Even with the wounds that covered his face I could tell who he was. “You? You came into the diner. You and your friends harassed me.”
“I did. And look what it got me.” He admitted in a don’t give a shit about you tone.
“What do you mean?”
“It means someone was fuckin՛ watchin՛ us that day and saw how I treated you, so they knew the right motherfucker to take.”
“Where are we?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “Beats the shit out of me, but it’s a hell of a lot better than where we were, I’ll tell you that much. At least in here I’ve been given food and water.”
Something I realized that I needed too when my stomach growled.
Wondering if he knew what Dekes had in store for him, I asked. “Did you hear what he’s planning to do with us?”
“You mean the plan where I become a rapist and Maverick tortures the shit out of me before sendin՛ my body back to Skull in a bag? Yeah, I got all that.”
“How did...?”
My words were cut off when the door opened and Dekes’ figure filled the doorway. “Getting to know your rapist, I see.”
“Fuck you, man.”
Chuckling, Dekes entered the room. “Are you really going to sit there and pretend like you never had any intention on raping Miss Lancaster over there?”
Spitting on the floor at Dekes’ feet, Worm glared up at him. “You don’t know shit about shit, motherfucker.”
“Oh, but I can assure you that I do, Mr. Hopkins.” Grabbing his phone out of his pocket, he scrolled down before turning the phone towards me.
“Ok, keep me informed if you find anythin՛ else out on her.”
“Will do. Hey, Skull?”
“What?”
“If we’re not goin՛ to use this bitch against Maverick, don’t you think I’ve earned the right to have her as my new play toy?”
“I think as long as you share that cunt of hers with me we can probably come to some sort of agreement on that.”
“Well, shit, of course I will. Hell, you can even have the first taste of that sweet pussy of hers.”
“As I should. I’ll get back to you on that. Later, Worm.”
Hearing him and Skull talk about me like I was just some piece of meat, a toy to be played with as they pleased, made me want to vomit.
“So, that wasn’t you talking to Skull about fucking her and allowing him to have the first taste of her sweet pussy?”
Looking at me sideways, he turned his attention back to Dekes and answered. “You’re goin՛ to fuckin՛ die before this is all over, motherfucker. So do whatever the fuck it is you’re goin՛ to do with me because I know in the end you’ll be sittin՛ right next to me in Hell.”
Laughing at Worm's words, he turned away from him and walked over to stand in front of me. “Have you made up your mind, Miss Lancaster?”
Looking up at him, I looked over at Worm, thinking about the conversation he had with Skull.
Worm had planned on raping you anyway.
He threatened you and harassed you.
If he somehow lived through this, he may still come after you.
Or Skull might come after you for falsely accusing one of his men of rape.
Hoping that somehow I could get back to Maverick and find a way to warn him, then tell Ava’s family that she was in danger and that she needed to visit them, knowing damn well she would never leave on her own, I began to form a plan. One that ended with a gun in my hand and a bullet between Dekes’ eyes for what he took from me. “I’ll do it.”
“This is great news, Miss Lancaster. What do you say we get started on getting you back home to Mr. Reed then? But first I’m going to need you to repeat everything you’re going to do when you get there. That way I know you fully understand what I want from you. After all, Miss Sabatini’s life does depend on it.”
Once I’d repeated back to him everything that he’d told me to do, he showed me his phone again. “Here’s just a little incentive to keep you on the right track and from coming up with your own ideas.”
Looking at the phone, I could see the inside of my parents’ diner come into view. Whoever he had in there was focusing the camera right on Ava as she walked into the diner and headed to the office.
Anger caused my cheeks to heat. “Look, I said I would do it, so leave her alone.”
“That won’t happen until I have everything that I want Miss Lancaster, so you might as well get used to it. Just remember, I have ears and eyes everywhere and in places you’ll least expect them to be.” Leaning closer, he whispered in my ear. “Don’t try to fuck me over or you’ll end up just like your parents. Understan
d?”
When my hand flew up to connect with his face, he caught it just before I’d been able to make contact with it. “I wouldn’t try that again if I were you, Miss Lancaster. You’re going to need all of your strength.”
“You just signed your own death warrant you dumb bitch.” Worm growled behind Dekes.
“Weak words from a man who’s never going to see the light of day again, Mr. Hopkins.” Dekes said to him, rising from his spot on the bed next to me. “Devin, would you join me and the lovely Miss Lancaster now please.” The guy named Devin walked into the room with another large man following behind him. “Gerald, please take Mr. Hopkins to the room next door while Devin and I get Miss Lancaster ready to go home.” The large man stepped further into the room and punched Worm so hard in the face that he collapsed in the chair unconscious before the man called Gerald untied him and threw him over his shoulder like he weighed nothing. When the door shut behind them, I noticed that Devin was now removing his jacket and rolling up his sleeves. My heart dropped in an instant with fear that Dekes was going to have Devin actually rape me. And his next words didn’t help.
“Now, this might hurt a bit, Miss Lancaster.”
Before I could even open my mouth to ask a question, I felt the first punch to my face followed by the one to my ribs. Falling off the bed, I tucked myself into a huddled, fetal position on the ground to try and protect my face and stomach. A kick to my ribs sent me toppling over before there was another punch to my face so hard, that it was the last painful blow I felt.
CHAPTER
4
Maverick
Arriving at the hospital, I literally skidded into a parking spot and had the door open even before I hit the e-brake. Slamming the car door shut behind me, I didn’t even lock it before I jogged across the parking lot and into the doors of the hospital. When I spotted Butch, I quickly headed over to find out which room they had Vultch in. “Hey, where is he?”
