Monster (32 page)

It was then that I
started genuinely worrying.

It was one thing to
know my life was almost over.

Whatever. That was the
life I lived. Every time I picked up a new job, met a new client,
pointed my gun, pulled the trigger... there was always a chance of me
not making it back.

But the idea that it
was someone else who might have to suffer because of me? Yeah that
shit didn't sit right.

I tried, like Breaker,
to keep my contacts to a minimum. To keep the possibility of
collateral damage a small risk. That being said, I wasn't like Break.
I made some friends. I visited some women more than a few times.
There were people that someone could hurt to get to me.

I had a sinking feeling
one of those people were in that bathroom.

Then fast forward to
Break charging in. No Alex. No plans, it seemed, to produce Alex.
Looking like he hadn't slept in days.

It didn't take much for
me to guess she was gone.

And that it wasn't him
who got her gone.

The second that kid
went into the bathroom and dragged out a kicking, swinging, spittin'
mad Alex... yeah, fuck. I don't think I have the words to describe
the look that came over Break's face.

Just utter...
devastation. Hopelessness.

Followed quickly by
determination.

He was going to get her
out no matter what.

And then that hacker
Josh showed up and gave me the whole, gory picture of what had gone
down since I got locked up.

Out of the corner of my
eye, I saw Breaker make his move. I pivoted, ramming hard into an
unsuspecting Rick, deciding it was time I threw my weight around as
well.

But almost as soon as
it started, I was restrained by an even more pissed off Rick (worth
it for the bloody nose he had), and Break was being pulled away. He
at least got a fair bit of damage in first.

Then I didn't get to
see the rest.

A pit was in my stomach
as I was shoved through the basement, up the stairs, into the
kitchen, then out through the backdoor. Not because of my own fate. I
had resigned myself to that the moment I walked out of the coffee
shop and had a hood over my head and burns from my spilled coffee
down my arm. Before I was even aware of who took me. In that second,
my fate was sealed.

But what was unclear
was what was going to go down in the basement between Lex, Breaker,
and Alex.

I knew Lex. I knew the
twisted shit he did. Especially to women. And I knew how much more he
would get out of it if he could force a man who loved that woman to
watch.

That was all I could
think about as I was led into a white wooden shed, set off into the
trees quite a ways from the main house, the windows blacked out from
the inside, the door with multiple locks and bars.

“I finally get to
have some fun with you,” Limp Dick Rick said, opening the door
and shoving me inside. “Had it up to fucking here with the
sarcasm shit,” he informed me, slamming the door behind him and
reaching for the pull tab on the light hanging from the ceiling.

There wasn't much
inside. Penny brick floor and reinforced walls. A chair with chains.
Three five gallon buckets in a corner. It seemed more like it was
used for gardening than torture.

“What? You
haven't enjoyed our time together?” I asked, putting a hand to
my chest. “That hurts, Rick. I thought you and me really had
something special.”

“On your knees,”
he growled out, moving into the small space.

“What is with you
guys and the kneeling shit? Is that why you're all so grouchy? You
like dick? You know... it's the twenty-first century. Even big bad
criminals can be gay, Rick. If you need some cock to feel like a
man...”

I didn't get the rest
of the dig out.

Mainly because his fist
found it's way to my face.

Maybe I was going to
die. But fuck if I went out like a sniveling pussy about it. Besides,
seeing that look of utter mortification cross his features, yeah, it
was worth the extra fucking pain.

And I needed a good
fight. I was due. I had been letting these cocksuckers (maybe quite
literally
cocksuckers), get the better of me for days. It was
time to knock them off their game.

Because they didn't
think I could handle myself.

But, boy, was Rick in
for a nasty surprise.

I
took three hits to the face and two to the center before I used my
wiry sort of grace against him, slipping away, then coming back
swinging. A strong uppercut under the chin had him on his ass before
he finished cursing. Which
gave
me just enough time to bend into my boot (where the idiots never
thought to look for weapons) and drag out the knife.

I wasn't a knife
person.

My weapon of choice
would always be a gun. It was impersonal. A scope and a trigger. A
target whose blood you never had to touch or smell.

But that didn't mean I
didn't know how to use one.

Thanks to Breaker who
was a bit more... hands-on in his forms of punishment or justice.

I had just aimed and
stabbed the blade into Rick's thigh, turning the knife brutally,
wincing at the sound of his scream (I didn't get off on the pain.
That was never my thing. It was a job. Or self-defense. Nothing
more), when the grounds outside sounded like they were blowing up.

My eyes sought Rick's
and found a similar shock there. So whatever was happening was not
part of some grander plan of Lex's.

Fuck.

Not good.

I grappled with the
idea of killing him versus getting the hell out of there before
anything even crazier went down.

“Every man for
himself,” I said down at Rick, getting onto my feet. He nodded
and I offered him my hand. Which he took and got onto his feet,
ripping the blade out of his leg and moving toward the window,
breaking it in the corner to look out.

“The fuck?”

That was my cue. I
ripped the locks off the door and flew out into the complete fucking
chaos.

I wasn't wrong about it
sounded like it was blowing up. There had to have been explosions.
Bombs or what-the-fuck-ever because there were fires all around the
grounds.

People were everywhere,
running, looking shocked and unsure what to do.

I didn't think. I
didn't even pretend I had any plans of getting away. I made a b-line
right for the house.

Break and Alex were
still inside.

I needed to get them
then get the hell out of there before anyone got any kind of control
of the headless-chicken men and made them drag us back.

I flew across the
field, shoving into the shoulder of some random lackey as I rounded
on the house, taking off toward the back doors that led into the
kitchen.

I had just reached for
the handle when the doors were flung open from the inside, sending me
off balance and falling backward onto my ass. Hard enough to knock
the wind out of me.

Then I was looking up
and there was Breaker. And Alex.

“They didn't kill
you yet?” he asked, giving me an odd smile and reaching an arm
down to haul me back onto my feet.

“How'd you get
out?” I asked, following as Break moved toward the corner of
the house, looking out.

“Lex has a panic
room for this kinda thing,” Alex answered at Breaker's silence.

“Heya sweetheart.
You alright?” I asked, grabbing her pinkie with mine.

“Yep. Things went
boom before Lex could get really twisted.”

There was a strange
edge to her words that made them ring untrue, but it wasn't my place
to push.

“Right, let's
go,” Breaker said, looking back. “Head for the tree line
and follow it to the front fence. My truck is still parked outside
the gates,” he said, reaching into his pocket and producing a
key.

A second later, Alex's
pinkie was pulled from mine as Breaker grabbed her hand and pulled
her along beside him, her body blocked from the yard by his. I
followed behind, similarly blocking her from behind and really
wishing I had taken a moment to find a gun somewhere.

But
then we were at the front gates, kicking our legs out faster as eyes
started to fall on us.

Breaker beeped the
locks on the truck as we rounded to it.

“Get in,”
Breaker said, moving around the hood, then stopping, tilting his head
at Alex who had frozen on the spot. “Doll, get in the fuckin'
truck.”

But Alex wasn't paying
attention.

Her gaze was focused
just beside the empty security booth where, when I squinted against
the darkness, I saw a shadow move.

“Break,” my
voice called a warning as the shadowed figure came closer. Whoever
they were, they were all in black. Tall. Thin. Wearing a hood that
was so big it covered their face.

“Who the fuck...”
Breaker started, moving toward the figure.

But somehow, Alex was
suddenly right by his side, grabbing his arm. “Stop,” she
said, her voice quiet but firm as she stared at the figure.

And then a hand snaked
out of one of the long dark sleeves, moving upward, and pushing the
hood off her head.

Yes. Her.

And she was a fucking
knockout. Not in my way. But regardless. Small. But fierce. Delicate
face, long straight black hair, dark brows, big blue eyes, and what
looked like tats snaking up the side of her neck.

“The fuck...”
Breaker said, something like recognition in his voice though her face
was new to me.

“You
guys need to move. Now,” she said, reaching into her pocket and
pulling a small remote out.

Alex nodded, pulling
Breaker back.

“Now,” she
said again, a little more urgently.

“In the truck,”
Breaker said, moving backward toward the driver's door.

Alex paused, reaching
an arm out like she wanted to grab the woman's hand though they were
far apart. “Thank you,” she said with feeling then ran to
her side of the car and threw herself into the passenger.

I gave the girl a wink,
getting into the minuscule backseat of the truck, watching out the
window as the girl slowly moved down the driveway, away from the
house. She watched us for a moment as we drove away before moving
herself into the center of the street, turning toward the house, and
lifting her remote-laden hand.

“How the fuck do
you know Janie from Hailstorm?” Breaker asked the exact second
the blast made the truck jolt, our ears pop, and Lex's house
fucking... explode.

Twenty-one

Alex

In the end, the glass
bottle trick did work. I just wasn't prepared for the show of force.
I had been half-expecting Bob to come in the middle of the night
horny with a handful of date rape drugs. I was prepared for that. I
had Breaker's gun sitting beside my hand on the surface of the table
with Jstorm's burner phone as well. Right before I drifted off, I
found Breaker's burner in my pocket, staring at it for a long, long
time, fighting the urge to open it and call him. Then, wiping my arm
across my cheeks to rub the tears away, I removed the SIM card and
banged at it and the phone itself with the butt of the gun until
there was no temptation left.

Then I went to sleep.

Prepared for Creepy
Bob.

Not,
however, prepared to hear the bottle drop and crack apart with the
other bottles just seconds...
seconds
before three huge men stormed into the room, hauling me out of my
chair before my hand could even reach for the gun.

And that was how Lex
got his slimy hands on me again.

I was dragged to a car,
one hand like a vice around my center, one pressing hard against my
mouth, then hauled into the backseat and on the lap of the man who
was holding me. A man who was hard doing so. So I didn't struggle.