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Wes’ hands release me to claw at the rope, desperately trying to slip under it and leverage it away from his air supply. But I can’t let go. I practically climb on his back, forcing him to his knees as he tries to fight me away, and I double down on the rope against his windpipe.
I’m vaguely aware of his spluttering noises and also a distant yelling somewhere that I don’t have a chance to consider the source of.
I cling to him even as it burns my hands, scraping away flesh as he tries to tug the rope out of my grip. Wes seems to realize the only way I’m letting go is when he’s dead. He sinks further to his knees and lurches forward, throwing me flat against the ground. In my moment of surprise, he presses into me enough to rip the rope from my fingers and then his neck. It takes him a moment to catch his breath, so I scramble to my feet and try to run past him. I took him by surprise once, but that won’t happen again. As much as I’ve pissed him off, I don’t stand a chance against him in a fight.
But if I can just make it to the car...
Wes reaches out and grabs me around the waist, knocking me to the ground again so that the air in my lungs rushes out in a gasp of pain. I try to keep my face from grinding into the concrete as I feel his weight on my back, and then his fist is in my hair, yanking me toward him. "Play time's over, bitch."
I'd assumed Wes wasn't carrying a weapon because he hadn't used one to threaten me yet. I realize I was wrong as I feel a blade press against the soft skin of my neck so hard that I’m scared to even breathe, which is just as well cause I can’t when a new voice speaks.
"Funny. That's what I was going to say."
I strain my neck and eyes to look up, straight into the barrel of a gun.
Chapter thirty-one
Remy
The man holding the knife to Claire’s throat doesn’t look entirely afraid of me. In fact, he almost looks amused.
"Well, if it isn't the man himself. Remington Boudreaux."
My fingers stroke the trigger, torn between blowing his brains across the walls or letting him explain himself. "And you are?"
"You don't know who I am?” He frowns, tangling Claire’s hair in his fist tighter so that she gasps in pain and arches her back more to ease the burden on her scalp. But I can’t look at her, can’t take my eyes off of him for even a second lest he make a move to kill her. “That hurts, Rem."
The man is probably Rhea’s age, give or take a year. He’s too young to be calling the shots, and yet I know that voice. It’s the very same one from the video... the one that had announced the bidding of a live person. Of Claire.
He looks innocent enough, a far cry from the tattooed and scarred men who usually do this sort of work. The kid looks like he doesn’t usually get his hands dirty, so how did he get wrapped up with the most deplorable men I've ever met?
"Should I?"
The man shrugs. "I'd think you would know your own brother when you see him."
"You?" I laugh. "You're delusional."
"Am I?" His eyes hold the smirk his lips don't quite fulfill. "You don't see the striking family resemblance? I mean, we're practically twins. Your father was a little darker in flesh than mine, but that’s nothing to be ashamed of."
"Drop the knife and get off of her." Given the amount of blood present when I’d slit the throat of the lanky one, I know there isn’t a chance he’s alive. The fat, greasy one lays on the ground at my feet with the knife protruding from his skull, his tongue is in the dirt just beyond the exit, and I’m pretty sure he isn’t getting up. But I don’t know how many others may be lying in wait. It would have been useful information to get out of Jovich, but I don’t regret pulling the trigger.
"As much as I'd love to humor you, we both know it won't do any good. She's already been sold. Even if you can find it in yourself to kill your own flesh and blood, even if you get away with her, they're not going to let it go. They'll come for her."
"Then I'll kill every one of them." I say, pressing the gun into his forehead hard enough that his smooth skin ripples around it. "Get off of her."
His eyes lock on mine as he weighs his options, which aren't much of anything other than die now or die later. It’s as he stares at me that I realize I’m looking straight into my mother's eyes.
"I'm not scared of death." He says. "But they'll kill me if I kill her, anyway." He drops the knife and unwinds his fist from Claire’s hair before showing me his hands, admitting surrender.
"Untie her." I demand.
"Fine." He moves off of Claire completely and reaches for her ankles, unknotting the rope.
When the last of it falls free, I tell him, "Help her up."
Claire is already getting to her feet. The kid laughs, but with the gun still trained on him, he does as I tell him to, pulling her up off the ground as she tries to put as much distance between him and her as her exhausted body can manage.
The first time I saw her, she'd been in lingerie similar to what she wears now. But that time she hadn't been bruised, bloody, or relieved to see me. That time, the sight of her had set me on alert, aware of the possibility she could be a threat. This time the sight of her fills me with a sick rage.
