AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Rage, growing impatient, shoves me forward, and I fall onto the ground on my knees. My chin bounces off the concrete since my hands are bound behind my back.
“What’s this? A gift? For me?” Griff asks, looking down at me like I’m a species of goat he’s never seen before. He places his fingers under my chin, and I jerk my head from his touch. This buys me a backhand to my cheek. I see stars.
“Frankie Helburn,” Rage says. “Word is she stole from you. Consider her an offering to prevent the war and the deaths of my brothers that would happen if this bitch keeps hiding behind the walls of my club like a scared bird instead of taking her punishment like a woman. Now say ‘thank you’ like a good boy so I can get the fuck out of here. It’s cold and dark and dusty in this fucking place. You’re like Batman without the cool car.” She gives Griff a once over. “Or the good looks.”
Griff ignores her insult and glances down to me. “You don’t care that I’m gonna kill her?” he asks, straightening his jacket as if it will make him better looking.
Rage rolls her eyes and tightens her hair tie around her long blonde ponytail. “We all die, Griff. Don’t act like that’s a surprise to you. We’re all just biding our time until we meet the dirt again. I’m just buying us a little more time is all. One in exchange for many. I hear that’s how morals work. I’m giving it a shot. Do we have an agreement? The bitch for laying off my club?”
Griff places his hand under his chin and pauses for a moment. “We have a deal.”
Another man comes up and yanks me off the floor, roughly pushing me across the room and tethering me to a small metal chair.
Rage doesn’t look in my direction when I yelp as he tightens the knot on my wrists, cutting off my circulation.
“You don’t care that Smoke won’t be happy with this revelation?” Griff asks curiously. His voice is high-pitched for a man’s. He sounds like a grandmother from Queens.
“I don’t know what you’ve heard, but there’s bad blood between me and Smoke,” Rage says. “I know people think I abandoned him. Just packed up and left, but he’s the one who broke up the team. He left me so he didn’t have to split the paycheck two ways anymore. So, you see? There’s no love lost between us. I’m looking forward to seeing his face when I tell him I’m the one who brought his bitch back to the kennel. But Smoke’s mine. To kill, to let live. He’s mine. That’s part of this deal.”
“Search her,” Griff orders suddenly.
I’m hoisted out of my chair and patted down. There are hands and fingers everywhere, and I mean everywhere. My eyes water from the painful intrusions.
Rage still looks bored, buffing her nails on her pink t-shirt that reads WHITE GIRL WASTED until they toss me back down onto the chair with such force my tailbone stings.
“We done here?” Rage smooths down her ponytail and taps her foot impatiently.
“We’re done here,” Griff says after his men give him a nod that assures him I’ve got nothing hidden on my person. “It was a pleasure.”
“It was creepy as fuck for me,” Rage turns, her blondness swaying back and forth as she makes her way out the same way she brought me in until I hear the roll of the heavy door.
Griff kneel
s before me and runs a fat finger across my throat. My skin crawls, and bile rises in my throat as I flinch away, but he holds me still by grabbing my throat and squeezing until I can’t pull in air.
“You and I are going to have so much fun,” he grinds out.
My last thought is of Smoke on the porch of the house in the prison, puffing on a cigar, strangling the neck of a whiskey bottle. I focus on his laugh as everything around me turns fuzzy and gray at the edges.
“You don’t know a lot about me, do you?” Griff asks, he pulls out a switch blade. He lets up on my throat so I can answer. I pull in a deep breath.
“I know that you buy and trade human beings like baseball cards,” I say.
Griff smiles proudly. “True, but there’s more to me than that, my dear. Did you know my mother was a midwife? For many years, she delivered babies, and I was her little helper. That’s how I was able to cut the child from Morgan’s womb. That’s how I was able to keep it alive.
“You’re a fucking monster,” I say. I’m vibrating with rage.
“I have no interest in being the hero of the story. Quite the opposite. I am only interested in being the one with the most money in the end. Morgan was asking Smoke to leave the business. I couldn’t let that happen, could I? He’s too valuable to me. But now, you’ve ruined everything. You’ve stolen my money, and I’ve lost my best man. You, you little bitch, have thrown out the anchor and you’re making this ship drag. I don’t like to drag.”
Griff runs the blade across my cheek, blood drips to my chin. “Where the fuck is my money?” he growls.
“I used it to pay mercenaries to stop your trading of lives.”
Griff raises the blade above my head.
“But not all of it. I’ve hidden a big chunk where no one but me can find it. It’s not in one place. I’ve spread it around. I can get it back, though” I say with shaky words.
Griff rolls his eyes. “Like I’d allow you near a fucking computer after all the damage you’ve done. I’m not that fucking stupid. Besides, I don’t fucking believe you.”
“I’m telling you the truth. I’ve got nothing to lose,” I say. “Not anymore anyway. Kill me if I’m lying.”
Griff thinks. “No, you won’t do it.” My hope sinks. “Leo, my nephew. He’ll do it. You’ll just tell him where to look. Leo!”
I’m looking at the floor at bright white sneakers. I lift my head. Khaki pants. I look higher. Bright green polo. Higher still. Bright white smile. Curly blonde hair.
“Duke?”
Chapter Fifty-Three
