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“What the fuck?”
I watched, angry and helpless as she walked across the dimly lit parking lot in the dark of the night, as if she were completely unaware of all the dangers hidden in the darkness.
I held my breath, certain she would soon stop at her little blue car, only she never did. She walked to the street beyond the parking lot where many Black Stallion employees jumped on the bus that would take them all over Glitz and Vegas. She didn’t even see the van creeping far enough behind her and probably couldn’t hear the engine as it approached.
All I could do was sit there like a helpless fuck and watch as the brown, possibly black van stopped just beside Bonnie. I could feel my blood pressure rising as the side door slid open, finally drawing her attention. Before she could identify anyone, a dark figure slammed a bag over her head and yanked her inside the van before it took off going at least fifty miles an hour through the parking lot.
“Fuck!” I yelled.
“What’s wrong little brother, finally realizing the ginger with the baggage is the girl for you?” Virgil snorted a laugh as he started the engine and stepped on the gas.
“No. I just watched Bonnie get kidnapped from the south parking lot. Looked like a small crew from The Crusaders.”
“Shit. What?” That grabbed Jasper’s attention. “You sure?”
I handed him the tablet so he could see the horror that I saw firsthand.
“Fuck me!”
“We’ll get you laid later,” Virgil said, his voice the definition of calm. “For now we need to focus. Maisie said some guy Joey was watching her a little too closely, so she talked to Kat. This guy deals for The Crusaders, but his real job, his main cash flow is in trafficking. Find pretty young white girls, knock them up, and sell the babies. Endless supply of cash with low overhead. I hear these fuckers keep the girls pregnant and sell the babies until the women are too old to have more. It’s fucking sickening. ”
My mind refused to process all the details that had been thrown at me over the past ten minutes. Bonnie couldn’t be in the arms of a trafficker. She couldn’t be. I wouldn’t fucking allow it.
“Drop me at Black Stallion, so I can follow the digital trail.”
“No can do,” Virgil said quickly. “Back to the Manor, Sadie’s orders.” His path never diverted because other than Jasper, Sadie’s orders were sacred, obeyed at all times. “We’ll figure it out, Cal. Just stay calm before you do something stupid.”
Easy for him to say. Virgil wasn’t the reason Bonnie was on the streets on her own in the first place. “I am calm.”
“You’re not,” he shot back. “And that’s fine. You care about her and that’s fine too. Just admit that shit and stop annoying the hell out of everyone.”
I didn’t have time to respond before we pulled up to Ashby Manor and headed inside single file to the dining room where Sadie, Kat, and Maisie sat with Thomas, whiskey and charcuterie set out as a distraction.
“Any word, Ma?”
Sadie shook her head and stamped out her cigarette. “I spoke to Ronan, and he swore he had nothing to do with this. I believe him, but just in case, I told him if I found out he was lying, I’d feed his precious daughter to scorpions in the desert. Piece by piece.” And what he didn’t know, but should, was that Sadie would enjoy it.
The fondness she developed for Bonnie was one part guilt in the role she played in Bonnie’s arrest, but it was deeper than that. She saw something in Bonnie, and she would happily remove Savannah from this Earth if any harm came to her.
“This Joey fuck, is one of Ronan’s men?”
Virgil nodded. “Afraid so.”
“He was brought in from the east coast,” Thomas said in his quiet, cultured voice. “Worked for the Russians before The Crusaders. Word is that Ronan had to pull off a pretty big favor to avoid a war with the Russians.”
Thomas smoothed his hands down the lapels of his three-piece suit, chin high in the air as he delivered his intel like a good, loyal employee.
“Thank you, Thomas. That was very helpful.”
With the barest hint of a smile, Thomas nodded and exited the room, leaving the family to deal with family business.
Jasper asked the question we were all thinking. “This can’t just be about the fucking money, can it?” That kept us quiet for a long moment. “Why would he take Bonnie?”
“Until recently,” I said between big gulps of Irish whiskey, “Bonnie was a virgin.”
“No shit,” Jasper and Virgil snorted at the same time.
“The point,” I growled, “is that he doesn’t know that, but he might be operating as if she’s some big fucking payday. It’s no secret how much virgins go for on the black market, and she’s strung out so…”
