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“I’m calling the only person who can get you out of the fix you’re in,” he mocks me, before pulling a fabric gag over my mouth. I scream against the linen when I realize it's Alex who he’s calling, crying against the restraint and begging her not to come. But all that comes out are muffled noises, and when Hawker hangs up the phone, he rips my gag back out before placing it calmly on the stool. I watch him lift up a spoon, emptying the contents of a baggy onto it.
“No, please. I don’t do that anymore.” I shake my head, tears streaming over my cheeks, and I struggle against the chair I’m tied to when the itch under my skin turns to fire.
“You don’t?” He waves a lighter under the metal of the spoon, attempting to look puzzled.
“Please don’t do this. I’ve worked so hard. I’m not that girl anymore.” The sweat starts to drip from my pores, and the smell of the powder turning to liquid attacks all my senses.
“You were easy to manipulate because you were so desperate,” he tells me as the substance on the spoon starts to bubble. “You wanted so much to be wanted. It’s so sad, Abby.” Taking a syringe, he sucks up the liquid from the spoon, and I look away, ashamed at the impulse I’m feeling.
I have too many people who believe in me. Alex, Ella, even Nyx is starting to trust me again. My toes curl with anticipation as he steps closer, and my veins throb to the same beat as my splitting heart.
“Please don’t do this,” I find the strength to beg him, remembering the hurt in Dan’s eyes that night he found me after I relapsed. I’ve come so far since then. Nyx’s brother, Brax, gave me his version of tough love, and I hated him for every second of it. He locked me in his basement and treated me like a prisoner, but he made sure I had someone with me every second. I may owe the fact I’m alive to him, but I don’t think I could go through it again.
The day I learned Danny was dead, I’d been clean for a few weeks, but I still stole a car from the club after everyone had passed out and drove out to Luke Robinson's place. I sat outside his big fancy house for hours, scratching at my arms, desperate for a way to make the hurt inside of me disappear, but each time I tried to open the car door, I saw the disappointment in Dan’s face. I remembered the days I’d spent in Brax’s basement beating this. I got strong, strong enough to drive away from that house. To deny my body what it craved, not because I was trapped in a basement or because I was scared of Brax, but because I wanted to survive for the people I had in my life, the people who were fighting for me.
“I don’t want to be that person again,” I cry, trying to slide my hands free from the binds.
“It’s just a hit, Abby, a really big one. Everything will be better soon.” Hawker smiles as he slides the needle beneath my skin. His face turns blurry as my eyes fill up with my tears. That cool feeling flushes through my veins and spreads under my skin like a river of calm. I don’t want to be numb, I want to fight, but my limbs won’t let me. I know I only have a few more seconds of caring left before the blackness sets in, and I spend them all on Alex.
“Maddy,” I speak desperately into the phone.
“Squealer, what’s the matter?” She must sense the worry in my voice, and yes, I’m fucking worried. That stubborn bitch has left me with no option.
Alex Monroe underestimated me massively tonight. Either that, or she doesn’t understand how much she means to me. She forgets that I know her, and I know she’s far too stubborn to give in the way she just did. I’ve also known throughout this whole scenario that she would never willingly allow the club to get Hawker before she did. It’s been eating me up since the day the club decided to work alongside her.
Alex is smart, I can’t risk following her and getting caught. So, I’ll give her a little slack on the leash, let her think she’s in control, and in doing that, I got a feeling in my gut that she’s gonna lead me straight to Hawker.
“I need you to stop whatever it is you're doing and trace Alex’s cell phone,” I explain to Maddy as calmly as I can. I’m tucked in off the road, sheltered from the trees, and all my suspicions were confirmed a few moments ago when Alex’s car sped back past me. She was never gonna hide out from the man she wanted to ruin. Where a part of me admires her for that, the other part of me, the predatorial, untamed part, wants to wring her pretty little neck for it.
“I can do that,” Maddy assures me, and I can already hear her fingers tapping on the keys of her computer. “She’s heading out toward the other side of town,” Maddy informs me. “Have you called Abby, maybe she knows where she’s headed? We should have someone bring her in too. If Hawker finds the link between her and Danny she could be in trouble.”
“Abby!” I say her name aloud, feeling the clogs beginning to turn.
“Could you track her too?” I ask.
“You forget who you’re talking to,” Maddy tells me, and within a few seconds, she has a location.
“She’s at an industrial estate just off Hunterton Road, looks like a storage company… wait…” I hear rapid typing that’s followed by a loud gasp.
“Squealer, that storage building is one of the businesses Danny had in the file. It’s suspected Hawker was laundering money through it.” I hear a chill in Maddy’s voice.
“Check the progress on Alex’s phone and tell me she isn’t heading for that storage building, Maddy.” I grip the phone in my hand so tight I swear it’ll crush it in my fist.
“Squealer,” her breath sounds shaky. “I know this isn’t what you want to hear but—”
“Call the others and send them to that address.” I hang up the phone and kick start my bike, and start riding. My hand hard down on the throttle and my chest pounding against my ribs. I’m always buzzed going into something like this, but that ain’t what I’m feeling right now. All I got inside me now is fear, sickening fucking fear that I’m gonna be too late.
I don't feel any fear as I pull up outside the storage building and grab the file off the passenger seat. What I feel is anger. Enough of it to forget all my morals and put a bullet in the skull of the man who took my brother. The same man who has manipulated a vulnerable girl. A girl I vowed to protect. I carefully slide open the huge metal door of the building and see a maze of containers filling the huge expanse of space in front of me.
I’ve no idea where I'm heading as I move through them, and the bright white lights above me are so bright they’re making my head hurt.
I step with caution into the open space, and the first thing I see is Abby, tied to a chair, with a needle hanging out of her arm and her head hanging to the side.
“No!” I panic and race toward her, but before I can get to her, a figure steps out of the shadows and blocks me. The gun in his hand aimed directly at me.
“Deputy Monroe, I’m pleased you made it.” Hawker talks so collectedly, and I stare right into his stone-cold eyes before glancing back at a lifeless Abby.
I can’t check any of her vitals. I can’t call for backup. She’s not moving or making a sound.
