Storm (Georgia Smoke #4)

• Twenty-Seven •

“You might have helped give me life, but you’re going to hell, knowing I was the one who took yours away.”

Briar

One Year Ago

I swirled the stirrer in my drink as I watched him. Loathing his appearance. His hair was thinner than when I’d seen him last. The way he leered at the young waitress made it clear that he still thought he was the attractive man he’d been in his youth. To hear him tell it, his mother had thought the sun rose and set at his feet. She’d called him her beautiful boy. He had reminded me often how lucky I was that he was a handsome man. That women threw themselves at him.

Bile rose in my throat as memories that I had tried to lock away in my head began to seep out. Things he’d said to me. How he’d started calling me by my dead mother’s name.

I set my glass down on the bar as another man stepped in front of me, smiling down with a crooked grin.

“Please tell me you’re not waiting on someone,” he said, some pointless attempt to be charming.

“Yes, I’m afraid I am.” I gave him a tight smile, annoyed by yet another male getting in my way. I hadn’t come to this shithole to pick up some skanky one-night stand.

“Think I could change your mind?” he told me, placing an elbow on the bar and giving me a cocky smirk.

“Sorry, my man just got out of prison on parole. It’s best if you move on along before he sees you here. He has a bit of a temper,” I replied, then picked up my glass.

The man looked a little uncertain as he straightened back and glanced around the bar. “All right then. Not looking for trouble.”

I held up my glass. “Then, you’d best get on along.”

He turned and headed off in the opposite direction. That one always worked. And if it didn’t, I mentioned taking them home to meet my seven kids, including two sets of twins under three, and how I needed some bills paid.

Roger stood up, and I kept my eyes locked on him. The creepy glance he gave the server who brought him back his change sent a shiver through me. She was too old for his taste. When she flirted with him, I wanted to go grab her and tell her to get away. My guess was, she had a little girl at home, and he’d found that out.

I picked up the rot-gut whiskey he liked to drink that I’d ordered, but not touched, then followed him as he headed for the exit. I noticed he swerved slightly as he walked. He’d had several drinks while I sat and watched, just out of his line of sight. I didn’t know how many he’d had before I tracked him here. But tonight, he was going to have one more.

He dropped his keys twice before he got to the ancient Cavalier he still drove. The second time he picked them up, we were far enough away from witnesses that I stepped in front of him and bent down to take the keys before he could get them.

His gaze traveled up my body, and it took all my willpower not to kick the fuck out of his face. But not here. I had to get him away from here. I’d set it all up carefully. Spent months planning it. Making sure every step was in place.

“Well, hello,” he drawled, stumbling slightly backward as he straightened back up.

I could tell from his drunken grin that he didn’t recognize me. But I hadn’t expected him to. There was nothing left of the dirty, abused, neglected child who had fled the hellhole he’d raised me in.

“Oops,” I said, flashing him a smile. “Seems you dropped these.”

“Well, hello, sugar. Aren’t you a pretty thing?”

I could not get sick. I was stronger than the demons. This ended tonight. No more.

“Seems someone has had too many to drive, and I could use a ride. Why don’t you let me drive, and you can come back to my place for the night and sleep it off?”

He blinked, swaying as he grinned. “Well, that’s a nice offer, sugar.”

Yeah, I just bet it is.

I didn’t give him a chance to argue—not that I’d allow that. I had backup strapped under the back of my jacket if I needed the extra push to get him in the passenger side of this car. Taking his arm, I led him around to the passenger door and helped him get inside before slamming it closed and making my way around to the driver’s seat. Right on schedule.

When I sat down, I handed him the drink I had been carrying. I hadn’t wanted to chance that he’d spill it. “Here, why don’t you finish this up for me? It’s too strong for my taste,” I told him.

He glanced down at it and chuckled. “Don’t want to put hair on your pretty chest.”

Just drink the damn whiskey, you sick son of a bitch.

I pulled out onto the main road and drove down to the marina less than one minute away and pulled his car into the spot I’d been instructed to leave it. He hadn’t drunk any yet as he frowned, then looked around.

“What are we stopping for?” he slurred.

“This is my place,” I informed him.

He gave me a weird look. “It’s a marina.”

I nodded and kept my friendly smile in place. “It is. I live on a houseboat. You want to drink that down before we get out. Might be easier getting on board if you’re not holding anything.”

He raised his eyebrows. “A houseboat. Ain’t never been on one of them.”

He gave me a leer that said he clearly was not reading this situation, then threw back the drink. I watched as he drank it. The way his throat constricted as he swallowed.

I had wondered how this moment would feel. If I would panic or freak. But neither of those things happened. It was relief.

It was almost instant when he lowered the glass; it fell from his hand, and his eyes widened in terror. Whatever it was doing to him was making its way through his body.

“Hello, Roger,” I told him, seething as I glared at the man who had taken my innocence. Stolen my childhood. Given me every nightmare I’d ever had. “It’s been a long time.”

The foaming started at his mouth as his body jerked.

“You’ll never hurt another child. That ends tonight. You might have helped give me life, but you’re going to hell, knowing I was the one who took yours away.”

Just before his eyes rolled back in his head and the thrashing began, I saw the realization. He recognized me.

“You will never destroy another little girl again.”

I sat there for a few moments more, and then the tap on my window drew my attention to Cax. I opened the door and stepped out. The gulf breeze smelled cleaner now. It blew my hair back as my gaze went from the car Roger was dying in to the water where his body would be dropped.

“You still going out on the boat? You don’t have to,” Cax told me.

Cax had been a regular at a bar I used to work at two years ago. He was a nice guy. Married with a kid. Rough around the edges, and I was sure he was involved in some criminal stuff, but he loved that kid. Bragged about him all the time.

I had been walking out of the bar late one night, and Cax was being pressed up against the building face-first. Another man had a gun to his head. All I thought about was that little boy losing his dad. A good dad. Not the kind of monster I’d had. So, I acted on instinct and took the gun I kept on me at all times from my bag. Quietly, I moved up behind them, and when my barrel met the other man’s head, he froze.

“Drop the gun,” I’d barked like I knew what the hell I was doing.

The man lowered his gun. When he turned around to face me, I knew I was going to have to make a decision to kill him or not. If I didn’t, he would kill me or both of us. If I did … then I’d have killed a man.

The shot that rang out wasn’t mine. Cax had taken the distraction and reached for his own gun, then put a bullet through the man’s head.

I was in shock when it was over and had blood splattered on me.

Cax had sworn to me then that he owed me. Anything. All I had to do was ask.

“I need to see him sink,” I told him.

He nodded. “You good?” he asked, placing a hand on my shoulder and squeezing.

“Yeah,” I replied.

“We’ll get him out of the car and onto the boat. The car will be in parts, scattered to different junkyards, before the sun comes up. I promise you.”

I nodded.

“Let’s get you to the boat,” he said, taking my arm and turning me away from the car.

“Cax.”

“Yeah, doll?”

“I’m gonna need to put a bullet in his head before he goes over. I need the reassurance he is dead.”

I had asked for something that would make him suffer, and Cax had supplied the poison. But I needed more. I had to shoot my monster.

“Then, you’ll put a bullet in the fucker’s head.”