Chapter 30 #2
I ran after them out through the back door, the sound of wood clamoring drawing my attention to the fencing someone was trying to hop over. I flung my bat, making it spin in the air until it met the back of the person. They fell to the ground in a curdled heap, groaning.
Carver made quick work of hauling them up, using his chains to wrap around their arms as he secured them behind their back.
“Let. Me. Go!”
The voice was distinctly feminine. I sighed as I stepped up to my bat and picked it up.
“Della Dodd.” She fought in Carver’s arms as I walked up to her and yanked the large hood from her head.
Scraggly brown hair tumbled out, covering all but the sneer on her lips.
She shook the strands away like an animal.
“Grant. How nice to see you again. Come back for more?”
My stomach roiled as I looked her over. “Fuck no.”
“You know what we came for,” Carver said, fighting against her jerky movements. “Get to talkin’, or we’ll get to findin’ the rest of your family, and we won’t make it pleasant.”
“No, we won’t.” I slung the bat over my shoulders behind my neck, resting my wrists over the wood.
“You think you own this town.” She spat on the dirt by my boots. “You’re all fucked up as all get out.”
“That why you found it appropriate to trash my shop? Or was it what I said to your worthless fucking brother?”
Her sneer intensified. “You leave Derrick out of this.”
“Ah. So he did tell you about our little run in.” I tapped my fingertips on the bat. “Was it also his idea to try to take my girl that same night? He follow us?”
“Your girl.” She laughed, sounding like a psycho. And people called me crazy. They clearly had never met a Dodd in their life. “No one can handle you the way I can, baby. You know that.”
I nearly choked on vomit. “You were one night and meant nothing.”
Her head cocked to the side. “We both know that’s a down-right lie.”
I slung out my bat and tilted her chin up with the tip. She smiled, like she enjoyed it. “Tell me which of your three brothers came after her.”
She pouted as I dropped the bat to my side. “Who says it was them?”
I already knew it was Tate and Bo. I recognized their voices by now, but I hadn’t thought Derrick was in on it until I connected how I saw him just before that’d happened. And my gut was tellin’ me he played a bigger part. “Tell me.”
She giggled and shook her head. “It was Bo and Tate havin’ a lil fun. You like fun, don’t you?”
“Not your version.”
“You did before.” She jerked hard and Carver gripped her hair and tugged her head back.
“Do that a-fuckin’-gain and we won’t be askin’ anything else. We’ll just drive you out to my land and bury you alive. How’s that sound?”
Her throat worked. “Okay! Okay!” She gasped dramatically, drawing in deep breaths. “You win.” Her eyes softened as she smiled. “You don’t notice anythin’ different ’bout me?”
“Why would I?”
“Look at me!” she screeched, then settled into a smile again.
I narrowed my eyes to her teeth, then took in the rest of her appearance. Her hair had grown nearly a foot, her teeth were no longer crooked, and her lips…even if I hadn’t known her before, it was clear she had work done.
“You had a surgery, or two?”
“Don’t I look good?” Her frown was paired with deep grooves between her brows. “Don’t you want me like this?”
I forced my bat under her chin again, tilting it up. She’d had her breasts augmented, too. Even under her large hoodie, what was once small was now pressing against the fabric. “You’re bleedin’.”
She glanced down at her hoodie, mutterin’ a slew of curses. “Those are still healin’.” Pushing them out further, I grimaced as she said, “Say you want me, Grant.” When I stayed silent as my thoughts tried to wrangle what the hell was happening, she screamed, “Say you want me!”
Carver yanked on her arms, making her yelp. “Who?”
She grinned. “I’ll tell you, but it’ll cost you.”
I lowered my voice. “You destroyed my shop and tried to have your brothers take the woman I love. Why on Earth—” I froze as it clicked. It hadn’t been our phones that were tracked to the cabin.
“Derrick told you about my cabin, didn’t he?” Her grin widened. “Answer me, bitch.”
She shrugged callously. “Maybe.”
Carver’s look of confusion forced me to talk aloud instead of in my head.
“Sophia’s ex came after her in Georgia. They tried to take her.
Just like they tried to do before we left, isn’t that right, Della?
Your brothers were the ones who shot up the bakery.
You were all paid to get her away from me, weren’t you? ”
“I—”
I closed her jaw with my bat, my face inches from her.
Her back straightened as I glared down at her soulless eyes.
“I don’t need confirmation. I just need to know his name.
” If it was Riyan, it’d make sense. I hadn’t heard her talk about her father in a way that would lead me to think he would be insane enough to scope out Alliston to hire people to bring his daughter home.
And Walton…well, it was clear from the news what he’d been up to since Sophia was here. It wasn’t him.
I slowly lowered the bat and she worked her jaw side to side. “You’re not bein’ very nice.”
“Tell me who paid you, or I’ll let Carver here chain you up to the tree. Heard there were more than just coyotes that love to roam around these parts at night.”
Her eyes widened. “You wouldn’t.”
“Name. Now.”
She locked her over-inflated lips closed and shook her head.
“Let’s just chain her up. I’m ready to go back home to my wife.” Carver started dragging her backward, her legs kicking the dirt as she screamed for him to stop. A coyote howled in the night, and she froze as Carver stopped dragging her and glanced around.
“They sound mighty hungry, Della. And we brought a bucket of bait with us.”
I smirked at his lie and mentally added that to the list of things we should keep in the truck. The wildlife out here was just as lethal, and left less for the cops to work with. Remove the chains and bam. It would be labeled an animal attack.
Done and dusted, just like that.
“Fine!” Della yelled. “I’ll give you a hint, but I can’t give a name. They said if I told anyone, they’d cut the implants out, and I like havin’ tits now.”
I scoffed and rolled my eyes. “I don’t give a fuck what he threatened you with.”
“That! That right there is my hint.”
“What?”
“You said he. But I never talked to a man.” My blood ran cold as I tried to think of anyone in Sophia’s past she’d spoken about that was a woman. Someone with a motive to go after her.
“She said she didn’t give a fuck what I did to get Sophia away from you. She said we could even rough her up if we wanted, she just needed Sophia to go back to whatever the fuck town she’s from. And if we didn’t get her soon, she’d come back and start takin’ back what she paid for.”
Carver glanced up at me, his hold on Della loosening. She broke free from his hold, and I pulled the gun from my waistband and shot at the fence as she reached it, missing her by a few feet. Just enough to scare her.
Della’s arms shot up beside her head. “Please! Don’t shoot!”
Carver looked back at the house at the same time I did. The very dark, very empty house. I kept my gun aimed for her as I pulled out my phone and called Hayes. The phone rang a few times before going to voicemail. My heart sank to my gut as I tried again. By the third time, Carver shook his head.
“Della,” I asked, my voice wobbling. “Where are your brothers?”