Chapter 32
Grant
The Canary
“Where. Is. She?”
Each word was punctuated with a punch to Derrick’s gut. Blood dripped from a cut on his lip, only visible because Carver used his knife to slice the balaclava covering his disgusting face.
I wanted to pound my bat into him, but I needed answers first.
“Where the fuck is Sophia?”
Still, no answer. Just more gasping for breath, begging for us to stop beating him.
Hayes stepped up and took over, his own grudge with them now much worse than it had been before.
Besides being an all around asshole, Derrick was now the one who was responsible for knocking Hayes out on my back porch with the butt of a shotgun when something he injected into Hayes’ neck had no effect.
“P-please!! I’ll t-t-talk, alright!” Hayes took a step back as Derrick’s head sagged to the side.
I wasn’t sure how he was still conscious—his two brothers passed out the second Carver got his hands on them.
Turns out we did get to chain some Dodds to trees tonight, just not Della.
She ran right after giving us that hint.
“I’ll talk, j-just p-please, make him stop. ”
Hayes glanced back at me over his shoulder. My fists grew tight as I gave a single nod. Every second that passed was wasted time. I wanted to get in my truck and drive until I found her, but I knew that would be like tryin’ to find a needle in a haystack.
“Tell him where they took her, or I’ll happily continue,” Hayes said through gritted teeth. He grabbed ahold of Derrick’s hoodie, forcing his head to slump to the other side. “I’m waiting.”
“I’ll tell you”—Derrick wheezed, leaning his head back against the tree he was confined to—“I’ll tell you what I know. Just…don’t tell…” His eyes rolled to me. “Don’t tell your sister.”
Hayes’ jaw worked. “Fuck that,” he replied before kneeing him in the groin. Derrick screamed as Hayes gripped the back of his hair. Hayes said something to Derrick, and whatever it was, it made his eyes grow wide and a sneer form on his lips.
“Liar!” Derrick shouted.
Hayes replied with another knee to Derrick’s groin.
“I’m growin’ real tired of this shit,” I muttered, stepping up beside Hayes.
I gripped Derrick’s scraggly jaw, and tears rolled down his blood-shot eyes.
“You and my sister are done, just like I want nothin’ to do with you and yours.
Hell, if I could bury you all and brush my hands clean of you, I would.
So why don’t you tell me where the fuck and who the fuck took my woman so I can keep rememberin’ why y’all aren’t dead yet. You feel me?”
“I think he needs more of a reminder,” Hayes said, the bloodthirst clear as day in his hazel eyes.
Carver’s hand settled on Hayes’ shoulder as he stepped up beside us. “Now, now. It’s clear Derrick here is willing to talk, especially since his sister ratted him out.”
“You’re all liars,” Derrick said, then aimed his gaze for Hayes once more.
“And he’s the worst of ya’ll. Tellin’ me that Ta—” Hayes’ knee went into Derrick’s groin over and over until he was begging for him to stop, his legs so weak that only the cold, thick chains kept him from falling to the ground.
“The next words outta your mouth better be what Grant asked for or I’ll stuff it with my new, shiny shotgun.” The shotgun he had ripped from Derrick’s hands the second he woke up and stormed back inside the house. But it had been too late. Only Dodds were left in my home. Sophia was already gone.
The sounds of a shotgun cocking next to us made Derrick whimper. “This one?” Carver asked, passing the readied gun to Hayes.
“Yep.” Hayes raised the muzzle to Derrick’s forehead. “This one.”
“Okay!! It was her. The woman who cut us a deal. She came into town the day after Lyra’s birthday party at Roland’s, but we told her to fuck off.
So, she offered us more money and anything else we wanted, as long as we kept tabs on her.
She made it clear that Sophia was supposed to go home or be killed, and if we didn’t have somethin’ active to report to her every day until one of those happened, she’d make sure to pick us off, one by one.
” Derrick started sobbing. “We just wanted more than the life we were handed, and she was offerin’, so we took it. ”
“At the expense of an innocent woman,” I replied, my molars grinding together so hard, I thought they’d break.
“Yeah. Sure. You all get it though, right?”
Hayes cocked his head. “I dunno, do you get that, Carver?”
“Fuck no,” he answered.
“Grant?”
“Absolutely-fuckin’-not.”
Derrick’s eyes shot between the three of us. “Please! You have to let me go. I promise, I’ll—”
“Go after another innocent woman for your own personal gain?” Hayes finished for him, rubbing the back of his knuckles along his jaw. “Don’t think that sits right with me. Maybe I’ll contemplate it more when you tell me what you shot into my neck.”
“S-somthing meant for the girl, not you.”
Hayes’ voice dropped low. “Tell me what the fuck—”
“You were supposed to get knocked out, she was supposed to get knocked up. That’s all I fuckin’ know, okay?” Derrick’s shivers wracked his body as my molars grit together so hard, I thought they’d crack. A fertility drug? “I’m s-s-sorry!”
“Talk.” Hayes groaned, rubbing the side of his neck. “Now.”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Derrick murmured to himself, then shook his head. “Her name was somethin’ with a C or maybe it was a K. She was maybe mid-40’s, rich as fuck, said she had enough to erase us from the planet if we ever told a soul.”
I tried to think back to the names Sophia had said before. “What about a Riyan, anything with that name ringin’ a bell?”
“I-I don’t know. She called a man a few times, looked kinda happy talkin’ to him, but the calls were short and straight to business. Check-ins with locations, things like that.”
“When we were in Georgia, did she do one of those calls in front of you?”
A stream of blood trickled from his nose while his brows went down, like he was thinking. “Ye-yeah, actually. That wasn’t a good phone call. She was real mad that day. Real quick to snap back at us and tell us we were worthless.”
“She wasn’t wrong,” Hayes muttered, then slid his gaze toward me. “Any of that sound familiar?”
“Yeah.” Using my bat, I tipped Derrick’s head back to me. “Did she say anythin’ else? Anything about location besides the fact she wanted Sophia back in Dallas?”
Derrick pinched his eyes closed, then shook his head. “No. No. Just somethin’ about a weddin’ being moved up.”
My heart started racing as it fell to my stomach. “When?”
Derrick’s eyes locked on mine, his tongue swiping out to gather the blood from his busted lip. “Tomorrow night.”