28. Chapter 28
Chapter twenty-eight
Dax
Phoebe’s video on Wrangler’s site was posted only two days ago.
That was all we were able to figure out so far.
The footage had been beyond gruesome to watch.
All the videos of these women were enough to send a normal person to a padded room from the trauma of watching them alone.
Only the most disturbed, twisted fucks in the world watched the kind of shit on these livestreams. They were beyond degrading; straight from the depths of the evilest kind of hell.
Torture. Rape. Murder. The viewers could spend virtual tokens to make requests, resulting in some particularly unorthodox forms of abuse.
The only saving grace we had from watching the recording was that Phoebe appeared to be alive by the time the stream stopped. She’d been branded with the initials of one of the viewers and definitely had some broken ribs, but it looked like she was breathing by the time she passed out.
Where the livestream was recorded remained a mystery, but it turned out not to be a totally random location.
Several of the other videos we investigated were in the same setting: what appeared to be one unit in a series of cells lined with iron bars against a brick wall painted black.
Low lighting. Cramped together. This was a regular filming location, which meant it was possible to pinpoint where it was located if we were able to pick up on any other clues.
When Ricky suggested Mateo could have had something to do with the attack at the restaurant, rage singed my insides.
However, the life I’d chosen before had always taught me to stay guarded. Evil knew how to fester in spots of weakness, rotting its victim from the inside out. Perhaps I had put my trust in him blindly, and he was able to find a weak spot.
I felt my muscles tense with indignation. What if Mateo was Wrangler? I couldn’t compute why he would have spent all that time working at the restaurant if he had a booming hustle in exploitation and murder. He had a family, for Christ’s sake.
Unfortunately, it was the only lead we had, and we were running out of time. Phoebe was somewhere in that dark cell, and they were still after Lucy. And as much as I wished I could stay up here to keep Lucy safe, I knew we wouldn’t be able to hide out at Lake Domenica forever.
I needed to get to Mateo—and this meant going back to San Francisco.
“You can stay here with Emile while I head back to the city,” I told Lucy in the most reluctant tone I could muster.
She glared up at me with fire in those melted caramel eyes. “No. Absolutely not, Dax. I’m coming with you, just like you promised. We’re in this together, remember?”
Stubborn fucking girl. It was like she didn’t care an ounce for her own safety. She had nerve, I’d give her that, but she had no kind of training. I didn’t have a clue what waited for us back in San Francisco and taking her with me would be a huge risk.
“We leave before sunrise,” I said. God, I really was a weak motherfucker. Even if it was against my better judgment, she had to make her own choice. Something in my gut told me I was making the wrong choice, that I needed to force her to stay. Like an idiot, I ignored it.
Emile decided he would stay behind while he and his associates at CIPHER tried to lock in the video location.
Leaving the lake house was bittersweet. I hadn’t spent much time there since I built it, but the memory of Lucy’s naked body writhing beneath mine on the dining room table would serve as my favorite one in the mansion.
It might have been my favorite memory, period.
There was also another reason I’d agreed to let Lucy come back to the city with me. She was curled up in the passenger seat of the borrowed minivan, watching as we passed several big rigs on the highway.
“Your interview is today, right?” I asked even though I already knew the answer.
“Yep.” She sighed, her dark lashes sweeping toward me.
“I think you should go,” I told her, even though I really didn’t like the idea of being separated from her.
Regardless, she couldn’t be there when I met with Mateo.
I called him last night under the guise of wanting to meet and discuss the plans for Bellissima and its staff in the aftermath of the explosions.
He’d sounded surprised to hear from me, but he agreed.
If she came with me, there was a chance she would see a side of me I wished I could hide from myself. She’d see the real me, underneath the shell of a man I’d become. The one with rage. The monster.
“I don’t think I’m really prepared at this point…” Lucy’s voice trailed off and my heart pattered.
My hand gripped around the steering wheel, my pulse in my throat. “It’s your dream, Luce. You can’t give it up just because the universe dealt you a fucked up hand. You gotta keep playing the game.” I meant every word I said.
I kept my eyes on the road for a long while before Lucy finally responded, “You’re right. I want to go.”
I wasn’t relieved to hear this, but I liked knowing she was doing what was right for her.
We were getting closer to the end of all this.
I felt it in my bones as we got closer to the city.
After that, her world would go back to whatever shred of normalcy was left in her life, and I would work on rebuilding the restaurant.
She’d continue working toward her future, and I would simply…
exist. Just like I’d been doing before. Except this time, I’d be existing knowing somebody like her also breathes the same air as me.
Touches the same earth. Just by knowing her, the world would somehow be a brighter place as long as she was in it.
I just had to accept it might not be in my world.
I watched her out of the corner of my eye as she applied some makeup from her backpack over her eyes and cheeks in the car’s visor mirror. She didn’t need it, but for some reason she seemed more confident after she’d fixed herself up and tied her hair into a neat ponytail.
She’d get the internship. I knew she would. Anybody would be a fool not to hire her, and I should know.
By the time we crossed the Bay Bridge, San Francisco was brimming with traffic. I already missed the calm, quiet pace of the lake. With traffic came people, and with people came danger.
I pulled up to the sleek offices of Echelon Developments ten minutes before Lucy’s scheduled interview.
When I walked her to the doors, a doorman eyed me with suspicion, his eyes lingering on my tattoos like they were personally offending him.
I got the immediate feeling that this place might be a little pretentious.
I’d gotten those kinds of looks plenty of times during my deals with the rich and powerful.
That was how the underworld often seemed.
Either you looked like them, or you looked like me.
We weren’t cut from the same cloth, but we were aware of things most people turned a blind eye to.
Lucy looked up at me, her notebook tucked under her arm. I could see the anxiety in her eyes, but beneath that was that fire I loved so much about her.
Oh fuck.
Did I just think that? I mean, I’d known it the moment I fucking saw her.
She was everything I had ever wanted, all wrapped up in the most beautiful package I’d ever seen.
She was every ounce of good in this world, intertwined with the most wicked and destructive desires that fueled my damned soul.
She was my fire. My light. But love wasn’t a word I’d had in my dictionary for a very long time.
I wanted to kiss her goodbye, but the doorman was still looking at me like I was some kind of riff raff, and I didn’t want to ruin any first impressions between Lucy and her dream job.
Instead, I squeezed her shoulder softly. “You’ve got this, Luce.” I shot her the most genuine smile I could manage, and she squeezed my hand tight against her shoulder before stepping back.
The doorman’s eyes shifted to her in relief when he realized I wouldn’t be following her in and invited her inside.
I watched as she slid past the door and the doorman gave me a smug look.
Bastard. If he only knew that I could buy this entire building and have him fired by the end of the day.
I imagined what his face would look like if I’d pulled up here in the Pagani.
He wouldn’t have so much to smirk about then.
Unfortunately, it was the keys to the minivan in my hand. I walked back to the piece of shit car with a grimace as I checked the time again. I only had an hour to get to Mateo before I had to be back here to pick her up. I needed to make the most of what I had.