19. Chapter 19 #2
“Just to get information, right?” She crosses her arms, pushing her tits up in the process. A tactic to get her way, maybe. Hard to tell, when I can remember just how soft they are in my hands.
“If you feel so uncomfortable, then stay close.”
“Don't know if I can do that without hurtin’ this guy myself.” Why the hell did I say that?
Her eyebrow rises, devious ideas in mind. “And why would you hurt him?”
“‘Cause you're not just a regular kind of doll.”
She blinks slowly. Her big eyes practically sparkling with her question. “And what kind of doll am I?”
“The fragile kind,” I monotone, coming back to myself. It’s difficult not to fall for her subby, playful eyes.
“Fragile like a bomb?” She smirks, too smug for her own good.
“No. Fragile like I don't know what's gonna set you off and kill this guy before we're able to actually get any answers.” She laughs and it’s a sound I hadn’t heard from her in a while. I want to hear more. I don’t think she laughs enough.
“Well, if he has it coming to him… Then what am I supposed to do?”
“Put your blade away.”
“Oh, it is. I don't even have it in my cheek. It's in my wallet,” she raises her bag to show me.
“That means absolutely nothin’ to me.”
She huffs, but I release her to finish doing what she’s agreed to do.
Never said I was going to leave her alone with him. That is more for his protection than hers, obviously.
I get a table in the restaurant to keep watch over her until she leaves with him…
“Vert, I think I got him where you want him,” she says, stepping out from the bed where he's tied up. I don't take any pleasure in having to look at this man's dick, so I throw a towel from the bathroom to cover him up. She’s effectively gotten him hogtied here. Couldn’t tell you how she pulled it off but he’s not going anywhere.
An added wrap of tape over his mouth will do a lot of good in keeping us inconspicuous.
“The hell?” He balks when he sees me approach. From the back of my extended stay, it’s not the most private so I’m sure he’ll appreciate the coverage as we head to the Chrome Flame in the truck he drove to this date in.
I don’t know how I ended with grand theft auto in addition to kidnapping but here I am. Nina sits in the passenger seat like the unhinged version of Bonny as I drive away. This was not a bit of Louisianan history I’d like to emulate.
When we drive out past the back parking lot to the open grass lot behind the building, I feel confident enough in our seclusion to get done what we need to.
Nina takes my lead, getting out the truck and coming around to the bed with me.
“Have some questions,” I say when I open the gate up. “You're gonna give me the answers I need.”
The rip of duct tape from his mouth is a painful sound between the three of us as I remove his. He immediately starts spluttering out with his mouth free. “Answers to what, man? Is this your girl or something? I— we barely even kissed.”
“Nah, nah, nah. Don't care about that shit. Honestly, she signed your death warrant, not me, for kissin’ her.”
Sitting Remo up so he can talk a little easier, I readjust the towel to cover him. “Wait, wait, wait. I... I'm sorry, man. Look, I don't want no trouble at all. That's your girl? You and her make a beautiful couple, and I just... let me go. I will leave, and it’ll be fine.”
“No, it won't be fine, because I've got some questions about Colton. Know him?”
“Colton? Yea, yea, man, I know him. He's, uh...” He does his damnedest to see us better in the dark lot. “What? What do you want to know about Colton?”
“Well, he's got somethin’ goin’ on, and it is affectin’ my family and my livelihood. Know anythin’ about that?”
“I don't know nothin’, man.”
Nina sits on the tailgate beside him. Gone is her sweet act, right now, this must be what she looks like with the blade in her hand. “Just quit with the lies. We already know you're affiliated. I just have questions about what that affiliation is like.”
“Well, what do you mean, man? I can't really tell you anythin’, dude. They'll kill me.”
“No, I'm actually going to kill you,” Nina says with a quiet voice. “After all, you're my kill, my find.”
“W-what?” he stammers out, looking between the two of us.
“Yea. I mean, you're kind of a piece of shit. The fact that you're even still alive is only thanks to this man. So, I think you should be thanking him.”
“T-thank you,” he stutters again. “Look, I don't know—”
Nina leans against the opposite side of the truck, bored or just wanting to seem that way. “Yea, you know something. So, what's going on?”
“What are we talkin’ about here? You mean the Griffiths?”
I repeat the name without adding anything else, because there is no recognition in that title at all, not for me, anyway.
I look to Nina, and she shrugs, not knowing who these people are either.
“And that's the group that Colton is leading?”
“No, no.” He chuckles despite still being tied up in the back of his own truck with no one on their way to help him.
When neither of us joins in with him, he clears his throat and continues, “Colton is not leadin’ it, per se.
It's kind of like some… partnership. He brought a lot of Dupont guys in after Blue was making a big stink about that bitch.”
“Nina,” I try to stop her, but Nina is quick to saunter back over, smacking the guy in the face. At least, I think she’s smacked him. The thin line of red begins to spill crimson down his cheek to his neck.
“Do not talk about my Queen that way,” she bites out, now holding him by his hair to look up at her. “Restraint on my part is not a strong suit, you and your guys have already done enough. Don’t test me.”
“You're right, you're right,” he stammers. “I was just... I was just friends with him, dude. I've been friends with him for a long time.”
“Friends with who?” I ask.
His tongue pokes against his cheek where Nina hit him. “William and his son. Hell, they were around when Senior still had a grip on things. We all thought Will would come next. He did, that’s for damn sure.”
“And when he didn’t, he did his own thing?” I piece together.
“Look, it was a slap in the face when Senior brought Junior in. Will was better suited even while he was number one. Blue would know that. He had a plan for where Fayes were goin’ and then all that shit went down and Junior got popped…
” Remo looks between the two of us again.
“Wouldn’t it just make more sense to go with the man you know that ain’t never killed your men than a stranger who has?
Loyalty shouldn’t be able to be given so easily.
A lot of us worked under Will closely prior and see no reason to stop doin’ that. ”
“You got that Redd?” I ask into my ear bud. Nina and Remo both look shocked, I never mentioned that I’d let him know what I was doing. My guy can get anything recorded through your phone, voluntarily or not.
Redd responds in the ear bud instead of the speaker. “Yea. I’ll take it to Blue. Get him to set up a meetin’—in exchange for his life.”
“Heard,” I say before the click of him ending our conversation sparks a new one. Walking over to where Remo still huddled tied up, “I wanna sit down with your boss. Make it happen this week or I’ll let Nina have her way with ya.”