Badger (The Elite #2)

Prologue

JESSICA

Nine months after I buried my mother, I walked into Olympus, a strip club four blocks from my house.

With two weeks left on the eviction notice looming over my head and no one else to rely on, since my neglectful alcoholic father was useless at taking care of himself, much less my little sister Lily, I needed another job to try to keep a roof over our heads.

My mother used to work here as a bartender.

When she was on her deathbed, her co-worker, Syd, let me know I had a job there if I wanted.

The outside of the club looked utterly run-down, perfectly camouflaging the clean and lavish interior.

I headed to the locker room to put my belongings away, leaving me in my black bodysuit with black boots and black fishnet tights. I finished putting my blonde hair in a high ponytail and went to my station.

Before I knew it, it was two in the morning. If I didn’t hurry, some of the lights on my way home would be put out.

Syd waited patiently for me at the door. She lived two blocks from me, so any time we worked together, we would walk home together. She was a petite brunette with bright hazel eyes and curves for days. Tonight, her curls were braided off to one shoulder. She placed a gray beanie on her head.

“Ready to go, Barbie?” she asked.

Barbie was my cover name at the club. I nodded as I wrapped a scarf around my neck. The bite of the frosty air nipped at any exposed skin as I wrapped my arms around myself tightly.

“Fuck, it’s cold out,” I grumbled.

Syd linked her arm with mine and rubbed my shoulder. “We need to get you a thicker coat, babe. This is way too thin for New York winters.”

“I know. I have one in my cart. I just need to purchase it.” I didn’t have the heart to tell her that all my money was going to more important things, like a roof over my head and food for Lily. I could suffer a while longer without a winter coat.

After parting ways, I was rounding a corner a block away from home when two dark figures approached me.

I tried to speed up without being too obvious.

The sound of salt crunching under my boots and the beat of my heart thundered in my head.

A strong hand grabbed my ponytail from behind, slamming me against a brick wall.

“Why is a pretty thing like you out so late?” a man’s gruff voice whispered in my ear. The smell of smoke and whiskey permeated my nostrils.

I squirmed to get free, only making my attacker hold on to me tighter. “Let me go, you bastard!”

“Oh, we got a fighter, eh?” I felt the bulge in his pants press against my back. “I love a challenge. Makes me rock-hard.” The man rubbed his nose along my neck. I held back the bile that rose in my throat.

The other man walked in front of me while the first grabbed both my wrists and pinned them behind my back. The tall man before me wore all black and a ski mask. He gripped my chin.

“What do you want?” I spat as I tried to fight out of their grips.

“We are here to give your dear old dad a reminder not to fuck with Butcher.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” My voice sounded shaky as panic coiled through me.

“That’s okay, darlin'; you don’t have to. All you need to tell your dad is Butcher wants his payment. He’s waited long enough.”

A blinding pain shot through my stomach as he punched me in the gut.

I let out a cry as another blow hit the side of my face before I heard fabric tearing.

Callused hands palmed my breasts through my thin bodysuit.

I began punching, thrashing and bucking my hips when I saw the glint of the man’s knife shine in the moonlight.

“Please… don’t do this!” Tears streamed down my face.

Putting the knife to my throat, the man bent down to eye level. “If you don’t want to die, bitch, you will let us do as we please and tell dear ole dad the message I gave you. Do I make myself clear?”

I felt myself begin to shut down as if there were a switch shutting off all functions of my body.

“Yes,” I managed to whisper before I was sent into darkness.

I woke in the same alley where the attackers had their way with me.

Snippets of the men groping me and squirting their cum on my battered body played on repeat in my mind.

My limbs ached, and my head throbbed. I felt raw between my legs, and my ears rang.

I yelped when a delicate hand touched my shoulder.

“It’s okay, sweetheart. I mean no harm. Let me help you up.” I let out a cry when the woman pulled me to my feet. “Easy, honey. You’re banged up pretty good.”

“Everything hurts,” I sputtered in between breaths. “Who are you?”

“Someone who wants to help. But you can call me Nellie.” Nellie adjusted my arm that was slung around her shoulders and used her body to prop me up.

I don’t remember how I got to the hospital, only that I was there and my body felt like it had been thrown around. My vision focused on what was happening in front of me, where I heard a woman’s voice.

“Listen, if we don’t get a rape kit done on you and get these cuts cleaned, you may get an infection,” she was saying.

I noticed that the label on her teal jacket was coming off.

This must be what shock felt like—focusing on things that weren’t important.

It was all I could do just to focus on the label and the woman’s voice.

It wasn’t a brand I recognized. At least she was warm.

She stood next to a woman in green scrubs who was taking my vitals.

“Honey, are you listening?” The woman’s voice was a little louder, making me flinch.

I felt everything and nothing at the same time. I finally looked up from the teal jacket to the woman’s face and was met with beautiful light-green eyes that I could tell had seen more than their fair share of hardship. Her bronze skin was flawless. Nellie was breathtaking.

“Yes,” I croaked out. It hurt to talk. One of my ribs had to be broken.

Nellie squatted in front of me and took my bloodied hands in hers. “I know you are still in shock, but we need to get all of the tests done to get those motherfuckers. They hurt you pretty bad.”

I looked down at myself and noticed I was wearing an oversized T-shirt and shorts that did not belong to me.

“Your clothes were taken for DNA,” Nellie said, as if reading my mind. “Will you let them do the tests?”

I allowed a single tear to fall down my face and nodded my head. At this point, I would do anything to get out of this place and get home to my sister.

By the time I hobbled out of the hospital, I had made a new friend with the woman who had saved me. Nellie had paid for my cab home and ensured I had her information in case I needed anything or wanted to come to a women’s group session.

As the car pulled up to the dilapidated apartment building, my gut told me something was off. Every step I took pained me at my core, making me wince and whimper several times before I got to my apartment. The door hung ajar, busted where the knob should have been.

What the fuck?

I pushed the door with my toe. It swung open and only stopped when it slammed against the interior door. I gasped.

My father lay in the middle of the floor, blood dribbling from his temple and his wheelchair on its side.

Dead for all I knew. The couch behind him was torn apart, its filling scattered across the room.

My mind raced as I ran as fast as I could through the apartment, looking for the one person that mattered.

The one person I cared about in this world.

My heart pounded in my chest, every muscle in my body screaming at me.

“Lil? Lily!” I called out with no response.

Each room was as destroyed as the living room had been, and Lily was nowhere to be found

When I reached our bedroom, I collapsed onto the ground in front of the torn, stained mattress. I kept the space tidy, but all of our belongings had been thrown on the ground, everything torn. Whatever the person had been looking for, they hadn’t left anything untouched.

Tears filled my eyes before white-hot anger seeped through every cell of my body. I got off the ground to deal with the piece of shit that lay in the other room. I needed answers. And I needed them now.

I stormed over to my father and slapped him across the face. He groaned as he pressed the heel of his palm to a bleeding spot on his head.

“Where the fuck is Lily?” I screamed.

“Lily,” he mumbled, trying to prop himself up.

“Where the fuck is she, Dad? She's not here! What the fuck happened here?”

After getting nothing but incoherent mumbles and grumbles, I grabbed my cell phone, cracked from the attack, and called the police.

“Are you sure she didn’t just go to a friend’s house?” the lady on the other line asked after I explained what had happened.

“What part did you not understand? Yes, I’m sure! My house looks like it was torn apart. Can you please send someone?”

“It sounds like someone just got rambunctious in the household, Miss, and your sister is just at a friend's. There’s no missing person’s case here.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The police wouldn’t come, and I had a feeling it had everything to do with who my father had pissed off. I knew all of this was his fault. I hung up the phone and looked down at my piece of shit sperm donor.

My father sneered and pointed a shaky finger at me.

“You!” he grunted as he tried to maneuver himself closer to me. “You! This is all your fault!” His eyes looked animalistic as he struggled to sit up. “It was supposed to be you! Now...” He broke down sobbing, his eyes showing more emotion than I’d ever seen.

“Now what!” I yelled. My heart raced as I tried to ignore my gut feeling.

“They took her! They took Lily!”

My sister had been taken and the police were not going to do a damned thing about it. What was I going to do? I fell to the ground as my useless father ranted that his “bitch of a daughter was supposed to be taken as payment for some debts that he owed” to none other than a man named Anthony Ricci.