Chapter 14 Fallon #2
He drops the blade to his side and leans away, leaving me breathless and missing his masculine scent. What is wrong with me?
“If you took the deal, then maybe we’d fill you in.” He backs toward the door. “Akio will be back later to lock you in for the night. Enjoy your dinner. Or don’t. Do whatever you want.”
I frown, confused, as he retreats from the room.
Why does it feel like he was attempting to be nice just now?
Even if it was in his own fucked up way.
Yeah, he pretended to threaten me with the knife, but I know he wouldn’t have hurt me.
Declan didn’t need to bring me dinner either because he knows I would have gone down to get it myself soon.
And, if I’m not mistaken, he sounded a little hurt that I was avoiding them. Weird.
I snatch up the glass of wine, again wondering how I got here, so worked up over these men.
The wine must have put me to sleep because the next thing I know a loud bump comes from upstairs, startling me awake. I push to a sitting position on my bed and rub the sleep from my eyes.
Several sets of heavy footsteps sound from the floor above me, which tells me the guys are huddling in Matteo’s office. In all of my snooping over the past couple weeks, I know for a fact that if they all meet, it’s in Matteo’s office.
A grunt of pain echoes from above and a niggle of worry pinches at my gut. No, not worry, you mean curiosity.
Glancing over at the clock on my nightstand, I see that it’s only half-past nine, which means I have at least half an hour before they lock me in my room for the night.
I still have some time to be nosey. Slipping out of bed, I walk on silent feet out of the room and up the stairs, pausing right outside the open door to Matteo’s office.
I peek my head around the corner. It’s dark, save for a lone lamp on the desk and the flashing lights from the computer monitor as Akio, mask shoved up to his forehead, types furiously on the keyboard. More Cerberus shit.
Declan is hovering over a shirtless and bleeding Matteo who is leaning back in his chair with a drink in hand. They discarded both of their masks on the floor.
“You won’t need stitches,” Declan announces, swiping a washcloth over the ugly wound on Matteo’s side. “You’re lucky. He could have fucked you up pretty good if you’d grabbed him at any other angle.”
“Fuck off,” Matteo grumbles before tossing his head back and draining the amber liquid in his glass. “I had everything handled.”
“He’s not lying,” Akio adds. “I just rewatched the footage of us jumping him before I deleted it. You’re lucky, brother.”
Matteo adjusts his position in the chair with a groan. “I’ll repay him for the new scar tonight when he wakes up. Finish getting whatever footage you need so we can expose this fucker.”
Do they have another prisoner here? They never told me what happened to the man they were interrogating when I interrupted them and Declan exposed who he was, but then again, why would they? I haven’t agreed to their deal, so I’m kept in the dark.
Whatever. I really shouldn’t care. I should go back downstairs and leave them to do whatever they are doing. But just as the thought enters my mind, Akio steps back, revealing the video playing on the monitor screen, and my blood turns to ice in my veins.
An average looking white guy with glasses and a receding hairline stomps into view, dragging a girl who looks barely older than eighteen behind him by the hair.
There’s no sound coming from the video, but I can tell that she’s screaming.
The girl claws at his pant legs, her face contorted in fear.
The screen flips to another video, the same man but a different girl.
This time, she’s naked and bruised, and he’s… he’s…
My stomach roils as the video flashes from one girl to the next, then the next, on and on.
All of his victims he beats and assaults.
Tears track down my numb cheeks, but I can’t look away, needing to memorize each face, needing to find a way to help them.
God, there are so many, too many. My breaths come too quickly, my mind whirling to the past, I’m pinned; always pinned, then back to the present as each horrible moment plays across the screen.
What happened to the girls? Did the guys find them, save them? Or is that why they brought this man back here? To interrogate him. Punish him.
A dark part of me hopes they do. An even darker part of me wants to join them.
Clarity hits me like a bolt of lightning.
What am I doing? I’ve been refusing to take their deal to get back at the guys for what they did to me, but in reality, I’m not helping anyone, not myself, and especially not the girls on the screen.
But what if I can help them? If all Cerberus wants me to do is answer their questions, if they truly think I might have any knowledge that could help end this fucking suffering, then fuck, I’ll do it. I’ll do anything.
The thought triggers me into action, and I step into the room, voice steady and sure. “I’m in.”
Three sets of eyes whirl to me.
Akio turns the monitor away, not wanting me to see the horror. He’s too late, and by the sorrowful look in his eyes, he knows it is too. “You shouldn’t have had to see that.”
I shake my head. “No. I shouldn’t have. But I did, and I’m glad because…
I want to help. I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to accept the deal, but if the conditions stand, I’m in.
I’ll help you.” I gesture to the screen.
“And do whatever I can to save people like them. In return, Cerberus helps me and then I can go back to my life.”
Akio is nodding before I finish speaking. “Yes. Deal.”
“Wait.” Matteo shoves to his feet and stalks over to me, eyes simmering with darkness and a hint of the monster beneath the flesh.
“If you do this, you’re agreeing to be a hundred percent honest with us.
You’re going to see things, hear things.
Fucked up things. Things that will haunt you and stay with you for life.
Revelations that will turn your whole perfect world upside down. ”
I grit my teeth. “My world is far from perfect, but thanks for the concern. It’s not needed. I can handle whatever happens.”
Matteo lifts a brow, but it’s Declan that speaks up, curling around Matteo with an arm flung over his shoulder. “You willing to prove it then?”
“Prove that I can handle what Cerberus is capable of? I think I’ve already seen enough when you had me locked downstairs.”
Declan laughs low and deep, sending chills down my spine. “That was nothing, Poison.”
Akio steps up to Matteo’s other side, all three towering over me now, just like they had that night in the club. My heart beats wildly, and it suddenly feels like I’m on the edge of a cliff. If I take one step forward, that’s it. There’s no going back.
I lift my chin, looking them each in the eye. “Show me your worst.”
They do. Down in the basement, in one of the cement rooms, screams split the air as the guys tear the man from the videos into literal pieces with bloody tools and their bare hands.
He confesses to everything. Who he purchased the women and drugs from – a name, I told the guys I honestly didn’t recognize.
How many women he bought and then violated.
Seventeen. He hurt seventeen innocent women.
I don’t look away as the guys do their worst, mutilating his body until he’s hardly recognizable.
When he screams that he’s a father, a brother, a husband, I push my sympathy down deep, locking it away.
He doesn’t deserve it. He definitely didn’t show any mercy for those girls.
Any family he has is probably better off with him dead.
When they’re done, and he’s nothing but a bloodied corpse with missing hands, Akio staples a note and the evidence of his crimes in the middle of his forehead for when they haul him away to be found later.
Then the three men – Cerberus, because that’s who they are at this moment – look back at me, gauging my reaction.
It was hard, I’ll admit, watching it all.
At several points during the torture, I went to the trash can and vomited up my dinner.
But I didn’t leave, I’m not broken, and I’m not rocking in the corner wishing I hadn’t been here to see him brought to justice.
This man deserved what he got. If anything, I regret not getting a few good punches in myself on behalf of his victims.
Declan steps forward, his shirtless chest wet with blood. He tilts my chin up with his forefinger, so that I’m looking at him. He assesses me for a moment, then must approve of what he finds because his full lips split into a dangerous smile that makes me weak in the knees. “Let’s drink.”
A quick shower later, I’m outside, breathing in the cool night air with a full glass of wine in hand.
Akio, hair slightly damp from his own shower, places a blanket over me before he takes his seat across the firepit from me.
The heat warms our souls back to life after what the four of us shared downstairs.
“Well?” I say, breaking the silence. “Did I prove myself?”
Akio kicks his feet back and folds his hands behind his head, exposing those fucking ridiculous biceps. This IT guy has some major muscle hiding beneath those clothes. “Hell yeah you did.”
“I admit, you managed better than I thought you would.” Matteo tips his beer at me before taking a swig.
“Now, about our end of the deal. We won’t help you with whatever it is you need from us until after we see some progress with nailing those who are in charge of the trafficking operations in Axton Harbor. ” He narrows his gaze on me. “Got it?”
I purse my lips but nod my agreement. I’ll have to trust that they uphold their end of the bargain just as they will have to trust that I’m being honest with them when they ask me questions.