Chapter 15 #4
The click from under the floor was louder this time, and the rug was pulled completely under the bookshelf. And then…nothing. We all looked around, not sure what it was that we were missing.
“That’s it?” the twins asked.
Reacher squatted forward, rubbing his hand on the wood paneling. “Maybe there’s another trigger. Something that opens a trapdoor in the floor?”
Tommy pressed on the lamp again, making it go forward and backward. Even turned the light switch on and off. The only thing he accomplished doing was making the rug move.
Then he cracked open the drawer of the end table, and the floor beneath Reacher’s feet shifted. The man dropped with it, his hands outstretched, knees bent, and an oh shit! expression on his face.
Carefully, Reacher stepped out from the middle of the room. Tommy opened the drawer the rest of the way, and we all watched as a section of the floor slid under the wood panels on the left. It revealed none other than a fucking concrete staircase.
“I hate this guy,” I muttered before charging forward.
Motion-sensor lights flicked on as I passed.
The others followed me down, with Spirit saying he’d stand guard up top.
The last thing we needed was for us to get trapped down here too.
Likely, there wasn’t a way to exit from underneath.
I wondered if the floor had some sort of soundproofing inside, so someone trapped couldn’t be heard up on the main floors.
At the bottom of the stairs, we found a hallway. One that looked very similar to the floors above. Like it was just another section of the house. There were marble busts and watercolor paints on the wallpapered walls. It looked…normal. Just like upstairs, there were several doors along the hall.
The door in the middle on the left opened up, and multiple weapons were raised until they saw who exited.
It was a woman. She was wearing a kimono, even though she was as white as Reaper.
She was young, maybe sixteen or seventeen.
And her head was down, her eyes cast on her traditional geta clogs.
“Mr. Dalton-Jones, sir, please, she needs a doctor. I cannot—” Then her eyes glanced up, she saw us standing before her, and screamed.
She ran back inside the room she’d come from and slammed the door closed.
Fuck! I bolted after her. The door, unsurprisingly, didn’t lock. Likely because Weatherby Dalton-Jones IV didn’t want his prisoners to find a way to keep him out.
I turned the knob and pushed on the door, and heard the sound of someone being thrown backwards. The same girl was sprawled back on the floor, like she’d been trying to use her own body weight to barricade the door.
She quickly shuffled to her feet, but instead of charging towards me, she rushed to the back corner of the room where a little girl, maybe four years old, had been playing with a doll on the floor. She scooped the girl up and used her body to protect the child.
From us.
I held my hands up, having no weapons in my hands. My knife was still sheathed on my thigh. “It’s okay. We’re not here to hurt you. We’re here for…”
My voice trailed off as I saw the other occupant in the room.
To my right, behind the door, was a small cot.
I realized then that this wasn’t just some room.
It was a bedroom for the little girl. There were pink teddy bears stenciled on the walls, a pink dresser, a little desk with paper and crayons, some more dolls, and a rocking chair.
The cot was made for a child, not an adult.
The woman who lay upon it had her feet hanging off the end, though that was the least of her problems. Bandages, cleaning supplies, and gauze lay on the floor beside the bed, one of the bottles open like it had been mid-use when we’d come down the stairs. Dried and wet blood was everywhere.
And laying there, her back flayed open to the point where I could see bone, was Nishi.
“Ae Akua,” came from behind me, though my brain wasn’t in any condition to figure out who said the low prayer.
“Tommy,” I snapped. The former soldier rushed forward. He had a small amount of medical supplies on him, but I didn’t need to be a doctor to know it wasn’t going to be enough.
“Stop!” the teenager shouted. “Don’t hurt her!”
I looked over my shoulder. Without words needing to be exchanged between us, Tangaloa stepped carefully into the room.
He’d holstered his gun and his hands were raised like mine had been.
He was talking softly to the teen, letting her know we were here to help and would not harm her, the little girl, or Nishi.
I turned my back on the room. Reacher and the twins stood just outside it. I looked to Reacher first. “Check the rest of these rooms. Make sure there are no other surprises.”
Reacher nodded once, “Yes, Prez.”
The twins, for once, had no smart ass comment for me as they waited for my orders. I had to mentally push aside everything but right now to get the words to come out of my mouth. “Find us something we can transport Mr. Dalton-Jones home in. Comfort is not required, neither are all his appendages.”
They nodded once, though I could tell they were confused about my order.
“Lu’s going to want her pound of flesh,” I explained. There was a tingling feeling beneath my skin when I thought of my wahine, but I ignored it.
The twins exchanged a look before heading back up the stairs.
I took a shaky breath before turning back around. Tangaloa was doing better at getting the teen to calm down. She wasn’t in such a defensive pose now, nor was she pressed all the way into the corner anymore.
I hated myself in this moment. Because there was a part of me that did not want to turn to my right, a part of me that wished we’d never found that fucking hidden latch, that wished we were leaving this house empty handed.
But we had and we weren’t, and I needed to turn to the right. I not only owed it to Lu, but also to Nishi.
As I neared, Tommy looked up. His eyes said what I already knew. No amount of medical intervention was going to save her now. Tommy leaned down and said something gentle to Nishi. I didn’t know if she was awake or coherent enough to hear it or understand it, but I appreciated his kindness.
Tommy stood, removing his latex gloves. He turned them inside out before sticking them in his pocket.
His face was remorseful as he approached me.
“I know what you’re thinking and you’re wrong, Paniolo.
This is old,” he said softly. “This didn’t just happen.
Even if we got here yesterday or even the day before, it couldn’t have changed anything. It’s infected, and badly.”
“How long?” I fucking hated hearing my voice crack. There was a piercing ringing in my ears.
“Minutes,” he answered solemnly. “I have enough morphine with me to… If you wanted me to…”
His offer was generous, but it wasn’t his place. It was mine. Wordlessly, I held out my hand. He quickly reached into his bag and pulled out a syringe and a bottle. He expertly filled it before recapping the needle and placing the clear plastic on my hand. My fingers closed around it automatically.
“We’ll give you a moment,” Tommy offered, and I nodded.
I heard voices behind me and then the shuffling of feet before the door was closed. I think it was the shock of seeing Nishi like this that kept me from noticing the smell in the room. I knew the acrid scent of death. It wasn’t new to me, but this time… It felt different. More potent.
I neared the bed. There was so much blood. I’d seen and done a lot in my years. I knew how much blood a human body could hold. And I knew how much it could lose. I did not doubt Tommy’s assessment of her condition.
Kneeling down, I pushed the useless supplies out of the way so I could be directly in front of her face.
The first time I met Nishi, I thought her an annoying idiot, Lu’s ridiculous friend.
The girl who believed there was still good in this world and that she could make it better.
I put up with a lot with Nishi and Lu those first few years Lu and I were together.
Nishi would bring over a hurt animal, wanting Lu’s help to nurse it back to health, and then I got home to find the girls trying to wrangle a loose seal in my house.
Then there were the times they were left stranded because Nishi never remembered to fill up her gas tank. Or they were at the beach, and Nishi buried their phones and wallets in the sand, and then forgot where she buried them.
I didn’t dislike Nishi, but I’d never been fond of her either.
When Lu had come back into my life two months ago and she’d confessed that Nishi had been pushing for Lu to contact me, to go back to me, I’d wondered if I’d misjudged her. Nishi was na?ve, there was no denying that, but deserving of this fate?
No, never.
This was cruel. I forced myself to look, needing to see.
I memorized every lash, every protruding bone, so I could replicate it later.
And it wasn’t just her back, though that was the most prominent.
Her wrists were raw, clearly from chains with thick manacles.
She was naked, and there was so much blood on her back and over her buttocks that I couldn’t tell if all of it came from there.
But I didn’t need to ask or look to know she’d been raped. Repeatedly.
I gently smoothed her greasy and bloody hair out of her face. “Nishi,” I coaxed softly. “Ho’oponopono…” The phrase didn’t seem to mean enough in these circumstances. Asking for her forgiveness and saying I was sorry while promising to make this right seemed too infinitesimal now.
Her almond eyes blinked open slowly. Her breathing was so soft, it didn’t even look like she was. The pain on her face was evident, but what broke my heart more than the knowledge of what I was about to do to Lu’s best friend, was the relief on her face at the sight of me.
Like I’d come to save her.
“Aloiki…” By all the gods, the woman actually smiled at me. “I knew you’d come.” Her voice was raspy. She didn’t even sound like her. “She found you.”
I nodded, finding it hard to breathe. “I actually found her, and I forced my ring back on her finger.”
Nishi looked like she wanted to laugh, but instead, there was a sudden increase of pain on her face. Her chin trembled, and if she’d been hydrated enough, there was no doubt in my mind tears would have been falling down her dirt-streaked cheeks. “I want to go home…”
I took her hand. “You will. I promised Lu I’d bring you home, ku?u hoaaloha.”
“I want to see the ocean again.”
I nodded. “I swear it. I’ll take you there myself.”
Her eyes were a little clouded now, unfocused, and I wondered if the morphine was even necessary. “And Lu… You’ll take care of her?”
“I got her, and our baby.”
“A baby,” she gasped, her lips trying to form a smile. “Poor Aloiki. I always said you’d make a great father.”
I couldn’t help the light chuckle that escaped my lips. I brought my head down to kiss her cold fingertips. “Nishi, I can help you. If you’re in pain…”
She closed her eyes, though I had to wonder what it was she could even see anymore. Slowly, she nodded.
I uncapped the syringe one handed. Tommy hadn’t said where to put it, but I figured I couldn’t go wrong with her arm. I tried to be as gentle as possible. She didn’t flinch as I inserted the needle, though the way her body loosened was almost immediate.
She opened her eyes once more to meet mine. “Mahalo.”
I tossed the syringe aside and leaned forward to kiss her forehead. “A hui hou, Nishi.” Until we meet again…
I stayed with her, not wanting that man’s touch to be the last she felt in her life. It was the least I could do.
Eventually, I’m not sure how long, I got up.
My fucking boots slipped a little in her blood as I journeyed over to the dresser.
I wasn’t entirely sure what I was looking for, but I knew I was not taking her home naked.
After searching through most of the drawers, I found a spare set of pink sheets.
One wasn’t large enough to wrap around her, so I used one to cover her head and another her body.
I didn’t know if it was better to hold her with her back facing up or down. Wasn’t even really sure it mattered, but carrying her upside down would be awkward for me and less dignified for her. I pulled my cut off and draped it over her abdomen.
We’d lost more than a friend today.
With Nishi in my arms, I made my way to the door and carefully opened it. The expressions on their faces were schooled, even Reacher who had no connection to Nishi.
“Can your club take care of the house?” I asked him.
Reacher nodded. “I’ll see it done myself.”
“Mahalo,” I replied softly. I looked to my men. “Jones?”
“Upstairs with the twins,” Tangaloa answered.
A spark lit in my gut, but I didn’t stoke it. Not yet anyway. I had a promise to keep first. “Good. Let’s bring our sister home.”