Chapter 23
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
GRANITE
Something wasn’t right. I could smell it in the air as we stood outside the garage.
Warning crawled all over my skin, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was about to go wrong.
I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but it just didn’t feel right.
The last time warning knocked on my skull like this was the night my dad died.
“Yo,” I turned to Ink, who was packing out the ammo, “Neon back yet?’
“No. Don’t think so.
“When did she leave?”
He glanced at his wristwatch. “About forty minutes ago.”
I looked over at the empty space where her motorcycle would stand. She didn’t ride a Harley like the rest of us. She had a pitch-black Ducati Monster. She called a Harley “the old fucker’s ride to hell.”
“Call her. See where she’s at.” I lit a cigarette. If it wasn’t for the run, I’d have a fucking beer right now.
Dutch stepped in next to me. “We should get the girl in the van.”
With a simple nod, I gave him instruction to go get Alyx. These wheels were rolling on the fucking hour, whether Neon was here or not.
As Dutch rushed off to get Alyx, Ink came back looking as pale as a fucking ghost, and I knew. I fucking knew this was why my motherfucking skin crawled with warning.
“What’s going on?”
He held the phone out to me, his eyes dark and doleful. “It’s Neon’s phone. One of the prospects found it outside the front door. Granite, Neon never goes anywhere without her phone.”
Just as I took the phone from him, the video caller rang. My gut twisted into a thousand tiny motherfucking knots.
Biting my lip, I slid my finger across the screen. And true as fuck, Slither’s ugly motherfucking face appeared.
“Hello, Granite.” His split tongue lapped over his lips. “It’s a fine day today, isn’t it?”
“What the fuck are you doing, Slither?”
“Just making conversation. I have to say, your huge-ass face looks tiny on this screen. Much less…intimidating.”
A heaviness crashed down on my chest, my body wracked with chills. “Don’t fuck with me. Where is Neon?”
“Oh, she’s here. Hold on.” The screen image went vivid as he moved. “There she is.”
On the picture was Neon, gagged, naked, and hanging upside down from the motherfucking roof, blood dripping down her arms.
I stumbled back, the phone shaking in my hand. “I swear to fucking God, I will cut your dick off and shove it down your throat, you motherfucker!”
Slither laughed, full-on hysterical laughter that was meant to mock me, then turned the camera back on himself. “Now, now. No need for such violence. You knew when you started this shit it would become messy.”
“Let her go.”
“No.”
“Slither—”
“You think those two prospects you killed the other night were the only two pairs of eyes I had on you?”
Anger surged, and I grabbed the first thing I could find—a wrench—and threw it across the room, the clanging sound as it hit the wall resonating through the garage. “Don’t fuck with me, Slither. You let her fucking go, right now!”
He brought the camera closer to his face, eyes narrowed. “You chose to fuck with me the day you mind-fucked my newest prospects into thinking kidnapping the PC’s daughter was actually a good idea. Well done, by the way, getting my guys to do your fucking dirty work.”
I bit my tongue. Did he really think I was that stupid? The call was most likely being recorded, so there was not a chance in hell I’d fall in that trap by confessing.
“I told you, we don’t have the girl.” Clenching my jaw, I tried my fucking best to sound confident in my own lie, but the image of Neon hurt was fucking with my head.
“You see, Granite, I call bullshit. One of my scouts saw your blue-haired pixie shopping for clothes that would…well, fit a ballerina. Do you have a ballerina in your midst?”
This guy knew exactly which fucking buttons to push. “Motherfucker, how many times do I have to tell you we don’t have the fucking girl?”
“I don’t believe you. Now, the deal is simple. Let the girl go home. That’s it. I don’t want her. Just let her go home to her loving family, confess this kidnapping sham was all the Kings’ doing, and I’d let your little blue-haired pixie go.”
“There’s just one problem with that, you sick fuck. We don’t have the girl!” I shouted into the receiver while kicking my boot against the fucking wall. “And if you’re so fucking convinced we have her, why not go to the PC yourself?”
Slither snorted. “I’m not stupid. You and I both know I can’t do that without evidence.”
“Exactly what I thought. You got nothing.”
“But you got something, don’t you Granite? A pretty ballerina.”
“I. Don’t. Have. Her.” I gritted out between clenched teeth.
“Liar. Let’s see if this will get the truth out of you.”
A scream ripped through the receiver. “Neon! Jesus Christ.”
Ink cursed, pulling his hands through his hair while we listened to her scream.
The sound was scraping against my bones, penetrating every goddamn vein in my body.
The intense pain and horror coming from her screeching cries was agonizing, and if I was a man with a heart, I’d probably feel the burn of tears.
“Stop, Slither. Stop, motherfucker! What are you doing to her?”
“Oh,” he faked a look of surprise, “here, let me show you.” The camera moved before it zoomed in on a finger laying in a pool of blood on the ground. A sudden coldness hit at my core, a flush of adrenaline burning a hole in my stomach. I was too fucking shocked to say anything.
“Now,” the camera moved back to his ugly motherfucking face, “that’s the first digit she lost. She has nine more. Catch my drift?”
Wiping my sweaty palm down my face, all I tasted was horrid, sour bile.
“By the way, Granite. Have you fucked the blue-haired pixie before? If you did, you’d know how fucking soft her skin is.” I heard him inhale deep. “Oh, and she smells like jasmine—all fresh and fuckable. Do you think she likes it up the ass?”
“You sick motherfucker, if you don’t let her go right now—”
“What then, huh? What the fuck are you going to do about it? You have an hour to get the girl home, otherwise your pixie girl will have a very unfortunate encounter with a snake.”
I bared my teeth, flexing my arm and finger muscles, ready to gut this motherfucker from nose to navel when we were face to face again.
“You listen to me, Slither. And you listen good. If you hurt another hair on her head, I will hunt you down, and I will skin you alive, cut you up, and feed you to the fucking fish.”
Another scream ripped through the phone speaker, and it ate through my skin, slicing its way to my heart.
“Whoops.” Slither laughed. “There goes another finger. Guess now we’re down to eight.”
“Mother—”
“An hour, Granite. You have a fucking hour.”
He hung up, the screen nothing but black. I couldn’t stop staring at it, my mind unable to process what the fuck I just saw.
Ink cursed then screamed as if he had the hounds of hell mauling him, tearing the flesh from his bones.
Glass shattered, steel clattered, and Ink’s cries ripped through his chest like a thousand demons, the echo of pain resounding from his roars.
Slither was torturing Neon, killing her slowly, and there was nothing we could do about it.
The one woman my father asked me to protect, and I couldn’t do it.
I was just about to crush the phone into pieces when a message alert chimed. My heart sank to the soles of my feet, and dread churned in the pit of my stomach. That message chime was like the fucking church bells before a funeral—foreboding and ominous.
I stopped breathing when I waited for the message to open. And when it did, my fear was confirmed.
“Jesus Christ.”
“What is it?” Ink grabbed the phone from my hand. I didn’t want him to see it, but my reflexes were delayed as shock still zapped through my system.
Neon wasn’t hanging upside down anymore. Still bound by her ankles, her upper body had been hoisted up, a giant hook pierced through the skin of her back. Her face…oh God, her face. It was…it was horrifying.
Ink stumbled back as he looked at the picture, falling flat on his ass. His jaw clenched, nostrils flaring and eyes protruding as anger started to set in.
“Jesus Christ. Neon,” he muttered, her name nothing but a soft sound from his lips.
I watched as the phone slipped from his grasp, the veins in his arms bulging, and tears slipping down his face.
I’d known the man for years, but I had never seen him shed a tear.
It was one of the most heartbreaking things I ever had to see.
The strong, big-mouthed man-whore tearing apart at the seams.
Dear God, this was not part of the plan. This was not how shit was supposed to go down. We were losing control over this war, and it had hardly fucking begun.
“We have to take Alyx home,” Ink gritted between clenched teeth.
I sat on a crate in the corner. “You know we can’t.”
“Why the fuck not?”
My eyes met his, and I knew he knew why we couldn’t let Alyx go. It was no more an option than getting Neon back was a guarantee.
My throat felt like a desert as I tried to swallow. Words escaped me, my lungs numb and unable to expand.
“Motherfucker!” Ink lost his shit, jumped up, and with one violent sweep, he knocked every tool that was on the table next to him to the ground. “What the fuck? She has nothing to do with this, man. How…why the fuck did he—Jesus, Granite. What the fuck do we do now?”
Weaving my fingers through my hair, pulling at the roots, I tried to focus, as I couldn’t fucking think straight. “He made it clear, man. If we don’t take Alyx back home within the hour and publicly take responsibility for her kidnapping…he kills Neon.”
“No!” Both Ink and I turned and looked at Alyx standing next to Dutch, eyes wide and face white. “What is going on?”
“Jesus. Dutch, get her out of here!” I yelled.
“No!” She yanked away from him and stormed toward me. “Where is Neon?”
“Dutch!” I called out, needing her gone. She couldn’t be here. Not now.
“Granite!” she yelled with fire in her eyes. “Tell me what the hell is going on.”