Diamond Desire

Chapter Two, The Day Of The Crash

There was a red haired stripper dancing on my boyfriend’s lap and as much as I wanted to throttle her for touching what was mine, I couldn’t bring myself to move. Technically, she was an ex-stripper. Even more technically, she was my boyfriend’s girlfriend, so had every right to touch him when he wanted her to. Worse; I enjoyed watching her dance on him. She was fucking beautiful, and all those years of her previous employment had given her a hell of a lot of skills at making even the hardiest of men crumble.

All those combined made it awfully hard for me to do anything other than sit in a velvet navy armchair, pouting and smoking a Cuban cigar and watching the pair of them, as I waited for one of my most trusted Red Diamonds gangsters to call me back with important information that I was far too impatient to sit around for, for much longer.

I had to get out of the hotel before I did something utterly stupid.

Something that I knew I would never do under normal circumstances.

Blowing smoke out between my lips, I forced my face into a snarl that I did not mean.

“We gotta go.” Snapping, I got to my feet, disposing of my cigar in the crystal ashtray on the side table. “We need to let Sapphire know we’re back and fill her in on what we found so this bullshit can wait till later.”

Raya always overdid her hotel rooms with opulence in the most obscure places. Like there were solid gold spoons in the drawer in the kitchen, as though rich people had to stir their tea with them. Sure, I had used it once. But it grossed me out, and the coffee had tasted worse than usual. Not that I would have said anything in complaint. Seeing as she had let me rent out her penthouse suite indefinitely, despite not charging me a penny for it even when I had insisted on paying, it seemed polite to keep my mouth shut about the things I found ridiculous.

I’d have transferred her the money, but Raya would have sent it right back and I wasn’t in the mood for long-winded games with a woman who didn’t fear pissing me off in the slightest.

“Right now?” Aiden had his large hands on Ruby’s waist, holding her still and stopping their game of pretending to not notice me in the room.

It made me want to shoot him, but I never would. I liked him too much to want him dead. Plus, if I pulled a gun, I wasn’t entirely sure he wouldn’t get one out faster, and then I would die for nothing but pettiness. And sure, if he was my actual enemy, then I wouldn’t mind petty games that lead to my death. But seeing as he was my boyfriend, and I cared about him being alive, I would restrain myself.

For now, anyway. If I had to spend another night listening to him and Ruby fucking, I wasn’t entirely sure how much longer I would last without being forced into action.

“Yeah. We have to go now.” My jaw ticked as I glared at Aiden, daring him to push me when he knew full well I was in a pissed off mood.

So what if I was cock blocking him? It wasn’t like he didn’t deserve it for how loud he’d made Ruby scream the night before, and it made me feel the slightest bit childishly satisfied. It had not been a fun night for me having to listen to their tryst, and I was fairly sure the sounds she’d yelled out were burned into my eardrums, echoing around my mind and tormenting me even when I was asleep.

Not that I slept much lately. Not since Ruby had come into my life.

If someone cut me open and bared my soul, they were going to be rather shocked to find claw marks in the shape of her wickedly sharp nails that had been etched into me without mercy. I could practically taste the bitterness of the frustration in the surrounding air, the lingering residue of their passion doing its best to suffocate me and remind me why I never bothered trying to like people, women especially.

Ruby had already started worming her way into my head and no amount of drinking or ignorance about my feelings seemed able to kick her out. The only trouble was, I knew it would come to bite me in the ass soon enough. The tension in my body was palpable, every muscle coiled like a spring ready to snap. Though I knew on the one hand that I hated Ruby for being a woman, the other part of me ignored all of that. It blocked out the trauma and my decades of pain and concentrated on the single, stomach churning and sickening fact that had been forming a pit in my stomach for far too long.

I fucking liked her. I liked Ruby. And even though every fiber of my being rebelled against her, against the unfairness of having my walls crashed into and ruined, I couldn’t seem to stop myself. It didn’t matter how resolute I was in my thoughts. The things she was bringing up inside my brain were unyielding, fueled by a fire that burned hotter with each passing second and no amount of wishful thinking or ignorance on my behalf would put it out.

For now, though, I would keep pretending. And part of that was making sure I didn’t have to keep suffering and being led astray by the sexual tension in the room that I was sure would vanish soon enough when I resolved my dilemma and reminded myself that I was too set in my ways to think stupid things about people.

“Fine.” Aiden sighed and stood up, bringing Ruby with him as he stretched out his long limbs, and I pretended not to notice the large bulge in his tight blue jeans, that was far too hard considering we were about to go outside.

Ruby squealed in surprise and wrapped her legs around his waist, making her short emerald pleated skirt rise high enough I could see her thick ass cheeks. More importantly, I could see the brand new tattoo she seemed to have gained in the last handful of days we had been in Diamond Grove before returning to Vegas.

“Nice tramp stamp.” I muttered.

As Aiden walked the pair of them to the front door, my glare narrowed in on the bright red lip print that had been inked into Ruby’s pale skin. It looked like a man’s kiss, not a woman’s, and I wondered if I was imagining things or she’d let a guy kiss her ass for a tatt. Then I wondered just how much I could torture a stranger for if he had indeed kissed her there.

Just friendly, unbothered, work colleague things, ya’ know.

“Thanks, sugar.” The second she was on her feet, she grinned at me – a feral sort of grin that had a lot of teeth and malice behind it. “You want one? Could make your ink less borin’ and let you pretend to have an actual personality beyond grumpy teenage boy whose mommy asked him to stop playin’ games and go to bed.”

As I walked toward the front door, I clicked my tongue, pretending not to want to laugh even though I was annoyed. “I have more tattoos than you.”

“But yours suck. Mine are fun and show off my personality. Yours are such man tatts.” She grabbed a pair of glittery silver hooker heels from the shoe rack by the door, shoving her feet into them and standing tall with a practiced confidence. “You literally have a clock and roses on your arm; it’s the sign of a guy being a huge douche.”

Snorting, I grabbed an extra gun from the sleek marble sideboard next to her, slotting it into the back of my pants before I handed Ruby her cropped denim jacket she had bedazzled her name on the back of, like a toddler who needed reminding what clothes were hers.

I pointed to our boyfriend. “Aiden has roses too.”

“Aiden doesn’t act like a bitch, though, so it’s different.” She winked at him as she shimmied into her jacket and took a second to check out her reflection in the large oval mirror.

Before I could respond, the man in question opened the door, ushering us both out with a roll of his eyes.

“Save it for later, children. We have stuff to do.” His deep voice grumbled.

As much as I wanted to continue bickering, he was right. So within twenty minutes we were fed – thanks to a burger drive-thru on the way – not bickering, and in my car, heading towards Sapphire’s house. She had texted earlier to let me know she was going out again for one of her many missions, but she ought to have been home by the time I made it there.

I wasn’t worried about her or anything else in the world. At least I wasn’t until my phone went off when I was about five minutes away from the long road that led to Sapphire’s driveway. It rang twice before I hit accept. The thick Russian coming through the car’s speakers a moment later, from one of the few ex-Bratva people I actually trusted, made my car journey a little less droll.

“Boss – bad news and good news.”

My fingers tapped against the wheel. “Go on, Kiril. Good news first.”

“The girl you asked me to look into — Yeva – I found her family.” Kiril was straight to the point; one of the things I liked about him, even if he was older than Sapphire by a handful of months and I didn’t make a habit of enjoying the company of what I considered children.

“And?” It wasn’t like I had tasked him with finding the poor stolen girl’s parents for a friendly chat. I had simply been outsourcing the job Sapphire had on her list of tasks as a way to help out. I’d only given it to Kiril on account of not wanting to travel to Russia in the middle of all the stressful things going down with Sapphire.

I may not have been the father she deserved, or even the uncle she needed, but I would do my best to take as much of the burdens off her plates that I could find a way to handle. And this was just one of the many pieces of the game she played that I had offered to make a move on.

“And you were right; her father is the man you thought he was, and he made a name for himself with the money given for her.”

Kiril confirming the thoughts I had when discovering Yeva’s surname wasn’t fun in the slightest, but I was glad to know that some of her demons had been dealt with, even if it was only a drop in the bucket that was her trauma. I would find a way to help her with the rest, though. She was a Montana now and I would do right by her, and all the others, who held my surname even if they were women.

I would step up and be the kind of man Ford had been – a man that Sapphire deserved to have in her life.

I wouldn’t mess up again. Not for anything.

“Fuck.”I clicked my blinker on with a bit too much attitude. “I thought I recognized her surname. Are you definitely sure it’s him?”

“Yeah I am. He was a prominent player in the skin trade and drugs; mainly PCP, but he had his fingers in everything, and it all kicked off right around the time he got his debts absolved and a few hundred grand in the bank. At the same time, his almost eight-year-old daughter allegedly died in an accidental drowning that never recovered her body. I know you dealt weapons and things with him, but he had a lot of businesses you didn’t know about, and I found more than enough to confirm he was Yeva’s father, and that he was a run-of-the-mill piece of shit gangster.”

The fact Yeva’s father was a waste of oxygen didn’t shock me; I had known the man for a handful of years as a necessary evil because of his arms dealing connections. But to know how he had acted in his secret dealings and with his child - and that he had been happy selling her - pissed me off far more than it should have. No father in their right mind would ever have done such a thing to their little girl, and the fact I had put money in his hands after such a despicable act only enraged me more.

I felt partially responsible for Yeva’s fate, even if I had minimal to do with it, and just like with Ruby, I was channeling my misplaced guilt and issues on to people I actually had a chance of helping.

“Had?”I pushed past my annoyance and clocked onto the tense Kiril had used. “But also, that makes her eighteen, not seventeen. She was off by a year. Not that I can blame her for not knowing specifics. So the passports and things I asked you to get, I’m going to need her date of birth changing on there.”

I wouldn’t have been able to remember my birthday if I had spent years living Yeva’s life.

I wouldn’t have wanted to remember anything.

“He’s dead.”Kiril replied. “Not me though – his second executed him the second I brought up Yeva and showed proof of her being alive. Not entirely sure why, but I didn’t care to question it when the guy asked to speak to Sapphire directly. I figured it was above my paygrade and so I’m calling you.”

Kiril hadn’t been with the Red Diamonds long. In fact, he hadn’t even stepped foot in America yet, let alone met Sapphire or had time to get his ink. But despite that, I had known the kid for years – his father and grandfather too – and despite the evil in his bloodline; he was a decent man and was already proving himself a worthy soldier.

I was almost annoyed with myself for waiting so many years before asking him to kill his father to prove his loyalty to the Red Diamonds and, by default, me. But I should have known that just because I had my personal beef with the Bratva from my hometown, and those I unfortunately shared a scrap of blood with, didn’t mean they were all bad. Occasionally, I had a cousin of some kind, like Kiril, who wasn’t a complete waste of precious resources.

Plus, I had freed him from a horrific life and, by default, that made him more loyal to me and the Red Diamonds than anyone else. He had been in hell and I had saved him – I could trust him based on that alone when I knew how much it meant to him.

“Do I know the second?” I asked, as the car slowed down at a set of traffic lights and my car companions made out on the backseat, clearly with nothing better to do with their time than act like horny teenagers because they were bored and liked to piss me off.

Not that anyone kissing Ruby pissed me off. I didn’t care what she did with her lips. The plump ones coated in lipstick that was just the right shade of red that would look pretty wrapped around –

Nowhere. Because I didn’t fucking like her like that. At all.

“Not to my knowledge, boss. But I’m bringing him back with me and he had a boyfriend who seemed invested too. They’re both in my car as we speak, and I’m happy to either take them out or bring them. Up to you.”

“Both?” My brows rose, a little surprised how the idea of Kiril handling two Bratva men with ease even if I knew how skilled he was. “But sure, bring them here – they can speak to Sapphire, and she can decide what to do with them.”

“You worried about me?” Kiril almost laughed as I heard him unlock a car.

I scoffed, but a smile tugged at my lips at his confidence. “Never. But what about the bad news?” I’d almost forgotten he had more than one thing to tell me.

It wasn’t my fault, though. I had been stressed and half-drunk for months on end and my mind was a tangled web of darkness and emotions I wasn’t functional enough to handle. My brain needed a good nap for a few hours or something before it gave up working entirely.

Kiril cleared his throat. “Kalvin Mercer is a rat like you thought. He was caught on camera meeting with John O’Malley last night and it was friendly. Or at least I watched them shake hands and not instantly shoot each other, so I presume it’s as friendly as they can get.”

Just like that, all manner of mild humor vanished, replaced by the stone cold realisation that though I had been right, I wished I hadn’t.

The Jackals hadn’t been turned completely.

They were working with John and the Vice Kings — something I had always been worried about long before today.

“Fuck.” The moment I cursed, Aiden stopped messing around, and both he and Ruby paid strict attention to me, even if she didn’t understand a word I said. “Do you have a last known location for either?”

“Both of them went off the map about an hour after they left each other, and I’ve just sent Aiden their last known location. But I found something more recent that might be of interest.”Kiril paused a moment, clicking at something in the background as his car turned on. “Mercer’s son landed at the Harry Reid International Airport about three hours ago. He met a team of hired mercenaries about ten miles out from the Gomez’s clubhouse and then he went dark about an hour ago. I would have told you earlier, but I only just got the messages – the signal down here is terrible.”

My spine stiffened as a pit of dread opened in my stomach.

“Shit, he’s here? Why?” I frowned as all sorts of dangerous ideas ran through my brain and I desperately tried to figure out what was happening and what I could do about it from my car, too far away from my Diamond.

If she needed me right now and I wasn’t there for her again, I might as well take a gun to my head and pull the trigger. It would be the least I deserved for failing her.

“Looks like a kidnapping or a hit or something. I found pictures of some girl in the mercenary request – I’ve sent them over to Aiden now.”Kiril said.

Aiden’s phone beeped, and he opened it, instantly spinning it around to show me the screen. A pretty blonde teenager stared up at me, grinning ear to ear as her big blue eyes sparkled with mischief. The same sort of mischief I had seen more than once in the last few weeks as she lived in Sapphire’s house and had fast become her friend.

“Fuck, that’s Henley.”I cursed and crushed my foot harder on the gas, wishing more than anything I had a way to teleport exactly where I needed to be. “I’ve gotta call Diamond – meet me at hers ASAP and bring the gangster punks with you. But don’t turn your back on them even once; they might have come willingly, but it could still be a trap.”

“Yes, sir.”Kiril barked.

The phone cut out, and I instantly hit dial on Sapphire’s borrowed phone number as I got Aiden and Ruby to ring her guys too, not wanting to miss them. My logic was where one was, the rest wouldn’t be far behind so it would be easy enough to reach one before anything happened during the last few minutes of my drive to Sapphire’s home.

Before it was too late for Henley, or whoever got between her and James fucking Mercer. The aggravating little cunt I couldn’t wait to sink a knife into.

Multiple times.

Luckily, Sapphire picked up. “Tío?” She almost snapped at me.

“Diamond-” Before I could utter a single sentence, my presumed luck changed.

There was a loud, smashing sound and a scream that terrified me to my core. A scream that burned itself into my eardrums, leaving an imprint behind that would never be removed.

A second later the sounds of glass breaking, men yelling, and something far too dangerous on the breeze echoed through the car speaker and all ideas of being calm and rational emptied out of my head, replaced with nothing but stone cold terror.

“Sapphire?!” I shouted her name more than once but there was nothing – nothing but more screams and the sounds of metal bending and breaking.

The unmistakable noises of a car crashing – the people inside being hurt.

Then the worst of all things.

Silence.Silence, then the phone cutting off.

“Find her now.” I all but snarled at Aiden as I floored the gas, shooting through red lights and a stop sign without a care.

Before I could glance back, he was already pulling his laptop out of the backpack on the ground, loading up his tracking software for me and didn’t need asking to do more. The tracking wasn’t needed though. Barely a few moments later there was an explosion loud enough to make Ruby flinch from just around the corner, right before a van sped past us, narrowly avoiding collision.

“What the fuck?” I muttered more to myself than anything as I raced around the bends, channelling my inner Lincoln even if I was nowhere near as talented.

It did the job, though. We got there almost in time.

Almost.

As my car skidded to a stop a moment later, right beside a mess of cars and blood and fear, Angel was one his feet and a little shaky. He was helping a barely conscious Widow out of his car, as he yelled down his phone, to what I hoped was backup or an ambulance or something.

Widow was covered in blood. I couldn’t see Kellan anywhere. Angel had what looked like a bullet hole in his shirt and there was… there was blood on the ground. Lots and lots of blood and gore and horrifying pieces of a person that I begged any God above or below didn’t belong to my girl.

Angel’s head snapped up when he saw me, his dark purple streaked hair a mess of debris and blood like everything else, and I barely had my door open an inch before he yelled.

“The guys are in that van!”He pointed back the way I came. “Sapphire’s already gone, but her men were taken separately, and Raya is coming to help us, so go!”

Even though every fiber of my being begged me to find my girl I couldn’t do it. I didn’t even hesitate to slam my door shut and spin the car around, heading back the way I came from on a rescue mission I knew I couldn’t mess up.

Though the van had a minute or two head start, the road was straight and clear – I was hitting the fucking top speed limit of my car within seconds, easily catching up. There was more chance of pigs flying than me letting my girl down by allowing the people she loved to be stolen away by some jackass punk I could kill with my eyes shut and no fucking hands.

“Give Ruby a gun.” I snapped, as I watched the van continue down the cracked road ahead of me, the driver speeding but nowhere near enough for him to get as far away as he needed to be to avoid his fate.

Their vans might have been expensive and far faster than normal ones, but I was in a better car –driving better. I had more to lose than they did, and it was delightfully easy for me to show that with my plan. It took no time at all for me to get close enough that I had a chance for what was either going to be a daring rescue or another fucking crash.

“Hold on tight.” I barked, mostly at Ruby seeing as she was a little more delicate than Aiden, as I hit the gas harder, getting right to the side of the van before I span my car around, breaks screeching and dirt flying.

Not a single ounce of me dared to breathe.

I was entirely focused on saving the people I knew Sapphire could not live without.

In a stroke of luck I had been desperate for, I hit the front of the van hard enough to send it off the road and – luckily – into a thick tree that bordered the edge of the sidewalk and not some random family home. The front crumpled on impact with a sickening screech, smoke appearing within seconds, and a large, wayward branch shattered the windscreen.

It was pretty good, for the start of a rescue, if I could say so myself. I hadn’t killed myself or my passengers, at least.

“Shoot anyone we don’t know!” I ordered my companions as my Montana urges kicked in and I shoved aside all thoughts of anything but violence and began to work on stage two of my plan.

With the lack of movement from the driver, I had to presume they were dead or unconscious, and I couldn’t complain at that. Both were perfectly good options.

I barely registered Ruby or Aiden hopping out of the car with me, weapons drawn. All I could concentrate on was running to the back of the door, shooting off the lock with a single snap of my trigger, and yanking it open wide. A single glance inside was enough for me to let out a breath of relief, thanking the universe that I hadn’t messed up again.

They were all there; my Diamonds men. On the ground thanks to the crash, but not dead, even if they were a little worse for wear and nearly all of them had the weirdest looking collars around their necks that had tiny packets of explosives attached…

At least four of them were there. One tall, dark, and stupidly gun talented man was missing.

“Where’s Kody?” I barked, as I helped Logan to his feet, and Aiden and Ruby did the same for the others until they were all out of the van and on safer ground.

Price instantly started wobbling on his feet when he spotted the blood splashed over everyone’s clothes and I watched him visibly shudder and close his tear-stained eyes, needing a second to take in deep breaths.

“Dead.” Lincoln said, his voice devoid of all emotion as he grabbed his brother, looking him over and paying close attention to the gaping wound on the poor kid’s forehead that streamed blood down his face at the same speed his tears were falling. “Same as dad.”

“What?” The words shot out of my mouth like a bullet and the bundle of panic in me exploded into an inferno of grief and pain. “What the fuck happened?”

Lincoln explained about the crash, and John, and the fucked up games that had been played. I could barely stomach listening to it and the longer he went on, as Aiden hurried to the trunk of my car to remove my bag of tools and to hand Ruby a medical kit, the more enraged I became.

Fuck.

Malone shouldn’t have died. He should have lived for another few decades, just to make Sapphire happy and so she didn’t lose another father figure in her life.

Malone deserved to be there to watch his sons grow up even more and live their fucking lives – either marry or have kids, if they were interested in those things. Or just travel the world, start a business, or do anything at all they wanted to do.

He had none of that now.

The people who loved him had him there for none of it either, and nothing would ever be the same again.

“John didn’t take Sapphire himself?” I double checked the facts, the gun in my hand tapping against my thigh, desperate to be used as I did.

It was a shame the driver of the van and his companion hadn’t come out to fight us. I would have loved to kill them – perhaps beaten them with my hands just to let out the slightest bit of rage inside of me. It would have been cathartic.

“No.” Lincoln ran a hand over his tanned face, harshly wiping away his tears as he took some medical supplies from Ruby and let her help him clean up a silently sobbing Misha. “I tried to help her, but I couldn’t do shit before John came and pulled a gun on me.” He motioned to his shoulder, that was slowly bleeding and, on a closer look, with a bullet hole in it… Not that Lincoln seemed bothered. “But I saw the stalker – at least I saw it was a masked woman who took Sapphire and got a general build which is better than nothing.” He said.

“You sure?” I asked, as Aiden handed Logan the toolkit, and the kid instantly searched for what he wanted to disarm the collars, regardless of how badly he was crying too.

Despite not knowing that much about medical care, I knew enough to treat a bullet wound and took some supplies from Ruby, using it to patch Lincoln up as best as I could until we could get him to a proper doctor. The wound didn’t look so bad – it was a through and through shot, minimal bleeding, and nowhere that would impact anything important.

Still, it would have hurt like a bitch.

“Positive. It was definitely a woman.” Lincoln replied. “She was even wearing this floral perfume – I can still smell it and I swear I’ve smelled it before.”

As much as I hated my Diamond being taken, least of all by a psychopathic stalker, there was one silver lining to who had snatched her away from us.

“That’s better than it being John.” I said, head nodding as I forced myself to remain calm and not let the anger or panic take hold just yet.

“How’d you figure?” Price croaked, as he shrugged off Ruby’s medical care the moment she’d stopped his bleeding arm, and grabbed Misha’s hand, holding on tight and keeping him close the minute Lincoln was finished playing doctor.

“John would have her raped, tortured and dead within the hour.” I spat, hands clenching. “The stalker won’t. She’s wanted Sapphire and will have every intention of keeping her alive for a while, at least. Which gives us more time to find her.”

Despite everyone around me shocked at the stalker being a woman, I wasn’t anything but glad we were finally narrowing down our suspects.

Women were vile creatures – I had known it for years.

They had the capacity in their soul for such twisted violence just as much as men did.

“You think they won’t torture her?” Misha whimpered as he broke his silence with a rough voice and shaky words. “Do you think she won’t be hurt?”

Hurt? Yeah. I thought Sapphire would be hurt. But to the same levels of physical pain that John O’Malley would inflict?

I replied, “No. I think the stalker will do more mental things to her than physical. Which is shitty either way, but we can fix mental a fuck ton easier than we can fix dead. So long as Sapphire plays along with the whole Maggie thing for a while, she won’t be killed yet.”

I trusted my girl to do just that. Not just because she was smart enough to figure shit out, but because all of those ridiculous podcasts she enjoyed had instilled a deep knowledge of bullshit crimes and crazy people in her mind. Sapphire would know her best bet was to play along – she would know exactly how to keep herself safe and what her options were to have the best chance of survival.

Just as I finished speaking, the van door creaked open, a masked up driver stumbling out, much to my surprise. I saw his hand reaching for the gun on his hip and my lips parted in warning, knowing that my presumption of the gangsters deaths was yet another foolish thing I had done lately.

My hand rose to shoot, just as two gunshots went off from right behind me. Spinning on my feet, I readied myself to thank what I presumed was Aiden for his help in saving me a bullet wound, only to find it wasn’t him holding the gun. It was a feisty red haired woman who was grinning ear to ear. Who clearly had been paying attention to all the shooting lessons Aiden had been ordered to give her over the last few weeks.

“You’re welcome, sugar.” Ruby leaned over and patted my arm, the most condescending tone in her voice. “Consider us even now.”

Lips parted, jaw a little slack, I tried to force the sight of her with a gun in her hands out of my head — tried to push away the fact she had just killed someone to help me…

“Thanks.” I muttered, after I swallowed the lump in my throat. “I’ll buy you dinner to show my gratitude, darlin’” I mimicked her accent again as she laughed at me.

And though I turned back to the task at hand - the bomb collars around the guys necks that needed removing, before John realized they weren’t in the van heading his way and he detonated them for fun just like the guys had said he’d done to Malone. I couldn’t help but replay Ruby’s laughter like a stuck record in my brain.

“Who knows how to work with bombs?” I asked.

Right as I finished my sentence, Logan moved to the car mirror, some tools already in his hand.

“I need ten minutes. Nobody fucking speaks to me or moves – I can do this so long as you don’t interrupt me.” He snapped, far more vicious a tone than I had ever heard him have before.

It was ridiculous, but I liked that he started with his own collar on the off chance he fucked up and triggered the bomb. Though I knew Sapphire would never have dared be with a man that wasn’t a good person at his core, it was still nice to be shown proof that she had made smart choices. It was even more ridiculous and nice that Logan somehow figured out how to unlatch it and deactivate it within a handful of tense minutes that had me a little in awe. He was oddly talented with bombs for a man who had never really used them before, beyond our time ruining the docks and casino. If he ever gave up being a mechanic, I would have loved to have him help me with future explosive fun.

“Fuck.” Logan ran a hand over his dark face the second he was sure his collar was dealt with, and it dropped to the ground with a click. “Whose next then?”

It was no surprise Price was pushed forward and that Lincoln insisted on going last. As much as I hated continuously complimenting men who were far too involved with my daughter, I had to admit I was glad she had them and that they were truly good people. Too good for the likes of John O’Malley to be dealing his bullshit out with, like taking away their father.

A pang of grief I refused to feel yet shot through my chest as my phone rang, an unknown number on the screen. Normally I wouldn’t have answered it, but I had a bad feeling so threw caution to the wind. With a wave of my hand, I shushed the group and they hurried their asses into the backseat of my car, Misha having to sit on Price so we could all fit, and left me and my people outside for a moment.

Not that Ruby was my anything. She was just… there.

“What?” I hissed into the phone.

“Now, now, Beau, that’s not how you’re supposed to greet your elders, is it?” John O’Malley’s voice made the flames of my temper burn brighter as I silently put the call on speaker.

“What the fuck do you want?” I snarled, hand shaking with the urge to smash my phone into pieces on the ground just so I didn’t have to listen to him.

“I wanted to show you something — something fun.” He snickered a laugh as my phone beeped twice. “Now I gotta go; there’s shit that needs doin’ and some toys I’m waiting to arrive. But you enjoy that little movie, won’t you? It’s one of many I have staring your pretty little daughter.” He laughed harder. “You reckon I could get her to call me daddy soon enough? Her ma is my woman, after all.”

There was no hesitation in my mind about how John’s future would play out. He was dead. And regardless of how many years it took me, I would find a way to hurt him far more than he had ever hurt Sapphire, and I would enjoy it fiercely.

“I’m going to fucking kill you, old man.” I promised. “I’m going to wipe out your entire bloodline and-”

John interrupted me. “No you won’t, lad. That little Montana whore won’t let you.”

“She’d help.” I didn’t bother defending Sapphire properly – I knew she wasn’t a whore, and I also knew she didn’t give a fuck if John called her one.

She just wanted him tortured and dead. That was it. And that was what I would do my best to do.

Slowly. Painfully.

John only laughed louder. “Doubt that. But even if she did, it would be worth it to know how it broke her heart when she learned the truth about all the nasty things we’ve done to her.” He hung up without another word and I fought the urge to hurtle my phone against the side of the van and instead clicked on the link he’d sent me, only to find myself far worse as I did.

The video wasn’t long, only ten seconds. But it consisted of Sapphire, tied unconscious to a chair, in an unknown room, as a hooded figured nearby set up a bucket, cloth, and hose that I instantly figured out the use for. I’d never been waterboarded myself, but I knew it was horrible, and I also knew my Diamond had nightmares about it already.

I also knew she would survive it – she’d survived as a child. There was nothing she wouldn’t beat now.

“Trace where it’s coming from. It can’t be that far away if she’s already there.” My voice cracked as I handed Aiden my phone, refusing to do anything more.

As my knees shook and I almost collapsed onto the ground, the undeniable crushing sense of uselessness almost broke me. I wasn’t an affectionate man. People touching me had long been a trigger and truthfully, aside from Sapphire and Aiden, everyone else made me trigger happy when they lay their hands on my skin. Women especially. But when Ruby placed her hand on my cheek, her thumb gently wiping away the tears of fear and anger I hadn’t known I was shedding, I didn’t flinch or shove her away.

I didn’t do anything but let her comfort me and promise all sorts of things she could never see through.

“We’ll get her back.” She whispered as she stared at me, her big green eyes filled with nothing but promises I hoped were never proven wrong. “Sapphire’s gonna be fine; she’s a strong woman and you and I both know she won’t break.”

I let Ruby wrap her arms around me. I let her hug me – and not for the first time either.

And I didn’t hate it.

“She shouldn’t have to survive.” My voice was quiet against Ruby’s shoulder. “She should just be happy, and I can never seem to make her that way. She’s always in one danger or another.”

Ruby squeezed me tighter. “And one day she will. When this is all over, she will get a happy endin’. You’re goin’ to make sure of that. Right now, you just need to be confident and calm. We’re goin’ to find her, and everythin’ will be fine.”

As much as I would have loved to believe Ruby, I couldn’t. Purely because I had already failed. Like I had said, my daughter shouldn’t have had to survive her life. She shouldn’t have had to fight every fucking day just to breathe, and the fact she did meant I had failed. I had not done my duty as her father – as her family. I had let her down, time and time again, and now it was even worse because there was no returning from it.

As much as it pained me, I couldn’t raise the dead. I couldn’t bring back the men she loved, like Kody or Malone. Or even fucking Ford.

I couldn’t even save her, no matter how hard I wanted to.