25
Logan
“Ijust can’t fucking do this.”
I dial Everest’s number for the thousandth time.
I’m sitting in the back of the car; Damien is driving and Seraphina is beside him.
We had to make a few pit stops to get rid of any evidence linking Lia to the bazooka attack.
It’s a little more complicated to do here than back in the United States, because we don’t have the same kind of friends in this country.
But one connection led to another, and with Damien’s help and a full day of work, I’m pretty confident that Lia won’t be bothered.
Then we had to make another stop at police headquarters, where the bazooka had been entered as evidence.
I don’t know why Lia is so intent on getting it back, but what my baby wants, she gets.
I’m not sure what she can possibly achieve with an empty bazooka, but if I’ve learned anything lately, it’s that I need to stop underestimating her.
I’ll let her have it, but I’ll make sure she’s nicely tied up and secured in her cage first.
Now, I wait impatiently for my call to go through. The results of the DNA test must be back by now.
“It doesn’t even matter, though,” I groan. “I know it’s her. I shouldn’t have listened to you, Seraphina. Damien is right; I’m only setting myself up for more pain.”
Seraphina opens her mouth to protest, but just then, Everest answers.
“Yeah?”
“ Fucking hell, man! You couldn’t have picked up earlier?”
“Well, I’m here now. What is it?”
“What do you mean, what is it? Why the hell do you think I’m calling you?”
“Yeah, yeah. Take it easy, bro. I’m still waiting. They said it would take a few more minutes.”
“Goddammit.” I sink back in my seat, the short wait feeling interminable.
“Got it!” says Everest at last. I hear the rustling of paper. “The results say the baby was female.”
“Right.”
“Maybe a month or so in age…”
“Yeah.” I close my eyes, each bit of information seeming to confirm the worst.
“They got a match in the database. A girl named Jane…”
“Fuck!”
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Seraphina’s eyes widen, and she reaches out a shy hand to pat my arm. I know it’s not her fault, but I hate her right now. Her, Damien, Everest. Everyone. But above all, myself.
It’s my fault. Everything is my fault. I’m the one who abandoned Lia, who allowed our daughter to be taken from her, and who’s keeping her in a cage now, treating her like she’s less than human.
“Let him finish talking,” says Damien from the front seat. “Maybe...”
“Maybe what?” I groan. “You were right, Damien. It’s useless. Everything’s useless. There’s nothing but pain for me in this life.”
“Damn, you’re dramatic,” comes Everest’s voice from the other end of the line. “Wait till I finish, man.”
“What else could there be?” I growl. “Her name is Jane, she was one month old when she died, and she’s buried under Devil College. I need to make my peace with it, and focus on Lia.”
“Okay, well, it’s just that I’m looking at the DNA results…”
“Yeah. We know.”
“I mean, the match they found was for another Jane. A girl whose DNA matched a different couple named Peter and Mia Solaro. It didn’t match Lia’s DNA or yours, Logan.”
I freeze, trying to wrap my head around his words. My voice seems to come from far away as I slowly ask, “Does that mean... does that mean my daughter’s alive?”
_
“Don’t get too hopeful, man.”
“I’m not. I’m not hopeful at all.”
It’s a lie, and Damien knows it, but he merely shrugs as he parks the car in front of the apartment building. Then I grab the bazooka from the trunk.
“I’m gonna go get Lia,” I say.
“Don’t open the cage,” he warns me. “She’s not fixed. She’s still a murderous head case.”
“Shut up.” I don’t know what I’ll do, but the thought of leaving my girl in that cage any longer with a collar around her neck, chained like some animal, makes my heart hurt.
I don’t know what’s wrong with me. One moment, I want to keep her in there for the rest of her life, the thought of her suffering making me hard.
The next minute, knowing she’s in there devastates me.
She does that to me. She sends me into a turmoil of pain and anguish and desire, and it feels like I’m suffocating whenever I’m with her. But when I’m not with her, I’m drowning just the same.
I still haven’t made up my mind by the time I’ve reached my bedroom, but my key is out. The one that opens the larger entrance, because whether she’s getting out or I’m getting in, all I can think is that I need her in my arms now, or I’ll go crazy.
It takes a full minute of staring for my mind to comprehend that the cage has been opened. No, not opened. Its bars have been sawed clean off.
“Oh, fuck. Damien!”
My voice comes out far too high-pitched. The door opens, and both Damien and Seraphina walk through.
“She left.” Seraphina’s breathy voice reaches me, her words making the situation final.
“Your girl might be a bad-ass, Logan,” comments Damien, “but I doubt even she could have sawed those bars off from inside her cage, when there isn’t a saw in this whole apartment. Someone took her.”
I groan, sinking down on the bed, before sitting up abruptly. “I’ll look at the feed.”
Damien snorts. “Did you really install a camera in here, you sick bastard?”
“You’re one to talk,” I hiss, “with the cameras you set up around Seraphina’s apartment when you had her locked up…”
It’s clearly not news to her, but she reddens all the same.
“It was an apartment, not a cage. Yeah, I liked watching her. I still do. It’s a whole new level of fucked-up to film your girl after you’ve locked her stark-naked in a cage.”
“I think the cage is fucked-up enough already,” mumbles Seraphina.
“I mean, the cage is a normal level of fucked-up.” Damien sits on a chair in the corner of the room, drawing Seraphina onto his thighs. “The camera thing takes it to a new level, though.”
Clenching my jaw so I don’t punch him, I grab the card from the small camera I had set up near the ceiling so that it pointed straight at her.
It was enjoyable, watching the feed today during my downtime.
Though I didn’t see her eat much, if at all.
And she looked depressed. Still, she was naked and in my cage, and even though the image made my heart squeeze with an indecipherable mix of emotions, my cock only felt one thing.
Damien yawns. “You probably won’t find anything. If whoever it is knew enough to realize he’d need to bring a saw, then he must have known about the camera too.”
“Right.” I still plug my reader into my computer, looking through one file after another, turning away from Damien. He’s back to being the asshole from high school, laughing at Lia’s pain, because in his mind she’s responsible for mine.
I guess she is, in a way, but I’m also responsible for hers. I need to find her and fix her. I promised her I would. And his joking around isn’t helping matters.
“She’s probably fucking a bazooka as we spea—”
He interrupts himself as I face him, not even taking the time to pause the video as the current file I’m on plays.
I grab his collar, shoving his back against a wall, ignoring Seraphina’s gasp of surprise.
I haven’t raised a hand to him in years, but he deserves it.
He really fucking deserves it. Right now, I’m so angry I could kill him.
“Oops,” he half-apologizes. “I’ll shut my mouth.”
“Too late,” I hiss. “Too fucking late.”
I slam him against the wall again, my blood boiling. I have no idea what I’ll do. We’ve both discovered over the years that we have it in us to kill the other, but it would take a lot. I don’t think I’ve reached that level of anger. I close my hand into a fist, drawing it back, and…
“Who’s that?” says Seraphina suddenly.
Reluctantly, I loosen my hold on him and turn back around. What I see is so surprising that my anger is wiped clean from my mind.
At first, I can’t make out the figure on the screen very well. He’s wearing a leather jacket and distressed jeans, and he’s facing Lia, his back to the camera.
He’s busy doing something—sawing the bars, I realize. And Lia’s crouched in a corner, still naked, looking up at him with a neutral expression.
I shouldn’t have left her naked. I should have dressed her. Fuck!
The minute the bars are cut through, he reaches into the cage, grabbing her wrist. She doesn’t put up much of a fight as he pulls her up. The next moment, he turns back around, and there’s no doubt about it, when I see the jet-black mask on his face. He belongs to the Puicin Gang.
I wonder if she knew he wasn’t me. I wonder if she even remembered who I am.
I swallow painfully.
But my dark thoughts are forgotten when the masked man glances up at the camera, and… nods.
“Well, that answers our question,” mutters Damien from across the room. “He knew about the camera. He just didn’t care.”
I glare at him, and he raises his arms in apology.
“It looks like he was taunting you,” says Seraphina thoughtfully.
“Yeah. I guess.” I sigh, sitting down heavily. “Now what? Now fucking what?”
“Well, now you find her,” says Damien.
I’m back to wanting to punch him. “Yeah? And how do you suggest I do that?”
Damien shrugs. “Well, he didn’t leave all that long ago. I bet we could follow him.”
“I highly doubt he’s stupid enough to allow...” I interrupt myself. “No, he doesn’t care, does he? Seraphina’s right, he was taunting us, nodding up at the camera like that. It’s not about stupidity, it’s about...”
“Balls,” concludes Damien. “Yeah. He clearly doesn’t take us seriously.
I bet he thinks his gang could take us. And maybe they could.
” He scowls. “They seem to think Devil isn’t as much of a force to be reckoned with as it was in the old days.
And with all our enemies joining them, it looks like our day of comeuppance is nigh. ”
Even in my anxious state, I can’t help but roll my eyes at his melodramatic tone. “Shut up. And even if they really are the powerful fuckers you’re making them out to be, I could take on the whole gang if it meant saving Lia.”
He sighs. “Fine. But I’ll go with you, and I’ll kill any motherfucker who tries to lay a hand on you.”
“I’ll come too.” Seraphina stands up and tries to go to the kitchen, but Damien holds her back.
“Ah, fuck. I forgot about this one. No kitchen knives for you, pet.”
“Damien, I can take care of myself!”
“Uh huh.” He rubs his eyes. “I need to get you a babysitter. But where can I find one on such short notice? Too bad about that cage, Logan. It would’ve done the trick.”
“It didn’t protect Lia, clearly,” I mutter.
“Yeah, well, I’m a little better at taking care of my girl than you are. Anyway, I guess I’ll have to take her along. But you have to promise me you’ll behave, okay, darling?”
She rolls her eyes.
“Okay, darling?” he repeats, punctuating his question with a hard smack on her ass.
“Okay, okay, fine! Whatever!”
“What happened to my submissive baby, hmm?” he murmurs, kissing her. “You’re getting to be a real brat, aren’t you? Logan, your girl is a bad influence.”
I shrug. I really should hate him for the way he talks about Lia. Anyone else would be dead. But at the end of the day, I know I can count on him.
Besides, I have more urgent shit to deal with, right now.
“Alright.” I clench my jaw and head to the door. “Let’s fucking go.”