92. Widow
Ninety-Two
Widow
Vesper came into my office after her rendezvous with Hades.
I still didn’t trust her, but she and Rory did.
A Devil and Viper didn’t mix, but arguing with Rory would be like arguing with a brick wall and Vesper was…
hell, I didn’t know what she was doing. She was teaming up with the enemy to find information on Cinder and her disappearance.
Melisa came in after her, and I straightened. I wasn’t expecting Melisa to be here. “What’s wrong?”
“Hades’s tech friend found something in Rory’s past. It’s not related to her, but there was another girl before her. The FBI was involved for her, but not for Rory.”
“How are they involved for one but not another?”
I looked at Melisa. “When the FBI came to me, they weren’t interested in Rory or what happened in Nevada. They wanted to know everything about Cinder, her dealings and what the Vipers did.”
“Do you remember the agent's name?”
“I’ll have to dig through my desk to find her card. It’s a Cajun name.”
My phone rang and it was Rory’s ringtone. “Phoenix?”
“What are you doing here?” I heard Rory ask.
“Rory?”
“I wanted to see you. You wouldn’t talk to me, so I had to see my princess again,” a man’s voice responded.
Shit.
I muted my phone. “We need to get to Rory’s tattoo shop. Now.”
After everything he did and the pain he caused, he better hope we didn’t catch him. I had plans. He would despise his life by the time I was finished with him.
There was a crashing sound, and it took everything in me not to call out to her, but if she wanted us to have the element of surprise, I needed to be quiet.
Fear radiated down my spine as I listened to Rory fight.
Rory was always fighting, and deserved to finally have a chance to breathe without someone trying to kill her.
The fifteen-minute ride to Misfit Ink felt like decades, but when we pulled up, there were several more officers.
There was shattered glass and blood droplets on the ground.
I darted into the shop, looking for Rory when she stumbled out from the back, clutching her forearm.
Rory looked pissed as Melisa and the officers scouted out the shop.
“Melisa, call a medic!” I yelled as I pulled my t-shirt off of my body.
Rory looked at my chest, her cheeks turning slightly more pink.
“None of that. Sit down, phoenix.” She grumbled but listened, sitting down in a chair Vesper pulled out.
I lifted the shirt to try and inspect her wound, but it was bleeding profusely.
Rory winced when I pulled the shirt tighter. “What happened?”
She shrugged. “I grabbed his mask, and he freaked out and bolted. I’m assuming it’s someone we know.”
“How did he get in?” Vesper asked. We all knew she was careful when she was alone in her shop.
She shrugged. “He knows everything else. He probably has a fuckin’ key.” She winced. “Fuck, this hurts.”
I tightened my grip on the shirt. “What happened?”
“I let Ariel out and locked the door. I started cleaning, but I was playing my middle-aged dad rock playlist, so I wasn’t focused on anything else,” she explained, shifting slightly.
“He turned off my speaker, and that’s when I called you.
I started asking him questions, but he said he wanted me to go with him willingly.
I told him to kick rocks. We fought. He grabbed me by my hair when he realized I wouldn’t go down without a fight.
I slammed us into a mirror, then the bastard used the glass to cut my arm. Fucker is just like Jude.”
I looked at her closely. Her eyes were puffy. “What else happened?”
She cringed. “I had a flashback when he was on top of me. I was distracted and he used it against me. He…I grabbed his mask when he tried to pull my pants down.”
My fists clenched. “I’m going to kill him.” I inspected Rory’s wound the best I could. “Rory, I think you need to go to the ER. I’m not a professional, but that’s a deep wound.”
“Give me my phone.” I handed her the iPhone that was thrown in a corner. She did something, and FaceTime started ringing.
“Hi bab—what the hell happened?” Hades's voice filled the room.
I grabbed her phone and looked at the woman. “She was attacked in her shop, she has a bad wound. I’m assuming she wants a doctor's opinion before she goes to the ER. Tell her to go before I pull her over my shoulder and force her.”
Vesper held the phone as I started removing the shirt. “Stop. That blood is arterial. Keep pressure on her cut. Don’t lift it up. She needs to get to the hospital ASAP.”
Rory grumbled, “Traitor.” She rested her head against my body. “I feel funny.”
“Melisa! Ambulance now.”
“Pulling up.” I seized her, securing her in my arms as I raced towards the county ambulance.
The medic and the EMT opened the back, pulling out the stretcher.
I placed Rory on it as the medic inspected her wound.
The medic spewed medical jargon that I didn’t understand.
Something about a radial artery and severe blood loss.
They loaded her up, and I told Vesper I was riding with her to the ER and to meet us there.
I held Rory’s hand as Hades talked to her on FaceTime.
Melisa was going to look at the security footage and see if there was any video of him with his face being seen.
How the hell did he manage to get into Briarwood without anyone noticing?
It was probably the same way he got to Cinder.
He was one step ahead of us, but hopefully we had something on scene that could help us find out who he was.
If Rory had additional scrapes and cuts other than the one on her arm, he had to be hurt, as well.
When we arrived at the hospital, Cher met us out front. Cher was devoted to helping people, but when it came to a fellow Viper, she would drop everything—unless she was in surgery—to come and check on them. Rory was a VIP with Cinder gone, and our job was still to protect her.
Rory smiled up at her. “Mon cheri,” she cooed.
“You need to stop seeing me bloody and out of it. Let's get you fixed up.”
Cher stopped me from going to the back with Rory.
I would have followed her and stayed with her through the entire thing, but Cher wouldn’t let me.
She might let us get away with things at the clubhouse, but the hospital was a different ballfield.
Cher said she would keep her safe, and if anything happened or if she had a panic attack, she would find us.
Vesper met me at the door. She had Rory’s phone and was still on FaceTime with Haven. “What did Cher say?”
“She’s gonna take care of her, but she said I couldn’t go back there.”
“I’m on my way there,” Haven said, gathering her things.
I looked at Vesper. Her lip twitched slightly, but she didn’t react. “You don’t have to come up here. Rory is alive.”
“Someone attacked my girl, so I am coming up there. I have a friend who can look at her security system and see if he can find anything.”
A Devil hacking into Viper property. I didn’t like it, but if it helped find the man who hurt Rory, I would suck it up for now. But if she betrayed us, I wouldn’t hesitate to kill her.