Chapter 22 Lincoln
Avideo call jolted me out of my sleep. I checked the clock next to the bed, 3:30 AM. The number was unknown. I sat up and swiped to accept the call. I said nothing, but waited for it to connect.
When the screen became clear, I could see her. The phone was directly at her face, but she wasn’t holding it. I could see her arms were above her head. She was crying. I could see the tears streaming down her exhausted face.
“Laynie, where are you? I’m looking for you, baby. Tell me where you are.” My voice woke J.C. and Charlie instantly. They both leapt from the bed and huddled behind me, but out of view of the camera. As much as I wanted to tell Laynie we found Charlie, it would put Charlie in danger. I saw Charlie’s hand go to her mouth when she laid eyes on her best friend.
“Screen record!” J.C. yelled, but in a whisper.
I swiped up to hit the screen record button. J.C. was always thinking two steps ahead.
“Linc…” her voice was raspy and low. “Listen to me, you have to s-stop l-looking for m-m-me.”
I knew he was making her say this.
“S-stop it or they will make it worse for me. They will come after J.C., you h-have to stop.”
“Laynie, where are you?”
“Linc, listen, let me go. Just let me go, please.” She started sobbing and sucking in air.
I couldn’t let her go. She was fucking crazy.
The camera moved from her face to her hands above her head. Blood was dripping from them. Her entire hand was bloody. Jesus fucking Christ. I heard Charlie and J.C. gasp when they saw.
The phone panned backwards, and I was staring at Alek. Motherfucker.
“Take her warning Lincoln. I ripped off 4 of her fingernails today because she refused to tell me about that sweet little sister of yours, but eventually she cracked. They all do. If you don’t take this warning seriously, it will be your sister on the other end of this call. Forget about Alayna, she is trash. She is just another dumb whore. Don’t risk you family for her. She’s not worth it.”
“You motherfu-” the call dropped.
Charlie screamed from behind me and fell to the floor. J.C. bent down to comfort her. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. He was ripping her fucking fingernails off one by one because of fucking me. What the fuck had I done?
I began pacing around the room, trying to think of what to do. She was with Alek right now, in a basement. It looked like a basement to a house. I could see the wall dimension behind her and it wasn’t big. Any basement in a warehouse would be larger and have more depth. I needed to go back to the screen recording, but when I looked up, J.C. and Charlie already had my phone connected to J.C.’s computer. They brought up the video on a screen. It was hard to watch again, but they were zooming past Laynie looking for any identifiers in the video that would give us a sign of where she may be.
“Stop at the hot water heater, when the camera pans to Alek,” Charlie instructed.
There was a hot water heater about 2 feet from Laynie in the basement’s corner.
“Zoom in,” Charlie said.
I watched J.C. use some tools on the computer to not only zoom in, but make the image crystal clear. She was working methodically and quickly.
“Johnson’s Appliance Repair. Says installed on February 3rd 2021. Shit, that was a year ago.”
Charlie pulled out a laptop from her bag and worked next to J.C. “So we all need to do is find out which houses they delivered to on that day. Hopefully, they keep good records. It’s pretty much all we have to go on right now, but it’s a fucking good lead.”
“It says they open at 7am. That’s 3 hours from now. So we just have to wait.”
I sat on the edge of the bed, watching over them. They watched the video again and again, looking for any other leads. “I’m going for a walk. I’ll be back.”
They both turned around to look at me.
“Is that a good idea, Linc? I don’t think we should leave each other alone right now,” J.C. stated.
“I’m not going far, I have my phone.” I left the hotel room before they could argue anymore and stood in the front collecting myself. I needed to let some steam off. While scrolling through my phone, shaking with rage, I dialed Julie’s number.
“Hello?” her voice was groggy.
“I’m coming over,” I said and hung up the phone.
I entered the metro station and waited for the train to come. There were homeless people scattered around the edges of the station, most of them asleep. Some of them had their bodies hidden inside their jackets and belongings you could barely see them.
I arrived at Julie’s apartment and banged on the door. I waited a couple minutes before I heard the latch unlock.
She stood in front of me in a silk maroon robe and her blonde hair tossed back in a messy bun. “Are you okay?” Concern etched her face.
I didn’t answer, but pushed myself past her.
She closed the door behind me and turned around to find me standing close.
“I need you,” I said and kissed her lips. She accepted immediately and kissed me back.
I grabbed her by her throat and pushed her back onto the couch. She moaned as I wrapped my hand tighter around her throat, squeezing. She began tugging at my shirt, trying to get it off. I sat up and threw it off while reaching down and untying her robe. She was naked underneath. Seeing Julie’s body so perfect and whole made me think of Laynie and how she would never look like this again. She was damaged inside and out, yet I desired her, wished she was on this couch. But she could never accept my aggression in bed. It would always be a trigger for her. I would never hurt Julie, but we pushed the limits sometimes.
I began to kiss and pull on her nipple with my tongue. She moaned and screamed when I bit down. Repeating it over and over, I made her arch in the air for me. I stood up and took my pants off and Julie reached for my dick and started rubbing it back and forth. When her mouth found its way there, I threw my head back. I stood there while she sucked and licked. She rolled her tongue ring around the head of my dick and I moaned and reached to push her head down farther. When she started choking, I backed up. “Turn around,” I said.
Julie turned on her stomach while I slid a condom on. She had her ass in the air, exposed and ready for me to take it. I climbed behind her and entered her ass slowly. It was tight and clenching against my dick. Once I was fully inside, I rocked back and forth, slowly at first, until her hole loosened up for me. While I was rocking, I reached over her side and played with her pussy. Rubbing and moving my fingers over her clit. She cried out while I pounded harder into her ass. I felt her climax building. “Cum on my fingers, baby.”
We both released at the same time. My dick was twitching in her ass as we collapsed on the couch. We laid there for a second, catching our breath. I was the first to move, getting up and removing the cum filled condom. I tossed it in the trashcan in the kitchen and started getting dressed.
“You’re leaving already?” she asked, sounding disappointed.
“Yeah, I have a ton of shit going on right now.”
She laid her head back down, still on the couch.
I leaned down and kissed her. “Thank you,” I whispered and walked out the door.
I thought I would feel better after that, but I felt worse now. Although Laynie and I were not in a relationship, I still felt guilty, as if I was cheating on her. I had strong feelings for her, but I knew she would need years of therapy. Even those facts didn’t ease the guilt that weighed on my chest. What the fuck was I doing?
I walked back to the hotel instead of taking the train this time. When I finally made it back, it was 6:30, and the sun was coming out. I walked back into the hotel room and saw Charlie and J.C. still huddled around the computer.
“You’re a fucking idiot.” J.C. said as I entered the room.
“Why?” I asked, taking my jacket off.
“I saw your location.”
“When the fuck did you get my location and start following me?”
“Hmm, I don’t know. Maybe when some fucking psychopaths started chasing our asses because you have some kind of savior complex,”J.C. said.
“Fuck you J.C., what I do on my time has nothing to do with you.”
“Yeah, I’m just sitting here wondering how Laynie would feel thinking her boyfriend is out trying to save her while her fingers nails are being ripped off, when in fact, he’s out fucking his ex girlfriend.”
I peeked a glance at Charlie, who looked disgusted and had her fists balled tight.
“I don’t have the fucking energy for this and Laynie is not my fucking girlfriend.”
“Right,” J.C. said with sarcasm at the end of her tone.
“We are going to the repair shop.” J.C. stood up and Charlie followed.
I said nothing, but followed them out of the hotel. J.C. knew I wasn’t letting them go alone. She was just being a bitch.
* * *
We arrived at the repair shop and I let J.C. do the talking. She was good at convincing people of things. Me and Charlie held back but I could feel the tension between us since J.C. mentioned Julie. I know Charlie had Laynie’s best interest at heart, so I understood why she was mad. Hell, I was mad at myself, but I had to remind myself that the only promise I made to Laynie was that I would get her out, and that’s what I planned to do.
“Hi, so uh, I have kind of a weird question. I was wondering if we could give you a date from about a year ago and you could tell us what addresses you delivered a hot water heater to that day? I know it sounds random, but it’s really important in order to find a friend of ours.”
“Do you have a warrant?” he smirked.
I could already tell he wasn’t going to help us or be forthcoming. He looked like a creep with his enormous stomach hanging out over his pants and showing at the bottom of his shirt. I wondered for a moment if he was one of them. It would make sense if Alek kept the business within business.
“Well, we aren’t the cops, so no, we don’t. Maybe you could just help out of the goodness of your heart.” J.C. batted her eyelashes.
“No, and if you don’t have any need for my business, please leave.”
I strolled to the door and locked it.
“Hey! What are you doing?” he called out to me.
“We tried to go the nice route, but since you want to be a fucking asshole, I guess the hard way is how you like it.”
“I’m going to call the police,” he stammered while backing up.
Charlie yanked the phone cord from her desk and twisted it around in the air, mocking him. I knew I was going to like Charlie.
I hopped over the desk and held my knife to his throat. He squealed like a fat little pig.
J.C. hopped over the counter and started searching through his computer, and Charlie joined her.
“Okay, let’s start by scanning the network.”
Charlie pulled out a laptop from her bag. “Got it. Running a network scan now.”
“Looks like the server is running Windows Server 2016. We can try a brute-force attack on the port.”
“Okay, let me fire up Hydra and we’ll start cracking the password,” Charlie said.
I had no idea what the fuck they were talking about, but I knew they would figure it out.
“Got it. Just give me a few more minutes to crack this password… there we go. We’re in.” Charlie said, sounding just like J.C.
“Awesome. Let me see if I can find the database server… ah, here it is. Okay, let’s start copying the data we need. We don’t want to be here any longer than we have to.”
“Copying data now… okay, I’ve got what we need. Let’s get out of here before we get caught,” Charlie said, looking up at me.
“If you move, I’ll slice your neck from ear to ear, you fucking pig,” I threatened.
Sweat was beading at the top of his forehead. I held him there for 10 minutes, waiting for J.C. to hurry and pull the information out.
“Okay, I got it. Let’s get out of here,” J.C. said.
I was going to leave the pig alone, but then I started wondering if he had any connection to Alek and if this would alert him that we were looking for her. I couldn’t risk it so I slit his throat with one clean swipe. Charlie didn’t react, but J.C. gasped.
“Linc, oh my God, what the fuck are you doing?”
I ignored her and let his body flop to the floor as the blood sprayed out like a sprinkler.
“Let’s go out the back,” I said.
The three of us quickly fled out the back and walked in silence until we reached a safe distance where no one would suspect us.
“Who the fuck are you?” Charlie asked.
I didn’t respond.