Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
ANDIE
You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. After being knocked out again, I come to, chained to the ceiling with my arms over my head and my toes barely able to touch the floor beneath me. Now I’m severely pissed. At least my clothes are still on, so I take that as a win. I’m in the same room being kept company by Rita’s corpse, her eyes clouded over with death and her body lying at an odd angle on the floor in front of me. I wish I could conjure up even a morsel of sympathy for her, but it doesn’t come. She was stupid to think that she could make deals with the likes of Julio or Alejandro and come out of it unscathed. Men like them aren’t honorable.
I tilt my head back as far as I can and look up at where the chains are connected to the ceiling. The finger Alejandro broke throbs and has swollen up like a fat purple and blue sausage. I won’t be able to bend it, so making a fist or even using that hand properly is a big nope. The chains rattle and clang together like wind chimes when I give them a testing tug. If they aren’t bolted into a cross beam or other support structure, there may be a chance that I can dislodge them from their tether.
Using a move I learned on the salmon ladder, this really cool contraption where you hang from a bar and try to jump it up rung by rung, I arch my spine and swing my legs back, then coil my core tight and lift my body in the air. I let all my weight pull me back down with a jolt, and the resulting force shakes the chains and causes a rain of plaster dust to fall down like snow upon my head. My mood brightens when I see cracks in the ceiling around the chain mount. Unfortunately, what I did was loud, so I’m not surprised when the door to the room opens and some guy wearing a wife-beater, his jet-black hair slicked back into a low ponytail, comes in to investigate.
I let my body relax and hang, giving him a brilliant smile in greeting.
“Hi. I’m Andie. Is there any chance you’d unlock the cuffs on these chains so I can go to the bathroom?”
He places his hand on the gun strapped at his side and comes closer. I’m hit with the overpowering smell of booze and weed wafting off his clothes and skin. If he’s drunk and high, I can work with that to my advantage.
“Um… cuarto de ba?o ?” I ask, trying to remember how to say bathroom in Spanish. That’s another thing I’m going to put on my if-I-make-it-out-of-here-alive list. I’m finally going to get Rafe to teach me the language. It shouldn’t be too hard to convince him to talk dirty to me in Spanish while he fucks me. Best idea ever.
Taking another step forward, the dark-haired man stops when he sees Rita. He bends down over her body and starts tearing off her jewelry and pocketing it. Well, that’s disrespectful as hell.
“Hey! Try to focus. Bathroom!” I say to him, and his attention snaps back to me. I don’t like the look in his eyes when they scan over my body.
He says something, but of course, I don’t comprehend the meaning. Licking his cracked lips, he comes another step closer. I try not to react when his hand grabs my tit and squeezes. I know exactly where this is headed, but I won’t give the slimy fucker an opportunity to finish. I quickly draw my legs up and crash my knees together, hoping they crush the sides of his head at his temples. The head has a weak point in that area that the hard skull doesn’t protect. Hitting the temple just right can cause the underlying middle meningeal artery to rupture. If untreated, it will lead to death because the blood has nowhere to flow but into the brain.
When he stumbles back, stunned, I wrap my legs around his neck and push my right knee as hard as I can against the side of his head at the ear. The celery-crack of sound lets me know I just broke the vertebrae in his neck and severed his spine. His eyes are still open and wide when his body collapses to the floor in a heap at my feet.
I look over at the door. No one has come in to investigate the noises I’m sure that little stunt made. Not letting that particular gift horse go to waste, I start hopping my body to pull on the chain. Surely, Alejandro or another of his men must hear the racket I’m creating. But still, no one comes. It takes twenty attempts, but finally, the bolt comes loose from the ceiling and the chains fall, as do I. I’m able to duck out of the way before I’m hit over the head, but I’m not fast enough to get completely clear, and the heavy metal links bounce off my left shoulder and arm, creating a bloom of pain in their wake when my shoulder dislocates. Fucking great. I’ll need to pop it back into place first. Once I do that, I can get the guy’s gun and use it to, hopefully, shoot off the cuffs that bind me to the chains without also shooting my hand or having a ricochet bullet hit me.
My legs are numb from dangling for a long period of time, and I have no choice but to crawl across the floor until I can pull myself up on the doorframe. I’ve seen movies where this works, so I cinch my eyes closed, lock my jaw, and whack my shoulder as hard as I can against the frame of the door.
Teeth dig into my bottom lip to stop myself from screaming because, holy shit , that hurt. But somehow, it worked. Thank you, Lethal Weapon . I poke my head out to see if anyone is coming. Not a soul in sight. No noises. Nothing. Where is everyone? Surely, Alejandro didn’t leave me with just one man standing guard.
I stumble over to the dead guy and take his gun. Feeling along the calf of my right leg, I’m still surprised to find Jax’s knife there. If only I could find Keane’s rings just as easily. I can’t take the chance of searching the place for them. My priority needs to be to escape as quickly as possible. At least now I have two weapons.
Making quick work of removing the cuffs, I hold the gun in my right hand since my left hand is out of commission, and quietly sneak my way out of the room. I can’t tell where I am or what type of building it is. It’s too dark. Keeping the gun trained in front of me, I slide my back against the wall to help keep me upright as I walk, my reserves of strength depleting swiftly. I haven’t had anything to eat or drink for days, and the lack of food is showing with how sluggish I’m beginning to feel. But that’s the great thing about adrenaline. It provides you with energy when you need it. I tap into that, letting my anger and need for revenge fuel me.
When I get to the end of the hallway, there’s a set of stairs and the thumping of music coming from up above. It sounds like club music. My mind instantly goes to the first night I met Liam, but I shake off the memory. I need to concentrate on the present and finding a way out of here. Getting up the stairs is going to be painful in the state I’m in, but what other choice do I have?
I reach the fourth step and stop. It’s the dance music playing that has me thinking of the security camera image of Rita meeting with Julio in the back alleyway of Spanks. No fucking way. Have I been right under everyone’s noses the entire time? I move more quickly up the stairs toward the door that will hopefully allow me freedom.
Just as I reach for the handle, the door swings wide open, and I don’t even hesitate. I fire my gun. The music drowns out the shot of the pistol. A man with gang symbols tattooed on his face, much like the ones Alejandro had, tumbles past me down the stairs, almost taking me with him. Shit. I need to move. Usually at times like this, Kellan would appear and tell me to pick my ass up and run or fight. Ever since our conversation at Rafe’s bedside, my brother’s ghost has been quiet. I wonder what that means.
As the ringing in my ears fades from the almost point-blank gunshot, the heavy bass of the music assails me, causing my head to pound along with it. Just another reminder that I probably have a concussion or two.
I carry the gun tight to my side, and I navigate down another hallway and out into the throngs of dancing people and flashing lights. It’s so loud and packed, no one should notice me or the state I’m in because I know I have to look like death warmed over and smell just as pleasant. Quickly slipping past the busy bar and into the back kitchen, I duck my head and angle straight for the exit where deliveries are brought in. If I’m lucky, the door doesn’t have an alarm that’ll be tripped when I open it. If it does, I’ll just have to run like hell.
As soon as the night air hits me, I breathe it in. And then I take off.
I don’t understand why the guys haven’t found me yet; why Declan didn’t realize I was being held captive practically right down the damn street from him. Tessa and Jax should’ve been able to locate me within hours. I’m left with thinking, what the hell?
Getting out of the club was too fucking easy. Things like that just don’t happen. There has to be a reason why Alejandro wasn’t there and only left a skeleton crew of two to watch over me. When I get to the end of the alleyway, I tuck the gun in the waistband of my pants at my back and pull down my tattered, soiled shirt as best I can to help cover it. The sidewalk I come to opens up onto 42 nd Street. I’m about twenty blocks from Falcon Tower, a little over a mile, give or take. If going at full sprint, I could run that distance in about seven minutes. However, I know it’ll take me longer than that. I’m already dizzy and feeling the crash that happens once your adrenaline comes down.
I make it one block before a light drizzle begins to fall. Why does this keep happening to me? At least it’s not a thunderstorm or a deluge like when I was stuck in the pit. The soft mist coats me as I walk at a fast clip. Old blood and sweat trickle down my face to my lips, the taste of it nasty and making my stomach roil. Once I get back to Declan’s, I’m going to take a very long bath, and then get Tessa to redo my nails, before falling into a sleep coma for the next week.
I’m thankful when no one I pass looks at me twice. That’s one of the perks of living in a large city. Nobody cares about you. You are just one in the four million other people who live here. Most everyone out at this time of night are, more often than not, coming home from a bar, drunk, homeless, a cop, or a municipal worker who got stuck with the night shift.
After twenty-five long fucking minutes, I finally reach the block for Falcon Tower.
Home.