78. Mandy
MANDY
The room is exactly what I’d expect from an abandoned mill owned by a monster.
Concrete floor. Rusted pipes. One naked bulb overhead. A drain in the middle of the floor that I’m choosing not to think too hard about.
No windows.
One door.
And one very large asshole standing between me and it.
He’s apparently the designated torturer. Lucky me.
He’s also my tracking device, since he has—I hope—the comm I slipped into his pocket during the chaos at Ashford’s house.
Assuming it still works.
Assuming Hendricks is tracking it.
Assuming this guy doesn’t decide to go grab a fucking sandwich.
Shifting onto the hard plastic chair he shoved me into, I sigh. There are a lot of assumptions involved in my current survival strategy.
The first punch catches me by surprise.
I turn my head with it, taste blood, and look back at him. What—no foreplay? “That all you’ve got?”
His mouth tightens.
Excellent. Men are so easy.
He grabs my chin.
“Where’s Turner?”
I blink. Of all the questions I expected, that wasn’t one of them. I relax my hands against the urge to take him out—no, the idiot didn’t tie me up. “Which Turner?”
His fingers tighten. “Cole.”
“I figured. I just wanted to make sure there wasn’t another homicidal asshole running around Montana with the same last name.”
He hits me again.
Pain explodes along my cheekbone. I breathe through it. I’ve been hit harder. Granted, not recently. I’ve been trying to make healthier life choices.
He steps back, glaring at me. “Where is he?”
I shake my head. “I don’t know.”
“Bullshit.”
“Really? Because I thought it was a pretty straightforward sentence.”
His hand closes around the front of my shirt and yanks me forward.
I could put him on the floor. Take his knee.
Break his nose. Get the gun off his hip.
A few seconds and he’d be done. Apparently, they looked at me, saw tits and ass, and decided restraints were unnecessary.
Normally, I’d be offended. Right now, I’m grateful.
But then what? I haven’t spent years chasing monsters to run the second one finally drags me inside his house.
Ashford is the reason I’m here. Not this asshole—Ashford. I’ve been trying to get close enough to take him out. Now I’m practically on his lap.
So I don’t fight—not yet. I need to buy time for Hendricks and the boys to get here so I have a better chance of taking down Ashford.
Instead, I let this asshole push me back into the chair. If I can keep him talking, I might finally get what I came for. So for now, he stays on his feet.
Even if that means I have to let him hit me again.