Chapter 35
Zayne
"I didn't get an assignment," I tell Bobby when the last of the guys walks out.
Bobby looks up from his computer, eyes landing on me.
There's no surprise in them. I'm exactly where he expects me to be.
"Close that door," he says, his tone no different from any other time he has spoken to me.
I walk in that direction, mind and body in battle yet again as I reach the door.
My head says everything is fine. We haven't been busted. Scott didn't open his fucking mouth about what he saw.
My body, on the other hand, fights me, urges me to haul ass out of this office and pray I can make it back to the cabin and shoot off a text to Casper so at least they can recover my body.
Experience tells me that this isn't the tight spot I'm trying to convince myself it is.
Remembering the terrified look on Sable's face when I walked her as far as men are allowed to go last night makes my decision for me.
The door closes softly, and in a split second, a pause too minimal to be caught, I demand that all aspects of my person get their shit together and see this through.
These women's lives are on the line, and if they can survive in that situation, then so can I.
Bobby smiles when I turn back to face him, as if he's proud of me, and since I only closed a fucking door, I let the eeriness that I made the wrong fucking choice settle inside of me.
"I've got your cousin out digging ditches," he says. "Grunt work is all he's worth to me."
I walk closer, taking a seat beside him.
"That fucker loves being outside. I don't think it's the level of punishment you're expecting it to be," I say, my face calm and cool because I suspect he's trying to test my loyalty to Zeus.
"You don't wonder why I'm punishing him?"
"Are you?"
"Am I what?"
"Punishing him? As I said, he loves it. Want to really punish him, make him teach a fucking class or something.
" I smile when the corner of his mouth twitches, taking a little pride in the fact that I'm eating the bait he's dangling in front of me.
"Better yet. Make him read in front of a group.
But that might end badly for everyone. He would flip fucking tables in school to avoid it. "
"I may consider that," he says, an analytical hint to his words, but I highly doubt he's trying to figure out how to best Zeus.
"We're just hanging out today?" I ask, tapping my fingers in an off-beat rhythm on the tables.
"No," he says, shaking his head quickly, as if he didn't realize he was so far off task until just now. "You don't care that he's on my shit list?"
The guy just can't fucking move on.
I shake my head. "He's his own person. I'm grateful you let him join, but I always knew there was a chance he would ruin the opportunity. He's got too big a fucking chip on his shoulder. He can't see past it."
"He is an angry man," he agrees. "Bad childhood?"
"We all had a fucking bad childhood," I mutter, growing increasingly annoyed with him. "Some channel that energy into better things. Some have worse coping skills, I guess."
"And if I said he had to leave?"
I blink twice at the guy, trying to figure out which direction he wants me to go, but I know what agreeing to him not being a member means. I could sign his fucking death warrant right now and never fucking see him again.
"He's fucking family," I say. "Wouldn't making his life a living hell be more entertaining?"
He watches me for a couple of long beats before speaking.
I feel the scrutiny of his gaze, as if he can somehow look right inside of me and see the inner workings of my mind. Despite knowing that's not possible, I shove every thought away.
"Speaking of entertainment," he says, looking down at his computer for a second before turning it around to face me. "We have a shipment coming in, and I'd like your help with it."
"I'd love to help," I say before looking at the screen.
Six sad faces stare back at me, eyes begging for the rescue they hope for but know will never come. One of the girls on the screen can't be older than seven or eight, her eyes swollen from crying, an eerie bruise on her face the shape of a palm print.
Every one of them looks to be underage, but even as disgust eats away at me, I don't bat an eye before looking up at him.
"I sure as fuck hope you don't plan to bring them here," I mutter.
"And why is that? Have a problem with little girls?"
"Do you have any idea how much they fucking cry?
" I huff a laugh, an attempt to push down the threat of sickness that wants to bubble up my throat.
"Those bitches are noisy. They don't shut up, no matter how much you hurt them.
Tears, crying, sobbing. It's fucking constant.
Takes months before they learn silence is golden. "
Every word out of my mouth is fucking acid on my tongue.
"Crying doesn't bother me," he says with a shrug, leaning back in his chair, hands clasped together on his stomach.
"What about your men? Will it drive them insane?"
"I don't care about that shit either."
"You'll care when they get pissed and hurt one of them. Have you ever tried selling one of those bitches when they're all banged up?"
"Some men like it," he challenges as if he's searching for the button that's going to make me act differently, as if he's trying to prove a point.
What the man doesn't understand is that I'm in my fucking element right now.
"Men like to hurt little girls, not purchase an already broken one," I clarify.
He pulls in a deep breath, annoyance apparent in the way it shudders at the top before he releases it. He turns the computer back around to face him.
"I don't need your opinion on who I've picked. I need your help figuring out a different travel path to get them where I need them to go."
"Where are they now?" I ask, thinking I seriously fucked up when he snaps his eyes up from the screen to me. "Where are they going?"
"So many fucking questions," he says.
"Bobby," I say with my own edge of irritation. "I can't help with the logistics of getting them from one place to another without knowing where they are and where they're going."
His head dips as if he understands my reasoning, but it doesn't make me believe he trusts me any more than he did before I closed the conference room door.
The man has taken me from doing menial work for over three weeks to telling me about little girls he's going to traffic in the blink of an eye. I knew I was fucking cooked the second he turned the computer screen around.
Unless this guy is just completely fucking stupid, I don't think he'd make such a large jump without testing the waters first. Grown women, castoffs like druggies and prostitutes, are easier to justify than children any day.
There isn't a single fucking child on this compound, and I hate that it's just now hitting me.
There are older underage teens, but no small children, although it doesn't make abuse of any kind okay, no matter someone's age.
For some, it's a little more palatable, and that's why it's more than a little suspicious that he's sharing this info now, the way he is.
"Maybe I was wrong in thinking you were the one to help with this," he says, an edge of disappointment in his voice that I know would just eat some of these bootlickers up from the inside out.
"I can help," I argue. "But I can't make transportation arrangements with no information."
"It sounds like you're digging for information," he snaps.
I tilt my head, pretending to be confused, ready to play this until the very end. If the man wants to dance around some shit, I've got my fucking party shoes on.
"Digging?" I scoff. "You want-"
"I want to know fucking how, not a specific route to take!" he yells, hand smacking down hard enough on the table that the laptop jumps.
"Oh," I say, unfazed by his outburst. I haven't met a drug user yet who can keep a fucking handle on his temper, and Bobby is no fucking exception. "A school bus."
"What?" he snaps, looking even more confused than before.
"Use a school bus to transport them. No one ever pays fucking attention to a school bus. Haven't you seen those videos? People drive right past that fucking stop sign despite the flashing fucking lights?"
"People pay attention to school buses," he argues, but I'm shaking my head before he finishes speaking.
"Think about the last time you were at a red light behind one. Did you look up at it, or divert your attention so you didn't risk making eye contact with someone else's crotch goblin?"
"I fucking hate kids," he answers.
"See? You didn't look. Even people who have kids don't like other people's kids. They avoid them if they can. School bus," I repeat. "That's the way to go."
He nods as if I've just given him the best information in the world, something he never thought of. There's a gratefulness in his eyes, but it only lasts a second before it's gone, replaced with something that makes me swallow against the sudden closing of my throat.
"Speaking of kids," he says, his voice calm and even as if this is exactly where he was planning to take the conversation since the minute he stepped into this room. "I heard about your mom's passing."
I pull in a ragged breath, wondering if trying to lie now would even be worth the energy it takes.
"Overdose," I mutter. "Knew it would kill her eventually."
His face is blank, with no emotion. There's no sympathy in his eyes, nor a hint of anger.
"And it did," he says, reaching a hand up and pressing a few keys on his computer. "Twenty-eight years ago."
He turns the computer around, the obituary Casper planted online staring me right in the face.
"Bobby," I say, annoyance lacing my tone. "My biological mother isn't who I call mom."
Confusion draws his brows together. "What?"
"She died when I was little. I hardly remember her. The woman I know as my mom, the woman who raised me between my father's beatings, is the one who died recently."