Page 53 of Bristol

“Okay,” I manage to get out. He turns around and I remove my shirt and bra. The lack of clothing and warmth has my nipples hard and chill bumps peppering my skin. There is a soft blanket on the cushioned table beside me. I lie flat on it with my arms tight at my side.

Kris sprays something on a paper towel and begins wiping my back. I jump at the cold intrusion. I wasn’t expecting it to be so cold. I feel so exposed lying here although I know nothing can be seen.

There’s a rolling silver tray beside me that has different tiny cups of ink. I focus on one of them while he lays the stencils on my back. Once he seems pleased, he takes a picture with his phone before showing it to me.

“What do you think?”

I look at the purple outline of the tattoo that I am about to get. It’s beautiful.

“I love it!”

“Okay. Then let’s get started,” he says, clapping his hands together.

He makes small talk, asking how I know Kendra while he gets the tattoo gun ready. The buzz of the gun makes me nervous. It’s here. He’s about to start tattooing me. I am for real about to get a whole ass back piece tattoo. Me. Bristol Tullier. Captive girl turned club ol’lady. Captive girl turned nearly-millionaire.

Life is fucking wild.

Chapter Sixteen

SEBASTIAN

Five fucking days. It’s taken five days to follow the lead Reaper got on this underground ring. We’ve been on the road. We’ve been camping out in fields in the middle of nowhere. We’ve been running on little to no sleep and little to no food. Me, Reaper, and Mo have been in the boondocks between Mississippi and Tennessee on a wild manhunt that feels like it keeps leading us somewhere further. Further from my girl.

I’ve hardly had time to text her, much less talk to her and I’ll admit, I didn’t anticipate missing her this goddamn much. We’ve been together almost every single day since she was freed from her own personal hell. Now I feel like I’m enduring my own sort of personal hell. A wild goose chase while being separated from the woman that I have fallen head over fucking heels for.

Reaper is sitting in the back of the Escalade with a pair of binoculars while Mo snores from the reclined passenger front seat. I’m stuck in the middle row, trying to make out what I can from the darkness of the night and the tinted windows.

Slider was able to make contact with someone in this underground ring and I don’t even want to think about the fucking atrocities he had to witness in order to do this for me. The club owes him big, and so do I. There’s a meeting that’s supposed to go down with who we are thinking is Patrick, but the thing with these meeting times is that it’s tricky. They give you a five-day period where they could possibly make a drop, but not definitely.

So here we are. Day five. It has to be today. But we have no idea what time. Also not one hundred percent we got the fucking coordinates right. Everything is encrypted and everything is coded and it’s fucking frustrating. If Clyde was in better shape, I’d have drug his ass out here but my luck, that fucker would scream, I’d have to shoot him, and all exchanges would be off because of his loud ass mouth. Instead, here we sit.

There isn’t a single fucking vehicle in sight and hasn’t been for the last five days. I’m beginning to lose hope that all of this isn’t for nothing when I hear it. Tires on gravel. The first car to come down this driveway in days. This is it. The exchange is happening right now. That’s another thing. We don’t know what the fuck they’re exchanging. Slider is inside, but there has been zero contact.

No contact in five days. He’s a smart man, much smarter than any of us so I’m inclined to think that he’s okay and is just doing his best to blend in. I can’t even imagine what that’s like. I would’ve lost my shit on day one and killed them all. Single shot to the balls and let them bleed out and that still wouldn’t be sufficient enough for all the sins they’ve committed.

Reaper is glued to his binoculars, pressing them so hard against the back window that it may shatter at any moment. He’s on high alert as the raggedy dark-colored van slows to a stop and the headlights kill. The silence is deafening. The air around us is thick with tension as we watch so closely for any visual of movement. After what feels like a solid hour, the door to the van opens and a man steps out. He’s tall, slender, and wearing a blue jean long-sleeve shirt and blue jeans to match. He walks to the front door and knocks. A porch light comes on. It blinks twice. Then is shut off. The man walks slowly back to the van and opens the driver door, sitting down in the seat.

The light from a cell phone illuminates the cab, allowing me to see that the windows are all completely blacked out. The two-story farmhouse feels like it’s mocking me as the trees around it sway with the light breeze blowing through. I want to know what the fuck is going on. My heart pounds. Adrenaline courses through my veins. I reach over and tap Mo on the shoulder. Whatever is about to go down, he needs to be awake for it.

“That was the signal that everything is okay and it’s a go.”

Reaper’s words are distant compared to the roaring, racing thoughts inside my mind. His words barely register as I continue to focus on the propped open door of the van. Watching. Waiting. If it’s him, and god I fucking hope it is, this night is just getting started.

“What’s the plan?” I ask.

We haven’t talked much about what we were going to do if the information actually checked out.

“Regardless of it’s the man we’re searching for, this house gets shut down tonight.”

“Good by me,” Mo grunts, sitting up in the front seat.

I glance down at my phone.

Bristol: Miss you.

I type out a response and lock it, turning it on do not disturb so nothing crazy happens like in the movies when people forget to silence their phones and end up getting caught because it rang or a text message came through. I slip it into my back pocket. I would’ve slid it into my cut-off but we aren’t wearing colors tonight.

These sick fucks will know who did this, they just don’t need to know it at first glance. We need to blend into normalcy as much as possible at first. Once we’ve secured the place, I’ll let them know who they’re dealing with if Reaper and Mo don’t beat me to it first.

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