Page 175 of Unexpected Heroine

Divergent thoughts race through me in a blur.

How the hell does Violet manage to crack the foundation of my being with so few words?

Deafening and rebellious emotions claw at the inside of the box I’ve bound them in, desperate for me to turn them loose.

I resist.

Barely.

Instead of feeling—a useless exercise—I attempt to think. To logically dissect what’s happening in my head.

Is it merely because she reached out to me that I feel a spark of life flickering inside me? I wonder if any contact whatsoever would have evoked this response. What if it was a simple hello or a random gif? The middle finger emoji or another meme I don’t understand? Would I be contemplating dropping everything and running to her side this way if it was something like that?

Or rather, is it what she’s asking that has me ready to fall to my knees in front of her, offering her the world for another chance?

Muffled groans pull me away from my heavy thoughts. After a quick cleansing breath, I slip the phone into my back pocket.

If I respond now, I’ll undoubtedly say the wrong things.

I’m committed, given the captive at my feet and my peers flanking me.

Squatting down to where Skidmark’s bound and lying in the dirt, I yank off the bag covering his head. He blinks and flinches from the light.

Although it’s not all that bright in here, he was in a dark hood for at least two hours while I waited for Jonesy and Aaron to arrive. After the bomb squad found nothing alarming in the gift that was left for Mia, Jonesy called me back. Excellent timing. With Mia’s situation handled temporarily, the guys were willing to help me have a chat with this disgusting maggot known as Kadin Dean. Jonesy even offered up the perfect place for this... meeting. It’s his late grandparents’ strawberry farm in Plant City, a rural town about thirty miles from Tampa.

Skidmark has a little blood running down the corner of his head from where I clocked him with my gun. Not a twinge of guilt hits me for causing that. In truth, those dried red streaks give me a sense of accomplishment.

It’s only a sliver of what he did to Lettie.

What he did to so many other women.

Hovering over his body, I stare at him for several long seconds, debating where we’ll begin. So many options. All of them enticing.

He looks around, drool streaming down his chin around the ball gag and his head wobbling from side to side. As he surveys his surroundings, I let my eyes follow the same path.

We’re in a dusty old barn. No floor other than dirt and weeds. Farming tools and various implements hanging on rusty hooks on the walls. A broken-down lawn mower in the corner that hasn’t run in twenty years. An interesting piece of equipment with long spiral spikes, weathered and well-used. Empty bushels that haven’t seen a harvest in more than a decade. Banisters and poles made of rotting wood hold up the partially dilapidated roof.

Well, time is wasting.

I reach forward to remove the ball gag so we can have our discussion. Like the punk bitch he is, Kadin shirks backward.

“Just taking this off,” I intone with no feeling in my words.

He steadies and lets me unclasp it. His beady eyes shift from me to the men at my sides, and fear weasels its way out of his mouth. “I only do what they tell me to do. I’m not the one you want.”

A dark laugh echoes off the barn walls, originating from behind my right shoulder. That would be Jonesy.

His boots kick up a small cloud of dust as he kneels beside me. Leaning close to Skidmark’s unctuous frame, he gets right in his face. “Shut your cock holster until we ask you a question. Besides, you’re definitely the right person. You know how I know?”

Jonesy doesn’t give the shit nozzle a chance to answer. “I had to carry a thirteen-year-old girl into the ER the other night. This child was so traumatized by what you were told to do to her she urinated on herself at the mere sight of me. She was fucking terrified that I was going to hurt her like you did.” He backhands Skidmark powerfully, making his head kick back from the force. “You’re exactly the person we want here tonight.”

Kadin spits blood in Jonesy’s general direction, who barely flinches. “Fuck you.”

I waste no time taking over. “Do you smoke?”

He doesn’t respond.

“He must be the quiet type like you,” Jonesy says to Aaron, who’s pacing around us, adding an air of foreboding to the scene.

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