Page 77 of Ours to Keep

He’s a sniffling mess and we’ve not even done half to him what he did to Lily.

Jax flicks the belt, catching Richard on the hip, causing him to cry out again.

Prick.

“Now, tell us. Where is she? Where the fuck is Mia?” Jax’s voice is as hard as a stone, and he has a cold determination that, one way or another, Richard will tell us what we need to know.

“Y-you leave my daughter out of this,” he says, trying to sit up straighter. “She has nothing to do with this.”

I raise my eyebrows and shake my head. “And yet you put a fucking target on her back when you put Lily on the dark fucking web.”

He baulks at that.

“Yeah, we spoke to George. He was easy enough to break, if you know what I mean,” Jax says with a sadistic grin.

If I thought Richard was pasty-looking before, he’s practically green now.

“That’s right, Dicky boy, we know all about your fucked up little enterprise,” I say as I play with my knife, the blade glinting off the opulence of the lights above. “If you think this is bad, you’re in for a rude awakening.”

I lower the tip of my blade to his chin and use it to tilt his face to mine. “This will be like a walk in the park in comparison. When the people you screwed over catch up to you, what do you think they’ll do to you—to Mia?”

Of course, I’m only saying this to get a rise from him. We’ll protect her in any way we can, but we can’t do that until we find her.

“So if you care about your daughter at all, you’ll tell us where the fuck she is right now.”

He squirms under our scrutiny like the pathetic worm he is. When his reply doesn’t come quick enough, Jax lashes out with the belt once more for good measure, striking his arm and leaving a huge welt in its wake.

I thought I was fucked up with the thoughts of retribution that had been circulating in my mind, my need to make Richard hurt becoming a fixation, but Jax bringing the same belt that cunt used to hurt our Lily is fucking genius.

I’m actually a little disappointed Richard doesn’t even have the backbone to try and defend himself and give me more of a reason to make him bleed.

I kick his barefoot hard, scuffing the pristine floor in the process. Whoops.

“Where is she?”

There’s static in my ear right before a voice comes through my earpiece.

“Jackson, there’s something you need to see.”

He folds the belt in half and points it at Richard. “Keep him here. I’ll go check it out. Keep comms on,” Jax says, passing Elliot the belt as he makes his way below deck, letting Louis know he’s on his way.

“Just had word from Gabe. He says there’s movement, possibly incoming,” Mason says into the comms.

“How far out?” Jax asks.

“Gabe says we have maybe four minutes at the most.”

I glance at Elliot. Fuck, this is about to take a very dangerous turn. I reach into my pocket and pull out some cable ties.

“Wrists,” I bark, causing Richard to flinch. His hands tremble as he holds them in front of him, and I reach out to circle his wrist with the tie, pulling it through hard until his wrists are secure.

“Maybe we should make you walk the plank and see if you can swim with your hands tied,” I say with a wicked grin.

“Two minutes,” Mason says into thecomms.

“What do you want to do, boss?” I ask, confusing the fuck out of Richard, who has no idea what’s going on.

But his reply throws me through a loop.

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