Page 47 of Venom's Sting

“It does not matter. My Serp will get us out of here.Merde! Why did I leave my phone in the glove compartment?” She starts pacing back and forth in front of the window.

I drop down onto the bed and sigh. My cell phone was in the same place, when I’d armed myself to go and check out the mill I’d left it there. My eyes go back to Ven’s mom, this woman is still energetic and sounds so confident. I wish I had her optimism. I’ve spent so long trying to convince the police that my grandfather was holding my mom against her will but could never prove it. And now I’ve found her, I worry that we’re falling into exactly the same situation. Maybe now is the time to tell Meli my fears, if Edmund is here, then that means the trade for my mom went south, and no one is coming to get us.

Chapter 17

Ven

While in the air I’ve slowly come to the conclusion that I might have to kill some people in cold blood in order to get the women in my life back. I check my guns to make sure everything is in order, feeling surprisingly okay with the probability that I might end up killing a man before the day is out.

Rage points down below. “Isn’t that Amy’s vehicle? It looks like someone ran her off the road.”

My brother is not wrong about that. I let loose a long string of curses under my breath. This is bad. No wonder she hasn’t been answering her phone. Those assholes got to her. There can be no other explanation for her abandoned vehicle.

“Go to the farm,” I tell the pilot, and he does a tight circle and heads east.

After five minutes the Grayson ranch comes into view and something else catches my attention, “Rage, look,” I shout. “It’s my mother’s SUV.”

“Yeah, it looks like it,” Rage answers. “I see Rufus’ pickup truck that he came to the clubhouse in, but I don’t recognize the other truck though.”

Dan’s hand comes out to rest on my shoulder from behind. “I recognize it. It belongs to Boyd and Brock Sanderson. They’re Rufus’ neighbors.”

Glancing back at Dan, I say, “Fairly stupid ones, I imagine.”

He nods. “Yeah, those two will do anything for a few bucks. I’m guessing as my brothers all came to the clubhouse, he hired those two to keep an eye on Carol.”

Great, I think to myself. Two men with zero moral compass have possession of my mom and the woman I swore to protect. What an abject failure I am when it comes to keeping the women in my life safe.

Rage turns to the pilot. “Change of plans, Jose. Can you land the chopper half a mile away, maybe behind the woods?”

“You got it, my friend.”

The helicopter manages to land behind the trees and the three of us jump out and start humping it towards the farmhouse where we know the women are being held.

Dan doesn’t say much but he keeps up and points out the most direct route. It’s as if he’s trapped in his own little world, trying to figure out how to reorganize his life around not being part of the Grayson clan anymore, now that he’s betrayed them trying to save Carol.

I ask him, “Have you ever considered joining an MC, Dan?”

His head jerks up and his expression turns bewildered. “Me? No, not for a second. I don’t even ride a motorcycle.”

“You could learn. I have an old soft tail that you can have. Consider it my thanks for helping us rescue Carol.”

“I might enjoy riding, especially since I’m gonna have an endless amount of time on my hands moving forward.”

Rage shoots me a strange look, so I drop the conversation for now. Maybe, I’m putting the cart before the horse. We need to get the women clear of this situation and then burn that fucking farmhouse to the ground and give Rufus and his band of merry idiots a dirt nap. They’re all out of control and think they answer to no one. I don’t think the old man is ever going to give up his happy families obsession and that puts both Carol and Amy in ongoing danger. Since I can’t have those assholes popping up all the time to harass my woman and her mother, I’m gonna have to do something drastic. I just know it.

When we approach the farmhouse, we see Big Joe and another man sitting on the porch with shotguns. Dan states quietly, “It makes the most sense for me to try to sneak in and check on the women. I’m betting not everyone got the memo that my father disowned me. That will make it easier for me to slip in.”

“Fuck that,” I tell him in no uncertain terms. “I’m going in there and nothing is going to get in my way.”

“Me too,” Rage chimes in. “What the quickest way to get into the house?”

Dan glances at his watch. “I say we wait until it gets dark and go in through the skylight in the master bedroom, that’s where Carol sleeps. My father sleeps downstairs because he doesn’t like the steps, but he keeps the master bedroom just like it was when his first wife died all those years ago. It’s a lot creepier than it sounds.”

“I’ll bet,” I tell him, trying to envision what that would look like. “And no one else goes in there?”

Dan nods. “No one is allowed in that room apart from Carol. Edmund’s room is on the first floor next to my father’s. Me, Big Joe, and Hal stayed in the barn.”

“Why the fuck didn’t you protest about your accommodation, can’t have been good seeing your brother getting the special treatment,” I say.

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