Page 69 of What He Wants

“So, it was you who shot at us!” I gasped.

“Not me, I wouldn’t have missed,” he confirmed, his tone indifferent. “But some worthless piece of shit I’d hired. Idiot rented a Cadillac. But I took care of him after he failed his assignment. I guess if you want something done right you do it yourself.”

I shook my head, tears falling down my cheeks. Because I knew then and there that he was going to kill me, and probably Jasmine, too. Pure evil was reflected in Paul’s cold, dead eyes, and the hate was a toxic cloud surrounding him. I knew that he was going to make me suffer. There was little humor in his eyes when he smiled the smile I’d come to hate and fear over the years.

“You know, don’t you. You know you screwed up. I wanted you back until I was shown a video of you screwing that filthy biker in his truck.” Without warning Paul backhanded me viciously across the mouth. “You had his dirty hands on you, his dirty cock inside you.” He backhanded me again. “I’m going to make you pay for that. By the time I’m done you’ll be begging me to kill you. And then when I’m done with you, I’m going after him.”

The next time Paul decided to hit me he did it with his fist. So, hard that I felt my jaw crack, and blood spewed from my mouth onto the wall and floor. Dizziness made me wobble on my knees and I fought to remain awake, but another fist to the face had me seeing stars and the next thing I knew I was falling into blackness.

Chapter 28

Big John

“You still awake, baby?”I waited a couple of minutes and decided that Daisy must have gone to bed. I didn’t blame her. It was late and I’d stopped on the side of the road on the way home to take a leak. Gator and Cooper were with me, each with their ears to their own phones. The protection run had gone without incident and I was eager to get back to my woman. Just to make sure she’d made it to the club okay I decided to text Ross, the prospect in charge of keeping an eye on her. When he didn’t answer back a bad feeling moved over me.

Shit!I called the bar at the club, knowing that someone was always there to pick up.

“Yeah?”

It was Painter. “Brother, have you seen Ross? He’s supposed to be watching my woman and neither one are responding to my texts.”

“Haven’t seen Ross all night, man. Thought he was fucking off.”

“Check my room for Daisy,” I ordered, fighting down the rush of alarm beginning to grow in my gut. “If she’s not there head to her house. I’m on my way!”

I kick started my bike and tore off onto the highway, cutting off a vehicle that swerved just in time from hitting me. The driver laid on his horn but I didn’t give a fuck. I was too revved up on adrenaline from fear of what could have happened to Daisy. The fact that Ross hadn’t responded to my text said a lot in my world. He wouldn’t ignore a text from a brother unless he’d been forcefully removed from the situation, or he was dead. And the only one who could relieve him from his duties was me.

Cooper and Gator yelled something as I sped past them but I ignored them, and the next thing I knew they were rolling up behind me. When they were even with me I indicated that they turn on their head sets.

“We’re heading to Daisy’s. She and Ross aren’t answering my texts.”

“Shit, man,” Gator said. “That’s not like Ross.”

Talking wasn’t necessary after that. We revved our engines and raced toward home. I was glad we were on the highway, and we pushed our speed as if there weren’t any limits. Moving in and out of traffic, letting nothing get in our way. If anything had happened to Daisy then Ross had better be dead because I was going to kill him.

Leaving the highway, we had to cut our speed for the twists and sharp turns on the country roads that would take me to Daisy’s. Couldn’t afford to get reckless and wiping out on a gravel filled road at the speed we were pushing hurt like hell. A couple of times I almost laid my bike down, but managed to bring it under control in the nick of time. We were still a fair distance away from Daisy’s, but not far enough to notice that the sky was lit up like a fucking Christmas tree on fire.

“Fuck, man, that Daisy’s house?” I heard Cooper murmur in a tone that revealed he wasn’t looking for an answer.

Fear like I’d never felt before pushed through me and like a mad man I picked up speed. Nothing else mattered right then than reaching my woman. Once I turned onto her road it was a straight shot to her place and I went full throttle. My blood froze when I got close enough to realize that Daisy’s house was on fire. Closer still exposed the fucking chaos surrounding it. The volunteer fire department was there, an ambulance, the cops, and some of my brothers were present. I knew this was fucking bad.

I jumped off my bike before it even came to a stop, not giving a fuck that it skidded and fell to the ground. My brothers, alerted to my arrival, rushed toward me, and held me back as I tried to get closer to the burning house. “Daisy!” I saw Ross’s truck and Jasmine’s car in the drive.

“Brother, no!” It took Painter, Snake and Rock to hold me back. “There’s nothing you can do.” Firemen had their hoses on full blast on the wood structure but as far as I could tell it was a lost cause. More of it than not was already burned to the ground. Daisy’s vehicle, which she’d kept parked behind her house, wasn’t there, and that gave me some hope.

“We don’t know if she was in there.” My president added.

As I slowly deciphered Hawk’s remark I turned toward him. I forced my breathing to calm, forced myself to stop resisting my brothers. They released me but didn’t step away. I watched the ambulance take off. No lights. No sirens. And that told me that if anyone was inside that they were already gone.

“Ross didn’t make it, brother,” Rock explained as we watched the ambulance go down the road. “He was found right inside the door with a bullet through the head.”

That explained why the cops were present, because there’d been a murder.

“Never had a chance,” Painter added.

“Fuck!” I exploded, looking past them back to the smoldering house, and the vehicles in the drive. “What about Jasmine?” I frowned. The cops present weren’t doing shit, just standing around their cruiser and watching what was going on. Probably waiting to hear if there were any other deaths to investigate.

Hawk released a heavy breath. “So far we don’t know where Jasmine and Daisy are. We’re waiting for confirmation if, ah, anyone else was in the house.”

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