Page 46 of Ruthless

Chapter 18

Ginger

I didn't know where I was. Everything had happened so damned fast. First, they'd pushed me down onto the floorboard of a car, and then we were moving through the streets of Daytona. I remained silent, saving my energy for when I would need it, and estimated that we'd been traveling for about half an hour before we reached our destination.

From there things got scarier. I was pulled roughly from the car and bound with my arms behind my back with a scratchy piece of rope that Jack had found in the trunk of his car. I was thankful that they hadn't forced me into the trunk of the car, because it looked like a catch all for discarded, smelly junk. Jack had foraged around until he’d found a half roll of duct tape, and slapped a strip of it over my mouth.

"Don't want you causing us any trouble," he said, giving me a wink.

"Come on," Daryl snapped, grasping me around the upper arm.

I took in my surroundings as he pushed me toward a large, white house. It was isolated, located at the edge of a swamp, and overshadowed by huge, ancient cypress trees. The sight of the swamp made me nervous when I thought about the snakes and alligators that made their homes there. It was the perfect place to get rid of a body.

I stumbled up the porch steps. Daryl knocked loudly on the door, which was answered by a fairly short, round man who quickly showed his disgust at seeing us.

"What the hell!" His nervous little eyes darted around the area beyond the door, as if he were expecting to see someone else, while he rushed us inside and shut the door. "I don't like people just showing up at my fucking home."

"We have a proposition for you, Clark." Daryl kept a tight hold on me, ignoring the man's anger. "You got some place we can stash her while we talk business?"

The man pointed toward a door. "Through there," he grated.

I was rushed through the room and deposited into a small room that looked like a kind of holding cell. The meager furnishings were shabby and old, nothing like the well cared for, older pieces in the rest of the house. I glanced at the bars over the windows with dread. They weren't for security, they looked more like prison bars, as good for keeping someone in as they were for keeping someone out.

I put my ear to the door to hear what was happening on the other side. It was hard to hear over the sound of my pounding heart. I could vaguely make out the murmur of voices until the tone changed, and with it the volume. "You idiots! I'm not the only supplier for those auctions, and I don't like doing business here at my private residence!" The voice belonged to Clark.

"Look, man, I'm sorry but you're the only one I know of who’s involved in this shit, and I need money now! I owe someone, and they're not waiting." Daryl's tone was desperate as he ignored the other man's objections. "You saw her. She's a looker. And with her curves? You could make thousands on her."

"That was before you told me that she's involved with a biker named Rebel. Bikers don't like when things are taken away from them, especially their women. I've heard of him. He has a real badass reputation. The people I work for wouldn't be pleased if we brought that kind of attention to their organization. They'll kill to remain anonymous."

"She's not exactly his?" I heard Daryl begin before he was cut off. I rolled my eyes, because he was too dense to hear the real warning behind Clark's words.

"He fucking her?" Clark grumbled.

Silence.

"You two are assholes," Clark snorted with disdain. "You stole a nomad's woman, and not just any nomad. Who the fuck do you think had a hand in taking out Wildman's club? Huh? Remember hearing about that when it went down four years ago? I heard Rebel went through a lot of fucked up shit while he was undercover, he came out a different man."

A loud scoff followed his rant. "I don't know about that. I met the dude the other night, man." I could almost see the look of indifference on Daryl's stupid face. He was so desperate for money that he was willing to downplay the danger. "He didn't look so fucking threatening to me."

Really? He didn't know Rebel, then.

"That's probably because you were fucked up then, and you're fucked up now, man," Jack snorted. "Shit, man, I should have left both your asses back at the apartment. You're the one who needs the money."

"Just calm down," I heard Daryl saying. "Look, all I need is a thousand bucks." He said it flippantly, as if he were only asking for ten dollars. "You have the means to get rid of her. I don't care how you do it. No one knows she's with us, so you don't have to worry about fallout."

"Are you forgetting about your girlfriend?" Jack asked.

Della! Damn him for bringing her up.

"So we go back and take care of her," he suggested.

What?! I didn't like the sound of that. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. How could he so calmly talk about taking care of someone permanently, as if it were nothing? As if she was nothing? They'd had a good relationship in the beginning, before the drugs had changed him. We had never meshed, but we'd put up with each other for Della's sake.

"Look, I don't care about your money problems. If you want to take her down to New Mexico I'll get her in our next auction down there, but I can't get rid of her tonight. She doesn't meet the criteria for what our buyers are looking for, and I don't have any way of holding on to her for the next month. When, not if, Rebel comes looking for her, I don't want her anywhere near here. Right now I want you all out of my house."

Oh, fuck, this wasn't going to bode well for me. Desperate people did desperate things, and Daryl was just that desperate. I looked around the shabby room, unsure of what it was that I was searching for until my gaze landed on the broken edge of the hanging mirror on the wall. Maybe I could use it to cut through the rope they’d used to bind my wrists, but I didn’t know what I would do once I was free. Try to squeeze through the bars on the window? That would be hopeless, but at least if I could get my hands free I'd have a better chance of fighting my way out.

Before I moved away from the door I turned and fumbled around blindly for the lock, praying that by locking the door it would buy me some time.

---