Page 57 of Lake's Legacy

She nods. “Yes. A second baby was born only a few hours after mine. His.” Marcia nods at Merkel, who has tried to make himself disappear. He goes green when we all turn to look at him. “Some poor girl that he impregnated and brought here. She didn’t survive the birth.”

“I don’t want to get your hopes up, but we found two babies on a cruise ship around that time. The man who brought the babies on board was Mikel,” Hex explains. “I don’t know if either of those babies is yours, but we’ll find out.”

“Really?” Marcia looks at Hex with heartbreaking hope.

“Lake, call Olivia. See if she’s still with Rey. We need ambulances and the cops to take over. Marcia, can you go with Lake?”

She nods and lets me take her arm. I lead her to a bed next to a woman who looks ready to give birth at any second—hex kneels to talk to the two doctors. I don’t know what he’s saying, but the fear on their faces tells me he’s making a point.

Olivia answers on the second ring. After learning she’s still at the hospital and talking with Rey’s brother, I give her our location and tell her to send the detective and every ambulance they have.

Hex finishes with the prisoners and comes to join us. “Olivia was still with Rey and Rey’s brother. They’re on their way here now. What are we going to do with them? Are we taking them back to the clubhouse?”

“No. Too risky. Besides, we don’t need anything from those two assholes.”

“Except for them to die after what they did to these women,” Pirate argues.

“They’ll get theirs. All we would do is kill them after inflicting some pain. Let them rot in some prison cell. My guess is they’ll get their asses beat daily by the prisoners once they learn these assholes were selling infants.”

“What if they get off?” Zip asks. “Two rich white guys? Odds are in their favor.”

“I already told them what we’d do to them if they didn’t confess.”

“Thank you,” Marcia says. “Thank you for finding us. Some of these women have been prisoners for almost a year. First as sex slaves, then once they got pregnant, those assholes had us caring for them so they could sell the babies.”

“I’m guessing they took you and Talia to care for the women?”

“Talia, yes, but they grabbed me because I was pregnant with Calder’s child. He and I worked together at Omega Hospital. He pursued me for weeks, but I resisted until he wore me down. Of course, once he had me, he moved on. Bastard. I can’t believe I was such a fool.”

“This isn’t on you. This is on him,” I assure her.

“Maybe. But I knew better. I knew Calder’s reputation. We lasted six weeks before he dumped me for a nurse who had just transferred to Omega from a hospital out of state. I transferred to Tulane Hospital when I realized I was pregnant. I debated telling him but figured he’d find out, so I did the mature thing. I met him for coffee and told him the news. He freaked out. Then, a few days later, he called and asked to meet. He told me he had time to come to terms with becoming a father and wanted to discuss the future. He came over for dinner. I woke up locked in a room and chained to the bed. That’s when the horror started.”

“Did he try to abort the baby?” I ask.

“Surprisingly, no. I almost wish that was what he’d done. Instead, he told me he owned me and that I would never be free again. He took me out of the room and into hell. Women were chained to beds while men paid to rape them. Calder and Merkel told me to care for the women, or they’d tie me to a bed. They forced me to treat those poor girls. At first, I refused, so they grabbed the nearest girl and slit her throat. The next day, they had a new girl chained to that bed. She was young and still a virgin. I don’t think she was older than sixteen. They told me I could either care for the girls they had or they’d dispose of the girls and grab new ones. I treated the women. I hated myself but didn’t want them to break another girl.”

“You said you were in a building. So, not this building?” Hex asks.

“No, I think it used to be an office building. There were multiple floors. Not sure how long we were there. Long enough to have my baby and lose him. Maybe a week or two after that, some kid showed up and told Merkel that they were about to get invaded by bikers.”

“What did this kid look like?”

“Young. Maybe nineteen. He had on a vest with the word Prospect on the back.” The rest of her description told us all weneeded to know. Fucking Irish had warned the bastards. That’s how they knew we were coming and why they cleared out the night we attacked.

“They killed those women,” Marcia murmurs. “All of them. They walked around and slit their throats. The fuckers said it was a shame to waste them but that they could replace them. The only women they didn’t kill were the ones who were pregnant. He brought us here.”

Hex stalks over to the prisoners and yanks Merkel up by his tie. “Do you have another fucking whorehouse?”

Merkel sneers at Hex until Hex hauls back and punches him twice in the liver and then in the throat. Dropping Merkel back to the ground, Hex stomps hard on the man’s left hand and then his right before smashing his kneecaps. As Merkel curls up into a fetal position, Hex turns his attention to Calder. “Want the same? Or are you going answer the fucking question?”

“No, we don’t. I swear it. We haven’t had time to set it up yet.”

A disturbance at the door draws our attention. “Police!” shouts the cops as they stream into the building. Calder looks relieved until they slap on the cuffs.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO: OLIVIA

As I helped the last woman into the waiting ambulance, I finally let the tears fall for them. Some were already pregnant when those assholes grabbed them off the street, but several became pregnant from rape. I watch the cops lead Drs. Calder and Merkel away in handcuffs, but part of me wishes the guys had killed them.

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