Page 13 of Cruel Debts
I raised an eyebrow at him but said nothing, letting the smirk on my lips do all the talking for me. He simply rolled his eyes and made a beeline for the back staircase that led to our floor.
Liam hadn’t even stopped when he set foot in the door. He avoided the others in this place whenever possible. Unfortunately, as the resident medical expert on hand, Asher was frequently called upon to handle this or that injury to another member. He didn’t get the luxury of hiding.
And I knew quite a bit of these fuckers simply because during our brief encounters, they pissed me off.
Namely, the motherfucker who’d just walked in the room, arm in arm with his fiery bitch of a girlfriend. Apparently, she’d been their former stalker and kidnapper. Now, she was their woman, and from the looks of it, their fucking leader.
If you had told me there was a woman out there who could force Jackal to put a fucking collar on and let himself be led around by a leash, I would have called you insane. That fucker’d always been one card short of a full deck. But to let himself be degraded like that?
Holy fucking shit, man.
She walked him like the dog he was, and he loved every minute of it.
They called her the Hyena.
She was crazier than the three Neon Dogs she shacked up with, that was for sure.
As if on cue, she glanced up and offered me a lopsided smile and a wave, a complete contrast to the death glare her pet sent my way.
Ah, yes, Jackal and I had a little bit of a blood feud these days.
It wasn’t that I’d ever done anything to him, or vice versa. He just rubbed me the wrong way. And every time we were forced into the same room, that aversion to his personality only intensified.
“Oh, hey there, Ghost,” she murmured cheerily, blood spatter decorating the side of her face.No telling what they’d been up to tonight.“Busy night, huh?”
I gestured to her war paint and grunted. “For some of us.”
Jackal tilted his head, looking for all the world like the fucking dog he claimed to be. “What’s a matter, the Gunners out of work these days?”
“Even if we were, we’d still be better off than your dumb ass,” I snapped back, reaching for the top of the fridge to liberate the last cherry and cheese danish hiding there. “You let your bitch do all your work for you these days?”
He fucking snarled at me, snapping his sharpened teeth in warning. “I let my bitch do whatever the hell she wants, because I can. Maybe if you could find someone to put up with your insufferable ass, you’d know what that’s like.” His lips curled into a grin as my frown deepened. The subtle snaking of his arm around his girl’s waist, the little tug he gave her until they were pressed together, he way he stuck his tongue out of his mouth and licked some of the blood off her neck as she moaned, it was a power play.
One I didn’t want to admit got to me more than it should.
“Get a room, fuckwit,” I snapped, turning my back on him to leave the fucking kitchen. “Nobody wants to see that.”
His laughter followed me out of the room as I wondered if there was some truth to his cruel, casual words.
Was there anyone out there who could tolerate me long enough to love?
SEVEN
TRINITY
Two months,six days, and twelve hours. That was how long I’d been a captive of this asshole whose name I still didn’t know.
But that was about to change.
He made the mistake of leaving me unsupervised during a thunderstorm, choosing to ride out the storm at the club he frequented.Myclub. My place of work, which probably thought I’d fallen off the face of the earth at this point. I wondered if my spot was still there, if Minnie would honor her word if I ever made it out of this hell alive.
There was a corner of the house where the roof leaked, and of course, The Prick’s office had to be relocated because of it. However, he hadn’t had time to reinstall the cameras or security system from his old room in the new locale, which meant that when the power went out because of the high winds, I had an opportunity I’d likely never have again.
I could get into his office, bypass the electronic locks, and maybe get to a phone. Maybe I could even find out who the fuck he was and where I was, enough to get a hold of law enforcement and call for help. Or, if I could get out of the house and off the property undiscovered, I could use that intel to get my bearings. Make an escape.
Who knew how far I’d have to run, though? Would he chase after me? Did I know too much already? Was it pointless to escape if there was nowhere I could hide when I was finally free again?
Minnie wouldn’t protect me. She was just a club owner, for fuck’s sake. I couldn’t expect her to do that for me. I was just some girl she’d hired off the street to paint men and women on artists’ night. I was a paid attraction that pulled in customers for her.
