Page 66 of Gunner
“Let you go? Why the fuck would I let you go?” I replied.
“What’s this about?” he asked, and I grasped Skid’s arm as he tried to approach. If I let him at Skeeter,Wilson, whatever his name was, he would be dead before we got the answers we needed.
“Why don’t you tell us about the deal you have with Smokey and Bullet?” Skid remarked.
Skeeter closed his eyes briefly, and when he opened them, I could see something inside his gaze that made me sick. He licked his lips and looked back and forth between Skid and me before he chuckled.
“Is this about that little slut from the Flats?”
My vision grew red, but I managed to grasp Skid by the forearm and hold him back from jumping on Skeeter. “He’ll get what’s coming to him, but we need him to talk,” I muttered, and Skid’s blue eyes swung to mine, filled with hate and rage.
He nodded sharply and stepped back as I turned to Skeeter. “Tell me about the girl.”
“Fuck, man. I don’t know shit about her. She was payment for a debt to my brother,” he replied, and I looked at Skid briefly.
His jaw was clenched, his fists were squeezed shut into fists, and I worried I wouldn’t be able to control him for much longer. “She was payment for the guns you deliver. Who decided on the debt?”
Skeeter laughed and shook his head. “The guns were a side deal I worked out with the club. She was payment for the money Crystal owed us.”
I heard Skid gasp, and he stumbled backward, falling against a tree. Crystal was their mother, and if what he said was true, she set her daughter up to be raped for her own selfish needs. I shook my head and stepped closer to Skeeter, pulling out my Army knife and holding it to his neck. His eyes grew wide and he pushed up against the tree onto his tiptoes, trying to escape the sharp point of my blade.
“Explain that again.” My voice was filled with gravel and I wanted nothing more than to watch him bleed out in front of me.
“Crystal and my brother hung out for a few months, and the stupid bitch kept snorting up the product. She ran up a big debt with him and she couldn’t pay it off. He offered her a job working it off in Marco’s whorehouse, but she came up with another offer. One afternoon with her daughter in exchange for the money she owed him. I swear, man, I didn’t hurt her. It was all my brother and his friends. You have to believe me.”
His words were rushed, and tears fell down his dirty cheeks as I processed his statement. I heard a branch snap behind me and realized Skid was getting closer. He had a knife in each hand, and I could see the butt of a gun sticking out of his waistband.
“How much was the debt?” I asked, piercing his neck with the tip of the knife.
“Seven,” he sputtered.
The same number of slashes across her back. One for each time she was raped by one of those animals.
“So you destroyed an innocent girl for seven thousand dollars?” I barked, and he jumped.
The smell of urine wafted up, and I glanced down to see he had pissed his pants. Shaking his head, his garbled words filtered into the small clearing, and I stepped back in utter shock.
“Not seven thousand. Seven hundred.”
“You gang-raped my sister for seven hundred dollars? You sick freak,” Skid yelled.
He ran at Skeeter and sunk a knife into his right shoulder, causing him to scream out in pain. I slammed my hand over his mouth and looked around to make sure we were still alone as Skeeter cried and pleaded from behind my hand.
“Shut your fucking mouth before I shut it permanently,” I rumbled, and he dropped his head against his chest as he cried.
I stepped away from Skeeter and pulled Skid back from him. “Let me find out about Smokey and Bullet, and then you can kill him. I need you to hold it together for a few more minutes. Can you do that?”
His cold eyes met mine, and he replied, “Five minutes.”
He walked to the far edge of the clearing and turned away from us as he leaned his extended arms against a large tree. I couldn’t imagine learning your own mother sacrificed your sister for a measly drug debt. That she allowed her daughter to experience something so traumatic, so painful, just to save herself.
“What do you think your fed buddies would think when they find out you gang-raped a teenage girl?” I asked, stepping closer to his trembling frame.
“The feds kicked me to the curb years ago. I was stripped of my badge a year after I met your president.”
I lifted my eyes to him and heard Skid walking closer to us. Glancing over my shoulder, I could see his confusion. Giving Skeeter my full attention, I asked, “So the deal with Smokey and Bullet? The guns you deliver to the club?”
“After they killed my brother, I knew I had to do something to save my ass. They agreed to let me go if I provided the club with guns. I had connections from the ATF that were able to supply the weapons, and it was a win-win for everyone.” His watery eyes met mine, and I could see the resignation in them.
