Hot as Hades (25 page)

“What’s he going to do?” Daisy asked Cowboy.

“What he has to,” Cowboy said simply.

“I’ll go in with him,” she offered.

“The hell you are!” he growled.

“Fine with me,” Duke said, seemingly unconcerned by having an audience. “This guy took your sister, right?”

She nodded.

“And tried to force himself on both you and the girl at the club?”

“Yes,” she confirmed.

He smiled at her then, a creepy little grin that made her shudder. “I’m going to extract information from him, the most painful way possible. If you want to come in with me, you have to promise me something.”

“What?”

“No matter what happens, you won’t try to interfere, you won’t throw up, and you won’t leave. Can you promise me all of those things?”

Daisy hesitated. Sure, she’d intended to knock Rock around a bit, threaten him, and maybe give him a few swift kicks to his tiny little junk. But Duke clearly intended to torture him.

 Could she do that? No. She realized she couldn’t. Shepherd had been right all along. There were things that had to be done on this op she wasn’t prepared to handle.

Daisy shook her head.

 Duke went in by himself and fifteen minutes later, Rock’s muffled cries could be heard outside the door.

She felt like pressing her palms to her ears, but forced herself to listen. Even if she hadn’t actually done the torturing, she’d allowed it to happen. Her conscience wasn’t clear.

Not that she really gave a damn about Rock. He was a piece of shit who deserved to rot in jail, or hell or rot in the ground for all she cared. But torture? She’d seen terrible things in Afghanistan. Roadside bombs, terrorists with explosives strapped to their chests, but this crap? In her book, there was a big difference between cleanly killing an enemy and yanking off someone’s fingernails or whatever the hell was going on in there.

 But if it bothered Cowboy and Shepherd, it didn’t show. They stood against the wall, stone-faced.

After what felt like hours later, Duke emerged from the room, and wiped his hands on a handkerchief he pulled from his back pocket, the cloth came away red and wet. And no it wasn’t paint.

 “The bastard wouldn’t fucking talk,” he pronounced.

“Dammit,” Shepherd said succinctly.

Duke slung the bag over his shoulder. “He’s loyal to his club, I’ll give him that much.” He raised a brow at the VP. “If you want my opinion, this is a dead end. I think we need to clean this up and put it to bed.”

To Daisy, that sounded like Horsemen-speak for killing Rock. “Wait! Let me have a go.”

“If he wouldn’t talk for me, he sure as shit ain’t gonna for you,” Duke said.

“Shut up, Hannibal, ever stop to think I might be a better interrogator than you?”

“No.” Duke smirked at her. “Believe me when I tell you no one is better at getting information from a subject.” He cocked a silky black brow. “Besides, I’m more of a Dexter, I only go after people who deserve it.”

“And who determines if they deserve it?” she asked, intrigued despite herself.

Not even a hint of humor in his coal black eyes. “Why, me, of course.”

She couldn’t suppress a shudder.

 “We should let her try,” Cowboy said, bringing the conversation back into safer territory.

Shepherd nodded, but fixed her with a stern look. “You’ve got five minutes.”

“Can I have your gun?” she asked Cowboy

He hesitated but then handed over his Colt. “Threaten him with it, but don’t use it. It’ll take the prospects weeks to scrub biker off the walls.”

With a nod, Daisy cocked it and stepped inside.

***

She found Rock slumped in a chair, arms and legs bound. He had a gag in his mouth and his eyes were nearly swollen shut. Blood dripped from his nose and his lip had been busted in two.

 Rock’s chest was bare and the sides of his shirt had jagged edges, like someone had cut it with a pair of scissors. Burn marks surrounded his nipples and the piercings had been ripped out, leaving two bloody trails down his chest.

His genitals had been pulled free of his jeans, and she noted what looked like electrical burns on them, creating a mass of red, bloodied skin. Daisy took a brutal sort of pleasure in his pain. She’d intended to cut his balls off, but this was so much more excruciating in the long run. It made her a hypocrite of sorts.

 He squinted at the gun and then glanced away again, evidently unconcerned. Maybe after surviving Duke’s grilling methods, a little handgun didn’t scare him much.

 “Where is she?” Daisy asked again.

“Where’s who?”

“No games, asshole. I’m exhausted from weeks of playing grab ass with your club brothers and I’ve had a really long fucking day. I’m looking for my sister. You used to date her.”

“You’re gonna have to be a bit more specific.” He laughed then, which turned into a cough. Blood appeared on his lips, a sign of internal bleeding. “I get a lot of pussy and it’s hard to keep track.”

She bit the inside of her cheek and then tried again, not taking the bait. “Rose Weston. She looks a lot like me.”

He studied her a moment. “I can’t say I recall a slut named Rose.”

She grabbed her cell phone, flicked to the gallery and Rose’s image appeared. Daisy shoved the phone in his face.

“Oh her? I haven’t seen that skank in a while.”

Daisy punched him in the jaw, causing more blood to drip from the corner of his big fat mouth. “Watch your tone with me.”

He spat out blood. “Yeah, come to think of it, she did look a bit like you, all rough around the edges, like she’d been used hard.”

 “And when did you see her last?” she asked tightly.

 “Fuck if I remember.”

Daisy tried another tactic. She got behind him, pressed the gun barrel against the back of his head. “Maybe this will jog your memory. Tell me what I want to know or I’ll blow your head off.”

“Hmm. I do recall something.” He chuckled. “Did you know she was a virgin? She bled all over my cock the first time I fucked her.”

Her sister’s first time had been with this asshole? They’d talked about guys all the time, and she knew Rose had come close to losing her virginity twice to boys she had dated but had always “saved” herself. While Daisy didn’t give sex the significance Rose did, she believed it should be pleasurable and with someone who treated you well. Like Cowboy. Someone who was honorable, and kind.

Tears pricked her eyes and she quickly blinked them away. Men like Rock thrived on causing pain and she be damned if she gave him the satisfaction.

“I don’t give a fuck about your sex life,” she growled. “I want to know what you did with her.”

“I’m sick of this shit. We both know you won’t pull the trigger. Not without permission from your little boyfriends outside. So why don’t you haul your tight ass out of here and let them do the heavy lifting for you?”

She circled him slowly, like a predator, willing him to speak. “Tell me where she is!” Daisy demanded again.

“Go fuck yourself, bitch.”

In Afghanistan, daily exposure to the horrors of war, created a curious sort of detachment to the carnage around her. The numb feeling inside gave her a fuzzy sort of amorphous place she could curl up in when things became too difficult to think about. It allowed her to do things like hose gray matter out of the Humvee after an IED went off. Or approach someone who might or might not have a bomb strapped to her chest without any qualms.

But looking for Rose? This was personal, visceral and after the day she’d had? Her nerves were raw.

She leapt on his lap, like a wild thing. He screamed as she came in contact with his raw, burned flesh. Daisy eased herself upwards, since he couldn’t very well talk if he passed out from pain. Then sank a hand into his hair, and pulled it backwards, baring his neck to her in some primal gesture of submission.

She tucked the gun in her back pocket and pulled the switch blade out, casually ran it along the line of his throbbing carotid artery. If she sliced it, he would bleed out in a matter of minutes.

 “You know, they’ve been talking about killing you,” she said conversationally, smoothing the knife over his skin, like she was practicing giving him a close shave. Evidently she’d gotten his attention, because he went completely still and his breath came in short pants. “If you tell me what I want to know, I’ll make sure they let you live.”

He made a disgusted noise in the back of his throat. “We both know that’s a lie. I was a dead man, the minute the Horsemen dragged me in this room. They
can’t
let me live. They know I would tell the Raptors and unleash all sorts of hell. They aren’t ready for a war.”

“Here’s a blast from the past. Remember what you told me the first night I waited on you? You won’t like what happens if I have to ask again. Now, tell me what I want to know!” she demanded, bringing a pinprick of blood on his throat.

 “You want to know what I did with her?” he growled.

“Yes!”

“I sold the little cunt.” He grinned, showing a row of bloodied teeth. Duke had pulled a few of them out.

“You sold her?” Her stomach rolled at the thought of her baby sister being auctioned off to some asshole. But she focused on the positive aspect of the news. “That means she’s alive?”

He shrugged. “Last time I saw the bitch, yeah.”

Daisy sighed in relief. “Who bought her?”

“I’m never gonna tell you, so you might as well kill me,” he wheezed.

She grabbed his shirt front and shook him. “Tell me, God damn you!”

“Fuck you, bitch!” he spat. “I’m takin’ it to the grave with me and there’s not a thing you can do about it.”

Shit!

 He wouldn’t tell her, if only for spite. He literally had nothing to lose, knew the Horsemen would kill him, and his manhood was pretty much a lost cause. Nothing she could hit him with as a stick.  And no fucking carrot to offer either.

She’d reached a dead end.

Duke had been right. If Rock hadn’t bent under torture, she didn’t have a chance in hell of making him talk.

Rock chuckled, coughing a bit as he did. “You’ll never find her. That means I win, bitch!”

Before she knew it, the gun was in her hand once more and she leapt off his lap. “How much did you sell her for?” She pressed the barrel between his eyes, cocked it.

Rock chuckled, blood leaking from his mouth. “Not nearly as much as I wanted. I planned on turning her over to the whorehouse for a big fucking finder’s fee, but she was a lousy lay and I was low on cash.”

“I asked you a question. How much?!” she repeated. “How much did you sell my baby sister for?”

“Two hundred dollars.”

Daisy cocked the gun. “Enjoy your win, bitch.”

She pulled the trigger.

Chapter Twenty

Blood splattered and trembling, Daisy slowly shuffled out to the parking lot. She was dimly aware of Cowboy and Shepard running into the hotel room behind her, cursing, but she didn’t care.

Rose was gone, truly gone. She’d killed the last person to see her sister alive and she couldn’t go to the club looking for more clues. She’d lost Rose, just like she’d lost her mother.

Eventually, she became aware of Cowboy standing in front of her. He shook her a little. “Daisy? Tell me what he said.”

She tried to focus. “He sold her.”

“To who?”

She shook her head. “The bastard wouldn’t tell me.”

“Oh, fuck.” Cowboy held her, but she didn’t feel it. She just kept replaying the conversation she’d had with Rock in her head.

Maybe she shouldn’t have killed him? What if she’d tried another approach? She could have…
No. Don’t second guess yourself. You went with your gut instinct.

 “You did what you had to,” Cowboy murmured as he rubbed her back.

Then, something awful penetrated the fog surrounding her brain. “Oh, God, what about the body, all that blood…”

“Shh,” he said softly. “I don’t want you to worry about it. We’ll take care of everything.”

 She let him lead her back to her hotel room, and didn’t protest when he steered her into the shower. He scrubbed the gore from her body, soaped her hair and skin, letting the water washing away all the evidence. Then, eventually he dried her off, and dressed her in a pair of jeans, and a white top he’d found in a drawer. All the while he spoke to her softly, soothing noises meant to reassure her, but she couldn’t quite concentrate on anything he said.

Nothing felt real.

Afterwards he tugged her towards the Silverado and she climbed into the passenger’s seat while he drove. She sat there, staring out the window as trees buzzed by. Miles later she blinked and seemed to come back to herself, but she felt fuzzy, like she’d woken from a nightmare.

Unfortunately, Daisy currently lived in one.

 “Where are we going?” she asked.

“There’s a place you need to see.”

They eventually pulled up at a farm just outside of town with a small red barn painted to look like a Texas flag, surrounded by a large fenced pasture. And in the distance, she saw a white farmhouse with a wraparound porch.

“Where are we?” Curiosity got the better of her.

“My place.”

He shut the engine off and they both climbed down. Cowboy directed her toward the barn and a horse whickered as they approached, sticking his head out of his stall.

 “Daisy, I’d like you to meet Cash,” he said proudly, gesturing to the jet black animal, who bumped his nose against Cowboy’s hand, seeking closer contact. “He’s a four year old gelding and the best damn horse you ever did meet.”

Cash snorted in response and tossed his head.

Daisy couldn’t help but laugh, despite herself, jarred out of her apathy. “This is seriously your place?”

“Yes, it’s all mine.” He plucked a few sugar cubes from his pocket and held them out to the horse who gobbled them down.

“Then why are you living in a motel?” While Hades wasn’t half bad, she couldn’t imagine passing up this place to stay there.

“I could tell you, but this is something you need to see.”

While she watched, he bridled and saddled Cash. The horse seemed to relish his attention, closing his eyes as Cowboy patted him. He placed a felt pad on Cash’s back, then a blanket, and then set the saddle down. After everything had been secured, he vaulted onto Cash’s back and then hauled her up behind him. The horse seemed to know the route, because he took off at a gallop, going off into the darkness without concern.