Rebel Roused (Untamed #5) (4 page)

“It’s for you.” He pressed his lips together and held out the phone. “It’s him.”

The floor seemed to shift under me. My stomach knotted as I grabbed the phone with one hand, steadying myself against the desk with the other.

This was it. The call I’d been waiting for. The call that meant Ree was still alive.

She fucking had to be.

“I see you got my message,” I said, not waiting for him. My father was all about power—he craved and coveted control. Not this time. “Where is she?”

“Your little whore has caused quite a spectacle, hasn’t she?” He barked the words out with a low, irritated growl. “If I’d known she was McKinley’s girl I would’ve gone about this in an entirely different way. Demanded some money before I sliced into her tight, little body.”

“If you’ve touched even a single hair on her head…” My voice and bravado wavered at the thought. No. I had to play his game. At least for the moment. “I’ll do whatever you want if you just promise to let her go. I’ll come willingly, just don’t hurt her.”

“Oh, you’ll come anyway. You and I both know that.” He laughed, then coughed like he was smoking up a storm. And the man only smoked that much when he was in the middle of a job. Fuck. “The bitch says she loves you. And it actually seems to be true.” He tsked. “To think that somebody loves a loser like you. Did you know that she refused to give us your phone number? I cut into her pretty deep, but the cunt still wouldn’t talk. She didn’t even scream, though I’m willing to bet she will when you get here. She strikes me as the type who likes to perform in front of an audience.”

“Don’t you fucking touch her!” Panic and anger sliced through my chest. I saw blood. “I swear, I’ll rip your head off if you hurt her!”

Archer’s eyes widened.

“Where is she? Tell me where you’re keeping her, you son-of-a-bitch! I’m coming to get her right now!”

Once again, my father laughed. “No, son. You’re coming to watch her die. But at least you’ll see her alive one last time.”

Archer was in my ear. “We have to call the cops, Dare!”

“Tell your little lackey, no cops. If I get even a whiff of pig, I won’t hesitate to kill your girl before you get here. She’ll be a puzzle you’ll have to put back together piece by bloody fucking piece.” He rattled off an address of an old shipyard in Jersey. “Just you. Come alone. Squeal to anyone and she dies before you get a chance to say goodbye.”

My father hung up, and it took all my self-control not to stomp the shit out of my phone.

I looked at Archer. “I’m going after her.”

“I’ll call Detective Sutherland.”

“No.” I shook my head. “He said no cops or she dies.”

“And we’re supposed to listen to that?” He looked at me incredulously. “Are you fucking insane?”

“My father is,” I said. “You don’t know him, Archer. He never backs down. If he says he’ll do it, he
will
do it. I refuse to risk her life.”

“Then what are we going to do?”

“What he really wants is me. And I’m going to fucking give him what he wants. In spades. Then I’ll bring her home.”

Or die trying.

five

“O
h, Prin-cess…” The strong smell of tobacco wafted over me as someone slapped my face. “Wake the fuck up.”

The sting pierced the fuzziness of my mind, and I forced my heavy lids to lift, filling my vision with bright, burning light. Nothing looked familiar. Had I been out partying? I couldn’t remember where I was or who I’d been with. And, fuck, every square inch of me was in pain.

“We’re going to have a visitor today.” A blurry mouth was an inch away from my nose, scarred lips turned up in a malicious sneer. The man kept coming in and out of focus, as if he was a prop on some hellish carnival ride I was stuck on. “Can you guess who’s coming to watch you die?”

Dare
. Despite my drugged haze, he was always the first thought in my mind. Dare, Dare, Dare. Always Dare.

But why was he coming to watch me die? Was I sick?

And then clarity returned like a cold, cruel wind, blowing the memories of the past few days through my mind. Daren Wilde’s face was now fully in focus, and my body instinctively tensed, preparing for the first blow.

The first one was always the worst. No matter how much I braced myself for it, the intensity of the pain took my breath away. I should have been used to it by now, but I was starting to think that maybe there were some things in this world that you simply could not get used to.

At least I knew that when it was all over, they’d drug me again, and I’d have the bliss of oblivion to take away the pain. Blood and drugs. That had become my world over the past few days as Daren tried to get me to give up Dare’s phone number.

I hadn’t caved, had I?

No. I was sure of it. But Dare was coming, which meant his father had gotten to him.

Dare was in danger, and I’d failed to protect him. Fuck.

I tried to scream, to swear at the monster in front of me, but no sound came out. Gritting my teeth, I bit down on the cloth between my lips, groaning in frustration as a few traitorous tears slipped down my cheeks.

Daren shook his head. “No, no, Princess,” he said. “Save the crying for
after
he arrives. It’ll be much more heart-wrenching that way.” He smirked. “Don’t worry, you won’t have to wait long. The ungrateful bastard should be here any minute now.” He slowly undid my gag. “I’m warning you now that any screaming will only force me to drug you again. And you really, really need to be awake for this part of the show. It’ll be all the more fun.”

Shouts exploded outside, and Daren’s head turned toward the sounds. Something crashed into the wall, and I swore I could hear the sickening sound of fists hitting flesh.

Daren turned back to me, a deadly grin on his face. “Looks like he’s already here.” He licked his lips. “Once they get him tied down, they’ll bring him in to me.”

So he could kill Dare?

Not if I had anything to say about it.

Using all my strength, I jerked forward, slamming my head into his face as I yelled, “Run, Dare! Get out of here!”

Daren reared back, howling, blood gushing out of his nose. “Jesus fucking Christ! You broke my fucking nose!”

Clutching his face with both hands, he lifted one black-booted foot and kicked me in the chest, sending me tumbling over backwards in the chair I was tied to. I felt bones crunch as my weight came down on my hands trapped behind me.

Pain shot up my arms and I groaned.

“You fucking bitch.” He pulled out his knife, grabbed hold of my right arm, and pulled. The pain in my wrist was excruciating, and I screamed as he wrenched me and the chair back up. “I should just kill you right now.”

He walked around behind me, and I closed my eyes, praying he’d make it quick, but knowing that wasn’t the least bit likely. I tried to hold Dare in my mind and heart, warm myself with his love so my last thought would be of him and only him. I heard Daren move swiftly, braced myself for the blow as stale air swished around us, but felt the knife slice between my hands, and my arms swung free.

My right hand throbbed and I couldn’t move my fingers, but I didn’t have time to do anything except gasp in surprise at my freedom before he grabbed me by the hair and lifted me to my feet.

“LET HER GO!”

No, no, no. He wasn’t supposed to come in here.

My chest tore in half at the sight of Dare, his complexion pale, dark circles surrounding his sunken eyes. Bruises were forming on his face, his lip was busted, and his knuckles were bleeding, but he was otherwise none the worse for wear.

I blinked back tears. I’d been wishing and praying to see him one last time, but now that he was standing in front of me, horror washed over me and all I could think was that he’d just sealed his own fate.

His death.

“And the prodigal rat returns.” Daren spat, pulled his gun out of the back of his pants, and pointed it at Dare. “Nice of you to finally join us.” He waved his gun toward the door. “Though you were supposed to have an escort.”

“I got rid of them,” Dare said coolly. “It’s just you and me now. Let Ree go.”

“
Dare
…” I shook my head. If he thought there was even a chance his father was going to just let me walk out of here after all this, he was insane. I knew better. He
had
to know better after a lifetime spent in this monster’s shadow.

“Let Ree go,” he said again, his eyes glued to mine. “I’m here. Take me, do whatever you want to me, just release her.”

Daren tutted. “That would be too easy, wouldn’t it? I want you to suffer the way you’ve made me suffer all these years. My wife, my kids, my business—you’ve murdered them all. I had to watch from behind bars as everything of mine was ripped away. All because I let you in, you ungrateful, selfish bastard.”

“That was all your own doing,” Dare said. “Your greed cost you your business. And you lost your family because you’re a malicious, psychotic son-of-a-bitch.”

“Haven’t you learned yet that there are consequences for talking back to your father?” Daren backhanded me with his pistol, and Dare surged forward but froze as soon as his father trained the gun on him again.

“I will fucking kill you if you hurt her again.” Dare’s eyes blazed, his whole body tensed as if he might pounce. But I hoped to god he wouldn’t. Not with that gun pointing right at his heart. “I will rip you to shreds, piece by little piece.”

“Funny, that’s exactly what I was planning to do to your little whore.” Daren yanked me back against him, and my skin crawled at the feel of his hot breath on my neck. “Though maybe I should just shoot you instead.” I could almost hear the slow malevolent grin spread across his face. “As for you, Princess, I’ll get your daddy to set me up with a big, fat reward. I’ll be set for life, free to start over wherever the fuck I want. I hear California is the place to be these days.”

My eyes traveled down his right arm to the gun in his hand. It was close enough that I could reach it. I glanced at Dare, his gaze bore into me and he shook his head just slightly. But it was our only chance. Daren’s finger was poised to squeeze, if I didn’t do something now, it might be too late.

And I was not going to be too late to save Dare.

With all of my might, I stomped on Daren’s boot and he lost his grip on my hair. I lunged for his gun, but he swung it at me, aiming right at my head.

“NO!” Dare yelled, thrust his palms forward as if that might stop his father. “It’s me you want. Just let her go. I’ll stay. You have my word.”

“
Your
word?” his father laughed, his eyes bright with insanity. “Your fucking word means nothing. You snitched me out before, you little shit. You think I don’t know that? You think I don’t know exactly
who
was responsible for me going to jail?”

Dare shook his head. “You did that yourself. They caught you because you took the time to put me in the hospital.”

Daren’s gaze was fixed on his son, his eyes bugging out, his expression incredulous. I slid one foot toward Dare and ever so slowly started to shift my weight toward him.

But as soon as I’d begun to move, Daren’s eyes were back on me. “You fucking move a muscle again and I will fucking shoot you.”

“Come on. You’ve got to let her go. You can’t keep track of both of us. And there’s no one here to help you.” Dare took a step forward, and Daren’s trigger finger started to squeeze. “NO! IT’S
ME
YOU WANT.”

Daren’s eyes flicked to Dare, and he considered him for a brief moment. “You know what? You’re right. It’s
you
I want. It’s
you
I want to see suffer. It’s
you
I want to have watching while I take away the woman you love. It’s
you
I want to bring to your knees. And I’m going to do that right now.”

He suddenly swung his arm toward Dare, aiming at his legs, his finger starting to squeeze the trigger.

And the world practically stopped, everything happening as if in slow motion.

I launched myself forward, not thinking about what I was doing, my only impulse to save the man I loved. I was flying through the air when an ear-splitting BANG rang out, reverberating through my body. Then something stung my stomach, and I was falling to the hard cold floor.

I screamed as agony unlike any other I’d ever felt ripped through me. The entire side of my body felt engulfed in flames.

Darkness closed in on me as I lifted my head to see if Dare was okay. To see if he’d been shot. But he was a blur. Fear and rage contorted his face as he hurled himself at his father. They were a tangle of fists and blows, wrestling for control of the gun between them.

Wet warmth seeped through my fingers as my eyes started to close, and the last thing I heard was the sound of Daren’s gun going off.

Then everything went black.

six