THE FIRST SIN (29 page)

Cabot wiped blood from the corner of his mouth, shook his head, and laughed.

He was laughing?

He pushed himself away while staring at my naked body. “Despite the fact that you look like hell right now, I’m going to do everything I want to do to you.” He gave his devil’s smile. “Unless you decide to answer each and every question I have.”

“Eat shit and die, Cabot.”

“Interesting choice of words.” He walked away from me, his Gucci loafers echoing on the concrete floor. “I may just have you do that.” Keys rattled as he pulled them from his pocket. “I might feed you shit. Moose and Duke have to be let out on occasion, and we can collect their fecal matter.” My heart was all raced out and my adrenaline shot. I completely collapsed against the wooden chair, which was so hard that I think it bruised my flesh, too.

All I knew was that the pain had only just begun. I closed my eyes. If I kept from looking at him maybe this wasn’t real.

“Open your eyes,” he said several moments later, his voice almost gentle.

My jaw ached from grinding my teeth as I opened my eyes. The leather bindings constricted me like rough hands as I strained against them. I strung together every swear word in every language I could think of and shot them like poisoned arrows at Cabot

“Finished?” He smiled and my gaze followed his movements as he reached for the tray on the table attached to the chair. “I think perhaps you may have missed Arabic.” The look I gave him had to be as poisonous as my words had been. I turned my gaze to the tray. “A little cliche, don’t you think?” The glimmer of silver tools laid out on white cloth looked like standard torture fare. But there were a few things I wasn’t sure about, one of them a bottle filled with some kind of black liquid. Cabot’s version of truth serum? A round box of salt was next to the bottle. Rubbing salt in the wound, I’d lay a bet on that any day.

“Let’s start with your name.” Cabot’s cologne was going to make me sick, as close as he was. “Your complete real name.”

I glared at him.

“All right.” Cabot picked up a pair of small metal clamps.

“These always add a little bit of fun.”

I swallowed. Nipple clamps. But these had sharp, jagged, jaws.

He brought the clamps to my breasts and snapped the jaws onto my nipples.

I almost screamed.

For a moment all I could think about was those clamps on my nipples and the constant, burning, piercing sensation of them as they dug their metal teeth into one of the most sensitive parts of my body. A bit of blood spotted my areolae where the teeth dug in.

He picked up another clamp as I squirmed against my bonds. With what looked like total focused pleasure, he brought that third clamp between my thighs. Oh, no. My body vibrated. Don’t, please, just kept going through my mind, but I didn’t speak the words out loud. He looked up at me with that same hateful smile and snapped the clamp’s jaws on my clitoris.

The scream that tore from me was something I couldn’t hold back. It came from deep inside my chest, the pain of my broken ribs nothing like the pain now between my thighs.

OhGodohGodohGod.

“Now tell me,” he said.

I couldn’t have gotten a word out even if I would break and tell him.

He chose one of the silver tools. “I’ll enjoy this part more than you can imagine.”

Block the pain. Block the pain. Concentrate on something else. Concentrate on the room, anything, anything else. The stuffy room made the perspiration that had broken out on my skin sticky. Droplets rolled down the side of my face. My shaking and the pain made it hard to focus, but I managed to make out what it was he held. A tool with a blade designed to carve into wood—or flesh. “Of course you need to be branded, to show your first owner.” He brought the tool close to my belly, and it felt like my belly button touched the back of the seat the way I shrank away from him. “Unless you play ‘Tell the Truth.’” I could have easily visualized Cabot enjoying watching other people inflict pain on their victims, but to do it himself—he was more sadistic than even I had imagined. My jaw was going to crack if I continued to clench it so tightly.

“One more time.” He lightly touched my diamond belly piercing with the instrument. “What is your real name?” I wasn’t about to endanger my family by giving out my real name. My mind shifted to my time in Special Ops, and to RED’s intensive training on surviving torture techniques. Pain was a way to control me. Don’t allow him to control me. Push away the pain. Meditate.

Shift my focus. Repeat a mantra.

My mind darted around like a tiny rubber ball pinging from one wall to another. Think of fun times. Sitting on my back porch watching the Red Sox, and yelling with my neighbors as they sat on theirs and watched the game, too. What was it? Sometime in April? The season was just getting going. How were our guys doing?

Or my family, the last time we’d all gotten together—

I almost shouted as pain snatched me from my “happy place.” There was nothing I could do to stop my body from trembling as he dug the knifepoint of the tool into my flesh on one side of my belly button. “Hmmm.” He cocked his head and looked at my belly as he drew a line down. My tolerance for pain was shot as I struggled to find that place where I couldn’t feel what he was doing. Blood beaded along the cut as he drew a two-inch line fairly deep in my flesh. I strained against the thick leather bindings. I tried to focus on anything but the pain of the cut, and the clamp on my clitoris and the ones on my nipples, but everything in my body was nothing but pain. A world outside of this time—did anything else exist?

Family. Friends. My job. Baseball—

Donovan?

“Shall I continue?” He looked up at me. “Let’s go this time with telling me the name of the agency you work for.” How far would he carry this?

He’d never stop.

All I could do was endure.

Cabot looked back at the little bit of blood on my belly, then cut into my flesh again. Blood filled my mouth, too, as I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from screaming. Really, Steele, what did more pain matter? I couldn’t help but watch him. This time he made two curves against the line.

For Benjamin.

Cabot was carving his initials into my flesh.

He was branding me.

April 21

Sunday afternoon

“I know you’ve got what I need.” Nick shoved the beefy informant up against the wall in the alleyway. Takamoto and Jensen stood a few feet away from Nick.

“Word’s on the street you’ve been spreading stories,” Nick continued. Dickey’s head hit the rough brick of the bar on Hanover Street in Charleston. The contents of the paper bag he was holding clunked when it hit the wall. “You’d better get that information out before I gut you.” The contact of Dickey’s skull against the brick didn’t seem to faze the idiot. Probably too drunk. “Cash. I wanna see it.” The informant reeked of whiskey that went well with the stench of vomit, piss, and garbage in the alleyway. His voice squeaked but he sounded determined. “You’ll get your money.” Nick put one hand around the big man’s throat that was scratchy with stubble. Nick squeezed. Dickey let out a gasp for air. “If you give me the information and I let you live.”

Dickey glared. Talk about a dumb shit.

Nick let out a low growl and wrapped both hands around Dickey’s throat as he thumped the man’s head against the brick. Dickey’s stringy hair swung across into his pale blue eyes.

“Fuck,” Dickey said in a strangled voice. He dropped the paper bag he’d been holding and grabbed both of Nick’s wrists. The bag landed with a crash and the sound of glass breaking. “Calm ya livva. I’ll tell you what I heard.” Nick backed off, but only a little. Dickey might be a dipshit loser, but he was a big man, and fast. Nick could take Dickey, but it didn’t hurt having Takamoto and Jensen at his back.

“You got it on my dungies.” Dickey glared down at the bag now soaked with what smelled like cheap whiskey and at the wet spot on his pant leg. “You gonna pay for that too.” “Dickey, I have no fucking patience left.” Nick fisted his hands and was ready to use the big loser as a punching bag.

Dickey hooked his thumbs in his belt loops like he was trying to figure out what to do with his hands now that he didn’t have the bag. “Heard it from another guy.” Great. Secondhand information.

“Farther down Hanover.” Dickey continued. “Near that real swank place.”

Nick went still. The feeling that he was about to get a decent lead prickled his spine. “The Gold Crown?” “Yeah.” Dickey shifted as if he was going to run.

Nick grabbed the collar of the informant’s flannel shirt and pressed him against the wall again. “We’ve had that nightclub under surveillance front and back for a while and haven’t seen a goddamned thing.”

“That’s because you hasn’t been inside that place next to it.” Dickey’s thick alcohol breath was enough to make Nick intoxicated and he pushed away from the bastard. Nick gave Dickey a skeptical look. “You have?” “Na-ah.”

Dickey shoved his hands into the front pockets of his stained jeans. Nick and his team had already searched Dickey for weapons so they knew he was clean. “But Jack budged a bulkie roll from the store and was having a drink by a dumpster in the alleyway round the corner from that Crown place and next to that craphole.”

“Get on with it.” Nick gritted his teeth. “My patience is about to snap, Dickey.

Your information better be good.”

“Jack’s no chowdahead.” Dickey glanced down the alley toward Hanover Street before looking back at Nick. “Jack said these guys looked like they could rough a guy up. They was talking somethin’ about candy.”

Candy? But Nick still got that on-fire sensation again.

“Get it the hell out.”

Dickey pushed his stringy hair away from his ruddy face. “Jack, he said those guys, they talked about women.. They said somethinn’ about merchandise and girls, like they was the same thing.”

Nick had the strangest sensation, as if being near Dickey was like standing too close to a vat of poison. He took a step back. “Are you sure you’ve got it right?”

Dickey tapped his head with one long finger and grinned, showing his yellowed teeth. “Got me a photographic memory. I know what Jack said he remembered. And Jack himself’s no bucka.”

“That’s what makes Dickey such a good informant,” Takamoto said as he came up to Nick’s side. “That ‘perfect’ memory.”

Dickey grinned. “And I listen up real well and no one pays no attention to no bazo.”

“Yeah, drunks aren’t usually as reliable as you. Dickey,” Takamoto said.

“Next time don’t screw around with me.” Nick put deadly meaning in his voice. “You spill your guts right away or I’ll do it for you.”

“Fuck.” Dickey looked at Takamoto. “Where’d you get this guy?”

“We’ll req your cash.” Nick said. “Right here, same time tomorrow afternoon, you’ll get it. An agent will be waiting.” Dickey looked down at the soaked bag now with jagged glass poking through the wet paper that was falling apart.

“Don’t forget money for the booze.”

Nick gave Dickey one last look. “If your info proves to be what we need, I’ll make sure you get a bonus.” Dickey cracked another smile, but Nick turned his back on the informant.

No time for anymore of this shit. Nick had to assemble a raid team and he had to do it now.

Nick

April 21

Sunday night

Nick and the rest of the six RED raid teams positioned themselves to the front and the rear of the place near the Golden Crown on First Street. In their black raid gear and with their uncanny abilities to remain virtually invisible the RED teams had no problem remaining unnoticed, regardless of the sheer number of agents.

Even after having been a SEAL, Nick was impressed with RED agents who were equally as well trained, efficient and dangerous, but in larger numbers.

RED had more of an advantage when conducting a raid than any other force Nick knew of.

Before Kristin had been kidnapped, Nick hadn’t know RED existed. Because of his background in Special Ops, Karen Oxford had tried to recruit him but would never name the organization she worked for, so he refused to have anything to do with it. She’d said with his unique talents he’d make an excellent addition to the division. Sources had informed him that some kind of covert organization similar to RED operated underground, but it was something no one had been able to prove. And once recruited, no agent would reveal the organization.

When Nick started searching for his sister, Oxford jumped to his mind. She’d told him she was based out of Boston. He’d taken the plain white card with the simple black writing with Karen Oxford’s name and phone number. And called.

A short time later and he was in.

To Nick, most importantly, RED had means to track down Kristin that would make it faster than if he had continued to operate on his own.

And now those resources were about to be put to use to get Lexi back.

Nick’s heart thudded so hard it felt like it hit his Kevlar vest. Electricity ran up and down his arms. He was so goddamned charged to make this happen and find Lexi. Sirens cut through the night in a distant part of Boston. The closer sounds of traffic only slightly muffled the noise and music coming from the Crown. From his hiding place in a doorway of a closed nearby shop, Nick caught the scent of alcohol along with smoke from the patrons who’d come outside for a cigarette.

The crowd was a little thinner on a Sunday than it would be on a Friday or Saturday, but the nightclub was still doing a good piece of business.

Nick spoke into his comm and all teams reported in. Yellow team was in place, covering the back exit and the green team had the front. Snipers were positioned on the rooftops of nearby buildings.

Blue team would secure the upstairs. Orange team and Red team would head straight for the lower level. Nick and his own private squad would be searching for Lexi. He had a feeling she was in there—but his gut told him she wasn’t going to be easy to locate.

“On my count.” Nick’s adrenaline rocketed. “Three...

two . . . one! Go, go, go.r

“Police!” Blue team leader shouted as they charged into the building.