Wicked Ties (Steele Security Series) (20 page)

The next warehouse search was fruitless.  It obviously hadn’t been used in quite some time.  Dust and dirt covered everything, with no tracks or anything else to indicate anyone had been there in months.  “That explains why they have so many warehouses,” he said aloud to himself.  “They’re alternating between them to avoid getting caught.”

Bull text
ed the others to let them know his search was complete and there was no sign of Chaise in either of his warehouses.  Within a few seconds, he received texts back from all the others relaying the same information, except Shadow.  Having not received a response from Shadow, he decided that was where he needed to go next.

As he silently walked through the darkened streets, he heard voices coming from behind one of the vacant buildings.  He slowed his pace and listened for any sign that they knew he was there.  The number of voices increased and he was able to identify six distinct voices.  They were speaking in Spanish and talking about the beautiful new Cordova girl. 

“Jorge, you think she’d want you,
ese
?  You’re crazy, man!”

“Yeah, Marco, she is hot!  She’d definitely pick me over you, homes.”

“You two losers don’t have to worry about it.  Manuel already ordered everyone to stay away from
Senorita Chaise
.  If I catch you near her, I’ll cut your dick off myself,” an older voice chastised the younger boys.

“We were just fucking around, man,” Jorge responded, clearly offended that he had been put in his place.

The voices started trailing off so Bull moved into position to follow them.  They had no clue he was close behind them, monitoring their moves and waiting for them to take him to Chaise.  He listened to their boasting from the shadows and gave them all the rope they needed.

Bull sensed a change in the air, a sudden charge of energy and the distinct feeling of being watched.  He skirted around the corner of the building, still hidden in the shadows, and silently unsheathed his knife.  Holding it firmly in his grasp, he readied himself for the man moving along the side of the building
toward him.

When the other man reached the corner, Bull’s arm flew up in a split second and stopped just short of the man’s neck.  “Shadow, what have I told you about sneaking up on me?”

Shadow’s deep chuckle rumbled through his chest, “Are you getting rusty in your old age?  The Bull I knew would’ve known the very second I moved into his range.”

“Fuck you, man.  Old my
ass—I made you as soon as you stepped on my block,” Bull said with a smile.

Shadow’s tone became serious as he said, “Come with me.  They’ve taken Chaise to Rico’s house.  I couldn’t get to the boat before they left.  John’s at the warehouse with the other girls.”

Bull’s blood turned to lava in his veins at just the thought of what Rico planned to do to Chaise.  “Lead the way,” he responded.

Shadow and Bull jogged to the waterfront warehouse where they’d held Chaise.  Bull swore under his breath when he saw the girls locked up in the cell.  Looking at his father, Bull asked, “You’re just going to leave them in there?”

“I have no choice until I can close this case and bust the Cordova family,” John answered.  “I have to figure out their trade route so I can shut them down or they will just go somewhere else and start this all over again.”

“This ends
tonight
, one way or another,” Bull responded.  “I’m not leaving here without Chaise.”

John walked over to the cell and asked one of the girls to follow him.  She eyed him wearily but she did as he asked.  Once he had her out of earshot of the others, John and Rebel sat down with her to decipher Cordova’s plans.

“What’s your name, sweetheart?” Rebel asked in a calm, reassuring tone.

“Consuela,” she answered meekly.

“Consuela, my name is Rebel.  I won’t hurt you, I promise.  I’m here to help you.  Can you tell us what’s going on here?  Why do they have you locked up in here with these other girls?”

Her eyes darted between Rebel and John and then over to the other men who were waiting a few feet away.  “They send us to their contacts in other countries to pick up the drugs for them.  We bring them back here and I don’t know what they do with them after that.”

“So they’re using you as mules.  That way they won’t get caught trafficking,” John stated.  “How do they send you?”

“In the bottom of a big, dirty ship.  The men on the ship are mean, too,” Consuela replied with sadness permeating her voice.  “Once the ship reaches US waters, it stops.  We have to bring the drugs the rest of the way in a small boat.  It is very dangerous with the waves and the weather.  They tell us if we don’t come back, they will kill our families.

“And, sometimes, we take the small boats far out into the ocean and meet another boat that looks like a submarine with a snorkel sticking up.  They throw the packages in the water for us to get,” she finished explaining.

“How do you know where to go?” John asked.

“The boat has a GPS-type device that shows us where to go.  The men put the information in it and then send us out.  We just follow the direction it shows.”

“Do you know what kind of drugs they are sending you to pick up?” Rebel asked.

“Sometimes it’s meth, but usually it’s heroin.  I’ve heard the men talking about it,” she answered.  “They have radios and someone calls out a bunch of numbers.  Every time we hear that, we know they’re about to send one of us out.”

John looked up at Rebel, “Now we know where they’re getting the coordinates to put in the GPS.  If we can get one of the radios, we can monitor it and be there to trap them.”

“Diego left his radio.  He forgot about it after he hit the pretty lady,” Consuela said as she pointed to a radio that sat on a shelf littered with garbage.

That caught Bull and Reaper’s attention.  Bull walked over to where they sa
t, turned a chair around, and straddled it.  He smiled at Consuela as he asked, “What did the pretty lady look like, sweetheart?”

“She had long black hair, pretty green eyes, and she was so nice.  She saw Ana and thought she was Aura, her twin sister,” she pointed to Ana. “She helped
Ana when Diego was being mean.  She took Ana’s place for the run tonight.”

“She took her place?” Rebel asked.

“Yes.  But I heard Manuel say they are going to
Rico’s
house first.  That is not good,” Consuela said.

“Why is that not good?” Bull asked.

“The girls who are taken to Rico’s never come back,” she whispered, as if she thought he would appear just by mentioning his name.  Her eyes were wide with fear and her bottom lip trembled with the thoughts of what Rico would do with Chaise.  

Bull swallowed hard to keep his thoughts and feelings under control.  He didn’t want to frighten the poor girl with his tirade, but he was going to kill the men who took Chaise.  Every one of them would soon face him and he vowed to be the last person they would ever see.

The boat
slowed in the blackness of the night and Chaise sat up straighter, trying to get her bearings on where she was.  Diego was at the helm and Manuel sat beside him.  They put Chaise in the back of the boat so she couldn’t see the modified GPS device or hear what they were saying over the engines.

As the boat came to a stop, she thought she saw something approaching from the right.  There was something sticking up out of the water but her eyes could not make out what it was.  Diego pulled out a spotlight and shone it across the water just as a small, semi-submersible watercraft fully surfaced.

The pipe sticking up out of the water acted as a waterproof snorkel for the craft that allowed air in but a special valve kept the water out.  The top hatch opened and a man threw several large packages out into the water.  The packages were strung together with a thick cord and floated in the water between the two vessels.

Diego turned to Chaise and snidely ordered, “Go get them,
puta
.  I hope you can swim.”

When Chaise didn’t move, Diego pulled his gun and leveled it at her.  “
Ahora
.” 
Now
.

Chaise stepped up on the side of the boat and dove into the deep, black water.  She quickly swam to the packages, grabbed the cord and towed it back to the boat.  Manuel reached down and took the cord from her hand and pulled the packages into the boat. 

“Get back in the boat or drown out here,
puta
.  Your choice,” Diego taunted.

Manuel shot Diego a look that made him sit back down and look away.  “You know we have orders to take her to Rico, Diego,” Manuel chastised.

Looking at Chaise, Manuel commanded her, “Get back in the boat.”

Chaise swam to the back of the boat and hauled her body out of the water onto the small platform.  Once she was back in her seat, Diego gunned the engines and they took off across the choppy waters.  Chaise noticed the winds picking up and the waves getting higher.  It was the middle of hurricane season in Florida and apparently another storm was about to hit.

Diego kept the bow straight to run straight into the waves so the boat wouldn’t capsize as the wave height increased.  The noise from the boat’s engines, the whipping wind, and the splashing waves made it nearly impossible to hear anyone speak.  Chaise could see Diego and Manuel talking but couldn’t hear most of what they were saying.  When she made out part of Manuel’s sentence, her heart dropped to her knees.  Even though she was wet and the night wind was cool against her skin, she broke out into a cold sweat from her fear.

Manuel had just told Diego that they were to kill Chaise when Rico was finished with her.  She knew they were taking her to Rico but she had no idea what he planned to do with her.  She only knew she wasn’t going to stick around and find out.  While they were busy battling the wind and waves to keep the boat straight, Chaise eased up to sit on the back of her seat. 

When a high wave rolled underneath them, Chaise leaned back and intentionally fell off the side of the boat.  She let the surge of the wave propel her forward as she swam as hard as she could away from the boat and her captors.  She knew there were other barrier islands that were close to Madden Island. She just hoped she was going in the right direction.

The sheer terror of being out in the open ocean at night was enough to render her immobile but the threat of being caught and tortured overtook her.  She swam harder and faster until her foot brushed against the sandy bottom.  Breathing hard, she slugged through the breaking waves until she reached the beach.  She fell flat on her stomach, exhausted from the swim and the nearly debilitating fear.   Within moments, she had passed out from exhaustion.

The sound of a speedboat engine woke Chaise from her slumber.  She pushed up to a sitting position and tentatively looked around to get her bearings.  She was momentarily lost until she remembered she swam up on the beach to escape Diego and Manuel.  The sound of the motorboat caught her attention and she scrambled behind the cover of the vegetation behind her.

As the boat passed by, she recognized the outline of Bull as he stood in the middle of the boat.  He was with several other men and they were headed
toward several lights that appeared to be just across the channel from her.  From the look of the area, she decided she was on Lauren Key and they were going to Madden Island. 

From the northwest tip of the barrier island, it was only about
a hundred yards across the channel.  She was exhausted, not thinking clearly, and only wanted to reach Bull.  She jogged along the shoreline until she reached the island point and then swam across the channel.

In the distance, she could see the boat coasting to the shore.  They had obviously cut the engines before they got too close.  Chaise started to run
toward them when she was suddenly grabbed from behind and yanked backward.  A menacing voice growled in her ear, “You caused me a lot of trouble tonight,
puta
.”

Diego twirled her around to face him.  The sound of his hand hitting her cheek made a loud
thwack
and sent her flying to the ground.  She grabbed her already bruised cheek and cried out in pain.  He yanked her up by her hair and then dragged her behind him.

When she stumbled, her hair was painfully yanked by his tight grip.  Diego turned and kicked her several times in the back and legs while telling her to get up.  She struggled back to her feet as he grabbed her upper arm to push her
toward a mansion that was partially hidden by the beach foliage.

When they reached the door, Diego shoved her up against it as he ground his erection into her abdomen.  “You are mine now,
puta
,” he hissed in her ear.  Chaise fought against his hold, pushing him with all her might.  He stumbled back a step or two but was instantly back against her with even more force.  She was just about to scream when she heard a familiar voice.

“Diego, what the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Rico asked coolly.

Diego quickly jumped away from Chaise to put distance between them but he knew he’d been caught.  He looked down at the ground in shame and embarrassment.  He didn’t dare try to give Rico a lame excuse so he kept quiet.

Rico looked at Chaise and his face registered his surprise.  His eyes grew wide at first and then narrowed as he inspected the damage to her face.  “Who did this to you,
mi amor
?”  Rico gently eased his hand across the angry bruise and swelling on her cheek.

His fingers brushed down her arm and stopped at the bruises in the shape of fingers that were forming on her upper arm.  His eyes narrowed more but he said nothing as he continued his perusal of her body.  Rico took Chaise’s hand in his and gently twirled her around to find the bruises beginning on the back of her legs.  He lifted her shirt just enough to see the marks on her back from Diego’s kicks.

As he turned Chaise back to fully face him, his voice was calm and reassuring as he spoke to her.  “Chaise, I’m very sorry for the way Diego has treated you.  I promise you,
mi amor
, he will never touch you again.”  Before Chaise could respond, Rico drew his gun from its holster and shot Diego in the head point blank.

Rico didn’t bother to look at Diego as his body fell limp onto the lanai.  Chaise screamed and backed away from Rico in shock.  “
Shhh,
mi amor
, I said he would never touch you again and I meant it.  Come inside with me.”  He took her hand in his and forced her inside his beachfront mansion. 

“You’ve been very hard to keep up with, Chaise.  If I didn’t know better, I would think you’ve been intentionally avoiding me,” Rico continued flirting with her as he led her to a beautifully adorned kitchen.  He stopped at a large island with bar stools and motioned for her to sit.

“What do you want with me?” Chaise asked with more courage than she felt.

“You will be my consort for the foreseeable future.  I’ve chosen you and you should feel honored,” Rico explained.  His tone of voice indicated she should be happy about his decision
as his eyes held a glimmer of insanity mixed with pure evil.

Chaise shook involuntarily as a shudder ran down her spine.  Just the thought of him touching her turned her stomach and made her long for Bull even more.  She had to keep Rico talking for two reasons:  to keep his hands off of her and to give
Bull more time to storm the house. 

She knew Bull and Noah were outside somewhere, along with several other linebacker-sized men.  She could picture them drawing a map in the sand to plan their attack.  Stalling sounded like her best option since Rico had already shown how fast he was with his gun.

“What does being your consort entail?” she asked, feigning interest.

He smiled warmly at her and she had the fleeting thought that he was pleased with her question, as if he believed this is what she wanted.  “Anything and everything that pleases me, Chaise.  Don’t
worry—I will make sure you are pleased as well.  But first, we need to get you out of those dirty, wet clothes and into something more suitable.”

Pulling her up from her seat, he led her up the stairs and into the guest bedroom.  He pulled out a thigh-length, satin nightgown and matching robe before escorting her to the bathroom.  After giving her a towel, he instructed her to shower and dress and then come to meet him in the den.  Before he left her alone, he turned and gave her a pointed look before issuing his warning.

“Don’t bother trying to run, Chaise.  You can’t outrun a bullet.”

She stayed in the shower as long as she could to stall and give the guys time to put their plans into action. 
Dressing in the nightgown Rico had given her, she tiptoed into the hall.  None of the upstairs lights were on but she saw the glowing light filtering into the foyer below her.

The storm was rolling in even more.  The rain had started and lightning flashed across the sky.  If the thunder rumbling in the distance
was any indication, the storm would get much worse before it passed.  The wind whipping outside blew the light rain sideways.  The raindrops sounded like pebbles tapping against the windows.

Slowly walking down the stairs, she strained her ears to listen for any
sounds—voices, movement, or even gunfire—but there were none.  Rounding the corner, she saw Rico sitting on a large, sectional sofa with a drink in his hand.  He smiled lasciviously at her as he raked his eyes over her body. 

“You are so beautiful, Chaise.  I think you may be my best choice yet.  Come sit with me.”

“Your glass is almost empty.  Can I refill it for you first?” she asked, trying to buy more time for herself and for her rescue.

“That would be nice,” he said as he extended his arm to hand the glass to her.  When her fingers grasped it, he intentionally dragged his fingers across hers and his eyes darkened with desire.  Keeping her face neutral as much as she could, she asked what he was drinking.

“Evan Williams Bourbon,” he responded as he watched her.  “Pour yourself a glass as well.”

Chaise turned
toward the bar that sat to the side of the picture window.  As she approached the window, her eyes landed on Bull’s as he sat crouched outside.  He put his finger over his lips, telling her to be quiet, before giving her a single, slow nod.  In that gesture, she knew he was telling her everything would be all right.

Chaise poured two drinks and walked back to Rico.  Knowing Bull had probably already moved, she couldn’t help but use her body to block Rico’s view of the window.   She fought to keep her nervous energy under control as she handed Rico his drink.  She took a small sip of hers to keep her hands and mouth busy.

Rico’s laid his hand on her knee, drew lazy circles on her skin, making each one bigger than the last.  His eyes were glued to her legs and where his fingers met her skin.  Chaise couldn’t keep her breathing under control.  Her chest heaved from the ragged breaths she drew in.  Rico no doubt thought she was affected in a good way when she actually wanted to claw his eyes out and bleach her skin clean.

The shrill sound of Rico’s phone filled the room.  Rico looked at the display and it showed a blocked number.  His eyes, full of lust, met Chaise’s as he said, “I’m so sorry,
mi amor
.  I said no interruptions tonight.  This must be an urgent matter for my father.”

Chaise nodded, happy for the interruption.  Rico answered the phone and within a minute he suddenly shot to his feet.  His face contorted in anger as he started spewing curse words in Spanish.  Pacing back and forth, his tirade ended with, “Come get me then, asshole.  I’m waiting.”

****************

Bull watched Chaise walk in
to the den wearing the flimsy nightgown and robe.  His eyes shot to Rico and his hand instantly went to the Glock .40 on his side.  Reaper stilled Bull’s movements and slowly shook his head from side to side.  Bull wanted to kill the man for the blatantly lustful way he looked at Chaise.  When she didn’t sit down, Bull took a huge risk by letting her see him, but he had to let her know he was there.