But almost as soon as it started, I was restrained by an even more pissed off Rick (worth it for the bloody nose he had), and Break was being pulled away. He at least got a fair bit of damage in first.
Then I didn't get to see the rest.
A pit was in my stomach as I was shoved through the basement, up the stairs, into the kitchen, then out through the backdoor. Not because of my own fate. I had resigned myself to that the moment I walked out of the coffee shop and had a hood over my head and burns from my spilled coffee down my arm. Before I was even aware of who took me. In that second, my fate was sealed.
But what was unclear was what was going to go down in the basement between Lex, Breaker, and Alex.
I knew Lex. I knew the twisted shit he did. Especially to women. And I knew how much more he would get out of it if he could force a man who loved that woman to watch.
That was all I could think about as I was led into a white wooden shed, set off into the trees quite a ways from the main house, the windows blacked out from the inside, the door with multiple locks and bars.
“I finally get to have some fun with you,” Limp Dick Rick said, opening the door and shoving me inside. “Had it up to fucking here with the sarcasm shit,” he informed me, slamming the door behind him and reaching for the pull tab on the light hanging from the ceiling.
There wasn't much inside. Penny brick floor and reinforced walls. A chair with chains. Three five gallon buckets in a corner. It seemed more like it was used for gardening than torture.
“What? You haven't enjoyed our time together?” I asked, putting a hand to my chest. “That hurts, Rick. I thought you and me really had something special.”
“On your knees,” he growled out, moving into the small space.
“What is with you guys and the kneeling shit? Is that why you're all so grouchy? You like dick? You know... it's the twenty-first century. Even big bad criminals can be gay, Rick. If you need some cock to feel like a man...”
I didn't get the rest of the dig out.
Mainly because his fist found it's way to my face.
Maybe I was going to die. But fuck if I went out like a sniveling pussy about it. Besides, seeing that look of utter mortification cross his features, yeah, it was worth the extra fucking pain.
And I needed a good fight. I was due. I had been letting these cocksuckers (maybe quite literally cocksuckers), get the better of me for days. It was time to knock them off their game.
Because they didn't think I could handle myself.
But, boy, was Rick in for a nasty surprise.
I took three hits to the face and two to the center before I used my wiry sort of grace against him, slipping away, then coming back swinging. A strong uppercut under the chin had him on his ass before he finished cursing. Which gave me just enough time to bend into my boot (where the idiots never thought to look for weapons) and drag out the knife.
I wasn't a knife person.
My weapon of choice would always be a gun. It was impersonal. A scope and a trigger. A target whose blood you never had to touch or smell.
But that didn't mean I didn't know how to use one.
Thanks to Breaker who was a bit more... hands-on in his forms of punishment or justice.
I had just aimed and stabbed the blade into Rick's thigh, turning the knife brutally, wincing at the sound of his scream (I didn't get off on the pain. That was never my thing. It was a job. Or self-defense. Nothing more), when the grounds outside sounded like they were blowing up.
My eyes sought Rick's and found a similar shock there. So whatever was happening was not part of some grander plan of Lex's.
Fuck.
Not good.
I grappled with the idea of killing him versus getting the hell out of there before anything even crazier went down.
“Every man for himself,” I said down at Rick, getting onto my feet. He nodded and I offered him my hand. Which he took and got onto his feet, ripping the blade out of his leg and moving toward the window, breaking it in the corner to look out.
“The fuck?”
That was my cue. I ripped the locks off the door and flew out into the complete fucking chaos.
I wasn't wrong about it sounded like it was blowing up. There had to have been explosions. Bombs or what-the-fuck-ever because there were fires all around the grounds.
People were everywhere, running, looking shocked and unsure what to do.
I didn't think. I didn't even pretend I had any plans of getting away. I made a b-line right for the house.
Break and Alex were still inside.
I needed to get them then get the hell out of there before anyone got any kind of control of the headless-chicken men and made them drag us back.
I flew across the field, shoving into the shoulder of some random lackey as I rounded on the house, taking off toward the back doors that led into the kitchen.
I had just reached for the handle when the doors were flung open from the inside, sending me off balance and falling backward onto my ass. Hard enough to knock the wind out of me.
Then I was looking up and there was Breaker. And Alex.
“They didn't kill you yet?” he asked, giving me an odd smile and reaching an arm down to haul me back onto my feet.
“How'd you get out?” I asked, following as Break moved toward the corner of the house, looking out.
“Lex has a panic room for this kinda thing,” Alex answered at Breaker's silence.
“Heya sweetheart. You alright?” I asked, grabbing her pinkie with mine.
“Yep. Things went boom before Lex could get really twisted.”
There was a strange edge to her words that made them ring untrue, but it wasn't my place to push.
“Right, let's go,” Breaker said, looking back. “Head for the tree line and follow it to the front fence. My truck is still parked outside the gates,” he said, reaching into his pocket and producing a key.
A second later, Alex's pinkie was pulled from mine as Breaker grabbed her hand and pulled her along beside him, her body blocked from the yard by his. I followed behind, similarly blocking her from behind and really wishing I had taken a moment to find a gun somewhere.
But then we were at the front gates, kicking our legs out faster as eyes started to fall on us.
Breaker beeped the locks on the truck as we rounded to it.
“Get in,” Breaker said, moving around the hood, then stopping, tilting his head at Alex who had frozen on the spot. “Doll, get in the fuckin' truck.”
But Alex wasn't paying attention.
Her gaze was focused just beside the empty security booth where, when I squinted against the darkness, I saw a shadow move.
“Break,” my voice called a warning as the shadowed figure came closer. Whoever they were, they were all in black. Tall. Thin. Wearing a hood that was so big it covered their face.
“Who the fuck...” Breaker started, moving toward the figure.
But somehow, Alex was suddenly right by his side, grabbing his arm. “Stop,” she said, her voice quiet but firm as she stared at the figure.
And then a hand snaked out of one of the long dark sleeves, moving upward, and pushing the hood off her head.
Yes. Her.
And she was a fucking knockout. Not in my way. But regardless. Small. But fierce. Delicate face, long straight black hair, dark brows, big blue eyes, and what looked like tats snaking up the side of her neck.
“The fuck...” Breaker said, something like recognition in his voice though her face was new to me.
“You guys need to move. Now,” she said, reaching into her pocket and pulling a small remote out.
Alex nodded, pulling Breaker back.
“Now,” she said again, a little more urgently.
“In the truck,” Breaker said, moving backward toward the driver's door.