“Just who I was fucking looking for. Missing something?” I heard the booming voice, and I turned to see my worst nightmare. Bex was being led into the outside bar by someone I didn’t recognize. The look on her face said it all. I could just barely make out the glint of the gun to the back of her head through her long hair. Where the hell was Cal? Someone needed to call the cops.
Who the hell was he, and what did he want with her? I couldn’t help but notice how fucking fantastic she looked in a pair of short shorts and a tight tank top. God, I’d missed her. But fear gripped me as I looked into Bex’s eyes when he stopped a few feet from me. She looked pissed, but I knew how to read her now. She was fucking terrified.
“Who the fuck are you?”
He stepped out from around her, the gun still to her head. “Someone who’s been looking forward to this moment for a long time, Frat Boy.”
My mind reeled with the name I hadn’t heard in a very long time. He was one of them. Otherwise he wouldn’t have known that name. I couldn’t recall ever seeing him before, not that it mattered. He obviously knew me.
“Ah, I see you recognize the name. I can see your wheels turning over there, good ol’ Johnny. Your girl here is very pretty. I’d like to take this one, too. Bet she’d be even better than Jill was.”
My mind rewound all of those years. No. He hadn’t been one of them, had he? I thought I’d memorized every single one of their faces. “You leave her the fuck alone.”
“You’re a moron if you think you can stop me from having this sweet pussy. See, I’ve been locked up for awhile thanks to someone, not naming any names or anything. So I’m having quite a dry spell. And this one, well, I bet she could be a great place for my dick to hide for a while. You fucked her right, Johnny? I wished you two were a little more voyeuristic so I could get my rocks off seeing her. But that’s okay, I’ll just have her while you watch. She won’t mind this cold gun to her head while I fuck her harder than you ever have.”
Bex whimpered, her reaction purely visceral. I knew there was no fucking way in hell I could let that happen to her. This asshole was here for me. “What do you want?”
“Other than a piece of this sweet pussy? Well, I want to kill her in front of you after I do her. You see, once I figured out where you were, it was easy to see who my target was going to be. You started panting after her like a fucking dog. You were too stupid to realize the notes I left were warnings. I even left her one. Now killing her is the best punishment for you being a snitch.”
The notes? Oh fuck. The cryptic notes. Of course. She’d gotten one? She’d never told me.
“You thought I was after your sister. Well, she’s a pretty piece and all, and I would’ve if I hadn’t seen this one, but yeah. I want her. Bexley, right? So here’s the plan, Frat Boy. You’re going to take us upstairs to a room you’re going to rent at the hotel. You’re going to watch as she pleases me, and then as I fuck her. After that, I’m going to put a bullet in her brain and then in yours. It’ll be beautiful, like a murder-suicide. I walk away getting my revenge on you, and you’ll both be dead.” He shrugged, the gleam in his eye enough to make my blood run cold.
“Let her go. Your beef is with me,” I said, stepping forward.
“One step closer and I blow her brains out right here. You’ll even get some of her pretty face splattered on you.”
“She didn’t do anything to you,” I argued.
“This isn’t your fucking game, Johnny,” he spat. “Call upstairs and get a room. And don’t try anything funny like calling 9–1-1. You’ll both be dead before you even get out of your mouth that you need police here.”
Goddamn, where was Cal? He had to be in his office with the door shut. It was slow; thankfully no one was in the beach bar right now. It had just rained which had cleared everyone out, and the dinner rush wouldn’t start for at least another hour.
We were alone.
Which was both a good thing and the most fucking disastrous thing that could happen.
My eyes met Bex’s, and I tried to reassure her without words. I’d do whatever it took to get her out of here before he did anything. I didn’t care if I lived to see another day, but she wasn’t going to be dragged into it.
I walked to the phone, trying to decide how I could clue in the girl at the front desk at the hotel that we needed police. The guy stepped closer with Bex as I pressed the number for the front desk. Come out, Cal. Come out. If he walked out now, he’d see the back of this guy with the gun pressed to Bex’s head. That was good for me. Cal was strong. Or at a very minimum, he could go back to his office and call the police.
The phone rang and rang. I looked out of the corner of my eye at the freshly washed chilled glasses in a stack under the bar. I nudged it just enough with my foot that it toppled over, making the most deafening crashing sound as the glass broke all over the floor. It was a risky move, but one that would for sure send Cal out here to see what happened.
“What the fuck was that?”
“Sorry,” I said, trying to act sheepish and not like I wanted to castrate the fucking guy. “I accidentally bumped the stack of glasses.”
Asshole swung around, shifting Bex so she was facing the other way. When he was satisfied that no one else was coming in, he moved back around to face me. “Don’t you try anything smart, asshole.”
Just as I heard the girl at the front desk answer, I saw Cal out of the corner of my eye. I tried to signal to him to back off without showing Asshole that someone else was in the room, but it was too late. He turned and saw Cal, and that’s when everything happened both so fast and in slow motion. I was opening my mouth to shout to Bex to run when she slammed her head back into his nose. I heard the deafening crack of breaking bones as he dropped the gun to hold his gushing nose. Bex took the moment to knee him in the groin, making him fall to his knees on the ground. The gun laid two feet from him.
I should’ve known Bex wouldn’t take what he was doing lying down. If there was any female on this Earth that could take down that thug, it was her. She reached for the gun just as I stepped up to get it off the ground.
“You thought you were going to fucking use me as a bait to come in here and get him?” She screamed, kicking him in the stomach. He fell, groaning again. “You fucked with the wrong woman.” Bex waved the gun. I wanted to step up and take it, but I was afraid to interrupt her.
She looked back at me. “What’s he doing here, Johnny? A drug deal gone bad? Was I just a pawn in your game all along?”
Pawn? Drug deal? What the hell was she talking about? “Bex,” I said. “Give me the gun.”
“Fuck you,” she seethed. “Oh wait. I did that. I was stupid, wasn’t I, Johnny?”
She was upset, that was understandable. But I didn’t understand what the rambling was about, and I didn’t have time to figure it out right now. “Bex.”
“Don’t Bex me.” She grabbed the guy by the collar and pulled him up. I would’ve been impressed at how strong she was if I wasn’t fucking terrified of what she was going to do next.
“Police are called,” Cal called. “You guys okay?”
I nodded, afraid to take my eyes off of Bex.
“Guess you aren’t so brave now that your balls hurt and your nose is broken, huh, you worthless slug?” Bex pressed the barrel of the gun to his temple. “How does it fucking feel to have a gun to your head, motherfucker?”
I would’ve laughed if this wasn’t so serious. “Bex. Let him go. It’s not worth it.”
“He was going to fucking kill me,” she said. “Because of you. What did I do to deserve that? Fall for you?”
We both realized what she said milliseconds after it came out. Her eyes widened, and she turned back to the guy. She clicked the safety, and I found myself wondering again what Bex knew that I didn’t.
“Give me one reason why I shouldn’t fucking pull this trigger right now and end your sorry life.”