A black van pulled up outside the gates and Lo nodded at us from the passenger seat. The other girl, Janie, was driving.
Cash's hand slapped down on my shoulder. “Let's get your girl back,” he said, and we all made our way to their van
“Hop in,” Lo said, gesturing toward the back of the van.
Wolf pulled the door open, revealing three rows of seats and a collection of guns all over the floor.
“Guess you guys didn't take the sleep advice,” Lo said as we pulled away.We pulled up to the gates a while later, the air in the van noticeably thick.
“Alright,” Janie said, unlocking the doors, “you guys have fun. I'll be here waiting.”
With that, Lo got out. Wolf and I followed. Cash paused. “You think it's a good idea for you to stay out here alone? With V's men everywhere?”
At this, she laughed, the sound husky. “Because I'm a poor defenseless woman?” she asked, rolling her eyes. “Worry about yourself. I'm fine.”
Cash hopped out, slamming the door, muttering, “Crazy fucking bitches,” under his breath as Lo fearlessly walked up to one of the men standing in front of the gates and announced herself.
The man nodded, moving toward the house and going inside. He came back a few minutes later, instructing one of the other men to frisk us and confiscate weapons. Lo had come with four guns strapped on. Why, considering she knew they would be taken, I had no idea.
But then in we were walking.
The closer we got, the more tense my body got. And, I noticed, Cash's and Wolf's.
We were led down a hall and into an enormous kitchen. Men were there. A woman was there. All of whom I didn't even see.
Because all I could see was Summer.
Fuck.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
Her face was openly bleeding, the drops slipping off her jaw and landing on her shirt. And then there was the eye. The black and blue eye. The blood filling it. And her neck. Fuck... her neck. With the imprint of someone's fucking hand.
My jaw clamped hard enough for my teeth to hurt as I tried to keep myself from flying across the room. To stroke her cheek. To beat the man behind her to a bloody fucking pulp.
Because I knew who he was. He was Martin. The man she was more afraid of than Deke. She'd told me about him, wrapping her whole body around me in bed like she was trying to disappear into my skin. “He has dead eyes,” she said, shivering.
And the fuck behind her had dead eyes.
He had to die.
Slowly.
Painfully.
With knives.
I wanted to skin the mother fucker alive.
But then V's voice reached through my anger, greeting Lo (aka: Lola) like an old friend. Like she had stopped by for tea.
Then Lo was crossing the floor toward V.
And kissing her fucking cheek.
If the air was thick in the van, it was fucking lava in the kitchen.
“It's been too long,” Lo said, holding V's hands and smiling.
“It has. I'm glad you came for a visit. I am less pleased about the guests you have brought to my house,” V said, her face slanting toward us and landing on me.
And, fuck, she was a perfect older version of Summer. Same hair. Same face. Summer was smaller, more delicate. And while Summer had her mother's gray eyes, V's were as hollow as Martin's.
“Yes, unfortunately, this isn't a social call. We have some business here.”
“Business?” V asked, her tone going glacial.
“Yes.”
“I wasn't aware you were in business with Henchmen,” she said, dropping Lo's hands.
I felt Summer's gaze on me and it was taking everything in me not to look at her. But I couldn't. Because if I saw her perfect face all beat and broken again, I was going to lose the small amount of control I had over myself.
“I haven't been. Until I learned they had taken someone important to you hostage.”
V's eyes cut to me again, then back to Lo. “Rich?”
Lo nodded. “Yesterday. Saw an opening. Got him.”
“Trying to step in on my business?” V asked, her tone lethal, her eyes boring into mine.
“I don't deal in skin,” I shot back, my tone matching hers.
“So what then? You want my daughter back? That's it, isn't it?” she asked, throwing her head back and laughing. The sound at once happy and so batshit fucking crazy that I felt my blood run cold. “Oh, that's just... pathetic.”
I felt my body jerk forward. But then Lo turned and her eyes pinned me. Fucking pinned me.
And it was then that I knew that everything was still under her control. It was all part of her plan. So I forced my body backward, my hands un-fisting.
“You don't think, perhaps, you wouldn't want her anymore?” she asked, looking over at Summer. And I couldn't help it, my eyes followed. “I believe Martin has been... visiting her at night,” she said, her words heavy with meaning that had the bile rising in my throat, the rage turning into something else. Something stronger. Something I didn't even know existed. Something that felt like it took all the blood out of my system and replaced it with fire. “She's used goods now...”
As if on cue, Martin grinned, moving forward and pushing Summer hard. Unprepared because her eyes were glued to mine, she fell forward off the stool, landing hard on her knees.
If Wolf's hand hadn't reached out and grabbed my arm, I would have been there. I would have been beating the ever loving shit out of the mother fucker's face.
But all I could do was watch as Summer paused. Oddly. Like she was thinking. And then her cuffed hands were moving downward and into her boot.
It happened so fast I almost missed it. I had never seen her move like that. One second, she was on the floor, hand in her boot.
The next, she was on her feet, her body half-turned away from me, my Glock-19 in her hands, finger on the side, the aim right between Martin's eyes.
“Oh,” Martin said, smiling, “you don't have the balls.”