Velvet Fire - Ashby Crime Family Romance

“The not Savannah Rhymer girl that you drugged and kidnapped?”

Asshole. “Yeah, Jasper, her name is Maisie. But she doesn’t know that was me. She thinks I’m just the guy who saved her.”

“Well thank fuck for that,” Ma grumbled and shook her head. “Does she have any idea who we are?”

“She knows we own a few casinos and bars in town, but if Bonnie’s heard the rumors, no doubt Maisie has too.” Whatever she heard obviously hadn’t colored her opinion of me, which only made me more determined than ever to find her. “Shit,” I muttered, finishing off my drink.

“Sounds serious,” Kat said, her tone grave despite the delight in her blue eyes.

“It’s not,” I told my family honestly, but the more I thought about Maisie, about what The Crusaders would do to her just to make a buck. Just to fuck with us. It made my stomach churn with acid.

“But now it is,” Ma guessed accurately.

I nodded, and she surprised me with a smile. “Then go get the girl and we’ll get started on the rest. Thomas,” she called at the same time she shooed me from the dining room. “Prepare a room for a guest. And call in the muscle. All of it.”

I flashed a grateful smile at Ma and left, grabbing my keys and my piece before heading out into the cool desert air.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Maisie

The sound of music blaring in the distance was the first thing I heard when I woke up. It was close enough that I could tell it was electronic dance music, but far enough away that it wasn’t deafening. If it were, at least I wouldn’t have to hear all the sounds of fucking all around me.

The last thing I remembered was that bald fucker hitting me. I sat up slowly, trying to figure out where the hell I was because clearly, he’d taken me somewhere. I moved too fast and my head spun, sending bile rising up my throat.

“Well fuck.” Opening my eyes was no easy task, especially since my left cheek was so swollen it blurred my vision, which explained the headache.

A few deep breathing exercises later and I was able to open my good eye and look around. Between the music, the fucking sounds and the disgusting stinky mattress and box spring underneath me, I figured this was some kind of crack house or brothel, maybe a combination of the two. I didn’t know who these people were or what they wanted with me, but I had two guesses.

The Ashby family or the Reckless Bastards. Gunny wouldn’t like this at all. And, Max would kill someone to keep me safe.

The door flew open, startling the fuck out of me.

The specimen standing before me would make any version of sleaze look classy. Yellow stained teeth, a stink that made me gag all the way across the room, bloodshot eyes, and a complexion that spelled too many drugs and back ally ass-kickings. “Oh good. You’re awake,” the charmer said.

“Who are you and where the hell am I?” This dude had a lot of fucking nerve, and if he thought he was getting anything from me, well he’d learn the hard way that I wasn’t a pushover. Oh hell no. Peaches and Chance made sure of that.

He flashed what could be considered a friendly smile but it was more of a grimace and the darkness in his eyes told me to keep my guard up. Way the fuck up.

“The name is Brendan Rhymer.”

He held his hand out, and I just stared at it, taking note of his short blond hair and almost black brown eyes. Or was that just the bags under his eyes? He was lanky and covered in tattoos which didn’t tell me anything about why I was here.

“Right. You’re inside one of my properties.” He spread his arms wide, proud as if this shit hole was something to be proud of.

“So you’re what, a crack dealer? A pimp?”

His smile faded instantly.

“Careful bitch or I’ll skip all the nice shit and put some smack in your veins and put your ass to work.”

The gleam in his eyes as he spoke told me he wasn’t just some gangster. He was one of those men Peaches had warned me about. Those sick fucks who landed in this type of work simply because it was this kind of work and they couldn’t do anything better.

“We’ll see if Virgil still wants you after you’re all used up.”

There was my answer. He was an enemy of the Ashby family and a really bad motherfucker. But I remembered what Peaches said about our strength as women. It wasn’t physical strength, not in the way men understood anyway. It was in our ability to survive. To mind fuck.

“I guess you got your intel wrong because Virgil isn’t my boyfriend. He’s just a booty call.”