Cartel (13 page)

Dornan headed out to the front driveway, where his bike stood alone. The rest of the Gypsy Brothers had already returned to the clubhouse ahead of him. He’d have a busy few days organising the distribution of the new coke. Only, now that he knew it involved that fuck Murphy, he was more worried about it than ever.

‘John,’ Dornan barked down the line.

The connection wasn’t the best, but they made do.

‘You need to get back here,’ John said.

Dornan didn’t like being told what to do, but there was an urgency in his friend’s voice that suggested panic.

‘Everything okay, brother?’

There was a deep sigh. ‘Caroline’s in the fucking hospital.’

He left off the word
again
, but his tone implied it. Dornan sucked in a breath. This was getting ridiculous.

‘She gonna be okay?’

‘Sure,’ John said dryly. ‘If I can keep her in there.’

Dornan pinched the bridge of his nose. John’s old lady was starting to become a real pain in the ass with her liking of the white powder. Not coke. She favoured heroin, and it was interfering in club business.

‘Sequester her,’ Dornan said wearily. ‘Forty-eight-hour psychiatric hold.’

There was a stunned silence. ‘She’s my wife,’ John protested.

Dornan looked longingly back at the door that led to the basement, and to his dark desire imprisoned below. How he’d love to blow off business and go down there with her. Take her away from this place, even. Show her a good time. She looked like she could use a good steak dinner.

‘You want to save her from herself?’ Dornan asked, not waiting for an answer. ‘Psych hold, my friend. She’ll be dead inside a year if you don’t shut this shit down.’

John didn’t answer.

‘I’ll see you in four hours,’ Dornan said. ‘Get it sorted, John. Is Julie at home?’

‘She’s with Celia,’ John said stiffly. ‘She’s fine.’

She’s at
your
house with
your
wife, was what John meant. It was still a rare bone of contention between the two best friends, even though Juliette was six years old now. John had been in Sing Sing Penitentiary when his daughter was born, addicted to heroin and having withdrawals so bad Dornan had come dangerously close to murdering Caroline himself for her selfish stupidity. Because while John rotted in jail for twelve months for something Dornan had done, Caroline had been shooting up and sucking the dick of every Gypsy Brother with loose morals and a baggie of smack to give her in return. As payment for his sins, Dornan and his second wife, Celia, had played mommy and daddy to a baby that never stopped fucking crying.

He hadn’t really minded, though he’d briefly contemplated throwing her out of the window a couple of times on those really long, loud nights where she’d just scream and scream. On those nights, he and Celia would take turns soothing the poor kid, stripping her down to a diaper and resting her on their bare chests. She still cried, but it seemed to help a little. He’d never done anything like that when his sons were babies, but the guilt that ate him alive every night over John being in prison seemed to ease somewhat when he gave the baby girl some comfort.

Every time he looked at her, it reminded him of that time. It reminded him that Caroline’s idiocy had almost killed a bright little girl.

But she was safe now. She was at his house, with his wife and sons. Celia had a shotgun and a pistol, not to mention his burly teenage sons, and she knew damn well how to shut shit down.

‘You still there?’ John asked down the line, and Dornan realised he’d been off somewhere else.

‘Yeah,’ he said, still looking at the house that held the girl prisoner.

‘I’ll see you in four hours,’ Dornan repeated. ‘In the meantime, sort your fucking wife out.’

He ended the call, taking a cigarette from his pocket and lighting it.

He took one drag, frowned, and crushed the cigarette under his boot heel.

It didn’t taste the same without Ana.

He climbed onto the bike and started it with great reluctance. Would she even be here when he got back? Emilio had said she’d be with them a long time, but she was kind of unpredictable, and unpredictable women were fucking dangerous to have around. Less than twenty-four hours into her stint and she had stabbed him. His fingers went to the tender flesh he’d sewn back together, and that foreign ache in his gut intensified.
I want her.

He sighed as he fastened his open-face helmet. He’d much prefer it if she was coming with him, her breasts pressed against his back as he took her away to a place of his own.

One final glance, and he steeled himself, kicked up the stand, and tore out into the warm San Diego sunshine, homeward bound.

They were going to sell me.

No matter how many times I turned those words around in my mind, rearranged them, dissected them and put them back together, my fate remained the same.

They were going to
sell
me. I’d grown up in Colombia, kidnapping capital of South America for a brief period of time in the nineties, until the Mexicans caught on that ransom kidnappings were an easy way to make money.

Dornan hadn’t returned to my room for a while. It was hard to keep track of hours and days when there was no natural light. An hour could be a minute, could be a day. But then, it didn’t matter, did it? Every minute that passed was just a minute closer to whatever fresh hell they’d decided to throw me into.

I spent so long on my own without interruption that when the door finally did burst open, I felt an odd sense of relief. Being stuck in limbo was excruciating.

My heart sank as I saw the man in the doorway wasn’t who I’d expected.

‘Oh. It’s you,’ I said.

Murphy strolled into the room, his hands in his pants pockets. The suit he wore this time was dark grey and impeccably pressed. It didn’t look cheap.

‘Who were you expecting, Annie?’

My skin crawled as he got closer. My father called me Annie.

Nobody else got to call me by that name.

‘Hey, asshole,’ I greeted him. ‘Come to take me on another vacation?’

He snickered. ‘You wish. Follow me.’

When I didn’t move to follow him, he turned on the ball of his black leather loafer and grinned, reaching into the breast pocket of his suit. I knew what he was going to show me before he’d even removed the small crumpled square.

He had me over a goddamn barrel, and he knew it.

‘Stop,’ I said sharply, putting up a hand. ‘I’ll come.’

He laughed. ‘Usually they tell me to keep going when they come.’

‘You’re so immature,’ I muttered, shaking my head as I followed him down the hallway and to something worse than I had ever imagined.

At the other end of the hallway, past the bathroom I was allowed to stop off and use, stood a large, blank room. It looked like it had once been a garage, but now it was an open space, sunlight streaming in from thin rectangular windows that flanked one side. The ceiling seemed very high, in stark contrast to the small room I’d been in. It reminded me of the way the sun had streamed in through the stained-glass windows of our church, back when Papa had still insisted on us attending.

‘Over here,’ Murphy said, pointing into the middle of the room, and that was the moment my heart froze in my throat.

What the —

I backed away, towards the door. ‘I’m not getting on there,’ I said, looking at the bed with stainless-steel stirrups. A trolley with scalpels, and other sharp instruments that promised blood and pain, stood beside it.
Holy Jesus, what was he going to do to me? Were they going to harvest my goddamn kidneys?

‘Relaaaaaaax,’ Murphy coaxed coldly, his bony fingers encircling the back of my neck and pulling me along with him.

‘Wait!’ I pleaded. He paused momentarily, surprising me.

I burned with shame as fresh tears fell from my eyes. I didn’t cry! I wasn’t weak! What was happening to me? I was so angry with myself for crumbling at the moment when my strength was most crucial.

‘Please,’ the words bubbled from me as my cheeks heated with shame. ‘Please just tell me what’s going to happen.’

His face softened minutely, as did the grip on the back of my neck.

‘Nobody’s going to kill you,’ he said, pushing me towards the bed.

I put my hands out to stop from falling onto it.

‘It’s a medical check. Get your pretty panties off and get on the bed.’

A medical check. That required stirrups?
Jesus Christ.

I turned my back to the bed so I was facing him again, and sucked in a deep breath. He must have seen the hesitation on my face, because he rolled his eyes and reached into his breast pocket, his eyebrows raised.

That goddamn photo would be the death of me
. I held up a palm and then hitched my dress up, reaching underneath and tugging my panties down. My heart sank as I thought of all the things he could potentially ask me to do, holding that photo of my baby boy as ransom.

All the things I’d say yes to, to protect my son.

I kicked off the panties and went to grab them from the floor. ‘Leave them there,’ he said. ‘Get on the bed.’

I scowled, but I left the panties on the floor and shimmied up onto the bed. It was so high, it was like it had been made for giants. I leaned against the back of the bed, which was in a sitting position, but didn’t put my legs in the stirrups.

My pulse quickened in my chest as Murphy bent down and collected the black lace panties he had purchased for me. He brought them up to his nose and breathed in deeply, before pocketing the panties. That wicked glint was back in his freakish blue eyes as he circled around to the end of the bed and stood between the stirrups.

I was about to tell him how lovely he’d look wearing my panties when he yanked each of my ankles forward and draped them over the stirrups. The move was so violent, so unexpected, that I barely had time to make sure my dress was covering between my legs, let alone try to kick him in the face.

I panicked as he deftly fastened a velcro loop around each ankle and pulled tight, trapping me.

He smiled victoriously, pinning me to the bed with his eyes. Jesus, he’d make a great serial killer in one of those cheap slasher movies my fellow students at the American boarding school enjoyed watching. I’d never been able to understand why they enjoyed those ridiculous films so much. Didn’t they know enough horrors existed in the real world?

But, I guess horrors didn’t exist in their worlds the way they did in mine.

Emilio entered the room, his pace brisk and business-like. Another guy followed behind him, wearing a pair of surgical gloves, and my heart sank. I surveyed both of them with open revulsion, which Emilio greeted with a fuck-you smile and a wink. A wink? Was he
trying
to be funny?

‘She good?’ he asked Murphy.

Without warning, Murphy reached under my dress and stuck his finger right up inside me. I squealed a little louder than I’d like to admit and desperately tried to shimmy up the bed, away from his touch.

‘Tight,’ he said, slowly taking his hand away. I stared at the ceiling, more embarrassed than I had ever been in my life, as he wiped his finger on the hem of my dress.

Emilio cocked his head to the side, a look of surprise on his face. ‘Virgin?’

Murphy shook his head. ‘Just tight.’

Emilio gestured for Murphy to step aside. As Murphy stepped back, the guy who’d entered behind Emilio, a Mexican man who looked to be in his mid-thirties, rolled a stool over and perched himself right between my open legs.

God. Could it get any worse?

‘Right,
cholita
,’ Emilio said, placing a hand on one of my knees. I looked at it like it was a dead cockroach, but he didn’t move it away. I winced as the doctor at the foot of my bed of horrors rummaged for something on the table of torture instruments.

‘Time to make sure you aren’t carrying any nasty diseases. Or secret pregnancies. We’ve had both of those come through these doors before.’

Murphy’s mouth twitched at the mention of secret pregnancies, and I glowered at him.

‘Do you have to make it so … uncivilised?’ I asked through gritted teeth.

Emilio squeezed my knee with the same affection one might squeeze their daughter’s knee, and I suppressed the urge to leap up and kill him with my bare hands. Mostly because that wouldn’t have worked and I’d have earned a black eye for my efforts.

‘Of course,’ he said, and in that moment I realised just how much pleasure he took in my misery. Feasting on my sorrow lit him up from within. I blinked to stop tears from welling up in my eyes, and he tutted at me.

‘
Cholita
. Come on!’ he chided. ‘Did you really think I’d put you to work as a maid? Washing dishes, scrubbing floors? You need to suffer so your father suffers.’

‘My father can’t see if I’m suffering or not,’ I retorted. ‘He’s in Colombia.’

Murphy shifted on his feet, an amused look passing over his face. I groaned. ‘Unless someone is telling him?’ I glared at Murphy.

‘Enough!’ Emilio demanded. ‘Murphy, tell the little bitch what comes next and when the auction is. And put some shit on her cuts to make them fade faster.’

He strode out of the room without turning back, his words slicing into my soul. What comes next.
Auction
.

Murphy popped a stick of gum in his mouth and started chewing loudly. As he snapped the gum between his teeth, I smelled the sickly sweet tang of fake strawberries in the air.

I tore my eyes from Murphy as the guy between my legs shoved something up and inside me that felt like a big, hard plastic dick. ‘What the fuck?’ I yelled.

The doctor looked to Murphy with raised eyebrows, pausing momentarily.

‘It’s a speculum,’ Murphy said in disbelief, from his spot right next to the bed. ‘I’m sure your dead boyfriend’s dick was bigger than that. Quit complaining.’

Your dead boyfriend
. That slammed into me like a freight train and knocked the wind from my lungs. Before I even knew what I was doing, I’d balled my fist up and swung as hard as I could.

Murphy wasn’t taken off guard this time, like he had been when I’d scratched his face in the car on the way to Emilio’s hotel. He parried the blow easily, grabbing hold of both of my wrists and slamming me back onto the bed.

‘You see that scalpel over there,’ he snarled, lifting his chin towards the tray the doctor had been fiddling with. ‘If you don’t stay still, I will take it and I will put it where the sun don’t shine. Do you want to be fucked with the sharp end, sweetie?
I
am the one in charge here. Not you.’

‘Fuck you,’ I spat. ‘You think you’ve got power? You’ve got nothing. Untie me and then see if you can stop me from kicking your ass.’

He rolled his eyes. ‘I’m not letting you up off this bed until you’ve got a full check and a pretty, tight, bare pussy.’

‘You’re making my pussy pretty so you can sell me off to some pervert who’ll keep me chained in his basement? What a powerful man you are.’

‘The customer is always right.’ Murphy grinned. ‘And the customer wants bare pussy.’

I rolled my eyes. ‘So, most of the girls you sell are actual virgins? You’d have to get them pretty young to ensure that, right?’

He let go of one of my wrists and slapped me across the face. I relished the pain as my cheek stung.

‘Let’s hurry this along,’ Murphy told the doctor. Emilio reentered my line of sight, and I was even more mortified.

I struggled against Murphy’s grip and the restraints on my ankles, but it was no use. I couldn’t budge, spread-eagled in the stirrups, my most intimate of places centimetres from the unspeaking doctor’s face.

I shivered in revulsion when Emilio leaned over my leg and trailed his index finger up my thigh, sinking it into me without any warning. It hurt — I wasn’t exactly wet, after being finger-fucked by Murphy. It’s not like the experience had been a turn-on, after all.

He withdrew his finger and laughed, a deep boom that rattled my chest.

‘I should make you tighter,’ he taunted me. ‘I should punish you for being disobedient. Sew you up so tight, you’re a virgin again.’ The bastard made his thumb and index finger into a circle, then watched my face intently as he curled his fingers tighter until the circle was tiny.

Sew me up? Down there? No way.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the doctor start to thread a needle with thin, translucent thread.

Jesus Christ. He couldn’t possibly —

‘Wait!’ I yelled. Suddenly I was breathing so fast, I was probably in danger of passing out. ‘I’ll do whatever you want.’

Emilio tipped his head to the side, grinning. He loved my fear, I could tell. Men like him lived on the fright of subservient humans.

He snapped his fingers and the guy between my thighs handed over the needle. Emilio’s mouth twitched as he brought it up to my eye, his other hand fisting my hair to stop me from shrinking away. Beads of sweat gathered at my temples as the tiny, sharp needle got closer and closer to my eye, so close that the tip of it blurred completely.

‘Whatever I want?’ Emilio asked.

‘Yes,’ I panted. ‘Please, I’m sorry. Anything.’

Emilio grinned, withdrawing the needle. I gasped as I watched it fall neatly into the breast pocket of his suit, such a tiny scrap of metal, but a violent threat to keep me toeing the line.

‘Remember this when you talk out of turn,’ he said. ‘Remember what you are to me. What I am to you.’

I bit back angry tears. He owned me for life. The present I could somehow handle, but my future? It was almost too much to bear.

The guy between my legs scooted closer, his movements hesitant and slow.

Hurry up
, I wanted to urge, but I refused to show any more weakness in front of these men. Instead, I laid back and braced myself for the pain.

And found his eyes, piercing into mine.

Not Emilio’s.

Murphy’s.

In the shadows, his blue eyes gleamed with amusement. And something else.

Satisfaction.

‘I’ll leave you to it, doc,’ Emilio said, walking out into the hallway. A second later, he ducked his head back in and called out to Murphy, ‘You coming?’

‘If it’s all the same to you, boss,’ Murphy said, grinning, ‘I think I’d rather watch.’

Emilio chuckled and disappeared.

My mind hurtled back in time, remembering a scene almost exactly like this. I was sixteen years old, and I’d just pushed my baby boy out into the cruel world that would insist he be taken from me. I had been allowed to hold him, the nurses laying him on my chest for a few precious minutes before he was whisked away. I had looked longingly into a set of perfect, dark blue eyes that stared into my own; a piece of my own soul made physical and brought into the world.