Down to My Soul (Soul Series Book 2) (41 page)

“Gep, let’s try it his way.” Marlon leans against my truck, arms folded across his chest. “I’ve kept him from killing this guy since high school. I think I can do it one more time.”

Gep’s got about five seconds to concede before I go in there on my own. My fingers itch to wrap around that fucker’s neck. I know Gep’s job is to keep me safe, but my safety is the last thing I care about right now.

“Okay, let’s do it.” Gep taps on the tinted back right passenger window, and a guy I’ve never seen before dressed in UPS browns steps out. Gep gestures to him. “Our element of surprise.”

We make our way silently up the steep driveway of the small house nestled into the side of the mountain. Gep and I step to one side of the door. Marlon steps to the other, and our fake UPS guy rings the bell. The door is barely cracked open, and as soon as I see Drex’s face, I shove UPS out of the way and lunge for that asshole, pushing him back into the house. He slithers out of my grip and zips toward an open door leading to the patio. I’m on his heels and tackle him to the flagstones, sitting on his chest to keep him pinned. The fool has the nerve to laugh up into my face.

“If you’re here for tips on how to fuck your girl right, I’m not telling you shit. Figure it out for yourself.”

My body processes what he said before my mind does, immediately punching him in the face. His eyes glaze a little, but the smile pops right back like a demented clown.

“She was so tight and wet that night,” he rasps. “Next time I’ll let her suck my dick.”

There is no stopping it. The momentum of my rage drags me into his face again and again and again. The sound of his flesh flattening under my fury brings me an unreasonable pleasure that drowns out the pain of my knuckles splitting, the flesh peeling back from my bones. That metronome that always marks my anger explodes, the tick tocking detritus littering my brain. I don’t even notice when he manages to roll to the side, and my fist pounds full force into the flagstones beneath us. I barely feel the impact, adrenaline surging. I snatch him back, latching onto his throat. Bloodlust swells in my veins, hauling every savage instinct to the surface. I tremble with the desire to choke off his air supply for good.

“Rhys, man.” Marlon pulls at me, and out of pure reflex I draw back to punch him, too, but catch myself. His eyes travel from my bunched fist to my face. “You gonna hit me now? Just be prepared for me to knock the living shit outtta you.”

Hot, heavy breath forces past my lips. When I try to flex the fingers of my right hand, I can’t. Since before I can even remember, protecting my fingers, my hands has been paramount. Our lives, my livelihood,
everything
always centered in my hands. And now it’s a limp mass of bloodied flesh. Needles of pain stab my fingers. Panic feels like it may catapult my heart from my chest.

“Rhys, your hand.” Marlon’s worried eyes settle on my hand. “We need to get you to a doctor, like now.”

I peer through the patio door into the living room where Gep has dragged Drex’s sorry ass. Gep towers over him, and the look he gives him is deadly enough to pin him to the couch. I draw a calming breath and approach them.

“Later,” I say to Marlon over my shoulder.

“Not later.” Marlon grabs my arm. “Now. This is your hand, Rhys.”

“I know.” I pull away. “See if you can find some Aleve or something until we’re done with this.”

“Aleve?” Marlon whooshes a frustrated breath. “At least let me call Bristol so she can have a specialist standing by.”

“Yeah, good idea. Dr. Mason’s the one who examines my hands for the insurance policy. She should probably notify him.” I turn to look at him. “Make sure she doesn’t mention it to Kai.”

Marlon holds my eyes for a moment before denting one side of his cheek with a smile.

“Always Kai.”

Always Kai.

“Just find that Aleve for me.”

I hold my injured hand, wincing as I join Gep and Drex in the living room. Drex offers me a bloody smirk, his face already swelling. He gestures to my hand.

“Looks like that hurts.”

“So does your face. Shut the hell up.”

Even bloodied and already swelling, his face manages to look smug. I have to look away because the urge to slam my probably-broken fist right through that expression is so strong, and I know we need the information Gep is trying to extract.

“Look, you’ve broken laws here.” Gep rests meaty fists on his hips. “You recorded Kai, and God knows who else, without her knowledge and blackmailed her.”

“That wasn’t me.” Drex’s eyes take a leisurely path between me and Gep. “I mean, yeah I recorded her when we fucked.”

He pauses to grin at me.

“But I’m not the one blackmailing her, and I’m not going down for it.”

“Then who?” I frown, unable to let Gep take the lead for very long. “Tell us everything, you piece of shit.”

“Ah ah ah,” Drex tsks and shakes his head, eyes alight with hatred and satisfaction. “I’m the one with all the information. You better be nice to me.”

“Nice to you?” Incredulity rolls a hollow laugh up my throat. “I’m going to destroy you either way. Your cooperation determines if I’ll leave you any scraps of your pathetic career so you can at least book weddings and bar mitzvahs.”

I lean close, almost close enough to sniff the barely-veiled panic that lurks just beneath his self-satisfied façade.

“Because make no mistake about it.” I look straight into his eyes so he sees that I have every intention of backing up this threat. “You’re through in this town. Done. I’ll block every deal. I started the black-balling as soon as I saw that tape just a few hours ago. You’re poison already and just don’t know it yet.”

“You can’t do that.” He says it, but I can tell he knows I can.

“Let’s not play the game where you pretend to have any power in this situation, when we both know I’ll come out on top.”

“You always do, don’t you?” Bitterness corrodes his words. “You always have.”

“Is that what this is about? Your ridiculous jealousy since high school?”

“Everything came so easy to you, Gray.” He shakes his head, hatred alive in his narrowed eyes. “I was the one person who didn’t scrape and bow at your feet just because you were some piano savant in another life.”

“You have no idea what my life was like. It certainly wasn’t easy.”

“Whatever.” He shrugs, deliberately casual. Falsely calm. “At least I fuck your women first. If that’s my only concession, I’ll take it.”

Gep grabs my arms, but I shake him off, staring back at Drex without making a further move toward him. This idiot thinks he knows my buttons? He has no idea.

“Here’s the deal.” I step directly into Drex’s line of vision. “Like Gep said, you recorded Kai without her consent. It’s illegal.”

“And I wonder what the cops would find on your laptop?” Gep keeps his face straight, playing along since he knows I have no intention of bringing the police into this. “If we got a warrant to seize your cloud, would there be other women there recorded without their consent? We could build quite a case, and you could do some real time.”

Drex’s jaw clenches, and fear thins his lips.

“What do you want?” he asks after a few moments to contemplate that possibility.

“First, I want any and every copy of that tape so I can destroy it,” I say immediately.

“I don’t have it anymore.” Drex leans back into the cushions. “I don’t have any copy. I told you I’m not the one who’s been threatening her.”

“Who?” I try to keep my voice free of panic. Whoever has the tape could do anything with it. They just threatened Kai days ago. They could release it at any time. They could release it while I sit here with this idiot. “Who has it?”

Drex sits back and remains silent, looking around the cabin like it might offer some escape, but it doesn’t. There is none.

“And we know this place is owned by John Malcolm,” Gep continues. “How’s he involved? Tell us everything or we get the cops in on this, and it gets messy.”

Drex’s eyes drift from me to Gep to Marlon and then back to settle on me. He heaves a sigh.

“Fuck it. I gotta save myself here.” He shrugs. “When things blew up between you and your girlfriend, and she signed with Malcolm, I saw . . . let’s call it an opportunity.”

“Go on.” Gep folds his massive arms across his chest.

“I called Malcolm and said I had something on his bright new star artist that I’d release unless he signed me, too. Got me some gigs. Gave me a shot.”

I already see where this is going, and the thought of Kai being caught in their disgusting cross hairs makes me sick. Makes me furious.

“To my surprise, he wanted the tape for his own game.” Drex laughs. “What’d I care? He told me to lay low for a few months because they’d be looking for me when he started threatening her.”

“Why’d he threaten her with it? Why keep them apart?” Marlon demands, confusion on his face. “I don’t get it.”

“He didn’t want Kai with me,” I say softly. “He knew I wouldn’t let him control her. He knew I’d get her away from him.”

“He figured when she didn’t take you back, things would die down. You’d give up and move on, and he’d have Kai for the next two years at least. Just another break up.”

“But it wasn’t just another break up.” I shake my head. “Not to me and Kai. He underestimated us, I guess.”

“Well, I don’t even have the video anymore,” Drex says. “He made a hard copy and deleted it from my cloud. I couldn’t release that video now if I wanted to.”

“And in exchange?” I demand.

“In exchange, I have a new record deal.” Drex smiles, a grimy spread of his lips. “And even shows in Vegas this summer.”

I don’t have the heart to tell him that will never happen. Or maybe I’m just saving that for dessert.

“Call him.” My words land in the room with atomic force.

“What?” Drex frowns. “He’s never been up here. He’ll suspect something’s wrong. What will I tell him?”

“I don’t care if you tell him he needs to come because the Easter Bunny has his eggs. You get that piece of shit here as soon as possible.” I flick a glance to my security guard. “Or Gep here will call some of his friends. Did I mention he’s ex-CIA?”

Our eyes lock, and he can hardly disguise his malevolence toward me. That’s fine because I can barely check mine for him, so we’re even.

Reluctantly, he grabs his phone and makes the call.

“WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK
you’re doing, calling me?”

John Malcolm’s voice in the living room booms loud and irritated enough to reach me in the bedroom.

“What’s so urgent you broke protocol? Why am I here?” he demands of Drex.

“I had an emergency I couldn’t discuss over the phone,” Drex says, his voice as nervous and tentative as I’ve ever heard it. “Something that could jeopardize the whole plan.”

“What?” Malcolm snaps

I step into the living room, Marlon and Gep right behind me.

“Not what. Who. Me.”

I lean against the wall and slide one hand into my pocket, leaving the injured hand hanging limply at my side. The pain is nearly unbearable. It is obviously beyond the power of Aleve, and as soon as I handle this monster, Dr. Mason is waiting to tell me exactly how bad the damage is.

Malcolm’s beady eyes stretch momentarily when they settle on me before swinging back to Drex.

“You idiot.” His frown just gets heavier and his complexion ruddier with his anger. “If you’ve fucked this up—”

“No, you fucked up, Malcolm.” I struggle to keep my voice even now that I’m faced with this manipulative bastard, responsible, at least indirectly for Kai’s exhaustion and hospitalization. For the last three months she’s been threatened and tortured and trying to fix this on her own.

“You fucked up when you interfered in my relationship with Kai,” I continue. “When you convinced her to leave me. When you tricked her into a shitty contract. When you pushed her past her limits. When you had the audacity to threaten
my girl
with a sex tape recorded without her consent.”

I draw a deep breath, reaching for the calming effects that never come.

“Oh, you’ve fucked up badly, Malcolm.”

The shock of seeing me fades the longer he stands there, leaving nothing but the monster I always knew lurked just below his too-polished, fleshy veneer.