Red & Wolfe Part 4: An Erotic Fairy Tale (4 page)

“About what?” He eyes me suspiciously, as if my nonsensical statement makes me dangerous in some way.

“I was worried…he killed them,” I chatter. “When I agreed to come here. Gertrude is my grandmother. I’m not his girlfriend.”

Even in my terror-stricken state, it stings a little. I realize how ridiculous that is but don’t have time to dwell on it.

The man in front of me is nodding. “Girlfriend or not, you’re in a bad place. You’re part of this now, babe. It’s a good plan, too. We’re gonna hurt you some before we make it out like he killed himself.” To my horror, the man smiles. “He’s mean to his women. If I didn’t show you, he would do worse. Odds are, you lucked out with me.”

He pulls a knife from somewhere and holds it to my thigh, just above my knee. I wobble and jerk, panting so hard I’m afraid I will pass out.

The man in black looks troubled. “I hope you know, I’m sorry for this, babe.”

Then he drags the knife down my thigh.

CHAPTER FOUR

WOLFE

I wake up hyperventilating, my mind haunted by court. The cross-examination. How am I going to keep a neutral face with Cookie’s father five rows back? I’m going to fuck it up. Get life.

I think I’m hyperventilating, so my mind takes me back to that place. A few gasps later, I realize I’m not having a panic attack. I really
can’t
breathe. I grasp at my throat and realize I can’t use my hands.

My eyes flip open: Linn.

His sweat-streaked face is framed by trees and sky. I’m on my back, on the ground. Motherfucker is straddling my chest with his bony hand pressed against my throat. His other hand pushes the barrel of what I think is my own .38 into my forehead.

I try my hands again and realize they’re bound in front of me, under Linn.

I blink a few times, because everything is so hazy. The sting in my neck…

I look into his brown eyes.

“You…drugged me?” My throat is dry. I try to swallow and end up coughing. Linn hits me with the gun. The sky above him pinwheels.
“Motherfucker!”

“You like that sort of thing, right?” he taunts.

My stomach spasms. I turn my throbbing head, because I’m worried I’ll get sick and would rather aim it at the grass.
Where’s Red?
I pray she’s safe in my stock room. Relief trickles through me, because I’m pretty sure she is. It would take a lot of force to break through the bookshelf.

Stay put, Red. Stay where I put you for once.

Linn sneers above me, and I struggle to think. My head aches, but it’s a faraway sensation. My arms and legs feel heavy, and I’m aware of every breath my lungs draw in. As if it’s an effort. As if whatever was in the dart was too much. I shut my eyes.
Focus, asshole.

Did Bob betray me? I push the thought away because it’s so unlikely. I pay him well to run my business, but that’s not why I trust him. We were friends as children, brothers in college.

Bob didn’t answer his phone. What the fuck happened to him?

I try to swallow. Choke. Linn presses harder against my throat.

“Did…Robert send you?” I rasp.

“He didn’t need to. I’m here for Cookie!”

I close my eyes and grab another shallow breath. So much to say. So little energy.

“Smythson did it,” I try. It’s a long shot, but I’ve got nothing else. I hope the shock of the accusation will make him listen to me.

Instead, his eyes narrow and he snorts. “Your scum. If I had a little less self-control, you’d already have a hole in your head. I don’t even want to touch you right now. You’re scum.”

My spinning mind struggles to keep up. Did he say Cookie’s father sent him—or not?

“I’m going to hang you. Or rather, they are.”

Linn jumps off me with aplomb, and I see two large men dressed in black standing a few paces behind him. Neither is the guard I saw with Linn before.

One steps forward and smiles. Then he stomps hard on my ankle. I’m almost grateful for the pain, because it helps bring everything into focus.

“So this is the Dom Killer.” He grins evilly, and I recognize the look in his eyes. Righteous rage. I saw it lots of times in court. People who thought their hatred of me made them morally superior. People who felt they’d get a star on their cape if they encountered me on a dark night and did me in.

The goon is saying something else, but I can’t really hear him. I’m using all my power to roll over on my side.

Hands grab my shoulders. Someone kicks me in the back, hard enough to send a bolt of pain down both my legs.

I tug against the binds around my wrists, trying desperately to think. When the pain dies down a little, I’m able to discern that I’m still wearing my jeans. And that’s a fucking miracle, because I keep a cigarette lighter in the front pocket of my jeans—always. Survivalist thing I picked up when Cookie and I did a few courses, just after we were married.

Someone flips me roughly over on my back. I use my legs to turn back on my side, but there are three of them.

No, two.

I look up at the faces of Linn and one of the two goons—red-haired, with leathery skin and thin, pale lips. Behind them is some kind of movement, but I’m still too high to pinpoint what.

“I loved her!” Linn hisses. He slaps my face, and I grit my teeth. I schooled myself years ago to smile when I was hit. It doesn’t even hurt, not really. Not even when the bigger guy clocks me in the temple.

But I can tell he got a good hit in. Everything…
spins
.

He presses me to the ground, and someone is picking up my leg. Spreading my legs. A tingly sense penetrates my brain’s fog just in time for me to twist my hips. The kick Linn aimed at my balls hits the inside of my thigh.

I groan, because it fucking
hurts
, then follow that up with a howl and couple of fake dry heaves. I jerk myself up with my abs, cursing and swinging with my bound hands.

If he knows he didn’t get a groin shot, he’ll do it again.

Linn is laughing.

“This more fun than I thought it would be.”

“We’re not even to the good part,” one of the goons says.

The other one steps back into my frame of sight. I sag against the ground, folding my legs together and pretending to grab at my crotch. Really I’m trying to get my ring finger inside my pocket. Get the lighter. I can feel it there. I think I can.

Please…

“What do you say we have a little fun before the big event?” one of the muscleheads says.

“I like fun,” Linn croons.

I want to scream
I didn’t do it
, but there’s no point. I need to focus. I’ve got my pinkie in my pocket. I bend my hand a little, working to get my ring finger in, Linn leans over and spits on me.

“Fuck,” I grit.

“Fuck you,” Linn sneers.

I lift my gaze to him and see, behind him, one of the muscleheads doing something in one of the trees.

Threading rope through the limbs.

Cold seeps into my bones, locks my muscles.

“See that?” The musclehead at my feet jerks his thumb at the noose. “We’re gonna hang ya. Rough up your woman just a little and hang ya. Killers like you don’t deserve to breathe, ’specially not somewhere pretty as this.”

I hear nothing but ‘your woman.’

I sit partially up, lit by rage. “My woman? What the fuck are you talking about my woman?”

Linn grins. “Red! My ‘body guard,’ Tom, found your little Red. She’s part of this plan.”

“Part of it how?” I growl.

“Oh, don’t worry,” Linn says, waving. “We won’t hurt her badly. Just enough so it looks as if you did. Before you hanged yourself.” His mouth twitches into a grin he quickly shuts down. He drops down to the grass beside me. “I’ve got a team here to help me. We will kill you, James Wolfe. And if it doesn’t look authentic, if it doesn’t look like you did it yourself.” He shrugs. “Who will care?”

Red will care.

My throat knots up, mostly because it isn’t true. I hardly know Red. I played her with my hands and mouth—even with my cock—but she’s probably afraid of me.

I drop back onto the ground and shut my eyes. It’s hard to breathe.

“What are you doing to her?” I hiss. I open my eyes.

She’ll know it isn’t me hurting her, won’t she? I feel a moment of terror, wondering if whoever has her is masked. Has her masked. I can’t stand to think she might believe it’s me.

“Just roughin’ her up a lil,” the Southern-sounding goon says.

I lunge for him with my bound hands. “Don’t touch her!”

Sweat blooms on my neck and chest. Flop sweat. I wonder how much adrenaline I would need to break the rope around my wrists. I lie back, panting like a dog. My chest aches. My eyes are closed. I can’t seem to make them open.

 “Please don’t hurt her.
Please
.”

All I can think of is the softness of that pale, pale skin. The color of the freckles on her nose: fine peach.

I open my eyes and find Linn’s impassive face in front of me. He digs my gun into my temple, but I ignore that and focus on his eyes.

“Let her go. She’s just like Cookie. Innocent.”

His mouth draws to the side, and he gives me a skeptical, accusing sort of look, the kind of look that says
shame on you
.

“So you
do
have a heart. A little piece of heart.” He eases the pressure of the gun off my forehead and shakes his head, like he’s disgusted.

I remember something suddenly. Something that changes nothing, but makes me feel like shit. When I arrived at the dock, the goon with Linn was just tying the boat to the dock. But I had heard the engine much earlier. They must have circled the island a time or two, scoping it out, dropping the others off.

“Where is Red?” I keep my voice casual, hoping that if I can get Linn talking, I can lead the conversation back to Smythson. Find out if he’s involved in this.

But Linn stands up. I feel too light without his weight to ground me. I didn’t even notice he was sitting on me again until he stood. I’m still high from whatever he used to get me here.

I watch in awful stillness as he joins the other two and grabs a thick rope hanging from one of the larger limbs. We’re on the south side of the island, I think. I shut my eyes. I know we are, because the trees are mossy like this.

I think of Red and lift my back off the ground again. Then I remember: The lighter! I work my pinkie and my ring finger into my left pocket, my eyes darting over to the tree to see if anyone’s watching.

Linn starts to whistle some song. I don’t know. Can’t seem to follow.

My heart is beating so hard. I can feel the lighter with my fingertip.

One of the goons looks over at me, and I pull my hands down toward my cock and wince.