The Bad Boy, page 28
My chest tightened, my throat closing.
“No,” I whispered, shaking my head and pathetically scrambling back to the wall again. “No, you can’t do this! You can’t kill me. I have a family. Please, I … I want to see them again.”
Memories of Mateo and Mom drifted through my head. All I wanted was to hold them one last time, to draw them closer to me and breathe in their scent, to hear them laugh, to watch Mateo scream at his video game with Mom.
Those moments were everything to me. Fucking everything.
And Blaise …
Another whimper escaped my throat.
“Blaise …”
If this was the end of my life, if they really did plan to kill me right here and right now, then I would never see him again. I wouldn’t get to publish my book or ride a skateboard alongside him. He’d be left alone in this world that he thought didn’t love him.
I leaned against the wall and cried. “I need to see Blaise. Please.”
There was so much that I wanted to tell him, so much that he needed to hear. I didn’t just love that boy. Blaise Harleen was everything to me. Blaise Harleen had given me confidence and happiness and so much fucking love that my insides exploded with warmth every time I was with him.
I love him, I mouthed to myself, wishing he could hear me. “I fucking love him.”
Suddenly, a door opened, letting in a gust of wind. I listened for any sign of life outside these concrete walls, of any way that I could get out or cry for help. I couldn’t die like this. I fucking couldn’t.
Waves crashing against the shore drifted through the room. The familiar scent of the beach—Mom had taken Mateo and me when we were younger—wandered into my nose. I sat up and swallowed hard.
Did they plan on killing me and throwing me into the ocean, never to be found?
“Please, let me go,” I begged again.
I didn’t know how many people were here with me because it certainly wasn’t only Jim. That giggle from earlier and that man’s deep voice. Whoever had just walked into the room. There were easily at least three or four people here.
Maybe even more.
Even if I tried to fight, I wouldn’t survive this.
“Let me go,” I cried, making one final plea. “I’ll do anything.”
“Of course you will,” a woman said, her voice familiar. “The mob owns you now.”
“W-what?” I whispered, heart pounding inside me. “What do you mean? Th-the mob?”
Another giggle drifted through the room, the same one from earlier.
“You can thank your mother for this, Vera Rodriguez. If she had kept her scummy hands off my husband and if you’d stayed away from my son, you wouldn’t be here.”
Oh my God.
Blaise’s … mother.
She spit on me. “Fucking Redwood scum. I wish they had killed you, like I asked, but I won’t mind watching every rich man in Redwood take advantage of a piece of trash like you.”
Chapter Seventy-Nine
BLAISE
I paced around Kai’s home—which was like an underground damn bunker—and waited for him to hack into the security cameras around the library. What must’ve been twenty monitors were set up in Kai’s main room, displaying different information on Redwood.
Avery had left to find any information that he could while Kai searched for any information on his variety of computer monitors in his home. Landon occupied Ana on the small couch, reading her a book about Barbies and princesses or some shit. And João had both hands placed on the back of a spare seat, watching the news on a screen.
“Can you hurry the fuck up?” I growled, becoming impatient.
After pulling out my phone, I checked for any messages from Vera. If her phone was turned on, then they might’ve been able to track her, but all the messages that I’d sent to her number failed to deliver.
“He can only hack into the footage so fast,” João said. “Settle down.”
I ran a hand through my hair. “I fucking can’t. It’s been almost an hour.”
While João knew that the mob had taken Vera, he didn’t know why. He didn’t know that they were going to thrust her into the sex trafficking ring that they ran. If someone touched her, everything would change. It would be all my fault.
Vera would never forgive me for having such horrible parents.
Even if she did, I wouldn’t let her. I should’ve walked away from my parents before I even started to pursue Vera. I’d just never thought that Vera would ever feel the same way as I did. I’d thought she’d only spend a couple days with me and be over with it, over me.
More tears welled up in my eyes. I never fucking cried, but I wanted to so badly—again.
“I’m in,” Kai said.
On the screens, footage from the cameras posted around the library popped up. He skipped to five-ten p.m. and played the recording from inside the library. Vera stood behind the counter, talking to the older lady, when a kid walked up to the counter.
“Fuck,” I growled. “Fuck!”
“You know him?” João asked.
“That’s Jim,” I said between gritted teeth. “He’s been trying to get into her pants for fucking weeks now. What the fuck is he doing at the library? I’ve told him to stay away from her.”
The recording continued to play, and Vera walked away from him and into an aisle. He appeared at her side a couple moments later, leaning against the bookshelf and talking to her. They exchanged a few tense words.
“Can you get the audio?” João asked.
Kai paused the recording, typed something into the computer, then replayed their interaction with the audio.
“Sorry. I just wanted to see if you wanted to,” Jim said, “go out with me tonight to get Italian ice.”
“I have a boy—”
“As friends.”
“No.”
“Come on, Vera.”
“No.”
“You’re really not even going to give me a chance? Blaise Harleen could never—”
“You don’t know the first thing about Blaise Harleen,” Vera snapped. “I’m not going out with you. Not only do I have a boyfriend who would kick your ass for talking to me, but I don’t want to go out with you. I never did.”
“What about in the library last week, when you told me to stay so we could … you know … during your break?”
“I was trying to make Blaise jealous, and it worked,” Vera said, becoming pissed off. “I never wanted to hook up with you. I’m sorry for leading you on, but I’m not interested. Please, leave.”
After that exchange, Jim left the building.
João leaned forward. “Follow him. I want to see where he goes.”
Kai flipped through the recording and followed Jim out of the library. He dumped the books into the back of a black van that didn’t have any license plates and paced around the front of the library, shaking his head and glaring at the sidewalk.
A moment later, Vera walked out with her backpack. “I thought I said to leave.”
He jerked her to him. When she yanked herself away, he threw her onto the ground so forcefully that her head bounced against the concrete. It seemed as if she had gone unconscious immediately.
I punched a hole straight through the wall. “Fuck!” My chest tightened at the sight of Vera on the ground, unmoving. “I’m going to kill that motherfucker for ever laying a fucking hand on her. He doesn’t get another fucking breath.”
“Find out where they went,” João said, jaw clenched.
Kai followed the black van through Redwood with the security footage. Jim drove through the back streets of Redwood, away from the cameras, and we almost lost it a couple times, but then the van reappeared near the beachfront. When he drove into the back of a restaurant, the van disappeared from footage for good.
“Landon, stay here with Ana. Don’t let anyone inside,” João said, heading to a back room.
Kai stood up and followed after him, and I did too. They had driven me here, and my car was still at the skatepark.
“We don’t have time,” I said. “We have to go now.”
“Call Avery. Tell him where to meet us,” João said, opening a door.
“We need to go—” I started but then stepped into the room filled with guns and ammo.
What the fuck is this? I know Poison runs Redwood too, but … this?!
Kai pulled open a drawer, picked up a gun, and loaded it with bullets, thrusting it into the waistband of his black cargo pants. Then, he did the same with another one and handed it to me. I widened my eyes and stared down at it.
“What is this for?” I asked.
“To protect your girl.”
Chapter Eighty
BLAISE
Callan: I checked the van as well as the building we thought Vera was in. Nobody is there. Even the cellar has been cleared out.
I stared down at my phone in the passenger seat and growled, unable to believe that they had moved Vera so quickly. We had done one final scan of the tapes beforehand and hadn’t seen one car leave that alleyway.
Me: What the fuck do you mean? Where the hell did they take her?
Callan: Meet me at Redwood Town Beach. That’s the closest place they could’ve gone.
Me: How would they get her there without anyone noticing?
Callan: Just meet me there.
“New plan,” I said to João. “Redwood Town Beach.”
When we pulled into the town beach parking lot, I spotted four cars parked at the base of a stilted building, where tourists hung around during the summer months. Avery sat in his car about ten parking spaces away from the others.
Callan: The mob has a place here, but I need to figure out how to get in.
Callan: Let me go in first. I’ll unlock it. Wait five minutes, then come in.
Callan: Understand?
Callan: I can’t be seen with you or else the mob will know that I’ve betrayed them.
I gritted my teeth and stared through the windshield in João’s car, glaring at the wooden fence and sand dunes in front of us. I wanted to go in there now to rescue Vera; I didn’t think I’d be able to wait much longer.
Instead of waiting for my response, Avery got out of his car and walked up the stairs of the building to the platform up top that I used to hang at last summer. He padded around the top for a few moments, scanning the area.
Hell, I didn’t even know if he knew what the fuck he was doing.
Balling my hands into fists, I glared out the window. “We need to go now.”
“No,” João said, one hand gripping the steering wheel. “Not yet.”
“We have to go,” I growled, knowing that they had trapped Vera somewhere here.
We needed to get her back as soon as we possibly could. I didn’t want any filthy man touching her body. I would never fucking forgive myself if they did.
I was supposed to fucking protect her.
My phone buzzed in my lap, jolting me out of my thoughts.
Callan: Jim’s here.
Callan: Heading toward the parking lot.
Callan: I’m walking down to where he left now.
When I spotted that fucking punk walking toward a car, I stormed out of João’s Mercedes and toward the row of cars. Before he had a chance to even fucking unlock one of them, I seized his collar and hurled him to the ground.
“What the fu—”
I dropped on top of him, straddled his waist, and slammed my fists into his head over and over and fucking over again. Like Vera’s head had, Jim’s head bounced against the asphalt like a fucking basketball.
Blood spurted out of his nose and ran down his cheeks. That desperate kid tried to shield his face from me, but I crawled up to him, set my knees on his elbows, and pinned that fucker to the ground.
“You fucking piece of shit!” I screamed at him, raining down fists.
“G-get o-off of—”
I slammed my knuckles into his mouth, knocking out two of his teeth. “You want to kidnap my girl and trade her in a fucking sex ring?!” I shouted, tears clouding my vision.
My hands moved so fast and hit so hard that I was sure that I had missed and hit the pavement a couple times.
My knuckles ached, but I didn’t stop.
I couldn’t.
Adrenaline rushed through my body. He needed to fucking pay for what he had done, how he’d treated Vera like she was garbage, thrusting her to the ground, knocking her out, and shoving her into the back of his van.
Jim stopped resisting underneath me, instead spitting up some blood. I put all my weight on his elbows with my knees until his arms turned purple. I grabbed a fistful of his hair and banged his head against the asphalt until his eyes rolled back into his head and someone pulled me off him.
“He’s dead,” João said. “Let up.”
When I ripped myself away from João—because I wasn’t finished with Jim—João grabbed me again and shoved me back.
“He’s fucking dead, Blaise. Forget about him and let’s go get your girl.”
My girl.
Vera.
I snapped my head toward the main building, where Kai stood at the foot of the stairs at the platform.
“Avery went this way,” he said, nodding. “Come on.”
Chapter Eighty-One
VERA
“She’s ugly and pudgy,” Blaise’s mother said, her voice shrill. “Not your typical cheerleader from Redwood that you’re all used to. But I’m sure one of you horny fuckers would love to be inside her anyway.”
I whimpered and pressed my back against the concrete wall in the corner of the cell, as if I could disappear right through it. Tears streamed down my face, and I hiccupped.
“Let me out. Please, let me out,” I pleaded, like I had been for the past fifteen minutes.
“Who wants to start?” she continued, something that sounded like her fingers drumming against the metal bars. “You know that they’re the best when they’re getting broken into this life. She’ll cry, scream, and beg for you to stop the entire time you’re inside her.”
“No!” I sobbed, furiously shaking my head. “No, please, don’t! Please!”
Her heels clacked against the concrete floor as she walked away from the cell and laughed menacingly. “Oh, look at you,” she said to someone. “Getting hard, thinking about her already? I know you like those screamers.”
My shoulders jerked back and forth uncontrollably. I didn’t want anyone to touch me, never mind be inside me. This wasn’t fair. This wasn’t fucking fair. I hadn’t done anything wrong. I wanted to go home. I wanted to just go home.
“Why don’t you tell everyone what she feels like?” Blaise’s mom urged. “I’ll let you fuck her for free, just this once.”
“No!” I screamed, voice cracking. Tears covered my cheeks. “Please!”
Suddenly, the cell bars scraped against the concrete floor, the door opening. I scrambled back against the wall even farther to put space between me and whoever the fuck was about to touch me.
Footsteps padded against the ground. I squeezed my eyes shut, even with the blindfold over me, and furiously shook my head, sobbing loudly.
This couldn’t be happening. This really couldn’t be happening.
I wanted to go home.
I wanted to see Mateo and Mom and Blaise one last time.
I-I just didn’t want—
A cold hand grasped my ankle. I pulled my knee to my chest, tearing it out of the man’s grasp, then thrust it into his chest as hard as I could. If they were going to touch me, then I refused to go down without a fight.
The man chuckled darkly, as if this was exactly what he wanted, and seized my ankle again—this time harder. “Fight all you want,” he said. “The more of a fight you put up, the better it’s going to feel for me.”
He yanked me closer to him until my back was flat against the concrete. I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of fighting, but I didn’t want his grimy hands all over me. So, I kicked him as hard as I could over and over, my feet cutting through the air.
“Let me out!” I screamed. “Let me out!”
Silence from everyone. Even Blaise’s bitch-ass mother.
“Please, don’t do this! Please!”
Ignoring my pleas, he grabbed my knees, thrust them apart, and crawled between them. I sobbed with everything that I had, my cries getting lost in the deafening silence of this cell.
What had I done wrong? Why couldn’t things have been different?
If I’d never started dating Blaise—
No, I couldn’t even think that.
If I’d never started dating Blaise, I wouldn’t be happy. I wouldn’t be—
The door opened, the scent of the beach drifting through my nostrils again. Someone else was here, and the man between my legs suddenly stopped. Loud footsteps padded down the stairs and into the room.
“I’ll pay to take her first,” a man said, his voice familiar. “Get the fuck off her, Peter.”
“Callan Avery …” Another woman chuckled. “Ah, I didn’t think you’d want a taste of her.”
“You thought wrong,” Mr. Avery—Blaise’s uncle and a teacher at our school—said.
I scrambled back from the man between my legs and shoved myself back against the wall again, curling up into a ball. I was fucked. Mr. … Mr. Avery?! He wants to pay for me? Pay to be inside me, even when he is so close to Blaise?
Another sob escaped my lips, and I found myself unable to move, unable to fight back any longer. All four of my limbs lay so heavily on the ground. I didn’t want to move. I didn’t want to fight anymore. I loathed Redwood so much.
“How much?” the woman asked.
“How much do you want?” Avery asked.
“You know what our price is for a student from Redwood.”
After grumbling, Avery walked toward the cell. “Take it out of my cut for this month,” Avery said, the cell bars sliding against the concrete again. “Peter, I already said to get the fuck out of here. Vera Rodriguez is mine.”
People shuffled around the room, and then Avery seemed to move closer to me. He seized my upper arm and pulled me to a standing position, but my legs gave out, and I dropped to my knees, ripping the skin as it collided with the ground.
