Den of Vipers, page 41
They hurt her.
I watch her crawl from the wreck of the car, the CCTV from the highway zooming in on her. She stumbles away with blood dripping from her head, her hands, and her arms. She only has one shoe on, and her face is pale, her eyes fuzzy as she falls to her knees. I watch again as they come at her, she still fights, trying to take them down. That’s my fucking girl, a fighter to the end, but she doesn’t see the needle coming.
I watch her fall, and this time, they catch her and carry her back to the cars. Then, they are gone. Breathing heavily, my muscles shaking with the need to kill people, I put the phone to my ear. “Track the cars.”
“Diesel’s new friend is already on it.” He pulls the phone away from his mouth. “D, he can’t work if you keep stabbing him,” he snaps, and then comes back. “I can’t get a hold of Kenzo, he gets no signal in the basement of Diamonds. Get him?”
“On it,” I snarl, and the line goes quiet. “Garrett, we kill them.”
“Too fucking right,” he retorts. “Anyone who touched her dies horrifically, and the Triad? We are going to fucking burn them alive for taking our girl.”
I hang up and send a message to my driver and the guards downstairs, so when I make it into the lobby, they are there. The car is idling outside, and I get in quickly. “Diamonds, now,” I demand.
First things first, get my brother. Then they are dead men.
They feared my father, but they should fear me more. Roxanne is mine, she owns us, and they took the one thing we will do anything to protect. They kicked the goddamn vipers’ nest, so now they get the fangs. This city will run with blood before tonight, and when I find them, I will make them scream for every finger they ever put on her.
I dial a number for their restaurant, knowing they will get it. They will understand. “You took something of mine, something precious.” There is no use denying it, they already know what they have, it’s the only thing keeping her alive right now. “I’m going to let the streets run red with your people’s blood until I get her back, and then? I’m going to kill you all. Starting with your families, your wives, your sons and daughters, even your parents. Only then, when everything is burning and destroyed around you, will I kill you. You fucked with the wrong family.” After I leave the message I hang up.
One, two, three, four, five.
I repeat it again and again, trying to stay calm, but I can’t. It doesn’t work. Fuck the calm. All I can see is Roxy, the smile on her face before it fades to that blank, scared look she had on the highway.
The city is about to go to war.
And before the sun rises tomorrow, only one family will be left.
Ours.
We pull up outside Diamonds, and I wait as they get Kenzo. He slips into the car next to me, frowning. “What’s wrong?” he asks straightaway, pulling out his phone before I stop him.
“She’s gone.” My voice is empty, not reflecting the inferno burning inside me. How can I sound that calm when I’m this fucking angry…and scared? Scared I will lose her. Scared that the best thing that has ever happened to me will be gone before I can even tell her. Scared to lose my love.
“What?” he questions, scowling and looking at me over.
“Roxxane, they took her,” I rasp.
He freezes, his head jerking down to look at his phone as he scrolls through the messages. “What?” he gasps. “No.” He shakes his head as we pull away from the curb.
“Yes, they did.”
He turns to me then, his eyes outraged, his lips curled into a snarl. “How can you be so fucking calm?” he screams, and then throws himself at me. He always did wear his emotions on his sleeve. I capture his head in my hands, pressing my forehead to his as he struggles and swears.
“Brother, look at me,” I whisper, but he’s still fighting, so I grip him harder. “Look at me!” I command, my hands shaking against his skin. He stops fighting then, staring at me. His eyes are lost, scared, like mine. “We will get her back, I promise you that,” I whisper. “I’m not calm, I’m anything but, yet I have to hold it together. For you, for her. Now more than ever, she needs us, and we need to handle this, we need to find them. Breaking down will not help, not now. We need to use every goddamn ounce of our power and intellect.”
“You promise?” he begs, searching my eyes like he used to when I was a child and he was scared, when I swore to protect him. I do the same now, protect him, it’s my job. Because, honestly, I don’t know if we will get to her in time, and that makes me feel so sick, I want to throw up everywhere, knowing what they will do to her.
Every minute counts, but if he needs my lies to function, then he can have them.
“I promise, we will get her back, and then we’ll kill every last one of them,” I vow.
His eyes shutter for a moment, those long lashes concealing him from me as a shaky breath leaves his lips. When they open again, they are hard, cold, like mine. It saddens me, but I understand. “I can’t lose her,” he admits, his voice making my heart ache. I wish I could shield him from this. I wish I could keep this from him like everything else.
“I know. We won’t. I need you, she needs you,” I tell him, and he nods.
“We kill them all,” he agrees, deadly calm. He’s feeling the type of tranquillity where you feel too much and you become numb. He’s nothing more than the Viper now.
A cold-blooded snake striking out.
In those eyes, I see myself and I see our future, because if we lose her—the thought even hurts—there will be no coming back. We will cease to exist as we do now. All laugher and love will be gone until nothing, nothing is left but our venom.
He moves away, and I let him, hiding my shaking hands from him. He needs my strength, not my weakness. Because that’s what she is, our weakness, but they don’t know she is also our heart, our strength, our reason we fight now.
“What’s our first move?” he asks, his voice dead.
I stare out of the window, a cruel smile curling my lips. “We hunt them across the city, starting at the bottom. Get your gun, it’s about to get bloody.”
Chapter Forty-Five
DIESEL
“You need to calm down, you have already killed four people,” Garrett snaps, but despite his words, his hands are clenched and his body is vibrating with lethal intent. I’m not the only one struggling with our girl going missing.
My little bird.
Mine.
And they took her.
I will paint this town red. I will kill everyone in it and wear their skin to find her. She’s mine!
“They had it coming.” I shrug, wiping the blood from my hands.
“That last guy?” he scoffs, and I look over at him with a smile which he winces at. “D…” He sighs. “He only asked what he could do to help.”
“I didn’t like his attitude.” I sniff, and I feel him staring at me.
“We’ll get her back, D, but ya gotta hold on, okay?”
“We will get her back.” I nod calmly and then look at him again, grinning. “I’m going to rip their hearts from their chests and give them to her.”
“That’s…the spirit.” He sniggers. “Fucking idiots don’t know what they have unleashed.”
“You are one to talk.” I grin wider. “Why did you beat the shit out of the security guard at the apartment?”
He scowls then. “He let them go. Idiot.”
“He’s in ICU,” I point out cheerfully, but inside, a fire is burning. Like always, it flays me from the inside, but these flames are growing higher than before without my little bird to help control them. They scream for blood, for death, and I’m twitchier than normal. I don’t know what is right and wrong…even for me.
Garrett is right, I’m already carving a bloody path through the city, but I don’t care. When I was hunting my mum’s killer, the bodies piled up, and I never even loved her that much. Little Bird? She’s my world. My goddamn black beating heart is hers and she is mine.
Mine.
And they took her.
The carnage will be unimaginable. They will call me a serial killer. They will all fear me, but I don’t care, as long as she’s back in my arms before the night is through. When I saw the bodies of her guards in the car and her blood on the backseat…fuck.
Panic like I have never felt before poured through me. No one gets to hurt her, to hear her screams, but me.
She fought, of course she did. She’s a fighter, a Viper. She killed them and would have slain them all if she could have. But she couldn’t, so I will for her. I will place their bodies at her feet for hurting her. And after…
After she will have to survive me.
Because I am unleashed.
We meet Ryder and Kenzo at the warehouse. They have been busy as well. The scent of the ocean wafts to us, which is just behind the dock. The shops are not too far away, but inside the warehouse is an entirely different world. Our security is swarming the place, all of us are together.
All of us are furious.
All of us are seeking blood.
On their knees before my brothers are eight men, who no doubt work for the Triad. I don’t ask how they found them so quickly, I don’t care. I can already feel their screams, their bones breaking in my hands. I ache for their pain, to sate the monster inside me until I get my hands on the bastards who took her. But Ryder stops me as he steps forward and eyes them with disgust.
“The Triad took something of ours, and we won’t stop until we get it back. Anyone with any information is to come forward now. You all know something, you work for them.” He waits, and the men all shift nervously, not wanting to betray their employers. Ryder loses his patience.
Usually, he would let Garrett or me do the dirty work, not that he’s afraid of blood, but it paints him as the cautious leader. But now? He pulls his gun and suddenly fires, shooting the man at the very left in the head without even blinking, his face cold. The men on their knees shy away, some screaming, some crying. “I will kill you one by one until I get what I want to know, and if none of you know it? I will start on another lot, I don’t need you alive. I will kill all of you. So I will ask again, any information?”
“Oh God,” one of them sobs, and Ryder shoots him next.
Six left.
I prowl around them, taunting them, kicking them, needing to feel their pain, needing to make them hurt.
Crouching behind one, I stroke his sweaty hair. “I would tell him. I might be crazy, but he’s worse,” I murmur to him, as I look up at Ryder and Kenzo. Ordinarily, Kenzo would be smiling, playing the good guy and hiding the Viper underneath.
He might be soft and romantic for Roxy, but only for her.
And she isn’t here.
The Viper is unleashed in him. His face is dark, thunderous with anger, his suit is stripped off, and his dice move rapidly through his fingers as he shakes with the need to do something. Anything. I know, ’cause I feel it too. Garrett is the same, storming around the warehouse on his phone, no doubt searching for anything, anyone we can use.
“Please,” he whimpers, shaking with fear, sweat pouring down him. “I know nothing, I’m just a delivery—” I snap his neck and stand as Ryder frowns at me, but he knows better than to try and stop me. Especially with her on the line, my little bird.
Just the thought of her has me turning and grabbing the closest man. I roar into his face, screaming into it. He screams back, trying to get away, but it’s no use. I need blood. I need pain.
Now.
Everything’s a blur, but when I come to, I’m heaving and my body is shaking with adrenaline. I lift my hands and notice they are covered in blood, as are my arms. I can feel it dripping down my face, and at my feet is the mauled corpse of the man. He’s a bloody mess.
I glare at the others, and they scream, one even pisses himself, the smell filling the air as I prowl closer. “D, enough,” Ryder snarls.
I scowl at him, but he narrows his eyes. Garrett steps closer to me, watching in case he needs to restrain me. It wouldn’t be the first time he tried. Until my little bird came, I did my own thing. Only doing as ordered when it suited me.
But then she wrapped me around her little finger. One smile, one punch, and I was hers. Her animal. Her killer.
“Diesel!” he roars, and I slink away, not far though.
“Anyone?” Someone shifts, and Ryder sighs, aiming again, and the man screams.
“Wait, wait! I know something!” he begs.
Ryder pauses, stepping closer and pressing the gun to his head while I laugh. “Tell us, better tell us.” I grin.
“They have taken one of your safe houses, that’s where they are keeping her, that’s all I know, I swear. I overheard it!” he sobs.
Garrett snarls and punches a cement support, which must hurt. “Fuck, we have loads of them, which fucking one?”
“We need to find Daphne and ask her.”
Garrett turns and, without a word, shoots all the men as he converges on me. “How is she alive?” He towers above me, but I’ve never feared him.
“I don’t know.” I shrug, I really don’t. “I played with her for a bit before I burned her in a building. She was tied down.”
“Fuck,” he snaps. “She’s helping them, we need to get her.”
“Roxy first, she’s all that matters,” Ryder reminds us, and we all look at him. “We need to know which safe house, call everyone in. Find it.”
Kenzo doesn’t speak, just turns away and stomps to the car waiting for us. I look at the bodies. “We should send a message,” I murmur.
Ryder nods. “Do it. I want this city turning on them. Let them know anyone who’s helping them is now our enemy and will die like the rats they are. Hunt the bastards down, make it rain.”
I grin then. “Are you letting me loose?”
He stares at me as he holsters his gun. “Go fucking wild. Make them come to our door, begging for forgiveness, while I find the safe house. Garrett, go with him, you need to release some tension. I will warn the police to stay out of our way,” he orders, before looking at the car Kenzo went into. “I’ll find the house with Kenzo, we will have it before dawn. Be ready to move.”
I glance at Garrett then, and even he looks worried. “D—” He starts.
“You heard him.” I laugh. “Let’s play.”
“Oh fuck,” he mumbles. “This should be good.”
For you, Little Bird, I’m coming for you.
Chapter Forty-Six
GARRETT
I watch D play with the man. My own hands are caked in blood, and the pain of my knuckles breaking has long since passed. Ryder gave us permission, and we didn’t need to be told twice.
I let it all out—the aggression, the hatred. All my emotions pour into the city like a disease, leaving bodies behind. They should have never challenged us…and taking Roxy? Dumb fucking move.
We might have let them off easy before. Now? Now they will die with our names on their lips.
I shy away from thinking about her, because when I do, I can’t control what happens, and right now, this guy is D’s, but the idea of her in pain…of her scared… alone, fills me with such fury, I have to kill something, anything.
We promised to protect her always.
And look what happened. I will never forgive myself for it, or for the fact it was my own fucking fault. If I wasn’t so consumed by my hatred for Daphne and the shock of seeing her alive, I might have noticed her using me to get my phone, to lure my girl, but I didn’t until it was too late, and now this. I am to blame.
She came for me.
And now I will come for her, always. I will save her, and then I will damn her, making her mine forever. If there’s one thing I’ve learned since I found out she was gone, it’s that I can’t live without her. Not anymore.
She worked her way under my armour, under my ruined skin to the fighter, the warped killer beneath, and she loved him and made him love her. She is my reason to breathe now, to fight my demons every goddamn day. D laughs, bringing me back from my morose thoughts.
The man is crawling with tears pouring from his eyes. His legs are broken in millions of places, dragging uselessly behind him. The blood trail he’s leaving almost makes me laugh. He pulls himself away while D laughs harder, holding the hammer he used to break his legs in his hand.
“Where is she?” he screams, and then brings the hammer down on his back. I watch, letting him get it all out. He dies shrieking in pain with no information for us. So we move on to the next one.
But before we can, I get a call back from Cherry. She owed Roxy, and she mentioned Triad members before, so I told her to put in some work. “What?” I answer, snarling.
“They’re dead, all three men that come here. They didn’t know much, but they mentioned something about the men you assigned to trail the ex—they’re dead.” Fuck, that’s why we can’t get a hold of them, and it leaves us with another dead end.
“Thanks, Cherry, want me to send clean up?” I inquire, trying to play nice.
“No, we got this, you just get her back,” she demands, as she hangs up.
We jump on our bikes and speed away, pushing it as we wind dangerously through traffic. I need that adrenaline, that high, and the wind to carry me away for just a moment, but when we end up outside the next building, a convenience store, it’s all back.
I have to get it out before it twists me and there is no coming back. Yanking off my helmet, I swing my leg over and look at D. “This one is mine,” I growl.
He nods but follows me in, and I head straight up to the counter. The man there glances up from his newspaper, and his face pales when he spots me. He stumbles away as D starts wrecking the shop behind me, throwing shit everywhere, getting his own feelings out.
“Oh God!” He grabs a bat from under the counter and tries to strike me. I catch it mid-air and wrench it from his hands, snapping it over my knee before grabbing him by the collar of his shirt and dragging him over the counter. He screams and jerks as I throw him onto the floor. He starts to scramble to his feet, so I bring my boot down on his back, grinding him to the ground, but it’s not enough.
