Ransom (Dead Man's Ink #3) Read online

  “Yeah. That.”

  “It’s been three years. I thought he would have forgotten about that by now.”

  I shake my head. I’m almost tempted to roll my eyes. “It’s been six months, you lunatic. And even if it had been three years, you know Rebel. You had a bunch of civilians killed for no goddamn reason, and then you tried to pin it on us. A lifetime could go by and he’s never gonna forgive you for that shit.”

  She pulls an ugly, disgusted face. “So fucking sensitive. Worse than a woman. He offended me. Of course I was going to retaliate.”

  Rebel refused to be her whipping boy. There was no way he was ever going to agree to run drugs for her, be her hired help whenever the fuck she felt like it. It was ridiculous that she even thought he’d go for that deal. I don’t argue with her, though. It’d be a pointless venture. The woman is completely unreasonable. She really does believe that her actions were justifiable. “Eat your breakfast, Maria.”

  “Wait.” She crosses the room, skipping a little to get to me before I can let myself out. “I’m so fucking bored in here, baby. Can’t you stay a little while? Entertain me?” She already knows by the face I’m pulling what my answer will be. “Or…” she says, grabbing hold of my arm. “I could entertain you instead? I seem to remember that you liked it when I used to entertain you.”

  I didn’t really have much choice when she chose to ‘entertain’ me before. I was strapped to a chair, naked, a zip tie cutting into my wrists, blood trickling down my finger tips, and she did everything in her power to figure out what would get me hard. She had girls come and blow me. She had people come and fuck in front of me. She let her bodyguard fuck her in front of me. Nothing worked. It drove her crazy. In the end, it was her frustration, her desperate, inexplicable need to sexually excite me that made it happen. And it was a conscious decision. She tried to force it, but that’s not me. She could tease and play with my dick from sun up to sun down and she wouldn’t have gotten anywhere until I decided to let it happen.

  Maria Rosa’s full, swollen lips part as her tongue darts out between them. Her hand slides down my body, traveling from my arm to my cock. She squeezes. Hard. “We used to have fun, baby. I know I’m in Rebel’s bad books, but that doesn’t mean I have to be in your bad books, surely?”

  “You’re the only person in my bad books, woman. Now get your hand off my dick before I break your goddamn fingers.”

  She grins up at me, not believing me for a second. “Come on, Cade. When was the last time you had a woman’s mouth around you? A real woman’s mouth. A passionate woman, not some silly little American girl.”

  “Back when I met you, you always wanted to be one of those silly little American girls, didn’t you?” Her hand is still exactly where she left it, and she’s squeezing harder. She leans into me, crushing her breasts up against my chest.

  “That was before I got locked away in your motherfucking basement. Now I know how stupid that was. I’ve had a lot of time to think. I’m proud to be a sensual, sexual Columbian woman. You can keep your stupid, blonde airhead bitches.”

  “Either way. It’s not happening. So move your hand. If you want someone to play with, I’ll send Carnie down here. I’m sure he’d be happy to oblige you.”

  She lets go, her repulsion at the thought very clear on her face. “Oh please. That little boy? He’s a child.”

  “He’s thirty. And you didn’t say that when you made Rebel watch you suck his cock in Vegas, now, did you?”

  “That was different. That was for Rebel, not for me. And it definitely wasn’t for that stupid boy.”

  I lean down close so I can whisper into her ear. “I’m gonna let you into a little secret, Mother. Rebel isn’t attracted to you. He never has been, and he never will be. So you can suck as many dicks in front of him as you like. You can let an entire football team take turns at fucking you. It won’t make the slightest bit of difference. He thinks you’re a crazy, manipulative, evil piece of shit. He wouldn’t piss on you if you were on fire. Do you understand?”

  Maria Rosa steps back, the smile slipping from her face. A cold glint forms in her eyes; dark though they may be, right now they’re frostier than Rebel’s pale blue irises. She’s gone from horny and devious to malicious and spiteful in a heartbeat, and I know that my time down here with her should most certainly be coming to an end. “He can think whatever he likes of me,” she says slowly. “He can pretend that he’s going to punish me down here in this fucking box forever. He can treat me like an animal, deprive me of my basic rights as a human being, but trust me when I tell you this, Cade Preston. I won’t be stuck down here forever. I will get out, and when I do there will be hell to pay for this. There will be blood spilled, and people will die, and I will stand over his grave and I’ll piss on that. And I will piss on yours after his. Only then will my rage be tempered.” Her hand whips out unexpectedly, and she slaps my face, hard enough that the enclosed space echoes with the sound of her palm making contact with my cheek.

  Slowly, I run my tongue over my bottom lip, tasting blood. “There she is,” I say. “Be careful, Mother. One of these days…I’m going to slap you back.”

  She spits, thankfully smart enough to do it at my feet instead of in my face. “Bullshit. You’re not man enough to raise a hand to me, bastard.” Even as she swears at me, curses me, I can see the fire sparking inside her. I can feel it burning off of her. She thrives on this kind of conflict. I know as soon as I step out of the door behind me, she’ll be tearing off her clothes and making herself come. She won’t be able to stop herself.

  “Eat your fucking breakfast,” I whisper. “Or don’t. I don’t give a shit.” I turn and leave, quickly inserting the key into the lock on the door, opening it and slipping through before she can try to dash through after me like she normally does.

  I stand there, fuming, blood racing like wildfire through my veins as I stare at the steel door that once more separates us. I can’t stand this shit anymore. Someone else is going to have to be her fucking delivery boy. She can fling her own shit and throw as many tantrums as she damn well likes. I’m fucking done.

  But still…

  My heart is tripping over itself right now. My skin feels hot, prickly, uncomfortable against my clothes. Fuck that fucking bitch. Damn it. I slump back against the concrete wall behind me, Maria Rosa’s wash bag at my feet, and I stare up at the low ceiling, my retinas burning from the harsh glare of the strip lighting.

  Her touch didn’t turn me on. It was her anger. Her pure, unadulterated fury. She’s fire and brimstone, the epitome of a woman scorned, and I do believe her when she says she’d do anything in her power to destroy both Rebel and me if given half the chance. But I know she’d want to fuck me senseless before she killed me. I can see the war of emotions in her all too clearly, and loathe as I am to admit it, I want to fuck her just as badly as I want to kill her, too.

  My hand automatically moves to my dick. I managed to control myself back in there, but I’m having less luck out here. I’m growing harder by the second, my body overheating, feeling like I’m about to boil over. I don’t even think about it; I unbuckle my belt and unzip my fly, my head kicked back, still leaning against the wall. I let my jeans fall down over my hips and I pull down my boxers a little, allowing my erection to spring free. It would feel so much better if Maria Rosa was on her knees in front of me right now, swirling her tongue expertly around the head of my cock, moaning as she tasted me, moaning as I grew harder than granite deep in her throat. But I couldn’t trust her not to bite the fucking thing off. I couldn’t trust myself not to lose control and grab hold of her so I could hate fuck the living shit out of her until she was screaming out my name.

  I run my hand up and down the length of my dick, breath catching in my throat. She’s dangerous. Wanting her in any way, shape or form is probably the stupidest thing I could ever do, and yet right now it’s taken every scrap of will power I possess to stop myself from opening that door back up and destroying her pu
ssy.

  I work my dick, holding myself tighter and tighter as I edge closer and closer to coming. Soon I’m frantic. My legs are shaking, my head spinning when I explode, a jet of semen spilling all over my hand, onto the floor, almost hitting the opposite wall. I grind my teeth together, holding in the need to groan as my body convulses and trembles.

  God.

  Holy fuck.

  What the hell is wrong with me? I feel numb and boneless as I pick up Maria Rosa’s wash bag and open it up. Her black panties are the first thing I pull out, which is kind of fitting. I can see that they’re used. I’m not a complete pervert, though. If I were, I might consider holding them to my nose and inhaling deeply. Even the thought of doing something like that makes me angry—a sensation at odds with the equally prominent desire to give in and just do it. I wipe myself with the black cotton, cleaning myself up, and then I use the panties to mop up the mess I made on the floor, too. The scrap of material is sticky and saturated by the time I’m done.

  I throw them back into the wash bag, knowing that I’ll be cleaning the entire contents myself this morning instead of leaving it out for Sophia to do. It might be a shitty prospect job, but there’s no way I want my boss’s girlfriend handling my fucking come.

  I’m bemused as I climb the ladder out of the basement. I lied to Maria Rosa. I told her that crazy bitches didn’t make my dick hard, but it seems as though that was an out and out lie. Crazy bitches do make my dick hard. They make it very hard indeed.

  CHAPTER THREE

  SOPH

  “Get that fucking bitch out of here. Now.” Shay glares at Carnie with the intensity of a thousand violently burning suns. The two of them have been sleeping together for months now, but for some reason Carnie turned up to the clubhouse this morning with a skinny blonde on his arm, and red lipstick smudged all over his smug face. I sigh as I fix up three more plates of bacon and eggs and shove them down the bar. It’s kind of pathetic that these two can’t get their shit together. Carnie collects one of the plates I slid down the highly buffed wooden bar top, and then he picks up another. He holds out the second one to the skinny blonde, who I’m sure has never eaten a strip of bacon in her entire fucking life.

  “You’re not the only one who can have a slip up, Shay,” Carnie says. “We’re all human here. Right, guys?”

  The other members of the club weren’t born yesterday, though. They know backing Carnie up right now is essentially picking a side, and picking a side is basically the same as signing your own death warrant when it comes to Shay. She’s completely psychotic most of the time. Angry and volatile. Not a one of these men or women would willingly bring her wrath down on their heads without good reason, and this is definitely not a good reason. She can fight her own battles with Carnie. Better to let the two of them go three or four rounds and then forgive each other than find yourself trapped in the middle of a life long vendetta that will only end in tears.

  None of the Widow Makers look up from their plates. Carnie pulls a face at Cade, who’s sitting alone at the table reserved for him and Jamie. “Pussies,” he says under his breath. And then, louder, he says, “I don’t see what the problem is, Shay. Your other boyfriend gets to eat breakfast with us. Why shouldn’t the girls I fuck share the same privilege?”

  Sounds like Shay’s bruised Carnie’s ego a little. She stands up from the table where she was eating and folds her arms across her chest. She’s wearing that look on her face that can only mean trouble. “If you’re referring to Cade,” she says, glancing over her shoulder at the dark-haired guy sitting alone, “then he’s hardly my other boyfriend, in the same way that you aren’t my boyfriend either. Cade and I fucked. Get over it. He gets to eat in here because he’s the motherfucking vice president of the club, you moron.”

  The clubhouse falls quiet. All conversation ceases. Cade stops eating, putting down his knife and fork on either side of his plate. He doesn’t look up at the fracas taking place. Instead, he grinds his teeth together, making his jaw muscles flex as he studies the mess of egg yolk and blackened bacon in front of him.

  Carnie makes a disparaging sound at the back of his throat. “Great. Just fucking great, Shay. Tell everyone, why don’t you.”

  “Sure I will. No one fucking cares, Carnie! You’re the only one who has a problem with this. Why don’t you take your peroxide hooker down to Denny’s, okay? The food’s better there, anyway.”

  “Hey!” I slam down my serving spoon. “If you don’t wanna eat the food I make, Shay, then drag your own ass into town and have done with it.” Shay and I have gone toe to toe a couple of times ourselves. I knew from day one that there was never going to be any love lost between us, and that if I wanted to become a member of this club I was going to have to stand up to her, irrespective of whether it mattered to me or not. Her head rocks back, eyes narrowing as she fixes me in her sights.

  “Calm your shit, Sophia. Not everything’s about you. Your food will do just fine,” she snaps.

  “What a compliment.” I roll my eyes. “Carnie, why don’t you and your friend eat outside in the sunshine? It’s too small in here for bickering right now. The walls are closing in.”

  “Y’know…” Carnie shakes his head, his mouth pulling up into a bemused smile. “For a prospect, you sure do get away with telling us all what to do an awful lot. I wonder why that could be.” We all know why I get away with blue murder: I’m the president’s old lady. Carnie won’t ever air that fact out loud, though. Rebel will string him up from the rafters and use his torso as a punching bag if he does. I’m about to come back at him with a retort about children being easily led, but a loud, metallic scraping sound cuts through the humid, stifling air inside the clubhouse and everyone stops talking again. Cade towers over everyone, hands planted on the table in front of him on either side of his silverware—he casts a dark, weary look at Carnie.

  “You’d better watch your mouth, man,” he says quietly. “It would be a pretty shitty start to my day if I had to kick your ass for being rude to Soph.”

  “See! This is what I mean,” Carnie says, throwing his hands in the air. “She gets preferential treatment because she’s blowing the boss.”

  “No one said this was an equal opportunities organization. If you don’t like it then you can always leave, Carnie. Just remember to leave your ink at the door.”

  Leaving the Widow Makers is just like leaving any organized crime outfit. It’s never as easy as it might seem. Even if Carnie hadn’t had access to highly sensitive, high dangerous information that could really hurt the majority of the club’s members, which he has, then he’d still have to get the huge tattoo marked into his back removed. And that is a particularly unpleasant and painful procedure that involves whiskey, knives, blood, fire, burning and bleeding. Carnie begins to turn a sickly shade of green.

  “I was just pointing out that—”

  “People that point tend to lose their fingers,” Cade growls.

  “Yeah. Well…”

  “And I’m not sleeping with fucking Shay, you idiot. I don’t shit where I eat.”

  Carnie looks at Shay, confusion all over his face. He looks so turned around that I almost feel sorry for him. I’ve got no idea what the hell lead to Shay telling this lie, but there’s no way I would have believed it for a second. I’m surprised that Carnie did either. Shay looks unapologetic as she swipes her plate up from the table and scrapes the remaining food from its surface into the trashcan at the end of the bar.

  “Why did you tell me you’d fucked him?” Carnie demands.

  “I have. Just not recently,” she says.

  “Not in the last five years,” Cade corrects. Shay turns purple, but she nods her head.

  “You wanted to know. You asked. You were being a little pissy bitch about guys I’d slept with before that you might know. When I told you about Cade, you didn’t stick around long enough to hear that it wasn’t a current thing. You made assumptions, because you’re a hard-headed jerk, and now here we are, with
you sticking your dick into a walking Hepatitis factory.”

  The blonde, who’s stood quiet for the most part up until now, sets down the food Carnie passed her. “I think I’ll just get going,” she fake whispers. She looks like her temper is rising but thankfully she’s managing to keep a hold of her tongue; Shay will rip it out her overly-botoxed mouth if she doesn’t.

  “I didn’t fuck her properly, baby,” Carnie says. “I swear I didn’t. I put my cock in her ass last night, but it didn’t feel right. I stopped. Tell her, Denise. Tell her I didn’t—” But Denise is walking out of the clubhouse, swaying a little on top of her six inch hooker heels, and she doesn’t look like she’s going to be stopping and turning around any time soon. God knows how she thinks she’s going to get back into town from here. Late last year, not too long after I arrived here with Jamie, we found one of the club member’s girlfriends strung up from a tree on the road leading from town to the compound. Her hands and one of her feet had been cut off. Along with her head. Ever since then, we don’t allow people to walk alone out there, especially women. Carnie was the one who found Bron, so it’s surprising he’s letting her wander off now.

  His eyebrows are drawn together, pulled upward in a look of puppy dog hurt. The lenses of his thick-rimmed black glasses are huffed a little at the bottom, suggesting his temperature is up. It’s hotter than hell in the New Mexico desert in summer as it is; arguments and bickering only makes the weather more unbearable.

  “You should have explained,” he says to Shay.

  “And you should have dropped the machismo bullshit for just a goddamn second and let me actually finish my sentence.” She has a good point. She doesn’t seem too fazed by the fact that Carnie’s been out fooling around with another woman. In fact, she seems frighteningly calm. If Rebel had done that to me, there would be hell to pay. I’d have his testicles in a heartbeat. The relationship I share with the head of the Widowers is different to most relationships inside the club, though. Monogamy isn’t high on most people’s list of desirable moral traits in a partner. That goes for the male members and the female members alike. No one seems to want to be pinned down—not when you could be having fun with a whole bunch of different people at the same time. Sloane would have something choice to say about the arrangements that take place here under this roof once night falls. Probably something about the risk factors of highly communicable venereal diseases, and how syphilis is a really bad look on people these days.