Zeth coughs violently. Just once. I think I’ve startled him with my comment as much as I’ve startled myself. I try not to react as I calmly exit the room. The door is barely closed before I slump against the wall, my heart exploding in my chest, ricocheting off my ribcage like like rapid gunfire. Shit, shit, shit! What the hell have I done? The meeting was not supposed to go like that, but something about that disgusting man makes my blood boil. He clearly holds women in low regard, and to be told so casually to degrade myself in front of him…on no day of the week was that going to happen. Thanks to my quick temper I’ve just created a pretty considerable problem, though. I was supposed to make Julio believe I was a whore…and it seems as though I’ve just implied Zeth is one instead.
******
There are few things in this life that have put me on the back foot. I’ve kinda come to expect shitty things from shitty people, so it’s not surprising when one of Charlie’s boys, or even some of my own boys does something seriously fucked up. But Sloane. Shit, Sloane keeps on surprising me. Sometimes in really good, entertaining, or really fucking hot ways. And sometimes in desperately stupid, idiotic ways. I haven’t decided which category her little act this morning falls under yet, but when I have I’m gonna make sure she pays for it one way or another. She needs to know she can’t pull that shit here. Not if she wants to survive. And I may not be much, and I may not have much, but I’m kind of attached to my life, too. I’d like to keep a hold of it for as long as I can as well.
I’m not gonna tell her about Julio’s reaction after she left his study. She’ll think it’s okay to speak to him that way, and it’s so not okay. It’s not okay for me. Not for Alaska. Not for Charlie. Not for anybody. I was a little surprised when he laughed, though. I straight up thought he was gonna pull out his gun and go shoot her in the back of the head, but instead he’d laughed like a fucking drain. Told me he totally understood why I’d brought her here, and then some.
“She wears you out, man, you send her straight to me, okay? I wouldn’t mind being toyed with by a pleasant piece of pussy like that.”
It turns out that Sloane was only half the issue with Julio, and once he’d decided she wasn’t a threat, he moved swiftly onto his other concern: Charlie.
“I’m going to need you with me today, Zeth. I need you to explain to me why you’ve run away from home like a dog with its tail between its legs. Plus, your help wouldn’t go amiss. I have some business to attend to.”
There wasn’t much I could do or say to refuse him. If I did, it would only make me look guilty as fuck. “Fine. Happy to help.” Happy to bury a bullet in the back of your head. Happy to set this place on fucking fire and dance around the resulting blaze like a crazed mad man. “What kind of business you got?”
“Is there more than one kind?” he’d said, shrugging. And that’s how we ended up in his basement.
I’ve never been down here before. No, a man’s basement is typically the place where they keep their darkest shit. If you end up in the basement, you’re either inner circle or you’re royally fucked. I’m hoping for the first, but in all honesty the later is more likely. The lower level is a series of small rooms, bare concrete boxes with no furniture and naked light bulbs dangling from the ceiling. It’s clear what goes on down here—I’m not even faintly shocked when I see the drain grates in the centre of each empty room as we walk by. In the third room we pass, a hospital bed has been set up and Andres Medina is laid out on it, hooked up to an IV with his right arm in a cast. He’s watching television, but his face is set into a permanent scowl—he’s definitely still mad that I kicked his ass. I didn’t know I’d broken his arm, though. That makes me deliriously fucking happy. Bitch should never have laid a finger on Sloane. Andreas notices us passing and tries to sit up, but we’re already gone by the time he shouts something offensive and Spanish down the corridor after us.
We pass more open doorways, until we reach one at the far end of the corridor that’s locked. I already know who’s inside that room. I haven’t forgotten about the guy Julio found spying on his girls outside the compound, and I haven’t forgotten the photos Julio showed me, either. Michael is behind that door, and I’m praying to all that’s holy that he’s still alive or I’m gonna blow my cover right here and right now and kill every last motherfucker within reach. I’ll probably die trying, but knowing that doesn’t change much. I won’t be able to control myself. And then everything really will be fucked. Sloane. I won’t be able to protect her if I’m dead.