Obsession (A Bad Boy's Secret Baby)(70)

Don't over think it.

Hugging my knees, I perched a foot from the body and simply... stared. Or waited. What was I waiting for? Some new, sudden strength that would make searching a corpse an easy task?

Metal glinted, gripped partially in one of his hands. The pistol was right there. I didn't need to dig through his clothes at all. What I was seeking was so close. So fucking close.

Think of Claudine.

Chewing my tongue, I reached out gingerly. Even now, my whole arm trembled, fingers twirling like leaves about to crumble in Autumn.

The man's eyes fluttered.

Falling backwards, I slid away with a soundless scream on my lips. This guy was still alive!

He focused on me, but it was clearly a challenge for him. When he coughed, red speckled his chin and the collar of his ruined shirt. Simultaneously, we both realized he still held the gun.

Even if he was dying, he had the advantage.

Surging forward, I buried my fears under a wall of self preservation. I had to act, or this would be the end of me. After everything, the idea of dying among these killers was too much.

Squeezing his arm to the floor, I put all my weight on it, grunting. He bared his teeth, flexing—amazingly strong for a guy full of bullets. Wrenching with all my might, I yanked the pistol free, scuttling backwards as I flipped it around.

“Don't move!” I gasped. It felt stupid to aim the weapon at him, considering his wounds, but I did it anyway.

Shutting his eyes, the man tried to take a deep breath. His chest shuddered, lungs wet with his lifeblood. Again he coughed, a weak smile stretching. “Fuck,” he mumbled. “Fucking hell.”

Brushing the trigger, I struggled to keep my aim level. If he's still alive, then... the others... Paranoid, I jerked my head around. The remaining two bikers continued to lay where they were.

“Go ahead,” the man said, drawing my attention back. “Shoot me. Finish this.” His laugh was nauseating, scraping at the nerves of my brain. “A junkie and some ex-MC loser. Everyone said it'd be easy... easy money, easy pussy...” His teeth were grizzly, crimson as a lit jack-o-lantern. “Nothing's ever easy. Should have fucking known.”

I didn't think he was talking to me. Not really, anyway. Except his final words... they curled through me until I let them take hold. Ronin had told me my hunt was over. That it had to end, because I didn't know where to find Claudine.

Checking the gun, I pulled the bolt back, pushing a bullet into the chamber. The crisp sound made the guy stare at me. It's possible he forgot I was there. “Tell me where they take the girls,” I said flatly. Having an answer so close was making me brave.

Trying to shift on the floor, his elbow slid on a patch of gore. Slumping, he eyed me with indifference. The dying have little use for emotion. “Girls?” he asked stupidly.

“Like me. The ones you guys kidnap and stick in your brothels.” Too quickly, this stranger was becoming the epitome of everything that had ruined my life. My knuckles were throbbing as I crushed the gun. “The girls you drug... and screw... and then slaughter like garbage.” On my bare arms, the needle marks burned anew.

Loose ends.

Ronin's statement feathered through my guts.

His head lolled to the side. “Why the hell do you care? Why does it matter?”

It was too close to the message that had haunted me since Claudine went missing.

Everyone thinks I should turn my back and run. No one cares about lost girls.

I was the only one.

Claudine.

I spelled her name out on the front of my skull, saw it when I closed my eyes. This wasn't just about her, though. My sister was a part of this whole god damn mess. Women who were stolen and forgotten.

I'd almost been one of them.

“Ah!” the man growled. On instinct, I bent close, shoving the barrel of the gun into one of his wounds. There was fresh fear in his eyes. It sickened me.

And it made me feel powerful.

“Where. Are. They?” I punctuated each word by pushing the metal in deeper. The back of his head touched the tile. Not once did he blink or look away.

I was in some shell of myself, hardened overnight by pain and loss and brutality. No, I thought, thinking harder. It didn't happen overnight. At the very least, this had begun when I'd made the decision to seek out Fiddle, when I'd stupidly drank from his poisoned cup.

My tongue tasted like alcohol from the cruel memory.

That was better than blood, anyway.

Shivering, the man stared at the gun. “You're crazy.”

“Probably,” I agreed.

Coughing, he sprayed new speckles of red. I knew his time was running out. “Fuck,” he said softly. “It doesn't matter. I'm fucking dead... and if you go after them, you're dead, too.” Considering that, he gave me a weak, but evil, smile. Maybe knowing I was on a suicide mission had loosened his tongue. “Miami.”