Ride With The Devil(23)

While he'd been drinking himself into oblivion, she'd been in here, alone and afraid. Sharp pieces of glass stuck out in every direction. It was a miracle that she hadn't cut herself.

Maybe she had. Maybe she was bleeding to death in an alley somewhere. If she died, he'd never get to tell her he was sorry.

He'd never get to tell her he cared.

He had to find her. Now. But how?

She could be anywhere. Kaylie was her best friend and even she had no idea where Janet could have gone. It's not like she had anyone else to run to.

Except him. She had him and she didn’t even know it.

If he'd played his cards differently, she would have come to him for help… instead she was out there, in God only knows what kind of danger. He spun in a circle, scanning the room for a sign. There was nothing. If she'd taken anything with her it couldn't have been much.

Then he saw it. On the floor next to her desk was a piece of paper. He picked it up.

It was a list of names and numbers. He frowned and then realized they were jobs she meant to apply to. He read it quickly and sucked in his breath. The third item on the list was a body work place. She'd probably thought it was a place to learn physical therapy.

But she was wrong.

Jack knew what it really was.

It was part of an underground prostitution ring run by another club. The Vipers.

They’d love a pretty little thing like Janet. Lost and alone and so beautiful it made your insides ache to look at her.

If they got their hands on her… they'd never let her leave. He crumbled the paper in his fist and left, fear making his heart pound furiously in his chest.

He had to save her.

He had to make this right.





Chapter Thirty





Janet





Think Janet. Think. How do you get out of this. You have to get out, before they-

Janet closed her eyes tightly, refusing to even think about what they wanted to do. She was curled into a ball on the floor, trying to protect her body in case they touched her again. She waited ten minutes in that position, making sure they were gone for real.

She had been here for at least twelve hours. Enough time to wake up in lingerie, and be held down while the owner explained ‘the rules’ to her.

They wanted her to whore for them. To… take men. One after the other. She was close to vomiting from the thought of it.

They'd left her with a bowl of something to eat and some water and then shut off the light, leaving her in pitch darkness. She'd decided right off the bat that it was better to appear meek and afraid.

So far it was working. They weren’t being too rough. And they’d left her untied. That was a bad decision on their part.

She was afraid, that part was not an act. But meek? Hardly.

She used her hands to feel along the concrete floor. There was no way in hell she was going to eat the food they'd left but she needed the water. She was parched. She could tell she was dangerously dehydrated, especially after her parents had trapped her for so long.

Unfortunately, that was the least of her worries.

She was an idiot. She had got herself into this mess, and now she needed to get herself out of it.

It had been the third place she went to looking for work. The first place that hadn't cared that she'd lost her ID and didn't have references. But the joke was on her. If only there were anything funny about it.

The ad she'd found for body work had been a scam. They were running a brothel here, and from what she could tell at least 75% of the girls were unwilling participants in the scheme. She’d met a few of them before she was tossed into this dank room all by herself.

Their accents told her they were from all over the world. Their eyes told her they were beaten and broken. Like her, they were the disenfranchised. No one loved them.

No one would come looking for them.

But she vowed she would make sure this place got raided, the second she got away. These other women weren’t going to be trapped here. Not if she had anything to say about it.

She closed her eyes, berating herself for the hundredth time.

How could she be so dumb?

When she'd walked in the place they'd taken one look at her and seen a gold mine. They'd drugged her. They tried to get her to put on some sleazy lingerie. She'd fought them tooth and nail when she woke but in the end they'd won, holding a cloth over her mouth until she stopped struggling.

When she came to the second time she was dressed in a black satin corset with lace panties, thigh high stockings and black heels.

How anyone could walk in those heels was a mystery. She could, but only because she was a dancer. And now, they’d given her a weapon.

Leaving her the heels was an oversight on their part. If anyone tried to touch her, she was going to stab them with those 4 inch stilettos. She would have already but she'd eaten a few bites of the food they'd brought the first time. It was risky but she'd been so hungry at that point she hadn't cared.