“Stay cold, baby, you can let it all out on me later,” I murmur, and he groans.
“She tends to hold a grudge. I know that from personal experience.” He laughs. “But no, we are not here to talk. We both know the time for talking has passed. Your family has signed their death warrants, and now you have a simple choice of how quickly you die.” He grins.
The men in the room rustle, and one in particular steps closer, his gun drawn. Diesel shifts behind me, protecting my back. Straightening in my seat, I wink at number two. “He’s right, I do hold a grudge. I’m very fucking good at it. Ask my men. Oh wait…you have one of them.” Wagging my finger, I lean into the table, flaunting my breasts as I take his wine glass and sip it, watching him before leaning back in my chair. His eyes flicker to the blood still on my skin, and he swallows. “So where is he?”
Ryder doesn’t stiffen at me taking over for him, no, he relaxes more, he’s too emotional to act the part right now. I don’t have to be composed, I’m the scorned girlfriend, so I can be as crazy as I want, and I plan to be. They took what is mine.
They hurt me.
They hurt my family.
Number two licks his lips nervously before he smiles. “Probably being cut open as we speak.”
I freeze and carefully, calmly place the wine glass on the table. “I will ask once more, and you should know that every person who has ever hurt me has a tendency to wind up dead…and you know the man behind me, right?” I relax back into D, who bends down and kisses me, making me moan as he flicks his tongue across my lips, tasting the wine there. “He’s a master of torture, and I learned from the best, so one more time before I get mad. Where is Garrett?”
Diesel’s hand circles my throat possessively and drags my head back again, kissing me hard and biting my lip until I taste my own blood before he releases me. Licking my lips, the blood undoubtedly dripping, I look to number two. “I’m waiting,” I purr.
“Go fuck yourself, you stupid bitch. You will all be dead when this is through, and no one will remember you and your fucked up family,” he snarls.
I blink, letting his words drop into the silence for two seconds before I jump into motion. Yanking out Ryder’s gun, I point it at the man closest to him and fire, hitting him square between the eyes as I push back from the table and stand. Yells go up, then guns are drawn and firing as I let off four more shots, killing four more guards before giving the weapon to Ryder and storming around the table. Trusting them to protect me. I hear Diesel laughing and others screaming as I meet number two head-on. He’s tangled in the tablecloth as he gawks at what’s happening.
He thought he was untouchable, but he’s wrong. No one is untouchable but us. Everyone can die, I will kill them all to get my man back. No one fucks with what’s mine, my damaged lover.
I kick back the chair, and it crashes to the floor with a loud thump. Stepping over him, I press my foot to his throat to stop his struggling, my heel pressing against his soft flesh. He gulps, his hands going out to the side in a gesture of peace, his scared eyes locked on me. He’s finally realising his family is dead. Everything they did to win, every law and rule they broke, and everyone they bribed or killed was for nothing. All because they got greedy and took something that wasn’t theirs.
“Where is he?” I snarl.
The firing stops, but I don’t look away as Diesel rounds the table, crouches next to number two, and looks up at me with blood on his face. “That was fucking beautiful. You are wearing those heels later,” he murmurs, as Ryder steps up next to me and stares down at number two.
“We warned you, where is he?” he growls.
I hear a rustle at the stairs and Diesel, without looking, pulls his gun and fires. I hear a grunt and then the distinctive sound of someone falling down the stairs.
“Sorry about your brother, he was a real prick though.” I smirk, leaning forward like I’m sharing a secret. “He talked like a little bitch at the end of my bat.” Number two sputters, and I laugh. “Don’t ever fuck with a Viper. Just because I have a pussy doesn’t make me weak. You fucked with the wrong family.”
He narrows his eyes, but he sees the truth in my gaze and deflates. “Please don’t kill my wife, she’s innocent in this.”
I don’t speak, but I dig my heel in deeper. “Did you afford us those same niceties?” Ryder snaps.
He closes his eyes for a moment before opening them and looking at me. “He’s being held at our family’s home, 478 Rosewater. The mansion on the hill overlooking the city.”
“Security?” I ask, and I can feel Ryder’s surprised and appreciative gaze.
“Over thirty men, the last of us, my brother will be there too…and her,” he sputters as I jab in deeper.
“Her?”
“Daphne, his ex, she was working with us,” he wheezes. “Came to us wanting revenge. We made a deal to kill you all, but she could do whatever she wanted with him. She’s been supplying us information.”
“Fucking knew it,” Ryder snarls.
“I should have tortured her more.” Diesel grins. “I won’t make that mistake again.”
I look to Ryder then. “Why did she betray him in the first place?”
The man under my heel struggles, so I push harder, and he starts to pant. “Why?”
He looks at me sadly. “For money and power. She was offered both by a rival, she thought they would own the city, but she was wrong. It almost killed him, they paid her to do just that, but he survived. We hunted her down, and Diesel killed her, or so we thought.”
“Now she has him,” I hiss. “She’s going to finish what she started,” I whisper in shock. “Ryder, we have to get him now.”
He nods and is already on the phone, so I glare back down at number two. “Anything else?”
He shakes his head, his eyes wide, so I grab my gun, the one Garrett got me, and I shoot him in the face. It explodes, and I close my eyes as brain and gore hits me and Diesel. Some even gets on Ryder, but he doesn’t blink at it.
Stepping away, I rip off my heels, and with a cry, drive them into his chest before standing and brushing my hair back. “Let’s go get him,” I demand, as I turn and pick my way over the bodies. I feel my men behind me.
What started as a business deal has now become my life. There’s an old quote, ‘Throw me to the wolves, and I will come back leading the pack.’ I was thrown to the Vipers, and now they are mine.
Never underestimate a woman, because those seen as weak have a lot less to lose than those with everything.
I’m used to being the underdog, but no longer. No, I’m a fucking viper queen, their girl, and I’m going to tell the whole city tonight after I get my man back and we kill the Triad for good. No one will ever come for us again, let this be their final warning.
We own this city.
We own them.
Chapter Fifty-Three
GARRETT
I know instantly something is wrong, the bed under me is too soft to be my own. The smell is wrong, not to mention my arms are straining and my legs are in an uncomfortable angle. My head is fucking killing me, like I took one too many hits to it. I don’t let on to anyone who is watching, my breathing remains the same, even as my anger chases away the haziness moving sluggishly through my blood.