Ashby Holler (29 page)

Chapter Thirty-Five

Dez

Dez squirmed, barely able to move in the cramped backseat of Ellen’s Chevelle. Leather crinkled as he turned to look out the back window. He couldn’t see Sasha’s truck or the gate to the compound, just curves and cliffs lined by leafless trees. His gaze drifted to Vinny, who was stretched out in the seat beside him while loading a shotgun. The kid’s hands were more steady than his own. He needed to get his shit straight.

“We can’t just leave the truck in the middle of the road like that,” Otis said, as if just realizing they had driven away from a blood-covered semi loaded with pounds of weed and bearing their club’s name.

“Kev and the prospects are on it,” Ellen said, turning onto a dirt road. “Load up. We’re almost there.”

“Where?” Dez asked, leaning toward the front seat. “There’s a gun pointed at your back, Ellen.” He wasn’t lying and wasn’t afraid to shoot. His thumb slid over the safety, clicking it off. “The shit that rolls out of your mouth next better have one hell of a truthful tone.”

“Knock it off, Dez.” Vinny snapped the barrel of his gun closed, raising an eyebrow.

“Really,” Dez said, holstering his weapon.

Vinny shrugged, laying the gun across his lap. “I didn’t aim it at ya.”

“We’re going to the warehouse,” Ellen said. “It’s the last place I’d look so it has to be where he took Sasha.”

“Who?”

“Dante,” Vinny blurted before pressing his lips tight.

“You know what?” Ellen sat tall, moving her hand from the shifter to the butt of her holstered gun. “Yeah, I am fucking Dante. And I was trying to ease him into the club.”

“Are you insane?” Dez shouted. “That motherfucker took your daughter.”

“He’s just trying to get my attention.”

“He killed Candy,” Vinny said, a tremble raising his voice. “If Sasha hasn’t gutted him by now, I will.”

Dez could hug his brother. Until now, he’d been convinced Vinny was Ellen’s bitch-boy.

“Stop the car,” Otis said. “It’s too loud. We should go in on foot, catch ‘em by surprise.”

Ellen pulled to the side of the dirt road and shut off the engine. “We can vote on my dismissal when we get back, but you guys need to know…” Her gaze fell to her lap, and she shrank down. “There are two men with rifles in the bushes at the base of the trail and another two by the bay door.”

“Fucking bitch,” Dez said in a roar, holding back his fully cocked fist.

“This was a trap for us,” Vinny muttered.

“How long have you known about this?” Otis asked, slanting toward his door.

“Don’t play innocent, man,” Dez snorted.

“Otis, please.” Ellen reached for Otis, and he slapped her hand away. “Dante called right before the meeting. I was gonna tell you, so we could stop him before he nabbed Sasha, but fucking Dez distracted me with his bullshit.”

“No!” Vinny bobbed in his seat, like a teakettle ready to burst. “This is your doing. We’re nothing to you, just objects to use in your sick games.” He pushed on Otis’s seat, dropping his head. “Let me the fuck out.”

Dez slid over when Vinny got out, gaining a better view of Ellen’s face. Blank, cold, full of contempt. This new light tainted her beauty in a shadow of ugliness, more so than ever before. He could strangle the life from her in minutes. It might take even less time and the world would thank him for it, but not Sasha. Ellen remained an eternal Goddess in Sasha’s eyes, at least for now.

“Sasha’s gonna see you for what you really are after this. I’ll make sure of it.” Dez smirked, grabbed a shotgun from the floor, and climbed from the car.

***

Kev

Kev gripped the wheel as the airbrakes let out a whoosh. Without a trailer, the semi hopped like a frog on a hotplate. Tires chirped as the rig lurched to a stop, just beside Vinny’s abandoned pickup.

“Oh shit,” Cash said from the seat beside Kev. “She jackknifed?”

“Sasha’s the best driver I know,” Kev said, opening his door. “Something must’ve happened.”

“What do we do?” Cory asked, popping his head up from the back cab.

“Follow me.” Kev jumped to the pavement, glancing around. “And keep your eyes peeled.”

“For what?” Cash climbed from the truck, creeping forward.

“I don’t know,” Kev said in a huff, waving his arm toward the ghostly trailer. “Anything.”

“There’s blood,” Cory yelled, hurrying to the passenger side.

“Wait!” Kev pulled his gun, jogging after the moron who would run into unknown danger.

“Oh, goddamn,” Cory sputtered. “There’s a dead girl in here.”

Kev stepped over a river of blood, staring into the cab of the semi. “Candy?” If he hadn’t spent years gawking at that girl’s body, he’d have never known it was her with no face left.

“These tires are flat,” Cash said, kicking the front tire.

“It was a hijacking.” Kev backed away, checking the road up and down the mountain.

“The product?”

“No,” Kev said. “They didn’t have enough time to boost the product. I think they were gunnin’ for Sasha.”

“What should we do with all this?” Cory lifted his arms to the crooked tractor-trailer, which oozed a bloodbath onto the road it blocked.

“Push her leg inside and shut the door,” Kev said, looking over the guardrail at the long drop to a rocky valley. “I’ll straighten the rig out so you can unhook the trailer. Then we’ll roll the cab off this cliff.”

“What?”

“Yeah. There was a horrible accident here,” Kev said, his stare locked on the treetops far below the road’s edge. “The truck slid off the road. People died. We’ll know exactly how many when Ellen and them get back.”

“Umm, Kev, man.” Cash’s big hand landed on Kev’s shoulder, rocking his body. “I’m sor—”

“Let’s make this quick.” Kev turned back to face the truck, cringing as pink chunks rained down from the body Cory pushed inside it. “We still gotta hook the trailer up to the other semi, get it and Vinny’s pickup back on the compound.”

Kev didn’t wait for a reply. Any minute, some asshole could drive up the road and then he’d have to kill them. It’d be nice to get through this without a pile of vehicles at the bottom of the mountain. Not likely but nice.

***

Sasha

Sasha yanked the knife from her boot and wrapped her arms around the back of the chair. The talking stopped, and all eyes steered to her. Dante stayed far from reach, behind his lackey, but the one who liked to hurl his fists inched closer. Her thumb rubbed the button of the switchblade as she glared up at the man.

“What the fuck are you staring at, bitch?”

“Just taking a good look before you’re mush.” Sasha grinned, couldn’t help it. The guy came to her like a moth to the flame.

“This is what’s gonna happen,” the guy said, standing beside Sasha. “I’m gonna stick my dick in every hole of your body.” He grabbed Sasha by the hair, pulling her head back while rubbing his crotch. “And my friend over there is gonna make your daddy watch.”

Sasha looked across the room, and Dante shrugged, nodding at the gun at his head. The blade flipped out of the handle in Sasha’s palm, almost by itself, and she sprung to her feet. A fight broke out across the room, but she didn’t care if Dante lived or died. She wanted to stick something of hers in the fucker who staggered in front of her.

It happened in flashes. The tip of a blade ripping open the flesh on a man’s cheek. Sasha screamed she jammed her knife in the guy’s neck and pulled. Her knees crashed to the ground when she slipped on blood. A body thrashed between her straddled legs, slower as its face disappeared beneath a scatter of deep gashes.

Sasha’s arm burned. Blood flew up in spurts, drenching her neck, but she couldn’t stop jabbing her knife in and out of mangled flesh. A gunshot rang out. The blast bounced around the wide open room, yet Sasha’s arm wouldn’t stop slicing, tearing, ripping. It was an improvement, really, of the ugly face that used to be there.

A shadow fell over Sasha. She brought her blade down, glaring up to see which asshole had survived the gunshot. Dante walked away from his now dead lackey and headed toward Sasha, lowering the gun that had found its way to his hand.

Sasha’s legs wobbled, and the knife in her grasp shook, but she rose, standing tall.

“Sorry, little girl,” Dante said, a hint of remorse breaking his cruel glare. “I’ll catch you next time.”

Dante smirked, which called upon the wildest of hellfires to scorch Sasha’s insides. After a dip of his head, he took off running for the back door. Sasha didn’t have the energy to chase Dante, so she chucked the knife in her hand. The force of the throw took her down. Cool concrete stung her palms as she hit the floor. She peered up, looking across the warehouse just in time to see her knife sink deep into Dante’s leg.

Dante pulled the knife from his calf, tossing it across the room before he limped out the steel door. Sasha fell to her side, taking a deep breath. The soft pound in her temples filled her ears and lulled her eyes to a close. If only death would come, end the agony of a dislocated shoulder, silence the torment of knowing too much.

A sharp ache cut through her gut, and she gripped her stomach. Another life depended on her now. She didn’t have the luxury of lying on a floor and dying. Mothers didn’t do that. Her mother would never do that.

Sasha rolled to her knees, and a cry burst from her sore chest, flying past her bloody lips. The walls teetered and the ground swayed, but she climbed to her feet. This warehouse had always been a reservoir of good memories. Chewy’s laughter, her father’s hugs, a time when smiles flowed. Those good times were gone, buried under crimson splatters. A face full of slashed skin and Dante’s leer, that’s what she’d see now when stepping foot in this place. Nothing a gallon of gas and a match couldn’t fix.

Sasha staggered toward the front bay door, stopping to scoop a handgun off the floor. For destroying the last happy place she had left, Dante would pay. Her mother would pay. The assholes waiting outside her warehouse to shoot her family would pay. She loaded a round into the gun’s chamber, slumping beside the metal bay door.

***

Vinny

Vinny ran through the woods, away from Dez’s words and Ellen’s sorry face. His right hand tightened around the grip of his shotgun, and he pulled a long serrated knife from his belt with his left hand. The two men at the base of the trail would bear the brunt of his rage. The other two by the door, they could have his agony.

A ray of the setting sun gleamed off metal, and Vinny ducked low. Through dense trees, the edge of a tall steel building shined. It had to be the warehouse. Now to find the biker fuckwads creeping around it. Vinny looked around, unable to see the trail he started on beyond clusters of bushes. Any one of those nests of briars could be hiding two men, ready to shoot him at the command of the woman he thought of as a mother. The second mother to steal his trust and trample his heart.

Branches rustled at his left, followed by a man’s cough. Bingo. One sloppy dead douchebag coming up. Vinny’s steps floated, barely touching the leaf-strewn ground. On the tips of his toes, with a gun in one hand and a blade in the other, he crept around the patch of shrubbery. His heart pumped as he stared down at a man’s back. He raised the knife, ready to plunge down, when a gun cocked from across the trail.

Any second, bullets would fly at him. Luckily, there was a human shield at his feet. Vinny dropped the knife, yanking the jerk who was crouching in the dirt up and in front of him. Gunfire rang out, crackling the air.

Vinny shrank down, and shots battered the body that pressed against his chest, driving him back a few steps. The blasts stopped but their echo lingered in his ears. He had ten seconds, at best, before the asshole across the trail reloaded, but he only needed two.

In one swift motion, Vinny released the gagging man in his grasp and swung the shotgun up. His finger cupped the trigger, squeezing. Both slugs fired from his double barrels, rocking him on his heels. Through wisps of gunpowder, he glimpsed boots flop against the dirt. A garble and slurs of words streamed from the man at Vinny’s feet. He bent beside the guy, who spewed blood from the many new holes in his quivering body, and picked up his knife from off the ground.

“Thanks, buddy,” Vinny said, dragging his blade along the man’s neck.

Sticks cracked, and Vinny tossed his empty gun aside, grabbing the rifle from the dead man’s hand. He lifted the gun, peering down its scope, and Dez dropped low.

“What the fuck, man?” Dez said through pants. “You got a death wish?”

Vinny turned back toward the warehouse, slinking to the edge of the trail.

“Stop,” Dez called out, louder than he should have.

Otis slid to a crouch beside Vinny, grabbing his arm. “There’s still—”