Breaker's Point Bad Boy Billionaires Boxset (47 page)

Griffin turned on his heel at the sound of footsteps coming up the porch behind him. Riley stepped through the door, his expression grim as he took in the empty house. The smashed vase on the floor next to the table at the door was the only real sign that there had been a struggle.

But Griffin knew better. He knew Cami, and there was no way she went without a fight. How else had she managed to call him? He'd listened to the struggle, the pain and anguish in her voice when she realised Spike had the upper hand.

"Griffin…" Riley said, his tone gentle.

"Don't ‘Griffin’ me. I don't want to be told to calm down, Riley. I don't think I could handle that right now. I just want to find her, to get her back, and I honestly don't care what I have to do to succeed. So you're either with me or you’re against me." Griffin’s voice was gruff with emotion as he cradled Cami's smashed phone in his hand.

"I just have one question for you." Riley paused and studied Griffin's face.

"What is it?"

"I need to know what she means to you. Why are you doing all of this?"

The question didn't really make any sense, and Griffin stared at his brother as though he'd completely lost his mind.

"What kind of question is that? I'm doing this because I promised her I'd keep her safe. Because she fought so hard to get away from her abusive stepfather in order to save Sophie, and meeting me screwed everything up for her."

"And all of that sounds lovely, Griffin, but I'm not going to risk bringing the cops down on our heads because you're trying to be chivalrous to a girl you barely know."

Griffin strode forward, his anger finally getting the better of him. He balled his hands into fists in the front of Riley's suit jacket and rammed him back against the wall hard. The force was enough to make the pictures hanging along the staircase rattle.

"When Holly was in trouble, you moved heaven and earth to help her out. Why did you do it? Why are you allowed to do whatever the hell you want, and you're not pulled up on it?"

Riley's expression never changed. He remained calm, a slightly inquisitive look filling his eyes, and Griffin knew he was searching his face, looking for something…

"I did it all because I love her. That's reason enough to do whatever it takes. Now I'm asking you, Griffin, and I'll only ask you once: do you love Camille?"

Griffin laughed, a short, bitter sound that erupted from between his lips. He opened his mouth to reply, to tell Riley how ridiculous he was being, but the words refused to come out.

It wasn't possible. He hardly knew her, and yet he knew without a doubt that if he didn't have her, nothing in his life would have meaning anymore. Without her, everything seemed pointless.

It wasn't that he required her to live, but her presence made everything seem brighter; the world had colour, food tasted better, and one kiss from her lips was better than every rush he'd ever experience in his life put together.

Love was a strong word, but there was suddenly no doubt in Griffin’s mind that it was exactly what he felt.

"You don't need to say anything. Your face says it all, Griff, and it's all I need."

"Why? If I didn't love her, would you have just left her to face that monster alone?"

Riley smiled and shook his head. "No, but I had to know you were doing this for the right reasons and not just because it was some sort of warped vendetta against Spike and Camille's stepfather."

Griffin shook his head and dropped the hold he had on Riley as Stuart stepped through the door.

"Wow, what did I miss?" Stuart asked, his voice heavy with suspicion as he eyed Griffin and then shifted his gaze to Riley.

"There's nothing we can do here. We should go back to the hotel…" Riley started to speak but Griffin cut him off.

"You want to just go back to the hotel and relax? What good will that do?" Griffin asked, his mind still reeling at the realization that his feelings for Cami were more than he'd first thought.

"I'm not suggesting that at all, but unless one of you has a GPS attached to Camille I'm not sure how we're supposed to track her into the dark, so to speak. We need the source to tell us where she is."

Griffin shook his head; the only clear thought in his mind was the need to find Cami before it was too late.

"What the hell are you talking about? What's the source?" Griffin asked, his impatience and irritation colouring his voice.

"Spike is the source. He's the one who's taken Cami, so he's going to know where her stepfather is. We need to find him and get him to talk." A grim smile slid across Stuart’s face.

"Exactly," Riley said.

"And how do you propose we find him? If we don't know where he's taking Cami, then how are we going to get to him so he can tell us?"

Stuart smiled and pointed towards the cell phone that Griffin still clutched tightly in his hand.

"Tell him you want to meet, that you thought about what you discussed this morning and you believe he's right. Spike's ego is the biggest I've ever seen, and I’m sure he'll be only too happy to meet, if only so he can gloat."

The sound of a phone ringing cut through the silence in the house, and Griffin stared down the hall to where Cami's landline sat on a desk against the wall.

It rang four times and then cut off before the answering machine kicked in. Griffin was disappointed when the voice he heard echoing through the house wasn’t Cami's, but instead that of the machine asking the caller to leave a message at the beep.

"Miss Thompson, I'm Sophie's principal, Mrs Berry. We met once before, when you first enrolled Sophie. We've had a somewhat unusual situation occur. Sophie's father Bradley Thompson has picked Sophie up from school. You never mentioned him before, and I just wanted to touch base with you to make sure you knew he was collecting her today."

The message droned on, but Griffin had stopped listening at the mention of Cami's stepfather. This was obviously a man who didn't care if anyone saw him, a desperate man, and that made him especially dangerous. Because if he didn't care who saw him, then what was his end-game? And what did he have planned for Cami and Sophie?

"We need to go. Make the call in the car," Riley said, his tone grim as he stepped through the door and made his way down the porch.

Griffin didn't need to be told twice and, without a backwards glance, he followed his brother. There was one person who knew where Cami was, and Griffin would make him talk, no matter what he had to do to get the truth out of him.

C
ami's head
ached as she slowly fought her way back to consciousness. Despite opening her eyes, everything remained in darkness, and as the car bounced over the rough road surface, she struggled against the wave of nausea that washed over her.

Cami felt around in her surroundings as much as her tied hands would allow. Her fingers slid against smooth metal before finding the edge of the brake lights in the trunk of the car.

She hammered against the one she'd found, but it remained undisturbed no matter how hard she battered against it. Cami gave up and continued to feel around in the trunk of the car, the distinct smell of body odour and oil mingling together as she pushed aside the rags and scraps of clothes Spike had tossed into his trunk.

Cami's hand closed around a long metal wrench and her heart soared. She lifted it to the brake light once more and, with two swift raps, the light dropped out, the electrical wires causing it to bounce aimlessly against the bumper of the car.

Fresh air poured into the trunk through the hole she'd made, and Cami gulped it down as the nausea started to slowly ebb away.

Leveraging her body up, she peered out through the hole, her stomach flipping nervously as she stared around at the deserted road the car was bouncing along.

The car turned suddenly, and Cami found herself sliding against the back wall of the trunk before the car rolled to a halt.

The engine died and silence closed in around her. She strained to listen, to hear something, anything, that might tell her where she was. She'd spent most of the journey completely unconscious and had no clue how long they'd been travelling.

At the sound of a car door opening, she scrambled back to the place where the brake light had been.

"Bradley Thompson, right? This place is really out of the way. For a while I didn't think I'd be able to find you." Spike's voice filtered through the gap in the trunk and Cami's heart dropped.

"Spike, I'm not sure how I'll be able to thank you for helping me find my little girl."

The sound of Bradley's voice filled Cami with a cold dread, and she covered her mouth with her hand in an attempt to keep her strangled sob from drawing their attention.

"You're the one helping me by taking Camille off my hands. You were right when you said she was a troublemaker."

Their laughter brought tears to Cami's eyes. She'd sworn she would never go back to him, never allow herself or Sophie to be at his mercy, and yet here she was. The phrase “never say never” existed for a reason.

"She got you good there. She's a nasty little bitch. Where is she?" Bradley asked, his voice drawing closer.

"She's in the…" Spike's voice trailed off. "Mother-fucker, look at what the bitch did to my car."

His voice was suddenly close enough to make Cami jump, and she clutched the wrench a little tighter as the trunk lid clicked open.

Sunlight streamed down onto Cami's face and she swung the wrench at the first shadow that came close enough for her to reach. It made a satisfying crunch as it connected with a body, and Spike’s startled shout of pain gave Cami the rush she needed to push herself upwards from the trunk.

She rolled over the edge of the car, the ground rushing up to meet her as she landed on her hands and knees in the dirt. She scrambled to her feet as a jolt of electricity coursed through her body.

Cami grunted, her body seizing up as the jolt sent her back to her knees once more. The pain was so intense she didn't even have the ability to scream. Her mouth opened but no sound came out.

The pain stopped and she slumped to the ground, her mind frozen by the pain that had been there just seconds before.

"I've got to get me one of them!" Spike said. Cami's mind slowly started to return, the muttered conversation between Spike and Bradley pulling her out of her shock.

Someone's hand wrapped in her hair, and Cami whimpered as the person dragged her back onto her feet before turning her to face a tumbledown shack. She cast a look over her shoulder at the man holding her, and Cami felt another whimper escaping her as she realised it was Bradley.

He smiled at her, the gap in his teeth reminding her of the night she had almost beaten him to death.

"Welcome home, Camille. I've been waiting for this day for a very long time." He urged her forward, and Cami stumbled along beside him as he limped towards the front porch.

The sound of Spike's engine starting up once more caused tears to form in Cami’s eyes. She was alone with a man who had sworn revenge on her the night she left, and Cami knew that if she didn’t come up with a plan, she was never going to leave the rundown house.

The cable ties around her wrists dug into her skin. She didn't stand a chance of getting out of them if she didn't find something sharp.

"Up you go," Bradley said, shoving her ahead of him.

Cami stumbled on the steps, her eyes settling on a rusty nail half protruding from the front porch. She went down willingly, and the wind was knocked out of her as she hit the ground. With her arms tied, there was no way she could break her own fall. But a few scrapes and bruises couldn’t stop her from wrapping her fingers around the nail and tugging it up from the wood.

"Get up! When did you become so clumsy!" Bradley shouted, his foot connecting with the base of Cami's back.

She crawled ahead of him, the pain of his booted kicks blistering through her body, and it took all of her might not to cry out. But the thought of giving him what he wanted was enough to make her grit her teeth and fight her way back to her feet.

"Cami!" Sophie's voice drew Cami's attention, and she cast her gaze around the shack’s small and shadow-filled living room until she finally spotted Sophie in the corner.

Tears started down her face when she realized that Sophie was handcuffed to the radiator in the back corner. Cami started towards her younger sister, but another sharp jolt of electricity caused her knees to buckle and she hit the ground with a thump.

"I don't want you corrupting my little girl. God only knows what crap you've filled her head with after all this time," Bradley said, and Cami stared up at him as he slid the Taser back onto his belt.

"I've only ever told her the truth. Everything Sophie knows is because you're a monster." Cami spat the words out at him as he leaned down and wrapped his fist in her hair once more.

His face changed colour, rage flooding into his eyes as a deep shade of red spread into his cheeks. Cami cried out as he dragged her across the floor by the hair. Despite the limp in his step, he was still as strong as she remembered, but probably not as fast as he had once been.

If she could just free herself, Cami knew both she and Sophie could easily outrun him. But getting free was the problem.

He pulled her over to a wooden post that stood in the centre of the living room, a beam the connected into the ceiling to hold it all in place. A chain hung down the middle of the pillar, and Cami could tell it was brand new and obviously something her stepfather had brought with him in preparation for their arrival.

Cami let out a sigh of relief as he released the grip he had on her hair. But it was short-lived as he grabbed her hands and jerked them upwards to meet the chain.

He moved quickly, securing the chain to the cable ties Spike had fastened around her wrists. Bradley stepped back and, with one sharp tug, dragged the chain upwards, forcing Cami to her feet.

She had no choice but to go with it. The pain in her shoulders as he forced her arms higher and higher until her toes scraped against the floor was enough to draw another cry of pain from Cami.

She didn't want to give him the satisfaction of knowing just how much it hurt, but the pain burning in her wrists and shoulders gave her no other choice. The circulation was rapidly being cut off in her hands, and Cami could feel a tingling in her fingers that signalled they would soon go numb. If she was going to cut through the ties around her hands, then now was her only chance.

"Daddy, please, no!" Sophie's voice cut through the fog of pain that was slowly descending over Cami, though she tried desperately to force it back.

"Don't worry, sweetheart. It'll be over soon and then you and I can go back to our lives. I've got to show you what happens to bad girls who don't do as their daddies say," Bradley said, crossing the room to where Sophie knelt.

Cami's stomach knotted as he crouched down next to her sister. She felt a shock of rage ripple down through her body as he reached out to brush a hand against Sophie's face.

"You're a sick, twisted pervert!" Cami said, "And it won't matter what you do. You're not going to get away with this. I won't let you touch, Sophie. Not now, not ever!"

Bradley turned back to face Cami, a smile twisting his lips as he looked her over from head to toe.

She watched as he slid his belt from the loop in his jeans and snapped the leather between his hands.

"I've known you were trouble from the moment I laid eyes on you, and I should have done this a long time ago. It's going to hurt, so don't be afraid to scream. No one will hear you…"

He advanced on her slowly, and Cami felt her blood turn to ice in her veins. She knew what was coming, but it didn't matter. He wasn't near Sophie anymore, and Cami got to work on the cable ties with the nail, so engrossed was he in inflicting as much pain on her as possible, he never saw her hacking and picking at the ties that bound her.

She was a survivor, and there wasn't a chance in hell that he was going to take that away from her.