Temperance was gone. Jay was shot, and it looked bleak.
“I fucked up,” Jay said.
“What?”
“I didn’t protect her. Someone has Tempe, and I fucked up.”
“Shut up, Jay. We’ll deal with this, and we’ll find her, and we’ll make the bastards pay.”
“At what cost, man? They hurt her, and we’re not going to get the same woman back.”
Richard couldn’t think about that shit right now.
“Got it,” Lewis said.
“Help me up,” Jay said.
“You need to rest.”
“I’m not dead yet, and I have a right to see this shit.”
He had no choice, so with Jackson’s help, he got Jay to his feet. They moved toward the main television where Lewis had hooked up the security footage. He was rewinding it back to the point where the apartment was first broken into.
Richard recognized one man as the guy on O’Brian’s security detail. He didn’t recognize the other guy.
The guards that Richard had assigned were out cold. The only one not there was Curtis, but it was his night off.
“Fuckers came in and started shooting. We didn’t have any time.”
Richard didn’t have security cameras within his apartment, so next he saw Temperance fighting them. She was trying to get away, screaming, kicking, and even biting.
He cursed when he saw one of them slam their fist in her face, and Temperance went out cold. They picked her up and disappeared. They clearly didn’t care about being caught. Richard had never seen anyone do this out in the open, which made him wonder who they had as contacts within the law. Lewis typed, changing each camera angle, and they watched as the men dumped her in the back of a car, and drove off.
Richard thought that would be it, but Lewis was already moving onto the next step, framing the license plate, and running it.
“What are you doing?” Jay asked.
“I’m finding where he went. I’ve got recognition software that I can access.”
“I don’t feel so good.” Jay started to sway, and Richard held onto him, leading him to the couch.
“I’ve got you, Jay. The ambulance will be here, and we’re all going to be okay.”
“You’ve got to protect her. She’s too precious to allow anything to happen to her.”
“Jay, shut up, and stop worrying. You’re going to be fine.”
“If I don’t make it, you’ve got to keep her.”
Richard gritted his teeth. “Shut up.”
“You’ve got to love and cherish her, and you’ve got to go through with it. You’ve got to marry her, otherwise I’ll come down and haunt your ass.”
“You’re not going to die.”
“I’m so cold.”
****
Temperance tried not to cringe when she caught sight of the man coming back. He was laughing, and she didn’t like that. It was terrifying.
“I see you’re still awake.”
“I’m not exactly comfortable,” she said. Her arms were spread out, and her ass was starting to get numb.
She was in an abandoned warehouse used for torturing people and she was more concerned about her numb ass.
Get your head in the game.
The man laughed. “This isn’t about your comfort. Do you really think they will come for you?”
He grabbed another chair and sat in front of her. Her heart was racing, and she was trying to hardest not to let the fear show.
Richard will come.
The BBMC will come.
In the beginning she’d thought the billionaire bikers were a bunch of men who didn’t know what they were doing. They were just playing at being tough men. Now, she saw what they were doing, and she appreciated it more than ever.
“You know, I’ve trained a lot of girls for a lot of men to be their pets.”
“Is that what you do? Train them to be animals?”
“Hardly animals. Some girls, they fight, and it takes killing another to keep them in line.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“I’m thinking if I kill you, it’ll keep everyone else in line. They have Mandy, and she was great for soothing the girls. She played her part. It was just a shame she decided to turn on us.”
“Mandy helped you?”
“In the beginning she fought like a wild animal. My mentor, he found her the hardest to break, which was why she was given special privileges over time. Once she earned enough, he kept her on to help the other girls. He had no idea the whole time she was a traitor. The woman is an expert actress. No other woman is ever going to get that close again.”
Temperance smiled. “That’s what you get for fucking with women.”
He slapped her around the face, once with his right, and then with his left.