Total pages in book: 66
Estimated words: 62197 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 311(@200wpm)___ 249(@250wpm)___ 207(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 62197 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 311(@200wpm)___ 249(@250wpm)___ 207(@300wpm)
The man who filled the doorway wasn’t Blaise. He was bigger, wider shoulders, arms the size of my fucking thighs and bulging with cut, defined muscles. That bastard had to be on steroids. No one was that damn built naturally. Not even if he lived in the gym.
Regardless of his intimidating appearance, it was a relief. He was the lesser of the evils. Huck Kingston wasn’t known for being a psycho, nor was he the boss. I doubted Blaise would send him to do the dirty work of taking me out.
“Your arms numb yet?” he asked as he entered the room.
“Yeah,” I replied hoarsely from my dry throat. At least if I was dehydrated, I wouldn’t have to piss.
He crossed his arms over his massive chest while holding a bottle of water in one hand and sighed heavily. “All this for a woman.” He shook his head. “Figures.”
He was happily married, last time I’d checked. But then so was Blaise. Didn’t seem to matter to him that I was being told I couldn’t be with the woman I loved. Yet they all got to have their women. Protect them. Keep them in their beds. Fuckers.
“You want some water? Been down here about six hours,” he said.
I shook my head.
“You’re gonna dehydrate.”
“Does that really fucking matter?” I asked. Seriously. I wasn’t walking out of here alive. Who cared about being hydrated?
He shrugged. “Guess not.”
Dropping his hands, he walked over to the workbench, where they kept several of their tools meant to get people to talk, a pack of Marlboros, a lighter, and a half-empty bottle of whiskey. He placed the bottle of water there as well. My eyes followed him as I waited for him to say more. Do something. Give me a goddamn timeline on when I would be taking my last breath.
“Boss is a little tied up. Linc arrived an hour ago,” he said, glancing back at me as he picked up a knife and hung it on a nail above the table. “More accurately, it was more like the cavalry. Hale, Bane, Luther,” he said, then reached down to pull out a stool and take a seat.
My dad was here. I hadn’t expected that. I actually hadn’t expected Linc to come, much less the rest of them. The first stirrings of hope that this might not be my end began, but I said nothing. I didn’t want to show any weakness. I was already tied up with a swollen, shut eye.
“They’re all in Blaise’s office,” he informed me. “Talking things through.”
What things? There’d better be no deals made in exchange for my life. Noa remained untouched and unscathed. Her life went on the way it always had, and she was none the wiser to this side of my world. That was something I’d die to protect.
“Not much to talk through,” I said. “I disobeyed an order. Pretty cut and dry.”
Huck’s eyes narrowed. “Are you wanting to die, Carver?”
No. But I wanted Noa. And if I couldn’t have her, life wouldn’t be tolerable.
“I want Noa safe. I want her left out of this,” I said through clenched teeth.
He crossed his tattooed arms over his chest again. “If you’re six feet under, you can’t make sure that happens. Did Gage hit you too hard? Not thinking clearly.”
Unlike Gage, Huck didn’t taunt. He was direct and businesslike. Both men worked directly under Blaise Hughes. They were in that position for a couple of reasons. However, Huck’s reasons weren’t the same as Gage’s.
While Gage hadn’t been born into the family and had been accepted in because he was Blaise Hughes’s best friend, Huck was a descendant of one of Jediah’s closest childhood friends, Mars Kingston. Jediah brought him into the family in the early 1920s. Every son after him had worked directly with the current Hughes boss. He had grown up with the future boss, trained with him, killed with him.
“You’re giving up too soon, Carver,” he said with a shake of his head. “You fucked up. But Blaise isn’t one to act without thought. He’s reasonable.”
A hard laugh escaped me before I could stop it. There was nothing reasonable about the Southern Mafia boss.
Huck raised his brows. “You don’t think so?”
“He put a bullet in his stepsister,” I said, pointing out just how heartless the man was.
Huck nodded. “He did. But he’d let her live after she took Maddy and handed her to strangers.”
Yeah, I knew the story, and that didn’t make him reasonable.
“Those strangers were working for Maddy’s father. The one she didn’t know she had. ” I said with a trace of sarcasm in my tone.
Maddy, Blaise’s wife, had never been in danger when she was handed over to the members of the Judgment MC.
“Point made,” he agreed. “But let me ask you this. What if a female took Noa, broke her arm, terrorized her? What would you do?”