Fool that I was, I sent straight into the lion’s den without any form of protection.
I rushed up the porch stairs, through the open door and headed straight for the staircase. It took my brain a moment to realize that I had seen something out of the corner of my eye. Skidding to a stop, I immediately pivoted and darted into the room on my left.
My blood ran cold.
In the middle of the room a woman was naked and sprawled out on a mattress. She was either dead or passed out. Visions of finding Isa exactly like this assaulted my senses. I could still feel the weight of her lifeless body as I cradled her in her arms.
Could still see the ugly track marks and the dirty needle plunged deep into her vein. Her once beautiful eyes dull and glazed over.
A loud thud ripped me from the memory consuming me. I opened my eyes and angled my head to the side just in time to see Jack rushing toward me. The veins in his forehead thick and prominent, his cheeks red with rage.
Where the hell is Becca?
I got my answer when I ducked Jack’s incoming fist. Laying in a miserable heap on the ground was the woman I’d come to save. The one I couldn’t bear to lose. Her eyes were shut, her head at an awkward angle.
Ice-cold dread clawed its way around my heart in a vice grip. If Jack killed her… Unfortunately for me, it took the few seconds I was focused on Becca for Jack to regain his composure and come at me again.
The hard edges of his knuckles connected with the side of my jaw, slamming my teeth together with my tongue trapped between the sharp edges. I hissed out in pain and immediately returned the punch, my fist landing on his nose. I swallowed the blood in my mouth and grinned when the satisfying sound of bones crunching filled the air.
An angry curse roared from the back of his throat as he brought both his hands up to stop the river of red flowing from his nose. I could’ve stopped there. I could’ve turned around and tended to Becca.
Hell, I could’ve scooped her up and got out of there
Instead, I surged forward and tackled the bleeding bastard to the ground. “Te voy a mochar la verga y metértelo por el hocico.” Straddling him, I rained down punch after brutal punch. Bones cracked and crunched, red stained my hands and still I couldn’t stop.
I wouldn’t stop until Jack Martin blew out his last damn breath.
“Don’t…”
My fist stopped inches away from Jack’s mangled face. I blinked and surprisingly it wasn’t my bloody hand that came into focus but the small delicate fingers splayed on my forearms.
I angled my head to the side, the movement feeling heavy and slow. Becca sat next to me; her already bloodshot eyes filled with tears, her cheeks blotchy but it was the big angry marks on her neck had me grinding my teeth and clenching my fist tighter.
“Please don’t kill him,” she begged.
I shut my eyes briefly before opening them again. “Still, you defend him.”
“No.” Her frame shook with every broken sob that left her body. “I called the police. Let them deal with him.” I followed her gaze when she stared at the phone in her lap. Without looking up, she whispered, “Don’t drop to his level. You’re better than that.”
“You don’t know me.”
She looked at me then and it almost broke me. Eyes that’d shone so brightly a few hours ago, were now dull and filled with defeat. Her shoulders slumped forward, her fingers sliding from my arm.
“You should go,” she said, her voice robotic. “Before the cops get here and arrest you for assault.”
I looked at Jack, beaten into oblivion. She wasn’t wrong. I’d definitely be taken into custody. Slowly, I pushed to my feet, but I couldn’t bring myself to leave. Not without her.
Holding out my hand, I begged, “Come with me.”
“What?” Becca tilted her head back to look at me.
“Let me take you away from this… I’ll protect you. Keep you safe.”
Her eyes darted to the girl on the mattress before meeting mine again. “I need to know why this happened… why my brother—” Her voice broke as more tears spilled from her lids.
Kneeling beside her, I took her cheek in my palms. “I won’t stop until you have answers. I swear it to you on my life.” In the distance, police sirens broke through the stillness of the night. “But you have to come with me right now. I know asking you to trust me after everything that has happened tonight is asking a lot.” The sirens grew louder. “Becca.”
She gave her brother a long look that we really didn’t have time for before slowly shifting her gaze back to me. “You’re the only true thing I know right now. Take me away from this, Santiago.”
Three weeks later.
“I found something.” Becca came rushing toward me with two papers in her hands. “I think they were using the firm to find their victims.”
In the weeks that followed, Becca had thrown herself into finding the answers she needed. And I’d been there every step of the way, much to Jorge’s dismay. But as Becca had pointed out not long after that fateful night, this thing was bigger than just her brother.
She wasn’t wrong.
It hadn’t taken us long to figure out that her uncle was the driving force of this sick game and that there were a lot more victims than we could’ve imagined.
She handed me the papers and as I scanned over it, I recognized a few of the names as some of the victims we’d uncovered. It made me sick. Both
