Jagger (Broken Doll Book 2) Read online

  My fingers tightened around the device and I hissed through clenched teeth. “I knew it was you, you fucking bastard. Where the fuck is she?”

  Across my desk, Sarge’s eyes popped and he began to rise. I held up a finger so he would stay seated. Sarge complied, but I saw his fingers curl into his palms. No, it definitely wasn’t Sarge who betrayed me. The man wanted the same as me—to reach through the phone and slit Cuchillo’s throat. The prick took George’s best friend, and George and Sarge were pretty close. Sarge wanted revenge for George.

  “Your nasty temper won’t get you anywhere, guero.”

  “Shut the fuck up, culero. You think I don’t know Español? What the fuck do you want?”

  I was gripping the phone so hard the plastic case cracked. Frankly, I was shocked the glass didn’t shatter in my hand. I hated being at this fucker’s mercy. Despised it. It went against my very nature to feel fear. But I was afraid, for my Miri. My heart was hammering, the lump on my head beating in time with my throbbing pulse.

  “You should think twice before insulting me, Jefe. It would be a very big mistake on your part.” Cuchillo was so calm, his attitude so smug, I literally closed my eyes and pictured my KA-BAR slicing through the flesh of his throat, exposing the pink layers, blood shooting out in a geyser, in order to stop myself from saying something I would regret. Something a bastard like him would certainly take out on Miri.

  “What do you want?” I said slowly, enunciating each word to hide my desire to maim and kill.

  “Your email address.”

  Sarge twitched in his seat when my eyebrows flew up to beneath my hairline. “What?”

  “You heard me, guero. Your email, now.” I clenched my free hand in a fist, my nostrils flaring at the insult. Fuck. I concentrated on breathing in and out of my nose so I could speak without threatening to dismember him one tiny piece at a time. The violent thoughts soothed me and when I was as composed as I would get—which was not at all—I recited my email. “Bueno. I will be in touch.”

  The call disconnected. I stood there like an asshole with the phone to my ear for another minute or so, unable to move or process what the fuck just happened.

  “Boss… Boss!” Sarge’s voice snapped me out of my trance and the phone slipped from my hand to clatter on the desk. “What did he say? Was it Cuchillo? Does he have Miri?”

  I swallowed repeatedly to shove back the terror and gather my thoughts. “It was Cuchillo, but he didn’t say for sure he had her. He wanted my… my email.”

  Sarge frowned and tilted his head. “He didn’t say if he had her? What else did the slimy little fucker say? Why did he want your email?”

  A hollow ache in the pit of my stomach began to grow, steadily expanding until the pressure made me physically ill. Something was wrong. Besides the whole “Miri was kidnapped by my biggest enemy.” I dropped into my chair and began typing on my laptop. A minute later, I had my email program open and was on the verge of hyperventilating. Sarge moved to stand behind me, leaning over my shoulder.

  “No new emails.” My inbox held the usual messages. Nothing out of the ordinary. The longest fucking hour of my life passed while Sarge and I stared at the screen, refreshing it every thirty seconds. Still nothing. It was close to ten p.m. “No fucking way am I leaving this spot. Call the men and tell them we’ve postponed the meeting. Get George, Shade, and Milo over here.” I had a really bad feeling about this. That heart plunging, bowel loosening, hands trembling kind of feeling.

  “Yes, Boss.” Sarge left the sealed cell to carry out my instructions.

  I must have refreshed the inbox a dozen more times. Fucking nothing. Frustrated, I shoved back my chair and walked to the windows overlooking the garden. Visions of Miri flashed through my head—barefoot, flowing gauzy dress, wild red hair glowing like a halo around her heart-shaped face. That small smile growing into a wide grin when a butterfly landed on her shoulder. The way her green eyes sparkled and her mouth opened in delight. Even though the glass was too thick to hear anything outside, I closed my eyes and imagined the light, musical sound of her laughter.

  Eyes snapping open, I grabbed my phone and redialed Cuchillo’s number. Straight to a goddamn dead number. Motherfucker used a burner phone and pulled the battery.

  Son of a bitch!

  I didn’t realize I was pulling on my hair until my scalp began to burn. Jesus Christ my entire body was vibrating with rage. My fingers stretched and curled, wanting to destroy everything in sight. My brain was shouting at me to drive straight to Cuchillo’s warehouse with my men and go all Scarface on his ass. Blindly shoot bullets all over the goddamn place until every last person was full of holes. Problem was, one of my own men might very well turn on me. Might call ahead and let Los Guerreros know we were on our way. Might shoot me in the back as I stormed the doors of the warehouse.

  Motherfucking, goddamn, asshole, cunt piece of shit traitor!

  Enraged by the utter hand-tying helplessness, I stormed out of the office and finally allowed the suppressed rage to overtake logic. When unleashed, hours and hours of pent up hatred and thirst for vengeance thundered to the surface. The relief of letting go was near instant and a hell of a lot better than the futile mind-fucking agony of the last three days. Taking the stairs three at a time, I went directly to the master en suite. The fire roaring beneath my skin crackled and snapped as the anger fed its hungry flames. I wanted to destroy. I craved the brutal beating of my fists crashing against flesh. I wanted to burn down everything in sight and laugh like a maniac while the fire reduced everything to ash. I snatched up the nearest object and held it in my hand, ready to launch it at the wall.

  But I couldn’t. Not if I wanted to save Miri. Unrestrained fury wouldn’t bring her back.

  Using strength beyond anything I thought I could ever summon, I managed to stifle the rage long enough to slide into the cool, collected skin of Boss. The cruel prick who contemplated every single side of a problem before plotting his attack. Who was a master at tactical planning. I put the heavy metal lamp back on the nightstand and cracked my neck, forcing my focus on what needed to happen next. By the time I stripped and stood under the hot spray, I had blocked out every single useless emotion except one.

  Wrath.

  I would be exactly who I had been over the last five years—an unfeeling, detached, ruthless and unstoppable killing machine. A murderer who felt nothing, cared about nothing, worried about nothing. The only goal, revenge. I scrubbed every inch of my body raw, desperate to cleanse away the guilt and pain. Strong and powerful, Boss stepped out of the shower, ready for war, and left that weak and sentimental pussy, Jag, to swirl down the drain.

  With purpose, I strode into my closet and perused my options. My fingers trailed down the fine material of a dark Armani. A frown pulled at my mouth. Fuck the goddamn suit. I was sick and goddamn tired of ruining them, and there was no doubt I planned on using my blades, which meant blood. A lot of blood. I dried off and threw on worn jeans and a long-sleeved tee, sheaths and knives strapped in place, gun in its holster, my mind singularly focused.

  Boss was ready for war.

  “Boss! Boss!” Sarge ran into the foyer and skidded to a stop as I descended the stairs.

  He flinched at the hard countenance and icy demeanor I had fixed firmly in place. I was certain he could also detect the boiling fury resting just under the surface, the façade keeping it at bay ready to split open at the slightest provocation. “What is it?”

  “You uh, got an email.” I moved to step around him, but Sarge’s hand shot out and clamped down on my bicep. Brave, but stupid.

  “What the fuck?” I snarled, leveling my enraged stare on my head of security.

  “Boss…” The guy swallowed and I noticed fear shining in his usually shrewd eyes. Despite my displeasure and the danger I posed to his taking another breath, Sarge didn’t let go. Instead, he squeezed harder. “Don’t.” The terror in Sarge’s eyes morphed to pity.

  No.

  Dread iced
over the lava pulsing in my veins. Chilling the glowing orange liquid into thick, black, sludge that pumped directly to my hollow heart. Whatever was on that email was disturbing enough for one of my most loyal employees to defy me when I was at my most lethal in order to stop me from seeing it. I tore out of his grip and ran to the study. Five years ago, I watched my sister systematically grow thinner and weaker by the day, waiting until I had enough men behind me to kill the boss and take her back, only to arrive too late. Ochoa put a bullet in her head while I stood and watched. If I could live through that, I could face whatever nightmare was in that email.

  “Boss!” Sarge pleaded.

  No fucking way was I not reading Cuchillo’s message. I opened the panic room and whirled around to face Sarge. “Don’t follow me inside.” His face fell and the guy looked like he was in actual pain, but the loyal bastard gave me a sharp nod, respecting my wishes.

  The room was a wreck. I picked my way through the shattered remnants of my various outbursts and sat behind the desk. The laptop was open, as was the email from El Cuchillo. There was a video attachment beneath a single word.

  Enjoy.

  Oh fuck. The thumbnail on the attachment was tiny, but I could clearly see Miri with a gag in her mouth. My heart stuttered and my limbs grew weak. Anxiety dropped like a lead brick in my lap. With a shaky hand, I reached for the mouse and double clicked the link.

  And promptly lost my goddamn mind.

  3

  Miri

  My entire body hurt, from the bottoms of my feet to the top of my head. I think even my hair hurt. When I tried to move, I noticed two things. One, I wasn’t on the hard, cold floor of the cement cell, but a soft mattress. Two, I wasn’t alone.

  “Oh my God. Thank you, thank you, thank you. You’re awake.”

  The sobbing female voice was familiar, but I couldn’t pull myself out of the haze long enough to remember before I slipped back into unconsciousness.

  The second time I came around, I lay perfectly still. Every little twitch or slight movement sent white-hot lightning tearing through my battered body. My breath hitched as I recalled the events from yesterday. Or was it today? Or had I been out even longer? I tried to keep the memories out of my head and failed. Every single horror that happened, from the minute I woke up tied to a chair in the beautiful room, until the minute I passed out from inconceivable pain, flashed behind my eyes.

  * * *

  The hand tightened around my throat and panic flooded my senses, my body going batshit crazy. This was it. I was going to die. I wanted to be brave, to face my fate with courage and not give these assholes the pleasure of seeing me beg, cry, or suffer. But the instinct to live was too strong to ignore. I jerked uselessly against the bindings and screamed myself hoarse around the gag. The hand pressed down further on my fragile windpipe and my lungs struggled to pull in oxygen. The light at the edges of my vision dimmed.

  Just like that, the hand was gone. My head flopped forward and I coughed into the gag as I inhaled breath after breath through my nose. When my brain received the much-needed oxygen and I shook off the confusion of near-asphyxiation, I heard the man behind me laughing. Unable to twist my neck far enough to see him, I faced forward and realized I was staring at myself on a screen. The tender skin around my throat was already bruised a dark shade of purple. The shape of a handprint clear on my pale skin. El Cuchillo, The Knife, as he called himself, was chuckling as if he were watching his favorite weekly sitcom instead of torturing a helpless woman.

  I wanted to kill him.

  “That was perfect, cusca. Beautiful. Your lover will enjoy seeing this. Probably not as much as I enjoy doing it, but what can you do?” He leaned over my shoulder and put his mouth right on my ear. I twisted my head away from his touch and cursed into the gag. Cuchillo pulled back where I couldn’t see him and spoke one calm word. “Raoul.”

  The large man stepped from outside my peripheral vision and before I saw it coming, landed an open-handed blow across my cheekbone and nose. He struck me so hard I immediately felt the hot trickle of blood dripping from one nostril. My head throbbed and my face felt as if it were on fire. Nausea surged again. I was sure I had a concussion, maybe more than one.

  “Now,” Cuchillo said, putting his mouth to my ear again. “You will not move away from me again, or Raoul will teach you to remain still. Will you be good?”

  I nodded, the metallic taste of blood on my tongue as it dripped over my lips, onto the gag, and seeped into the material. If they ended up breaking my nose, I’d suffocate to death with the gag in place.

  “Bueno.” He caressed my hair and I wanted to scream. Afraid of earning another hit, I closed my eyes and focused on breathing instead of how close he was or how his fingers felt like snakes slithering across my skull. Cuchillo’s lips brushed against the shell of my ear and his hot breath blew across my skin. I shivered in revulsion. “Look at the camera, puta barata. This is for your Jefe. You could call it a… special gift.”

  My family moved to Texas when I was nine, and I never bothered to learn Spanish. Until now, I never regretted the decision. I knew the words Cuchillo used were insulting, I just didn’t know how.

  Raoul’s huge hand shot out and grabbed my chin. I yelped behind the gag. He squeezed harder and tears leaked from my eyes.

  “I said look at the camera. Are you estúpida?” Cuchillo snarled.

  Fear gripping my insides, I shook my head. Thought loathe to do it, I obeyed, focusing through blurry tears to stare at the laptop while watching the girl on the screen do the same. Raoul pulled his hand back and stood to the side. Jesus, he almost broke my jaw. Cuchillo wound his fingers into my hair and yanked, hard. I cried out and arced my throbbing neck to lessen the burning pain on my scalp. I swore he was about to pull all my hair out by the roots. Cuchillo’s other hand slipped down my bruised throat while he continued whispering in my ear.

  “Such beautiful pale flesh, don’t you think? My mark is already showing here.” He pushed a finger into the swollen, aching flesh where he choked me and another scream tore from my chest. “You will look even better when I cover your body in marks.”

  El Cuchillo stepped back and Raoul came forward. I shrieked into the gag and flailed wildly within the confines of the ropes. Raoul held my head still and glared. The pure evil in his eyes stopped me cold.

  “I see you are learning,” Cuchillo chuckled. “Maybe not so estúpida after all.”

  Raoul untied the gag and removed it. I gasped and swallowed the bloody spit that had gathered in my mouth. My chest heaved as I panted and reveled in the cool air that filled my lungs. It was difficult to breathe with one nostril clogged and the gag in my mouth, so I took advantage of the opportunity to inhale unencumbered while it was an option.

  “I like you better this way, cusca. Your beautiful screams will add so much drama to my little film.”

  He stepped in front of me, his dark eyes shining, and began.

  * * *

  A hand brushed my arm and I screamed, only no sound came out. I opened my eyes, but they were so swollen, I could barely see through the tiny slits.

  “Miri, stop. Don’t fight. It’s me.”

  This time, I recognized the woman’s voice. A voice I hadn’t heard in almost a year. Only… it was impossible. It couldn’t be her, could it?

  “Cat?” I asked in a hoarse whisper.

  “Yes. It’s Cat, Miri. How did you end up here?”

  “Me?” I rasped. “What about you?” I tried to sit up and groaned.

  “Let me help you.” Cat assisted until I leaned heavily on pillows propped against a twisted iron headboard.

  “Where are we?”

  “We’re in a bedroom in a house somewhere. I don’t know where. I don’t even know what city we’re in.” Cat’s tone of voice was flat, unaffected, as if she’d either accepted her fate or didn’t particularly care what happened next.

  This wasn’t the Cat I knew. My Cat was a fighter. Except for the deep depression she suff
ered from her stepfather’s abuse, I’d never known Cat to be anything but optimistic. She was the one who got us an apartment. She was the one who said we could get jobs and make it on our own. It might have been my idea to leave home, but Cat was the one who made me believe we could someday have the life we wanted.

  “Jag…” I sobbed. “They hurt him.”

  “Who?”

  “Jag. He’s my…” My what? My boyfriend? My drug dealer? My savior? I didn’t know. “He’s my friend. They hurt him when they took me.”

  One good thing came out of the videos. If Cuchillo was sending them to Jag, it meant he was still alive. They didn’t kill him in the parking lot of the garage.

  I focused on Cat through the swelling around my eyes and gasped. She looked nothing like the girl I remembered from less than a year ago. Cat was horribly thin, dark eyes dull, hair brittle and frizzy, and her formerly gorgeous tan skin was a sickly shade of yellow.

  She looked like me when my addiction tossed me off the cliff to hit rock bottom. I wanted to check her arms for track marks, but couldn’t. I was too weak, too beaten. I didn’t need a mirror to know I was covered in bruises from top to bottom. El Cuchillo beat me within an inch of my life, always hard enough to make me scream but never enough to actually break any bones, though I was sure he wouldn’t care if he did.

  “Cat,” I croaked. “We need to get out of here.”

  Jag

  I ignored the sounds of the contractors working on my office. I wasn’t sure why I was bothering to fix shit up. If I didn’t get Miri back soon, I’d just tear it up again in another fit of rage.

  My bruised knuckles pulsed in time with my heart and I rubbed my hands. When I watched the video sent by El Cuchillo… Shit. It hurt just to think about it.

  My entire body began to tremble as I relived the fury all over again. My anger was so raw I had to close my eyes to rein in the violence that threatened to shove logic to the ground and piss on its remains. Waves of tension radiated up and down my spine, spreading to my extremities—begging, screaming for me to unleash on the nearest object.