Filed to story: The LORDS Series Free PDF by Shantel Tessier
As I stare at the gated entrance, I can’t bring myself to push the button. What will I say when he answers? How will I explain that I knew he’d be here? What if he’s not?
If his brothers can’t find him, does that mean they don’t know this place exists? So I shouldn’t know it’s here. It’ll bring up questions that I can’t afford to answer. Haidyn doesn’t know I’m seeing him because I was ordered to do so.
Obviously, he knows I’m part of his world. They would never allow just anyone to enter Carnage. Especially to come and go. Once you’re in, you belong to them.
Picking up my cell, I try to call him once again, but it goes to voicemail. I’m getting desperate and very, very pissed.
Letting out a frustrated sigh, I put the SUV in drive and speed off, needing to clear my head and think of a different approach. How can I get in? I need to get his attention. Maybe I could park down the street, jump the fence, and set his house on fire?
That’s a little extreme, but that’s what the Lords would expect. They put you in situations where it’s either you or someone else. We’re like rats-claw or eat your way out for survival.
I highly doubt standing in his front yard and saying, “Oh Haidyn, how are you feeling today?” with a smile on my face wouldn’t make him suspicious while his house burned behind him. He’d know that I was the one to set it. Then he’d most likely throw me into the flames, so I’d burn with it.
I’m driving down the curvy road when I see a car in my rearview mirror speeding up on me. The flashing lights turn on.
My eyes drop to the speedometer, and I hit the steering wheel. “Dammit!” Haidyn had all my focus, and I wasn’t paying attention. The main road doesn’t offer a shoulder, so I slow until I come up to a gravel road on my right. I pull off onto it and bring the SUV to a stop.
He gets out and walks up to my driver’s side door as I lower my window, taking in a calming breath. “Good morning??”
“License and registration.” The officer interrupts me.
I go for my purse in the passenger seat but stop myself. Don’t give him the wrong one. I open my glove box and grab what he requests. “Is there a problem?” I ask, pretending I wasn’t going fifteen miles over.
He looks over my information, and then his dark eyes meet mine. “Get out of the car.”
“What?” I ask, sitting up straighter. My heart picks up speed.
He pulls on the door handle and opens the door.
“Hey-“
“I said get the fuck out of the car.” He reaches in, grabs my arm, and yanks me out, making me stumble into him.
“Don’t touch me,” I snap, and he drags me to the front of the SUV, spins me around, and slams the side of my face into the warm hood, momentarily taking away my vision and fight. It gives him the opportunity to place my wrists in handcuffs behind my back. He tightens them down on my bony wrists, and I cry out, finally able to suck in a deep breath.
He grabs the back of my shirt, yanks me from the SUV, and pushes me to his car, putting me in the uncomfortable back seat and buckling me in. Tears run down my face as I try to adjust my body, but it doesn’t do any good. They’re too tight.
I watch him return to my car and sit in the driver’s seat, but I can’t see what he’s doing. Moments later, he steps out and walks back to his car. Getting in, he drives off with no explanation.
EIGHTEEN
HAIDYN
Ienter the garage at my house and jump on my R1. It’s a nice day for a ride. I turn my baseball hat on backward, not bothering with a helmet or leather jacket. I don’t wear either often. If it’s my time, then it’s my time. I’m not one of those who try to prepare for the worst. It’s going to happen regardless. I’ve been shot, stabbed, and drowned. I’ve lost count at this point how many times I’ve died, yet here I am.
Placing my sunglasses on, I start the bike and rev the engine, then drive out of the garage, leaving my gated property. I take a right, and before I know it, I’m hitting eighty miles per hour. You can’t go much faster than that on the straightaways because the road has too many tight curves you have to slow down for.
I didn’t get much sleep last night, but that’s normal. I worked out until the early hours this morning and then showered. The sun was already rising when I finally crawled into bed, but I was up within a couple of hours and needed to clear my head or at least try to.
It’s been repeating the same events over and over to the point I want to fucking knock myself out. From what I can remember anyway…
I can hear voices, but their words aren’t registering, and I have no clue where I am. All I know is that I can’t move. My heavy eyes open, and I look around, not able to really focus on what I’m seeing, but I feel cold…and wet.
It’s hard to breathe, as if someone is sitting on my chest. The voices start to penetrate the fog.
I recognize Devin’s voice immediately. “I just need to sedate him.”
“No!” a guy barks out, his voice echoing off the concrete walls that I see. Am I back at Carnage? If so, how did I get here, and where is Ashtyn? We were on our way to dinner…had a wreck…I was shot. Where is she?
Devin speaks. “I can’t help him unless he’s sedated. I have to cut him open??”
“You have two choices.” The man interrupts him, pressing the tip of his gun into the side of my head. “You either cut him as is, or you give him a shot of adrenaline.”
I try to talk, but my lips won’t move. Where is Ashtyn? She was with me.
The sound of cabinets banging and drawers opening and closing fills the room.
“What the fuck is that for?” one of the men asks.
“What you have on him now won’t be enough,” Devin explains. “Once the adrenaline hits, he’ll be hard to keep down. I need him as immobile as possible, especially if I cut him open.” He tightens something over my waist and a couple more on my legs. It makes it even harder to breathe, much less move. “Open,” he orders.
My eyes find Devin hovering over my face, and I take in a long, shallow breath, forcing my lips to work. I need to know if she’s here. Alive. “Ash-tyn?”
One of the guys laughs. “That bitch is as good as dead. You’ll be lucky to join her.”
I open my mouth to argue, but Devin shoves a mouthpiece into it. Then I feel the familiar pain that takes what little breath I had left away. My body bows up off the table, straining against the restraints. My jaw locks down on the mouthpiece, and my heart races.
The adrenaline makes me feel invincible even when I’m on the verge of dying. I try to fight, but they’ve got me strapped down too tight. Devin places a hand on my chest, and then I feel pain like I’ve never felt. My vision fades in and out as if someone is playing with the lights. The voices fade into the background, and it feels like my insides are being ripped out.
Warm liquid covers my skin as if someone is pouring buckets of water all over me. I could be drowning or on fire. Honestly, it all feels the same. Thankfully, my eyes fall closed, and I openly welcome the darkness. Accepting your death is the most peaceful part.
My hand tightens, pulling back the throttle as I adjust myself on the bike, getting ready for a set of curves coming up when I speed past something white that I catch out of the corner of my eye. I pull on the front-brake lever so hard that my back tire comes off the pavement, putting me in a front wheelie-stoppie-position. Once the back comes down and touches the pavement, I spin it to turn tightly in the road. I speed back and come to a stop when I see the back of the Rolls Royce Cullinan parked in the center of a dead-end gravel road. I park behind the SUV. Getting off my bike, I walk up to it. It’s still running, and the driver’s side door is open. Looking inside, I see a purse in the passenger seat. I know this SUV. I’ve seen it countless times on the Carnage cameras. It’s Charlotte’s. I grab her purse and start going through it. Feminine products, lip gloss, a mirror…everything looks to be there except for a cell phone and wallet.
Where the fuck did she go, and what the fuck is she doing out here of all places?
Getting out, I remove my cell from my pocket and call Adam. He answers on the first ring.
“What’s up, man?”
“Four years ago…we had the meeting with that detective at the house of Lords,” I remind him as if he could forget.
He’s silent for a second, and his voice goes cold when he asks, “What about it?”
“The missing high school girl…they found her BMW? What were the details of the scene?” I ask, looking over Charlotte’s SUV. It seems oddly familiar.
He sighs. “The news report said it was found on the side of the road. Abandoned. No girl, no phone, and no purse. It was still running, and the driver’s side door was wide open.”
The rumor was Adam was the last one to see the driver of that car. He was being set up to look like he killed the senior cheerleader among other women who had gone missing.
“Why all the sudden interest?” he asks.
“I just found a car, and it’s similar.”
“Similar how?” Adam demands.
“Abandoned on the side of the road, still running, driver’s side door wide open. But there’s a purse in the passenger seat. No cell or wallet, though.”