My eyes narrowed as I stared straight ahead.“How do you know that?”
“Uh, it’s on your account,” she replied.
Of course it was.I was gripping the phone so tight that it was starting to sting my hand.“Yes.Then if it can be brought to me, that will be fine.”
“Great!I’ll have someone bring it then.”She was clearly relieved.
“Thank you,” I told her, then ended the call.
It had been easier when I thought Bane had done all this.The Mafia wanting to get rid of me was one thing.Kash wanting to was another.
It was a cut I hadn’t wanted to accept, but I had to now.
Twenty-One
Kash
I stood in front of Arthur Howt as his head slowly bobbed with his struggle to hold it up.Blood dripped from his ears, nose, and mouth.He was starting to choke on it too.Once he had begged me not to kill him and admitted to the things I’d read him in the texts he had with Cressida, I’d gone a touch mad.Whatever control I’d been trying to hold on to vanished, and I’d seen red.
I wasn’t sure he was even aware of his surroundings anymore.His eyes were a touch vacant.But he did still whimper when I took my knife to him.He was feeling pain if nothing else.
“We gonna leave him strung up here?Or ditch the body elsewhere?”Than asked.
The abandoned mine we’d brought him to was one that I’d been in before.Two years ago, several of the guys in the Alabama branch had been sent to help the Arkansas branch handle an issue.The issue had been brought here and tortured until he talked.No one came here.It was closed due to safety issues and illegal to mine in.While the Arkansas branch took their victim’s body parts to feed the hogs, I didn’t want to spend the time doing so, nor did I trust them not to report our being here to Linc.
“Yeah.He can hang here and rot.The Arkansas branch will find him eventually and dispose of what’s left,” I replied.
“Sweet.So, we’re about done?Not sure he’s mentally with us anymore,” Gathe said as he lit a cigarette that he had clenched between his teeth.
“Yeah.We’re about done.”
I stepped up closer to the bastard who had hurt Cressida both physically and emotionally.He made a gasping sound, then a gurgle as blood came from his mouth.
“You touched what belonged to me.My little Songbird was broken at your hands.She survived you.Escaped you.And I’ll take care of her now.You can go to hell, knowing she won.She defeated you.And that sweet body she would never give you?I’ve had it.I had it first, and I’ll have it last.She gives it to me.She wants my cock.Those pretty legs spread for me.”
I smirked as hatred glinted in his eyes.He was still in there.He understood.I grabbed his face, squeezing his cheeks together as more blood ran from his nose and the corner of his mouth.
“I’ll see you in hell, you son of a bitch,” I drawled, then took the blade in my hand and slid it right between his ribs.The exact way I’d taken Pirate’s life four years ago.
The struggle to breathe was instant for him, and I twisted the knife in his lung that I’d punctured, watching his wide-eyed panic when he realized he was going to choke to death.
“And there he goes,” Gathe drawled as the fight in his eyes slowly faded until as did the sounds of him struggling to breathe.
“Are you gonna tell her he was the one who killed her mother?”
I wasn’t sure.That was information I didn’t think he’d meant to divulge.The affair that Cressida’s father had been having and his refusal to leave his wife because of her emotional state had led to the current Mrs.Beck bribing her brother with Cressida one day being his if he killed her mother and made it look like an accident.I wasn’t sure Cressida needed to know that.I’d gotten her revenge for her.
“Are we gonna kill the stepmom too?Because if we are, I suggest putting some time between the two deaths,” Than said.
I turned and walked back toward them.“No.But I’m going to make sure her sins are revealed and she pays for her crime.She has to suffer, too, but I’ll let the law handle that one.”
“Thank fuck.I hate killing women.Even terrible bitches like that one,” Gathe said, falling into step beside me.
We walked out of the mine into the evening air.I was ready to get back to Madison, clean the bastard’s blood off me, and go see my little Songbird.Reassure myself she was safe.
The sight of Bane’s truck outside my house when I finally pulled in the next morning wasn’t what I wanted to deal with right now.I’d texted Cressida ten times, and she’d not responded once.I’d called, and it would only beep once, then start recording for a message.No ringing.Nothing.
Bane being here meant he was aware I’d left town and possibly why.Dammit.Leaving Cressida and going back to Alabama was not happening.Not yet.I needed more time to figure out how to stay.How to have her too.Yes, I’d acted out of rage four years ago, and if Cressida hadn’t lied, I would have very likely gone to prison.But I hadn’t.She’d protected me, and I hadn’t protected her.I sure as fuck wasn’t leaving her unprotected anymore.
