I glance up to see the black cock-like vibrator Bodhi is now gripping.
“Should I pack it for her? Girl needs her toys, right?” Fucker thinks this is funny.
My glare hardens, and he places it back in the bedside drawer he got it from, backing away before I thump him.
Shoving him out of the way, I pull the drawer all the way out and empty the contents onto her bed. A couple of diaries that I scoop up and throw in the bag, they might be handy later, especially if she still won’t talk to us. There is also some cheap jewelry, a lighter with the Southern Breakers logo across the front. A small cardboard box that I flip open. It holds a couple of bank cards and a license with her face on it, but most definitely not her name. “This is why we never found her.” I pass the thing to Bodhi for him to do his checks.
“Elsie James.” He reads out the fake ID. “Matches that profile I found. If they went to the lengths of changing their names, this is more than them running. They were hiding from something or someone.”
I have a hunch, not that I saw anything after her dad dismissed me and I left their place. I fucking knew I should have stayed. The tension was high, I could feel it, could see it by the look on her mother’s face. Shit was about to go down, and I shouldn’t have left her alone with them. But I had my own shit going on that night. “You think Keller had something to do with it don’t you?”
“She said her mum was murdered. Maybe she and her dad thought they would be next?” He raises a brow, saying exactly what I was thinking.
Keller was involved in all sorts of underworld operations. Whatever he could do to grow his empire, he would. People didn’t matter to him; it was all about the bottom line. And if they got in his way, Bodhi could be right, they might have been in real trouble. I know he was after a signature that night, he needed city council approval for a large development of the local shopping center. It was the start of it all. His in with who counted, and once we had it, his company didn’t look back. He had the respect from his people and their money to keep growing his empire. That night changed all our lives. I don’t think he killed her mother, he wasn’t still there when I left, but that doesn’t mean he couldn’t have come back. That way none of us boys would have known it was him. Only trouble is, he’s not still around to ask, and any surveillance from that night was wiped.
“Hey, K, I reckon you wanna see this before we leave.” Bodhi’s sharp voice snaps me out of my thoughts. He has shoved her mirrored wardrobe door open to reveal a crazy-as-hell set up. With ring lights, a top-quality camera, and what looks like a burner phone still on charge.
“What was the password to her other phone?” I ask, knowing he was the one who broke into the phone she rocked up with.
“Deadwater.”
I type it in, and sure enough, this one is the same. Sickness churns in the pit of my stomach, knowing what this set-up looks like, the possibilities of what she was doing with it. I head straight to her photos and click on the first video saved. Dove comes into view, and my heart nearly stops. She’s in a sexy-as-sin black lingerie set, her massive tits spilling over the sheer lace. Her striking green eyes, enhanced by dark, alluring make-up, flirtatiously meet the camera’s gaze in the dim light as she talks to the camera. She moves back toward the bed, and I flick the video off, my heart thumping out of my skin. I’ve seen enough.
“Fuck, she’s got one of those OnlyFans pages, doesn’t she?” Bodhi watches over my shoulder.
My raging boner absolutely wants to see more, see what my innocent birdie really gets up to when she’s alone, but knowing she was doing this for someone else makes my skin crawl. As I scroll through her photos, I find there are hundreds just like the first. “Someone needs to pay for this shit.” My fist clenches around the phone so hard I hear the screen crack.
“Who the fuck are you?” comes a gravelly voice from the doorway. I glance up to see a burly man in a biker jacket with a baseball bat held in his meaty grip. For fuck’s sake.
“Who the fuck areyou?” Bodhi is quick to respond.
I pocket her phone for later, and I take a step closer to our intruder. “The girl owes us money,” I snip like I’m filthy about it. This might be the perfect way to get the information she wouldn’t give us.
His scowl deepens. “Join the fucking club. Bitch is a good two months short on her rent, I’m here to collect.”
With a baseball bat. She might not be happy about it, but that girl is lucky she’s safely locked up in my home. I pop a brow, moving my jacket just enough that he can see I’m carrying a gun. I motion with my head for him to ditch the bat. “You the landlord?” I ask, trying to play it cool, even though I’m ready to launch myself across the room and unleash my anger on this fucker for whatever his involvement is.
His eyes narrow, his attention shifting between Bodhi and me, puffing out his chest. “I don’t want any trouble.” He tosses the bat on the ground. I know the kind hiding behind his club, thinking it will save him by reputation alone. He will be sorely mistaken with us. “These apartments are owned by the Southern Breakers.”
I nod, taking a few steps closer. “And they sent you into collect her debt?”
“Something like that.” The man sneers. He’s big as an ox, and from the look of it, dumb as a doorknob. The two of us can take him no problem. But I want information before all that.
Bodhi tilts his head, looking over the man with an intense curiosity. “Damion Ryan, you own this dump and three others just like it. You like to weasel money out of vulnerable girls, overcharging on rent and expecting payment in flesh when they fall short.”
Damion takes a shaky step back, his eyes narrowing in on Bodhi. “How the fuck do you know who I am?”
Bodhi grins. It’s subtle, just a tilt of his lips, but I know it means he has the dude already worked out. That’s why he’s my head of security; he’s one step ahead every time. “What would Dotti think of your payment methods?”
His eyes widen in fear. “You wouldn’t tell her.”
Bodhi shrugs. “Depends on how helpful you are today.”
I shrug, circling the man like a shark toying with my prey. “Probably should help us out before the cushy life you seem to enjoy becomes anightmare.” I wink at him, always the charmer, even in these situations. “See, Damion, you might think your club is special, that your boys will back you up, but we have something you don’t.”
When his shifty eyes lock on his bat, I kick it out of reach before he has the chance to scoop it up again. He didn’t come very prepared, but I guess he was expecting to find a small girl who was in his debt, probably scared, not us. Not that he knows who we are, that much is obvious and probably useful at this point. I could destroy this man’s life with just a couple of clicks on my keyboard. But today I feel like a little old-fashioned vengeance.
Bodhi picks up his phone. “Maybe I should call your girl, see what she thinks.”
