Page 86 of Malice and Surrender
Irene screwed up her face as she thought. “I don’t know. I was asleep by then and was groggy, but say, two hours. I don’t know, Kai. It was a long time ago.”
“Funny how prison will make it feel like it was just yesterday,” I drawled. “Anything else you think I should know?”
“The only other thing I can think of is that when the cops came, Dave was all too happy to start telling them how terrible you were to me and how he was planning on throwing you out.”
I stood up straight and fixed my gaze on Nick. “Your turn.”
I walked over to where Nick was pathetically cowering against the bed. I stuffed my hand in my jacket pocket and pulled out the old image. I held it up to show Irene and Nick, who was whimpering more than Irene. This guy was a putz, and I’d quickly figured out there was no way he was one of the guys who raped Raine unless he had an entire personality overhaul in ten years. A guy who could rape a teenage girl was a different kind of animal than the piece of shit cowering in a ball in front of me.
Nick’s eyes were shifty as he looked at the image and then away again. “You know what I want to know, don’t you? That’s why you’re so scared.”
A sheen of sweat broke out on Nick’s forehead that had nothing to do with the workout he’d been getting a few minutes earlier.
“Before you try to lie, let me ask you a question. Between whoever you are covering for and me, who do you think will mess you up more? Who do you think will make your death more painful?”
Nick rubbed at his eyes, the quaking in his muscles making it very obvious just how terrified he was. “Fine, yeah, I know.”
“Nick…” Irene started to say but shut her mouth when I looked her way.
“Keep going, Nick, or I’m going to let Roach here slowly saw off each one of your fingers and toes, one at a time, and if you pass out from the pain, we’ll just wait until you wake up to continue.”
“I only ever sold two more of those other than yours.” He held up his hand. “And mine.” He ran his hand through his hair. “The one dude was some random guy traveling through Florida and stopped at my tattoo shop on a whim. I never saw the guy again.”
“And the other?” I prompted.
“The other is a guy named Frank, but he goes by Father Frank. He’s a real whack job and has his own cult or something. Anyway, he is a friend of Dave’s.” My lip pulled up in a snarl, and Nick stumbled through the rest of his words. “That’s his hand in the photo. He was the first one that chose that image, maybe a month before you came into the shop,” Nick managed to stammer out. I looked at the artwork on the guy’s right hand and knew this had to be the fucker I was after. Why couldn’t I have chosen something like a fucking unicorn?
“How exactly does Dave know this Father Frank?”
“I don’t know, man. Some bar, some random conversation, and the next thing you know, Dave is talking about him like he’s the next messiah.”
“You seem like a man who’s in the know, Nick. One of those, like the local barber shop where everyone comes in and tells you their secrets.” I squatted down to stare Nick in the eyes. “Tell me, Nick, did anyone happen to wander through your doors and spout off about who all put me in jail or, better yet, who raped Raine Eastman?”
Nick looked down at the floor. “Fuck, man. Yeah, someone might have come in and bragged a little.”
“You’re going to get us killed,” Irene yelled at Nick.
“Well, I’ll certainly kill you, and I’m in the same room.” I smiled at Irene, but it didn’t reach my eyes.
“Talk, Nick.”
The man reminded me of a ferret with his narrow features and how he scrunched up his nose and wiggled it.
“His name is Jim, but everyone calls him Jumbo ‘cause he always eats those massive hotdogs.”
I knew exactly who Nick meant. I’d sat in the garage and chatted with Jim all the time. He might have been Dave’s trucking friend, but he was around so much that he felt like family. The betrayal was thick as I thought about what had happened to Raine. About how many times she’d brought him a beer or his dinner when he was over. The more I thought, the angrier I became, until my knuckles cracked. I now understood the looks he’d given Raine and how his eyes would linger on her ass when she walked away.
I was pretty sure Raine had been collateral damage because I hadn’t shown up at the fights that night. The fact that I had anything to do with what happened sat like acid in my stomach and burned the back of my throat.
My eyes slowly rose to meet Roach’s, and he pulled his gun from the back of his jeans.
“What the hell? What is he doing?” Nick and Irene asked as Roach screwed on the silencer. Nick crawled onto the bed and jumped off the other side as if he could feel the walls closing in.
“We told you everything we know,” Irene blubbered.
“I know. Kill them,” I said and marched for the door as the sound of soft popping was accompanied by short-lived screams.
I was going to find those three men, and I was going to kill them. They’d signed their death warrants the night they attacked Raine. No one hurt Raine but me. She was Mine.
