Echo (Black Lotus #2)(72)
I remind myself of all the reasons why I should let this man kill her, remind myself of all the reasons why I hate her. But no matter how many reasons there are, I can’t rid myself of the unyielding need to find her. It tugs on the threads that stitch my heart together, the heart that she ripped from my chest and tore apart. And as much as I want to deny it, as much as the thought repulses me, the fact is, the one that destroys is the one that heals.
I need her.
MY STOMACH GROWLS as I sit here on the ground with my hands bound with a plastic zip tie around a pipe that runs down the length of the wall. Since restraining me, Richard has retrieved a bag from the car filled with food and water that will never find its way into my stomach that hungers. So, I sit and watch, having no idea how much time has passed, if it’s night or day.
We’re underground, and I can tell by the looks of his phone that he’s also operating on an untraceable disposable, making me worry that no one will be able to find me. Although Declan called and now knows I’ve been taken against my will, a part of me doubts that he cares enough to even come looking for me. But he’s the only hope I have because there’s no one else out there that even knows who I am. No friends. No family. Nothing.
Strength wanes.
Hope fades.
The tired fight inside of me vanishes.
Slowly, I open my fisted hand and wince from the sting of oxygen hitting the gash in my palm. Flesh covered in crusted blood—blood dead—proof that nothing survives forever. Old news to me, but yet I’ve always chosen to go on.
Why?
What’s the point?
Win one battle only to be faced with another, but when will it end?
Will it ever stop?
Cellophane crumpling draws my attention to Richard’s hand that holds a wadded chip bag. He stares at me as he throws it my way, but it doesn’t reach me as it falls to the ground. I look at the garbage and can’t help but compare myself. I sit here, lifeless as well, but marred in swollen bruises, cuts, and scabs. Some are self-inflicted, but others come from my love and this bastard in front of me.
I’m waste.
“What are you waiting for?” my voice cracks.
My words catch Richard’s attention, and he looks down at me with question in his expression.
“No one’s coming for me,” I tell him. “If you think Declan cares about me, you’re wrong.”
He doesn’t respond as we stare at each other, and then I ask what I need clarity on before my time runs out, “How did you know my father?”
His eyes shift to his gun that lies on top of the desk, and when he reaches over and picks it up, he gazes at the steel as if it’s his desired beloved.
“You worked together, didn’t you?” I ask on a trembled voice that threatens to break. Pieces begin to connect in my theory. “You said you used Bennett’s business to wash money from guns.”
Keeping his hand around the pistol, he rests it upon his thigh when he leans forward, saying, “You have no clue the tangled web you’re caught in. It’s almost a privilege to be the one who gets to unwrap this gift for you.”
I thought I knew Richard. Thought he was nothing more than an ascot-wearing chauvinist that I didn’t have to worry about. But now, I have no idea who this man sitting in front of me really is. I’m wondering if we’re more alike in the fact that we mold ourselves in pursuit of self-gratification and manipulation.
“Just tell me,” I say, free from revealing the emotions tugging at me.
“Steve worked for me. He worked as the middle man, the eyes and ears on both sides.”
“Both sides?”
“Me and the mules.”
I can’t even attempt to connect the dots that led him to Bennett because all that floods my mind is my dad. Never have I pictured my father other than what he always was to me and still is—my prince with a handful of pink daisies. I can’t imagine him working for a man like Richard, a man that dug his knife into my face and hand just to prove a point.
“He was always loyal though,” he adds. “Until he took a plea bargain in exchange for names. I guess he thought the Feds would protect him, but Menard is filled with prisoners that are linked to me in one way or another. Although he never gave me up, which I hold great respect for, he did give up names of men who walked the low ladder of the business, and for that, he paid the price.”
“You bastard,” I breathe in sulfurous hate.
“Me?”
“You knew he gave up names?”
“Yes.”
“And out of loyalty to you, he never gave you up?”
“Steve did what the Feds asked of him in exchange for an early release—for you,” he says, nodding his head to me for emphasis. “But at the same time, he never turned his back on me.”
His words are gloats of pride for his assumed stature, and I grow in rage at the price it cost my father. The gravel in my voice thickens along with my animosity when I say, “But you held power. You knew the danger he was in, and you did nothing to protect him from what you knew would be inevitable!”
“It was out of my hands.”
Blood boils, fists clench, and I begin to tug my wrists against the zip ties as I seethe, “But you’re the boss! You hold all the power, and you did nothing!”
And then it starts clicking. The pieces now begin snapping together. Twisting my hands even more, the edges of plastic dig into the tender flesh of my wrists, cutting the tissue and releasing the blood my wounded heart pumps.