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“I should be getting home,” I yawned as the clock ticked past one.
Star pulled a face. “Really?” she replied. “You don’t want to hang out a little longer?”
“Maybe another time.”
“I’ll hold you to that! Come on, let me walk you out. You want me to get one of the guys to walk you home?”
“I’m fine,” I replied, waving a hand. “I’ve lived in this city most of my life. I can handle myself.”
I pulled on my jacket and said goodbye to my friends and then headed for the door, Star right behind me. She seemed particularly protective of the other girls in this place, and I wondered just what she had been through that had made her so intent on looking out for us. I guessed I would find out; she seemed like the type who would spill her guts after a few glasses of wine.
“You sure you’re going to be okay walking back by yourself?” she fussed over me outside the bar.
I nodded. “Star, I’m going to be fine. I’ll be back at my dad’s place in, like, ten minutes. Honestly.”
“Okay, well, if you’re sure,” she replied. She leaned in and gave me a tight hug. “It was so good to meet you, Chels. We have to do this again sometime!”
“Agreed,” I murmured, my face in her blonde hair. She was such a sweetheart. I wasn’t sure exactly how she and Jax had ended up together, given the kind of shit that he had been caught up in, but still—they seemed like a good match.
She waved and headed back inside the bar, and I pulled out my phone to check my messages. I had signed up for a dating app recently, after I had gotten back, but I hadn’t had anything in the way of matches that interested me yet. I’d had a few hook-ups in college, but all of them had been pretty much letdowns. None of the guys I met there seemed to know what they were doing.
Or perhaps I was just used to a very different type of guy altogether...
Anyway. I needed to get home, drink some water, eat some toast, and brace myself for the hangover that was going to hit me the next day.
I wandered off toward the street and cut down an alleyway that would lead me to dad’s place a little quicker. Yeah, of course I knew I shouldn’t be fucking around like this, wandering down dark alleyways all by myself, but fuck it. I was a grown woman, and I knew I could handle whatever came my way.
I stared down at my phone, frowning at the screen as I swiped through some potential matches the app thought I would be into. Ugh. None of these guys looked cute to me. I mean, I was sure plenty of them were perfectly nice and all, but none of them made me feel that shiver of attraction that I ached for when I looked into a guy’s eyes, that edge, like he might be trouble but he was hot enough that it didn’t matter.
Suddenly, I heard something behind me, and my head snapped around. But there was nothing. I must have been hearing things. Maybe there had been something stronger than vodka in those drinks I had been putting away tonight.
I turned back and continued on down the street, tucking my phone back in my pocket so I could pay attention to what was going on around me. I was suddenly distinctly aware of the silence that surrounded me. Why was it so quiet? Had this place always been this quiet? I had spent so long living on campus, where there was always something going on, that the sudden silence clinging to me felt like it was crushing me.
And then I heard it again. That sound. That sound that drew my attention back behind me. Footsteps—I was sure of it—footsteps closing the distance between me and whoever was right behind me.
I stopped dead in my tracks and spun around again, planning to catch whoever it was off guard before they could get any closer. But, when I turned, there was nobody there. I was sure I had heard those footsteps. I wouldn’t have imagined something like that, I wasn’t paranoid that way.
I scanned the alleyway behind me. A pipe dripped into a dirty puddle a few feet from me, the wind rustling a trash bag that was sticking out of a dumpster. A door squeaked on its hinges beside me. But there was nobody there, nobody before me. I must have been imagining it—
And then, suddenly, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I opened my mouth to cry out, praying that someone at the Kennels would be able to hear me, but before I could get a sound out, a rag clamped over my mouth. I inhaled before I could stop myself, a thick, noxious scent filling my senses, and a second later, the corners of my vision began to blur.
Terror was the last thing I remembered as the blackout hit my system, and I slumped back into the arms of my attacker, helpless.
Chapter Two – Zane
I paced back and forth as I stared at her, passed out on the bed, one arm secured to the bedframe.
Her red hair was splayed out around her head, and she looked almost peaceful as she lay there before me. I would never have guessed, if it hadn’t been for the zip tie wrapped around her wrist, that she was being held here against her will.
It had been nearly three hours since I had snatched her off the street, hit her with a heavy dose of chloroform, and dragged her back to my car. The cops steered clear of that part of the city, knowing the Dogs would have caused them too much trouble if they showed their faces around there. Which made it that much easier to steal her away before anyone could catch on to it.
I didn’t know how long it was going to take for someone to notice that she was missing, but I knew it was going to be chaos when it clicked. I wasn’t even entirely sure who she was, but I was certain she had to be a Dog. There was no way she would have spent the whole night at the Kennels if not. She had been pretty drunk when she had walked out of there, and those fuckers were too arrogant to make sure she got home safe. They thought they ran this city after they had taken Lombardi down, but they didn’t know who they were dealing with when it came to me.
This apartment I’d brought her to was dingy as hell, but it would do for as long as I needed it. I wasn’t sure exactly how long I was going to be here, but one way or another, I would get what I wanted out of the Dogs. I would either destroy them financially, bleed them dry with demands that would leave them with nothing, or I would crush them mentally by killing one of their own.
And this girl was part of the younger generation, maybe even the daughter of one of the Dogs, and that was going to hurt even more. I almost felt a little bad for her, given how young she was. That crop of bright red hair, her freckled skin, those green eyes—she looked fresh, which was rare for women in this line of work. She hadn’t seen a lot of the world, which explained why she was wandering down dark alleyways all alone when she should have known better.
But I had to get that sympathy out of my head. She was part of them. Probably knew what they had done to Lombardi, what they had done to my brother. Celebrated that victory along with the rest of them. She didn’t deserve anything from me. Not a damn thing.
