It smells like vanilla, and it makes my mouth water. I close the lid and place it back on the dresser.
I open the top and look around inside. There are some personal belongings inside—a few pieces of jewelry, two books, and a small box. Picking up the box, I open it and find two more pictures inside. I take them out and study them. The first one is of a very young girl in the arms of a woman who looks to be in her twenties. The woman looks a lot like Sasha, except she has a slightly different nose.
Sasha’s mother.
The second picture appears to have been taken on the same day because the girl and woman are wearing the same clothing. Only this picture also includes a young boy and a man.
Her dad and brother.
The last thing in the box is an unopened letter with a return-to-sender stamp on it. It’s addressed to Marnie Cooper of Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Sasha’s name and an address different from this apartment are in the upper left-hand corner of the envelope.
Is her mother dead? Did she abandon Sasha?
Either of those reasons would explain why this woman isn’t in a picture frame on the top of Sasha’s dresser. My gut tells me her mother left, though, and it makes me wonder why.
Why do you care?
Flipping my conscious the bird, I put the box back and open the next drawer down. In this one, I find bras and underwear. They’re mostly virginal white and cotton, but my eyes spy a sliver of purple silk at the very bottom. I tug on the fabric, pulling a thong from the mass of good-girl panties, and my eyebrows raise with surprise.
Briefly, my mind floats back to the image of her tied to my bed, but this time she’s wearing this thong.
Only this thong.
I quickly tuck the material into my back pocket and adjust myself. My cock is so hard it feels like it could bust right through my jeans. I close the drawer and open the next one. There are more clothes in there. I rifle through them and feel something hard in the bottom of the drawer.
Moving the clothing out of the way, I find a cell phone. She must have fled. I’m almost happy to find out she was smart enough to leave her phone behind. She knows we could have tracked her with it.
Unfortunately for her, we network with Clubs all over the country. With Stone putting her description out, someone will recognize her soon. When they do, I’ll personally retrieve her and drag her ass back here.
A quick search in the last drawer shows there is nothing else of value to me in the dresser, so I close it and move on. Moving to Sasha’s bed, I pick up the mattress and search for anything hidden between it and the box spring. Nothing is there, so I lower it back down, catching her scent in the breeze.
Unable to stop myself, I take her pillow and hold it up to my nose. Her natural scent relaxes me and takes a bit of the edge off. My eyes close as I inhale smells that remind me of the beach, the sand, and the sun.
I give my head a slight shake to clear it and squeeze my eyelids shut. Gripping the pillow tight in both hands, I pull hard on the fabric, ripping it in half out of anger. I watch as the air around me fills up with feathers. I shouldn’t feel relaxed right now. Being in Sasha’s room, surrounded by her things, shouldn’t minimize this situation’s severity.
“Everything alright in here?” Cap checks in on me.
Fuck. I forgot he was here.
“Yeah. I’m just angry that she’s not here. I’m ready to confront her and make her pay for what she did to Iron.”
Cap walks to me and claps a hand on my shoulder.
“I know, man. We all are.”
Chapter Eight
Sasha
If there’s only one positive thing I can say about this hotel, it’s that the curtains do a bang-up job keeping the sun out. When I roll over and look at the clock, I’m stunned to see that it’s nine thirty in the morning. I can’t remember the last time I slept this late.
I must have been exhausted after all of the commotion yesterday. Pulling the covers back, I get out of bed and grab my toothbrush and toothpaste from my bag. Then, I drag my feet to the bathroom, rubbing the sleep from my eyes as I go.
While brushing my teeth, I curse myself for not bringing shampoo and conditioner along. A soapless shower will have to do because there’s no way I’m leaving without rinsing the grime from this hotel room off of me.
I turn on the water and let it heat up while I put my toothbrush and toothpaste back. After I get undressed, I take the empty bag out of the trashcan and put my dirty clothes in it. Then, I lay out my clean clothes on the bed and walk back to the bathroom.
The spray of water isn’t as hot as I would like it to be, but I get in anyway. The quicker I can get out of this place, the better. I scrub my skin and run my fingers through my hair, trying to get as clean as possible. When I feel as though I’ve done a good enough job, I turn off the water and wrap the thin, white towel around my body.
Stepping from the shower, I exit the bathroom, and it’s as if all of my breath is stolen from me. On the edge of my bed, is a very large, very sexy, yet terrifying man.
I scream and turn around, trying to run back into the bathroom. I don’t even make it one step before a pair of strong arms wrap themselves around my torso and squeeze me tight, like a python killing its prey.
“Let me go!” I scream just before a hand covers my mouth.
“Shut up or, so help me God, I’ll snap your neck right now,” his murderous voice hisses in my ear.
I stop screaming because I believe that he’ll kill me without thinking twice about it. With his hand still covering my mouth, he lowers me to the floor until my feet hit the carpet.
“Sit down,” he commands.
Still breathing heavily, I struggle to swallow the fear lodged in my throat, and I take a seat on the edge of the bed where he just was. I look at the man, but my eyes don’t reach his face. I’m too scared to look him in the eye. He towers over me in distressed black jeans, a black t-shirt pulled tight over a muscular frame, and a black leather vest. There is a patch on the right side that says, “Enforcer.”
I can’t see the back, but I fear that I know what I would find if I got a look at it.
“Who are you?” I beg, shaking with fear.
“I’m the only one who gets to ask questions, Sasha.”
He folds his arms across his chest and plants his feet firmly on the ground in front of me. A lone tear runs down my face as my fear is confirmed.
The Devil’s Skull has found me.
“Did you honestly think you’d get away with it?” he questions.
I don’t know what to say to him, so I stay quiet other than my sniffling. My eyes fixed on his bulky, shit-kicking boots.
He takes one step closer to me before speaking again.
“Did you think we wouldn’t come looking for you?”
I begin to shake more, the closer he gets to me. My brain is buzzing, trying to think of a way out of this. It’s screaming at me to try and run. But my fear holds me hostage, unable to move from my seat on the bed.
“Look at me,” he orders.
I can’t. My body shakes uncontrollably, but to try and move voluntarily is impossible. I see his hand move, and I flinch. Instead of the attack I thought was coming, he merely places his finger under my chin, forcing my gaze to meet his.
When I look into his obsidian eyes, fear still paralyzes me, but my shaking quiets slightly. I want to tear my eyes away from the pain and anger I see in them, but I can’t. He holds me in a trance-like state, with a promise of never letting me go.