This.
All of it.
The fact that it was Jerry who’d kidnapped me right out of Nightingale Investigations reception area and not one of the crazy, mean, f**king Balducci Brothers didn’t make me any happier.
This was only partly because I was over all the shitty, terrible traumas that kept making my life so f**king difficult. It was also because I knew Hector (and everyone, for that matter), were probably scared out of their minds that I’d been gone all night.
And them being scared pissed me right off.
I yanked my hand which was handcuffed to an iron bedstead so that it made an awful clink and I glared at him.
“Uncuff me,” I snapped.
“No f**kin’ way. You get uncuffed after you talk to your Dad,” Jerry replied, putting a mug of coffee and a bowl of cereal on the nightstand. The room I was in was clean, drab and had no personal items just a double bed, dresser and two nightstands.
“Where am I?” I demanded, taking a different tact.
“Your father’s safe house. The Feds never found it,” Jerry replied, standing several feet away from the bed, arms crossed on his chest, looking down at me.
“Where is it?”
“You’re spreadin’ your legs for an ex-Fed PI, Sadie,” he returned, his tone ugly. “I’m not gonna tell you where your father’s safe house is.”
I decided to ignore his rude words.
“How did you get me?”
“Stun gun. You went down, I dragged you out, your bitches came after me. I fired warning shots, they backed off. Got you in the car, Nightingale’s operations man, Monty whoever-the-fuck came after me, I shot out his tire. You started to come around, I gave you a different kind of shot. Nightie night.”
I felt my breath catch. “You shot at them?”
“Warning shots.”
I yanked my hand against the cuffs and got up on my knees.
“I swear to God, Jerry, you hurt any of them, I’ll f**king kill you!”
He grinned like he thought I was hilarious. “Much as I’d like to put a bullet in Nightingale’s piece or his f**kin’ sister, who’s a pain in everyone’s ass, you Dad’s orders were to get you, no collateral damage. That’s what I did.”
That made me feel better but I still spat at him, “You’re a pig.”
At my words, his face went hard. “Rather be a pig than a traitor.” He leaned in and his face started to turn ugly. “You make me sick. The idea of that ass**le’s hands on you, his mouth on you, his dick in you. Christ, your father trusted him and Chavez f**ked him, he f**ked all of us. Now you’re lettin’ him f**k you. Can you imagine how that makes your Dad feel?”
“My father feels? Wow, Jerry, thanks for sharing. That’s news to me,” I retorted sarcastically, too beyond angry to stop myself.
His face twisted with fury. “It was me you f**ked over that way, I’d let the Balduccis play with you. Not Seth. ‘Take ‘em down, one-by-one, make it hurt,’ he says to me. ‘Keep an eye on Sadie, Chavez falls down on the job, make sure she’s safe,’ he says. Fuck.”
My body had gone solid.
Make sure she’s safe. He said.
My father wanted to be sure I was safe.
And, if I read it right, he was resigned to Hector having that job.
I couldn’t wrap my mind around it and I started to tremble but luckily Jerry didn’t notice.
“Eat. You’re father’ll call, he’ll talk, you’ll f**kin’ listen then I’ll take you back to your f**k buddy,” Jerry finished our tête-à-tête and turned to go.