Page 34 of Casual Felonies (Wildlings #1)

TRUETT

Despite the years of going after shitheads who like to hurt the most vulnerable members of society, I’ve never received more than the occasional broken nose.

I’ve never had my skull cracked before, and certainly never with a weapon.

Gotta say…not a fan. The pain I understand, but the dizziness is pissing me off.

Also, this black bag is fucking suffocating.

Does anyone even know I’m missing yet?

Stop catastrophizing, Valentine.

Even if Holmes didn’t hear me shout, he’d know something was wrong as soon as he got to the shop and I didn’t show up. Having seen some of the Wildlings in action, I have to believe they’ll call up the cavalry as soon as they suspect a problem.

Unless whoever this is managed to get a team up to the penthouse.

Horrified that they might have gotten to Rami, I kick and punch out, twisting my body.

That’s accompanied by another gun butt to the head, but this one doesn’t quite land.

Hurts like hell, but I’m still in it, so I kick out like a donkey.

The high-pitched moan tells me I may have actually hit crotch.

“I’m gonna kill this motherfucker. ”

“No, you’re not. We’re being paid good money to bring him in alive.”

My question is answered seconds later.

“Boss wants to send a message.”

“Who’re we sending a message to?” asks a guy off to the side.

“The fuck do I care? Boss says to pick someone up, we pick someone up.”

Who the fuck is their boss?

“See that’s where you fucked up,” I say, my voice stronger than I feel. “My man’s father is Anders Bash, and he’s not the kind of man you fuck with. I’d love for you to imagine what he’d do to someone who kidnapped his son’s favorite person.”

I don’t know if I’m his favorite person yet, but I hope to be.

“My boyfriend’s daddy’s gonna save me,” mocks the guy closest to me in a high, little girl voice.

The passengers in the van—four by my count—laugh, certain that I’m delusional.

“Wait. Is this guy’s boyfriend really the son of Anders Fucking Bash?” asks a man in front of me, his voice going up on Anders’ last name.

“Yeah. Isn’t he that experimental surgeon billionaire who made his kids do charity in order to get their trust funds?” says another.

“Yes,” says the first guy, his voice higher and more urgent. “But he’s also Anders Fucking Bash , who started taking body parts when the oligarchs got a little too full of themselves.”

“What are you talking about?”

I grin to myself. “Ever notice that some of those rich old fucks are missing their pinkies?” I ask, kicking out and hitting a cushion. Fuck . “Ever think it’s weird that so many of them are missing that specific body part?”

“No, fuck face. I’ve never looked at a rich man’s hands before. ”

“Well, start,” the nervous guy interjects. “If they’re missing their pinky, that’s someone who’s met Bash in person, and I can promise that taking the pinky was the least horrifying thing that man did to those people.”

The idiots in the van start fighting with one another, and I take the opportunity to use their increasing volume to more specifically locate every fucking one of them.

The guy closest to me is the loudest idiot, and just as he’s making a point for just killing me and letting the rich assholes sort it out, I break his nose.

Damn, that was satis ? —

The van jerks to the side with a violent jolt, and I’m thrown against the window.

I’m a little disoriented and there’s blood, maybe, dripping from my eyebrow, but I force myself to focus.

Moans fill the air, and no one seems to be paying attention to me.

Taking advantage of the distraction, I work the black bag off my head with my bound hands.

The guy in the front passenger seat is slumped forward, his head bleeding. None of us was wearing a seatbelt, so everyone’s dazed by the impact. With a loud, metallic whine, the van door is shoved open, and Rami is standing there with a weird blaster-looking pistol, Holmes coming up behind him.

Rami takes one look at my face, then shoots the driver and co-pilot, reducing their heads to ash.

The guy in the seat behind me lets out a squeal before Rami silences him.

Holmes reaches in and grabs me by the shirt, pulling me out onto the shoulder of a rural highway.

Rami takes out the van’s remaining inhabitant, leaving the vehicle looking like Swiss cheese on the side of the road.

He then reduces the entire thing to ash, spitting on the remains.

“Just so you know,” Holmes says in a modulated tone, “we usually keep at least one person alive and retain the vehicle to review in case there are items or details of interest. ”

Rami darts a look at Holmes, murder still in his eyes. “Fuck that.”

Honestly, it’s kinda sexy to see him like this.

Reeling, I turn to Holmes. “How did you…?” Blood rushes to my head, and I forget the rest of the question.

“I heard you shout.” He leans in with a concerned expression. “Hey, are you okay?”

“Got hit in the head a couple of times.”

Maya appears out of nowhere and reaches for my face, thumbing up my lids, checking my eyes with a penlight. “What’s today’s date? Who’s the president?”

I answer her easily.

“Any pain or injury aside from your head?” she asks, patting down my eyebrow with something that immediately stops the bleeding.

I shake my head, and the world goes a little wobbly.

“Who’s your favorite Wildling?” she asks with a troublemaker grin.

“The one helping me right now?”

Rami’s jaw swings loose and he glares at his sister.

“Good answer,” she says, giving Rami a smug look, similar to the one I’ve seen on her dad’s face.

“Ehh,” Rami buzzes, pulling me into a careful embrace. “That is the way wrong answer.” I put my arms around him, and he sniffs, all murderous bravado gone in a flash. “Thought I lost you.”

“Nah, I’m too stubborn for that,” I say, ignoring the pounding in my head as I rub his back. “Still not sure why they kidnapped me instead of you.”

Omar joins us, and if his eyes were lasers, Anders Fucking Bash would be a dead man.

“You were supposed to keep pace with us, Habibi.”

Anders looks unconcerned. “Yeah, well, that was until our son figured out that Preston is the one responsible for this. For all of it.”

“What led you to that conclusion?” Omar asks Rami. “Preston Whitaker is many things, but family is everything to him.”

“Tell him,” Holmes prompts as Maya pulls a syringe from her cross-body medical bag.

Rami recounts his thought process as Maya quickly makes small injections along the knots in my head. And maybe it’s whatever’s in that syringe, but Rami’s reasoning is sound.

By the time Maya’s finished examining me, my head feels fine—great, actually—and there’s no evidence of my kidnapping or the subsequent firefight, save for the piles of gravel and ash on the highway.

Ope, missed one. I point out the guy army-crawling toward the brush, both of his legs broken.

Silas, who is terrifying in his dark sunglasses and tactical gear, takes aim with a sweeping motion, and the guy becomes a stripe of ash and chalk on the side of the road.

Sy’s satisfied little grin doesn’t even crack the top three most fucked-up things that have transpired in the last twenty-four hours.

I send Holmes a pointed look, and he shakes his head. Just a guess, but convincing Silas to keep someone alive for questioning probably only works if you lethimdo the interrogating.

Two black helicopters, eerily silent, touch down in the field by the side of the highway. Four operatives pile out of the first helicopter and three set up a perimeter while the fourth, a Black woman with braided hair, approaches Anders and Holmes.

“We’ve got the highway closed a mile in either direction, but local law enforcement isn’t happy.”

“On it,” Holmes says, pointing to the serious-looking man with red hair and the dorky guy with glasses and a black canvas bag exiting the second helicopter. “As soon as Dexter gets what he needs, we’ll roll out. ”

She gives him a serious nod, then takes a stance outside of the group, completing the perimeter.

“Dex!” Rami says, hugging the nerd. “Uncle Eddie!”

The redhead—Uncle Eddie, apparently—gives Rami a half-hug and sends a nod to everyone else. His mouth tightens when he sees Silas. Weird, since they give off the same serial killer energy, right down to the matching wraparound sunglasses.

“Given that the pistols, which have not been approved for field work, were, in fact, used in the field,” this Eddie guy says, pausing to glare at Sy, “Dexter wanted to see how they functioned.”

“Great,” Rami says enthusiastically, pointing to the pile of ash that was the van. “Took out the motherfuckers who kidnapped my boyfriend with extreme prejudice.”

Realizing what he said, Rami sends me a quick grimace. I mouth boyfriend? with a teasing wink. He takes my extended hand, and I draw him in close, whispering, “Pretty sure rescuing me from kidnappers is an automatic promotion to boyfriend.”

Rami flushes, and it’s pretty fucking adorable.

Meanwhile the nerd—Dexter—pulls a beaker from his black bag and starts scooping tiny piles of leftover body into it before saying as much as a hello. He pushes his glasses up his nose, frowning as he examines the contents in the light.

“The blast radius on these things is better, but the overall efficacy is nowhere near the tolerances we’re looking for,” he says, shaking his head as though disappointed in himself.

Gesturing to whatever the fuck it is he’s doing, Rami says, “I thought you worked in decomposition or something.”

“Yeah, I like to spend time out at the body farm, but…I get bored sometimes.” Dexter holds up his big cup o’ remains.

“Besides, see how some of this is ash, and some of it’s sorta chalky and gravelly?

That’s not how the guns are supposed to function.

This should be all ash, just like you see with the rifles.

No bone fragments at all. Uncle Odd and I are going to have to go back to the drawing board. ”

Maya snorts and leans into my shoulder, whispering, “Hint: talk to Dex about his experimental rockets, his forays into app creation, or his new sous vide equipment. Do not, under any circumstances, ask him questions about how the body decomposes. He will talk your ear off for hours about the most horrifying shit.”

Rami nods, his expression grim. “And if you see him and Silas arguing over carbon dispersal, just walk away while your sanity is still intact. I promise you, they are not talking about fossil fuels.”

“Rude,” Silas replies, not looking offended in the slightest.

I stare at Silas. “And what do you do?”

“I don’t think you want to know what I do at the Cave.”

“The Cave? What is the Cave ?”

Honoré puts his hand on my shoulder. “It’s our headquarters in Wimberley.”

“Do I wanna know why y’all call it the Cave?” Or why Hedy didn’t mention that little tid bit to me.

“It wouldn’t make your day any better.”

Dexter quickly finishes taking samples while Uncle Eddie and the dads have a heated discussion off to the side. Silas quietly collects the guns, placing them in a hard case before walking them over to the tense group.

Eddie snatches the case from Silas, who cracks his neck and steps back. Shit, that’s some serious beef. The kind where one wrong look would set off a chemical reaction. Just as I think they’re about to go full ignition, they retreat, peeling off in opposite directions.

Okayyyy.

“Looks like everyone has what they need,” Holmes says, gesturing at the empty highway. “Let’s wrap this up and head out. ”

The dads join us. “We’re returning to Wimberley with Dexter and Edison for an emergency meeting,” Omar says, then turns to H and H. “Holmes, Honoré, you’ll return with the security detail and debrief with Rae, yes?”

Ah. Uncle Eddie is Edison . Hedy’s Edison. She mentioned him during our conversation.

Based on what she said—and the fact that even Omar’s calling him Edison—I’m guessing only the Wildlings are allowed to call him Eddie.

“Yes, sir,” the cousins respond, bringing my focus back to… whatever the hell you’d call all of this.

Omar thins his lips and sends them a curt nod. “Good work out here.”

“Thank you, sir,” Holmes says, and I can’t help but imagine Mav trying—and failing—to pull off his crisp salute.

Holmes and Honoré take off toward the helos and I pull Rami into a tight hug. “Thanks for coming after me and for murdering my kidnappers.”

“Anytime, boyfriend.” His soft kisses spin me up so quick I’m dizzy again. He grins, surreptitiously palming my crotch. “Mm. Serum boner for the win.”

“Shit, sorry,” I say, grinning. “Mind helping me take care of that when we get back to your place?”

“I’d love to.”