Page 13 of Keeping Her Under (Deranged Highway, #1)

Thirteen

“Open the glove box,” Asher says.

My pulse increases as we reach our destination. If we pull this off, in less than twenty-four hours, I’ll be between my girl’s thighs. I’ll have four whole nights to treasure her. Four whole nights of filling her with my cum.

Fuck.

My cock twitching, I reach inside the glove box. I pick up two black balaclavas, a set of gloves for me, a lock pick set, two phones, and a gun. I don’t need to check to know its serial number’s been filed off. Asher does a lot of dirty jobs for the Blood Fangs.

“Leave one phone here,” Asher says. He nods at the set of lock picks as he takes the gun. “You still know how to use those?”

When we were teens living on the streets, I’d use them every day – breaking into houses to find shit to sell, breaking into mattress stores for a good night’s sleep.

But it’s been decades since then.

“Yes,” I say. A single word. A vow of confidence.

I’m not going to let a mere door keep me from my future wife.

Ashers looks at me, gauging the truth in my eyes. Then he dons his balaclava and steps out of the car. I follow, my mask on, the phone in my pocket. He opens the trunk of the car and pulls out a can of gasoline. In his other hand, he holds the throwaway gun, his finger off the trigger.

We walk up to Ryan’s house in silence.

It doesn’t take me long to break inside.

No alarm blares.

No dog barks.

Just silence.

My heart racing, we walk down the carpeted hall to the back of the house. I looked up the floor plan online, having found an old listing for this place. It was bought a few years ago. Sold for market value. Two beds, one bath.

And the master bedroom is the next door on our right.

We stop outside it, one on each side of the frame.

The silence is broken only by the beating of my heart.

By the anticipation of toppling the first domino that will end up with taking Summer as my wife.

Asher looks at me, then nods at the door handle. He raises the gun as I reach across the hinges and place my fingers on the brass L.

One heartbeat.

Will he hear us when I open the door?

Will he wake up fighting?

Does he sleep with a gun on the side of the bed?

Two.

I twist it slowly, listening for the smallest of creaks.

Asher’s finger slides along the trigger, but it doesn’t curl around it.

The door swings open and –

Utter silence.

No.

Wait.

There’s a slight snore every few seconds.

My cousin glances at me, then slips inside. He’s left the can of gasoline in the hallway, so I bend down to pick it up before entering behind him.

The room is dark, the curtains black-out beauties that’ll let him sleep during the day for when he’s on night shift. I slip through the shadows towards the bed while Asher hangs further back, his gun raised and ready. He holds it with one hand as he digs into his pants pocket with the other.

Reaching Ryan’s sleeping form, I unscrew the lid on the can of gasoline. The sharp smell of it fills the room, and I glance down, my body tense.

His face twitches, his eyes screwing together.

My pulse screams, anticipating him waking.

Fighting.

Forcing Asher to kill him. Forcing me to think of another way of getting into Summer’s room.

My pulse beats louder. Almost a wail.

But my hands are steady. Precise.

I pour the gasoline onto his face.

He jackknifes upwards with a gasp. His hands wipe frantically at his eyes and mouth. We were uncertain if he’d come up swinging, so we made sure not to give him a choice. It’s an instinctive need to clear one’s eyes. A primitive drive to escape the dark.

Moving down his body, I pour a line of gasoline.

“What the fuck?” he shouts.

The sound of a pocket blowtorch burns to life behind me.

“That’s gasoline,” Asher says as if he’s talking about the weather. “And this is the torch to Hell.”

Ryan swivels towards my cousin’s voice. His body shakes. He swipes at the fuel still dripping down his face; the sharp tang of it burns my nose.

“What do you want?” he asks, his voice shaky and squeaky.

“It’s not what I want,” Asher says. “It’s what my boss wants.”

He swallows hard. “Wha-what does he want?”

“You’re taking care of a woman in the ICU. Her name’s Summer.”

He sucks in a breath. “She had a reaction to the anesthesia, but she’s stable. I swear –”

Asher waves his hand, and the gun he’s holding flickers in the firelight. Ryan pales as his eyes dart between it and the blowtorch. The pungent smell of gasoline seems as thick as smoke.

“I know,” Asher says casually. “One of our guys stopped in on her.” And just like that, we have framed her shitty boyfriend as one of us.

Spread the fear that we can get to him anywhere.

Planted the first seed he’ll tell the police once his balls drop and he tries to go to the authorities.

“You’ll check in on her at 10:30 tonight. At 10:55, you’ll make sure the floor is empty for the next ten minutes.”

“How am I supposed to do that?” he whines, and my jaw tightens at how easily he’s handing her over. He has no idea what we want with her. Ten minutes is plenty of time to kill her and sneak out.

My hands fist with rage, the knuckles of my right hand clenching around the can of gasoline. It’s only plastic, so beating him to death with it won’t be very easy, but if he tries to fight back, Asher will shoot him.

Then I can finish the job while he’s bleeding out. Because fuck! His job is to protect people. He took the Nightingale Pledge. He is her nurse; yet, not even he will try to save her?

She’s all alone in a cruel, cold world.

Not anymore, a little voice whispers.

And that is the only thing that cools me down.

Makes my fingers relax. I need this piece of shit to get into her room so I can take care of her like she needs.

I could wait until after she wakes, when I move her into my house, but the thought of her spending one more night on her own sickens me.

If I could go to her now, I would. Not let her be alone for one more goddamn second.

“There’re four other nurses on shift,” Ryan cries. “How am I going to –”

“You’re a smart boy. You’ll figure it out,” Asher cuts in.

“I’ll lose my job!”

That is what he’s worried about? His fucking job when we could be going there to kill my beautiful angel?

My cousin steps forward before I can, the torch in his hand burning bright.

Ryan slinks back on the bed, none of his muscles able to help him now.

“Because if you don’t,” he says, stopping at the foot of the bed. He lowers the flames just over the soiled sheets, damn near touching the puddle of gasoline.

My heart rate kicks up even though I know he won’t go those last few inches, won’t rob me of my time with my girl. Ryan’s pulse, though, must be damn near vibrating.

“Okay!” he shrieks. “I’ll do it!”

“You will not go into her room at all during the night. At 5:01, you will make sure the floor is empty again for the next ten minutes. Failure at any of these steps will lead to your corpse being picked apart by the crows.” He sways the blowtorch back and forth.

Ryan starts to cry. “I’ll do it. I’ll do it. I’ll do anything you want. Just please step back.”

Asher smirks, and I step forward before he can give my colleague the choice to suck him off.

He sighs as he looks at me. You owe me, reads so clearly in his eyes.

Stepping back a few feet, he returns his attention to Ryan.

“If you don’t, you’ll cause a gang war. She is the girl of a capo in the Shadow Domain.

” They’re a rival Family, on the outskirts of the Blood Fang’s territory.

The two gangs are currently at peace, but it’s a strained one where capos aren’t allowed to cross the territory lines without express permission.

If she really was what we’re claiming, and one of them did, nearly every hospital in the South would be overrun with casualties.

“Then we’ll kill you,” Asher says, “and everyone in your contact list.”

I set down the can of gasoline, then pick up the phone on Ryan’s nightstand.

He starts to move towards me, just a shift of his weight.

“Ah ah ah,” Asher says, waving the gun, and the man freezes.

“Please –”

“You don’t need to beg unless you fail. Now tell us what your password is.”

He whines, refusing to give it up with more gusto than he ever did with Summer. My jaw is back to being tight again, and I eye the lamp on the nightstand beside me.

Asher shrugs and starts to toss the blowtorch towards him.

“Okay!” He screams out his four digit password. I test it, and it works. Slipping his phone into my pocket, I pull out the one I took from the glove box and toss it to him. He’s lucky I don’t grab the lamp cord next and wrap it around his neck.

“Text the saved number when the floor is empty,” Asher says as Ryan fumbles to catch the phone.

He nods at the door, telling me to leave first. I pick up the can, still half full of gasoline, and start pouring a line on the ground as I leave.

I make sure I don’t walk with the same arrogance as I do at work.

I make sure to move my shoulders more, put in more of a swagger.

I don’t want to give him any reason to think Dr. Rath Slader was in his home tonight.

I wait in the hall for my cousin to join me, the blowtorch still burning bright, then together we take our leave, a trail of gasoline leading all the way to his door.

Once in the car, I pull out his phone, unlock it, and scroll through his call log. I want to know who called him while he was at lunch the other day. When his face lit up and he forgot all about his food.

At her name, I smile wide.

I click back to the home screen and look at the older woman smiling up at me. Of course.

“Anything good?” Asher asks as we pull out of the drive. I toss Ryan’s mobile out of the window. There are too many ways to track lost phones these days to risk taking it with us. Besides, I found all that I need.

“The thing I owe you...” I say with a smile. “You will get it by next week, probably earlier.”

He looks at me curiously, but I leave him in the dark. Even when he nags me, I keep my lips sealed.

“Come on!” he says as he takes off his balaclava and pulls onto the highway, heading back towards my house.

I do the same with a chuckle. “No.”

This is payback for him having hidden her phone from me. The fucker.

He knows it too. He lets off a string of curses. Of promises to fuck me up if I don’t tell him right now; he never did like surprises.

But even if he really meant them, nothing could bring me down.

Because tonight, I’m going to fuck my future wife.

Tonight, I’m going to make her mine.