Chapter 8

Cruz

I've always found it fascinating when someone is on the brink of death how much they beg, willing to give anything up to me just to see another sunrise. It's pathetic really. They don't deserve to live and it will be my hand to bring them to their end as it should be.

"Are you done playing with your toys, Cruz, or can we move on?" Nix questions me from his spot by the door he's been leaning against since we arrived.

I found this abandoned factory and set it up as a shop of horrors for a few days. Screams really echo in here, bouncing back to me like a never-ending loop of torture. Makes my dick hard.

I don't respond back to Nix. The fuckhead's been getting on my nerves for days. Checking in with Payne and reporting everything I'm doing like some babysitter. I should just kill him. Tempting, very tempting but not just yet.

Nix rolls his eyes and fishes out his phone when it starts to ring, strolling to the other side of the building out of earshot. I turn back towards the mess in front of me and can't stop the smile spreading across my lips at the sight. Slicking back my dirty blond hair, I walk around the area from all sides, feeling nothing and everything at the same time.

When I first grabbed the trucker outside of the hotel, I kept him alive for a couple of days until I had all the information I needed. It was easy pulling out answers to the questions I had for him, but the way he squealed like a pig as I peeled off layers of his skin until he was just a meat bag? The animalistic sounds still ring in my ears, making my endorphins high for days.

He begged for mercy but I wasn't feeling very happy with him. By his answers, he didn't seem to know much about the girl he picked up in the middle of the desert. But I could smell a lie, he was trying to be brave by not giving up Tillie. I was growing bored and when I'm bored, the real fun begins. He started singing eventually but what he gave me only pissed me the fuck off. He got to the part of her giving him a lap dance and never seeing her again, and that's when I saw red, knowing he touched what's mine. I pulled more information out of him by slowly torturing him. He told me everything by the time I was pulling his toenails off with my knife digging under his nails. He dropped her off at the bus station downtown and if he took too long to answer every single detail, I started prying out his teeth by cutting his gums with my knife.

So here we are days later, trucker Adam dead in the corner of the room and my next victim ready for a torture session. An old, abandoned tire factory is the perfect place to hear the young employee who works at the bus station sobbing for her life. Everything echoes right back to me.

"Please. I don't know anything. She bought two different bus tickets but I'm not sure which one she got on! That's all I know!" she cried out, her gaze trying to follow me as I circled her.

Once the truck driver, Adam, told me he dropped Tillie off at the bus station, I didn't waste any time. Okay, I took my time killing him but the moment I was done, I was striding into the bus station. You know, I don't always have to torture someone to get what I want. I can be charming too to get what I need from people. That didn't work with the annoying fucking bitch working at the bus station though. When I showed Tillie's picture and asked if she'd seen her, the response I got was a shrug and her popping her bubblegum in my face. Knocking her out cold with the butt of my gun and kidnapping her was almost too easy at the end of her night shift. I enjoyed watching the confusion in her eyes when she finally woke up, finding her body trapped and the smell of death and tar had her screaming within seconds. It hasn't even been an hour and she's already telling me everything so she can live. I never said I wouldn't kill her, she just assumed I'd set her free.

"And where did she go?" I ask from behind her, bending down to grab the gasoline tank at my feet and pulling my lighter out of my pocket.

"I told you already. Her tickets were for New York and California. Please. Let me go!" She struggled in her awkward position, trying to get out of the tires that I had stacked from her feet to shoulders.

"You didn't have to end up here in this situation but you know what I hate most?" I ask her, ignoring her whimpers and starting to splash gasoline on her. "People who think I owe them something. I owe no one anything! I'm above you all and that's why you're going to die. Should have answered my questions the first time instead of being a cunt and you might have lived."

She screams and calls for help but no one will be coming to her rescue. It would be too late anyways. I flip open the lighter and smile as I throw it at her. The flames instantly light the tires on fire surrounding her and her shrieks get louder as her flesh sizzles and pops. It starts to smell like burnt meat but I don't care. I'm here to watch the show as her skin melts off until bone peaks through. Eventually, she stops screaming as she slowly dies but the tires keep her body burning until only what will remain of her will be burnt flesh stuck to the tires.

"Cruz!" Nix calls out from somewhere behind me, keeping a distance, but I don't bother looking at him when I have a show in front of me for my entertainment.

"What?" I scowl at the remaining flames, annoyed that he's interrupting my me time.

"Something happened. We need to get to the club. Right now."

The first thought I had upon arriving back at the club for the first time in two months is that it's going to be some stupid bullshit. Missing drugs or some shit, which tends to happen when you have a bunch of bikers that are hooked to the shit. But I didn't think I'd be opening a perfectly wrapped package with a fucking head inside. I wasn't sure what the big deal was at first. Just someone out there missing a body part, but once I pulled the head out and held it up to the rest of the Demon Jokers surrounding me, I realized what a prize I had in my hand. My fist gripped handfuls of hair as Payne's head dangled in the air, his expression one of surprise. The bastard thought he was invincible, it's almost a shame I didn't get to kill him myself. This makes it easier to take Tillie without having to get this fucker's permission to have her to myself. Not like that would stop me anyways.

"Any idea who did this?" I ask the men around me, noticing some missing members like Poe and Whiskey until I see some more packages scattered on the bar top.

Is that a foot sticking out of the top of the box? I have to admit, I'm impressed. No postage or any hints of where their bodies were chopped up at or where they came from. I'll find out eventually. Nothing gets by me. I'm smarter than all the mindless, boring people.

"Not yet but it's only a matter of time. This means war. Whoever did this came after our club and president," someone mutters, my eyes connecting to the prospect whose name I don't bother remembering.

Just another body that's breathing in his meat suit before he dies.

"I want answers now. What has Payne been up to in my absence?" I ask out loud, meeting anyone's gaze who has the balls to meet my eyes.

When no one says anything, I raise a brow and slam Payne's head down on the table. As I let go, a streak of shredded skin and muscles smear across the surface of the wood as his head rolls off and topples to the dirty floor.

"I'm your president now. Being Vice makes me next in line. I want some fucking answers. Now!" Cracking my neck, I plaster on a fake ass smile that strains my lips and gaze each member in the eye as I pretend to be anything but angry. "Okay, who is going to tell me what I missed while I was gone?" I calmly ask and feel smug when these lowlifes don't question me being Prez.

They could have a vote but then I'd have to start killing them off one at a time for voting against me and I'm pretty sure they know this.

"Payne was on a bender again. Keeping his whereabouts mainly to himself and took his most trusted club members with him. All we know is he was visiting another motorcycle club somewhere in California." The prospect speaks up again and it's as if the kid thinks he can impress me by squaring his shoulders while looking me in the eye.

It doesn't work but he has more balls than most of these fuckers avoiding my gaze. He does have my attention though when most would bore me. I'm eager to hear what he knows about California.

"What's your name one-percenter?" I walk towards him, enjoying the fear that flashes in his eyes for a split-second before he clears his throat as I stop in front of him.

"Taz," he mutters and gets shifty-eyed as I place my hand on his shoulder and steer him towards my new office, Payne's old office.

"You're dismissed!" I say loudly enough for everyone to hear me, the sound of stomping boots quickly leaving the room hardens my smile. One command and they go running like the devil is chasing after them. Nix shakes his head and walks out slowly, he better fall in line. I don't care if he hates me or how I'm going to run this club. If I say jump, he better ask how high. Everyone will obey me.

Useless cowards.

I turn my attention back to Taz and my smile slips off my face when I shut the door behind us, rounding the desk. Taking a seat, I prop my feet on the desk surface and stare at Taz for a long time as he fidgets near the door.

"I see a promotion in your future very soon, Taz. Tell me everything you've heard. California you said?"

I shiver in delight. It looks like we will be taking a visit out to California. I just need to figure out which club Payne went to. I can feel it. Mine. My little bird is hiding in the sunny state and I can't wait to find her.

"I might be able to help. I've heard some things whenever Payne was high. He had some ties with a gang out there on the west side. Muerte or something like that." Lorrie's smoker voice speaks up as she pushes through the door without knocking, letting me know she was eavesdropping, and plants her skinny ass on my lap.

Her eyes are glazed, blown wide from cocaine or whatever shit she's on these days. I hide my disgust with a stoic expression, leaning back in my chair as I stare at her weathered face from years of drug abuse.

"Since when?" I wave my hand at Taz, dismissing him as I rub my blond beard with my other hand.

"Since they started supplying hardcore drugs to our club and offering a lot of money to bring in some woman off the streets to put up for sale." She smiles, patting my chest, and not seeming all that sad that Payne is currently cut up into tiny pieces, hanging out in the bar.

"Rig used to take a lot of trips out there back in the day. Payne was a greedy bastard and wanted more money than God. I've heard that the Muerte isn't well-liked around those parts but they have cash flowing in." Lorrie starts to slide her hand down, covering my cock with her palm and frowning when she realizes I'm not hard for her.

Only one woman gets me hard and she's not fucking here. No one can hold a candle to my little bird.

"Thank you for sharing that bit of information. I've always wondered where Payne was disappearing to and where he was getting expensive, pure snow," I say and muse out loud, smacking Lorrie's rubbing palm away and standing suddenly.

She falls to the ground with a pathetic cry and stares up at me with fear as I tower over her frail, weak body.

"I–I can be useful. I'll please you like no other woman has before, you can do whatever you want to my body," she stutters, desperately reaching for my belt buckle as if blowing me will save her life.

"I don't want a willing woman, I'd rather hear her screams as I take her body," I say without emotion, picturing my initials on Tillie's back as I fucked her ass.

I shiver, needing to see her tears and hear her pleas for it all to stop once again. It's been too long and I'm hungry for more of her.

Lorrie's eyes widen as I pull my gun out from the back of my pants and dig the barrel between her eyes. She starts blabbering, promising me she can be all that I want but the thing is… no one can expect little bird.

"Once a whore, always a whore," I say, picturing my birth mother passed out on the threadbare couch as some faceless stranger rammed his cock in her, all for the needle that pierced her skin every night.

My lips twitch at the corners, wanting to smile but I never can. Not unless I force myself to. I pull the trigger and watch as Lorrie's brain matter splatters on the walls in chunks. I take a deep breath, closing my eyes, feeling more alive but not fully. The warm spray of her blood doesn't even cheer up my mood. At least we are finally getting somewhere and we have a destination. Time to make a deal with this Muerte gang with me being the new Prez.

Soon, very fucking soon, she'll be within reach.