Finn came to with a pounding head, and arms and legs too heavy to move. Until he realized his arms were bound behind his back, and his feet to a chair. When he could make out enough from his surroundings, he saw Lars was sitting a few feet away, his head lolling on his chest.

Both their mouths were bound. Finn tried yelling through the duct tape gag, but the whine it produced had no chance of waking Lars.

Boots approached. That must have been what woke him. Finn scanned the gloom, but couldn’t see where they came from. It looked like they were in a warehouse. Crates stood stacked against one wall, massive barrels along the other. Greasy tracks beneath him indicated this might have been a delivery point at some time, or perhaps even recently. Until whatever had been in here had been removed to make way for him and Lars.

Although it still had to be light outside—he couldn’t have been unconscious longer than an hour—the only illumination in this place came from a bare bulb against a wall close to the suggestion of a doorway.

The boots had been coming from outside. Metal screeched against metal as the warehouse doors were hauled open. A pair of men came inside, their rifles more an afterthought, and a now familiar silhouette appeared in the midday glare.

So he’d been out for more than just an hour or two. Fuck.

Javier Martin, in all his white-linened glory. Immaculate as always. Thick, long hair perfectly styled. Designer shades, and designer probably everything else, even down to what was undoubtedly a pair of pristine name-brand briefs.

Which probably encased a dick the size of a peanut. Men with small dicks always felt the need to overcompensate, and if this villa wasn’t fucking overcompensating for something…

“Good afternoon, Mr. Finn,” Javier said.

Finn didn’t try to respond. It would have been useless through the gag, and maybe him remaining silent would piss Javier off so much that he would remove it.

The screech of the doors opening had woken Lars. Finn watched from the corner of his eyes as he lifted his head and stared groggily over at Javier as the man approached.

There was the soft crunch of grit under Javier’s polished shoes as he came closer. Another smell came to Finn then. Some strong chemical that had spilled in this place.

Bleach.

Was this their killing room where all their rivals came to die before being hacked up and disposed of? Those barrels looked big enough to contain a human being, if you chopped off the limbs and stuck them in around the torso.

He had only himself to blame if that happened. He’d known Angel was bad news, just as Lars had known it. But they’d both let Cora fog up their minds. The guy had seemed so important to her that her concern over him had overridden their own logic.

Finn desperately wanted to ask where Cora was. What Javier had done to her. He’d had limited visibility from inside the SUV when Cora had been hauled out in front of her godfather. He’d seen Lars though, how the guard had slammed him into the gravel and then kicked him repeatedly in the kidneys. He wouldn’t be surprised if Lars peed blood for a week. Finn glanced aside at his friend. His right cheek had bad scrapes over it, but otherwise he seemed uninjured.

Tough as a strip of beef jerky.

But Javier had found their soft spots; each other. Cora, him, Lars. None of them could stand seeing the other get hurt. And Javier had zero issues with using that weakness against them.

“You shouldn’t have taken her from me,” Javier said to Finn. As he came closer, he began rolling up one glaringly-white sleeve of his summer suit. “I am a forgiving man…” Javier frowned. “But taking my family? That is something I cannot forgive.”

Javier began removing his rings. He wore at least five, three on the one hand, two on the other, and they each went into the left breast pocket of his suit. All except one: a large ruby. Then he rolled up his other sleeve, giving Lars a dismissive flicker with his eyes before coming to a stop in front of Finn’s chair.

“I am afraid she may scar,” Javier said quietly. “That beautiful face…”

The man’s handsome features contorted a second before he swung a fist into Finn’s jaw. It was a solid punch. Stars danced at the edge of his vision as Finn shook his head to force clarity back into his sight, his mind.

“I understand I cannot lay the entirety of the blame at your feet,” Javier said, giving his hand an absent shake. “She claims Zachary West was the one that kicked out her back teeth. Still…”

Another blow, this with the other hand, to the other side of Finn’s face. Definitely Javier’s weaker arm, but Finn still had lights across his vision before he could shake them away. The dull ache of earlier returned, fiercer now. But he gritted his teeth and faced Javier, blinking away a bead of sweat when it trickled down his forehead and stung his eye. The warehouse was hot, and seemed to be getting hotter every second.

“I thought you’d feel compelled to protect her. Instead, you handed her to him on a fucking platter.”

Another blow. Javier’s strong hand again. Finn’s teeth were starting to feel loose. There was blood in his mouth, and all he could do was swallow it down.

Across from him, Lars made an angry sound. Javier ignored him, giving his hand a hard shake.

He hoped his jaw broke Javier’s fucking fingers.

“Had he taken her…”

Javier grunted when he hit Finn again.

The world spun a little when he set his head straight. He could hear blood rushing in his ears, and a distant whine that came from nowhere and everywhere. Keeping his eyes open was difficult, and the amount of blood he had to swallow was making him sick.

“If that mamahuevo had gotten away with my Elle…?” Javier ripped away the gag, as if realizing Finn might drown before he could land another few sets of punches on him. “You’d already be dead,” Javier whispered.

Finn pushed blood out of his mouth, shaking his head like a dog. “So kill me.” Finn had to force the words out, and they were so mangled he doubted Javier could understand.

But the man bent low, getting on eye level with him, and then laughed. He spun away from Finn, hands thrown in the air like Finn had just told the one with the priest and the rabbi, and then swung back and landed a fist so hard in his jaw he heard something snap.

For a moment, he thought it was his neck. But then he felt the jagged edges of a tooth in his mouth, swimming in the blood, and almost swallowed it down before he managed to catch it against the roof of his mouth with his tongue.

Javier leaned in again, eyes ablaze with a maniacal light, and said, “Soon, Mr. Finn. But for now, you’re more valuable to me alive than dead.”

He was in the process of standing, half twisting to Lars as if he’d decided it was time to include him on the afternoon’s entertainment, when Finn spat out his tooth. It ejected from his mouth in a spray of blood, most of which painted the side of Javier’s face and his crisp linen suit.

Javier held out his hand like a man who’d just had gutter water splashed on him from a passing car. He turned back to Finn, and slowly wiped his face against his shoulder.

Javier’s next punch was so hard, it knocked him unconscious. But before that always-eager darkness claimed him, he heard Lars make an angry sound in the back of his throat.