JETT
I watched the guy squirming in the chair, the tape so tightly wrapped around him I could see his skin on his arms turning a reddish-purple. For the past two weeks, I’d been tracking down Giordy’s friends who had been associated with him around the time Ebony was fifteen.
This was friend number four.
“I don’t know who you’re talking about!”
York whacked him across the knees with a stick. He screamed like a little girl, tears running down his cheeks. Usually, this would bring me joy, but right now I wasn’t feeling it, and I knew it was because I wasn’t making any fucking progress. My patience was long gone, which meant my gun was about to be pulled out to waste yet another guy fucking with me.
“Ebony Caine,” I said, holding up her mugshot. “Remember?”
“Oh... you mean Adora-Lee’s kid?”
“Yes...”
“What about her? She’s a felon.”
“Do you remember her a little more… vividly?”
His eyes widened, and he shook his head quickly. “No, I’m not like that. She was just a kid.”
“Who else showed a particular interest in her, if not you?”
“I can’t. He’ll kill me.”
“I’ll kill you,” I said, angrily. “Either quickly, or I’ll drag it out. Kill your family. Your kids. Then as you watch your world wither away around you, I’ll slowly torture you until your body gives up.”
He sobbed while I waited for a name. Yes, I was a sadistic man who enjoyed the pain of others but for the last couple of weeks, I’d been on a mission to find out who had hurt Ebony. I found myself caring about her, somehow she had wormed her way into my cold, dead heart, and I didn’t like it. When I found the man who had taken her away from her innocence, I was going to hurt him and all he held dear, and then I was going to flush the memory from her mind and send her on her fucking way into a new life so I could get back to mine.
“Name.”
“I only know one person. He wasn’t the one that did it, but he’s hiding the man who did. His name is John Lambert.”
I sat back on the chair I’d been sitting on, annoyed this fuckhead was wasting my time with names I knew didn’t exist anymore. “John Lambert is dead.”
“No, he’s not. Just in hiding.”
A flurry of emotion made its way into my chest. Although I had closed that part of my life down, I didn’t expect it to hit me so hard. I nodded to York who hit the guy over the head, knocking him out cold.
“Who the fuck is John Lambert?” York asked.
“Someone I had buried a long time ago, or so I thought.”
“Someone I should track down?”
“Yes. I need to find out where he is, if he’s alive. This fuck may be lying… let’s hope he is.”
“Anything I should know first.”
“I guess I should tell you the first thing you’re going to find out. John Lambert is my father.”
✽✽✽
I was out of my comfort zone telling someone about my past. York didn’t react, just nodded and went off to get the information I needed. I had to do something to get this anger out of me. John was meant to be dead.
Goddamn, I knew I should have pulled the trigger myself. You can only trust yourself. At least that’s what they said, wasn’t it?
Pulling out my gun, I took aim at the target in front of me. The shooting range had been a favorite of mine for quite some time. It was where I learned how to effectively shoot, and how to focus on the target and become proficient in hitting moving items. Those days were long behind me, though. I hadn’t had to learn anything new for years.
Shooting dulled my anger, but I still had the underlying anger toward my father waiting to burst free. How hadn’t I known he was still alive? John wasn’t someone who laid low. I quickly emptied my clip and holstered my gun. Time was not on my side. Grabbing my jacket, I headed toward my Lamborghini.
Speeding through the streets of the city, I felt like I needed a lift, so I stopped by Serenity Asylum. I sat in the car for a while hoping I could find the courage to just drive away but instead, I pulled my holster from my arms, rolled my sleeves up to my elbow, and headed inside. The entire time I knew I needed to just walk back to my car and take care of my failing organization, the organization Giordy was trying to overtake.
“Mr. Black!” Maria smiled over at me. “What a surprise. Have you come to see your friend?”
“Yes. How is she?”
“She’s about to go in for her ECT. Would you like to observe?”
They’ve booked her in for the electro-shock without consulting me? I know I had told Dr. Romero to start the process, but I honestly thought it would take longer to convince him to do it off the books. He was relatively new to the establishment, but he knew not to question me, and I liked that about him.
“Would love to. Has she been trouble?”
“She’s decided to believe she’s not delusional and has rebuffed us at every opportunity. Likes to think you’re the devil and illegally keeping her here.”
I smiled, liking that she was still displaying some form of restraint. That was my girl. The thought that crossed my mind just now wasn’t what I wanted to think when it came to her. I didn’t want her to be my girl—I didn’t want nor need a girl.
Maria led me down the hall. The last time I’d used this facility to get rid of witnesses and people thinking they weren’t scared of me, most of them ended up committing suicide or becoming legally insane and were moved to another facility. It was the best way to get rid of someone when I needed them off the streets without having to clean up their dead body. It didn’t happen as often as I killed, but when it did, I reserved this treatment for those who truly fucked with me.
Maria opened a door into an empty room. “Where is she?”
“Coming. They’ve had to strap her to the gurney before moving her.”
I smiled, knowing my little spitfire was about to be taught a lesson. The wheels of the gurney squealed as the orderlies rolled her in. She wasn’t acting out, though. She was still on the gurney with the straps holding her down. Her head rolled from side to side with the movement. What if she lost her memory of me? I had heard of things like that, people lost their memories with this treatment.
“She’s not fiery today.”
“No, she’s sedated.”
Had she lost her fire and succumbed to her situation? God, I hoped not. Dr. Romero came into the room, surprised by my presence, but said nothing. Luckily for me, I’d found a doctor for hire, one so disgraced by his past that he had no option but to do as I asked. He moved to Ebony and began telling her what was about to happen in a soothing tone. I could only smirk as she turned to him and spat right in his face.
Dr. Romero calmly wiped his face nodding to his assistant to begin administering the muscle relaxant. His assistant, Gloria I think her name was, walked over to Ebony and placed a mask over her mouth and nose. Maria was telling me this was how it worked giving her a general anesthesia first. To my surprise, Ebony didn’t move while it was happening. Finally, I saw her body loosen from its stiffened posture onto the gurney once the relaxant had taken effect.
Gloria placed electrodes over the temples of Ebony’s head linking her to a machine off to the side. Two electrodes were placed on her chest and an arm cuff around her upper arm. Lastly, they clamped something on her finger. The doctor inserted a tube into her nose, taping it to the side of her mouth to keep it in place.
“We’re ready.”
The nurse turned to watch the monitors that were connected to the wires coming from Ebony. Romero administered a shock that rocked Ebony’s body. She jerked upward and down, the lines on the monitor became erratic for a second before returning to normal.
“Again.”
Romero clicked a button on the side monitor, and Ebony jolted again seizing off the gurney before falling back down with a thump. Her head lolled to the side, but she was still awake. I could see her eyes on me.
“All fine, doctor.”
I had a strange feeling reside within me watching it unfold in front of me. I’d had subjected this treatment to others without even thinking twice about them, but I’d never wanted to watch before. Once I locked someone in here, I forgot about them until I found out they’d turned into the monster I had always wanted them to be or until they had to be transferred. With Ebony, for some reason, I was worried she would lose her memory of me, of what I did to her, and what I was threatening to do to her. Maria ushered me out of the room as the doctor and Gloria removed the tubes and electrodes. Maria was standing off to the side checking on a clipboard I knew was her rounds’ schedule, but every now and then she would look up at me with a curious expression before turning back to her work. I knew what it was about. She was wondering why I cared for Ebony, why the hell I was checking in on her when I’d never done that before. Fuck, if I knew the answer to that, I wouldn’t be so fucking conflicted right now. This sharp pain shooting across my chest was not something I was used to. The last time I had this was when I heard my mother being murdered over fifteen years ago.
Romero came out a short while later, a look on his face I couldn’t read. “We won’t know how successful it was until tomorrow, but we suggest she go through the same process once more this week and maybe some more next week. Usually, we’d subject her to a month of this, several times a week, but she doesn’t seem to be as psychotic as most who undergo this treatment.”
I knew it was a dig at my authority over him. I’d come here to take my mind off my father and the fact he may not be dead, and yet I now faced another challenge. I was feeling something for this woman—for this enemy of mine. Another thought had suddenly occurred to me. If John wasn’t dead, that meant this place was still his, and therefore so was Ebony.
“Just let me know what happens tomorrow.”
I took off without saying goodbye to Maria which was out of character for me. I knew who to keep on my good books, and she was someone I didn’t want to push away. There had been many a time when she’d cleaned up a mess of mine so it didn’t come out of those asylum doors to destroy my good standing with the government officials, but the thought of John owning Ebony had me angry. I needed to fucking find him now before he fucked everything up for me.
I thought back to that day at the cabin when Ebony had asked me what made me into the monster I am. The truth was, it was my father. He forced me into this persona—whoever the fuck I am, mostly because he was a monster himself. The problem was I was much worse than he had ever been. I think he knew that in the end. He knew I would kill him the second I saw him, but oddly enough I hadn’t. I’d asked someone else to do it, and look what damage control I was doing now because I’d been too chicken-shit to commit patricide.
He was still fucking around and in secret which scared me more than if he’d made himself known. What was he hiding?
There could only be one reason why he was staying silent for so long—one reason which scared me half as much as losing Ebony to him.
He had plans for me.