Brice’s patience wore thin the longer he spent waiting for that fucking cop to come home. If the sheriff wouldn’t help him, Sergeant Foster would. The hours he spent in this little hovel of a home with the cold congealed bacon grease from yesterday morning stinking up the kitchen were about to be rewarded. As night turned to dawn turned to a morning spent eating stale cereal while he waited, his fury rose that the fucking cop slept in some lover’s bed while Brice had forced himself to stay awake for just this moment.
Sergeant Foster walked in the front door and headed straight for the table, where he tossed his change and keys in the bowl Brice spotted earlier, anticipating the man was a creature of habit. That routine allowed Brice to gain the upper hand on the armed cop. He stepped out of the office on the other side of the wide foyer from the kitchen and swung.
The bat hit Foster in the back of the head with a sickening crack. The sergeant crumpled like a demolished building. Brice snatched the gun from his belt and tucked it behind his back in the waistband of his black trousers. He stared down at the unconscious man with a smug, satisfied smile.
“Take that.” Brice used to play on the After Midnight softball team. They faced off with the Marked cast. A bunch of tough guys who played SWAT team members on a popular TV show. Brice might not look like a jock, but he could hold his own.
Brice clamped his hand around the big man’s wrist, dragged him into the office, and rolled him to his back. He pulled his hands together and tied them with the rope he found in the garage.
Foster’s eyes squinted with pain. He groaned as he regained consciousness. Brice worked fast, using Foster’s disorientation to pull him up and into a chair. The man tried to fight, but the head injury made his movements slow and ineffective against Brice’s steady head and speed. He had the man’s ankles tied to the chair legs in less than a minute. Foster struggled more. Brice took the bat in hand and jabbed it hard into Foster’s sternum to get his attention.
Foster coughed and tried to catch his breath, sucking in air that didn’t fill his lungs at first, but then he regained his breath and his head and glared up at Brice.
“There now. I have your attention.”
“What the fuck do you want?”
“An answer to a simple question. Who has Adam?”
Foster shook his head. “I don’t know.”
Brice punched him.
Foster’s head snapped to the side. Blood dripped out of his cut lip and down his chin. He worked his jaw, then spit blood, hitting Brice right in the face. The goopy spittle rolled down his cheek. He wiped it away with the back of his sleeve looking at the bloody mess. He hit Foster again, breaking his nose and sending a gush of blood out his nostrils. This time when Foster’s head snapped back, then forward he had the sergeant’s full attention. And hopefully his cooperation.
Brice sucked in a breath, riding the rush of adrenaline and pleasure racing through his veins. “Didn’t Ashley tell you how much I love to cause pain?” Brice set the end of the bat on the wood chair between Foster’s widespread legs and nudged the tip right into his balls. “Who has Adam?”
Foster tried to breathe through his open mouth. His head hung forward, his eyes closed. Blood dripped onto the bat between his legs.
Brice grabbed him by the hair and yanked his head up. “I know he’s not with the DEA agent who was with Aurora . . . oh, I mean Ashley, at the hospital. The one who thinks he can put his hands on my woman.”
Foster’s eyes opened and the man glared daggers at him. “You don’t want to fuck with him. He killed your buddy Darren early this morning. You even think about going near Ashley, he’ll kill you, too.”
Brice pushed Foster’s head, pulling his hair, and released him. “No. You’re lying. Darren isn’t dead.”
Foster gave him a gruesome bloody grin. “He tried to sneak onto that DEA agent’s property to kidnap Ashley back for you. For all his wanting to please you, he ended up dead.”
Brice jabbed the bat into Foster’s balls. “No! He’s not dead.”
Foster grunted in pain and folded over, trying to ease the excruciating pain and hide his nuts from another attack.
Brice seethed. “That stupid fuck. I told him to stay put and wait for me. He defied me and got what he deserved.”
“You will, too.” Foster found his breath and the ability to spit words through his clenched jaw. “They found your files in Darren’s car, including the one with all the video cards of the recordings you made of all the twisted things you did to Ashley . . . Aurora . . . no, Ashley.” Foster’s narrowed, fury-filled gaze sharpened with the promise of death if he got his hands on Brice.
No. They took all his precious recordings.
All his allies would fall.
He’d have no help.
He was on his own.
They knew his secrets and what he’d done to help Ashley transform into her true self. They didn’t understand. No one but Ashley understood why and how hard he’d worked to help her become her true self.
He swung the bat wide, whacking Foster in the head and putting him out, hopefully for good judging by the blood oozing out of the wound on the side of his head.
He didn’t need Foster’s help to find Adam. Once he got Aurora back, she’d know where to find Adam. They’d be together again. All he had to do was bide his time, find the right opportunity, and he’d have her back in his arms. They’d finish what they started. She’d finish her transformation and be his. Finally.