With Val bleeding on the ground and Stephanie wounded, I knew I had to move fast if I wanted to get out of there before the cops showed up…again.

 

“Come on,” I barked over my shoulder. “Get that dead bitch from the roof and bring her down here.” Kyle trotted upstairs and I heard him lugging Tara’s body down. She had a shocked expression on her face, like she couldn’t believe that she’d somehow died while patrolling. I had to look away—I didn’t like violence, but sometimes it was necessary. And if I was being honest, it gave me a thrill. Guns gave me a thrill, they made me feel powerful, even in a way that leading Jungle’s Thorns didn’t. Guns were an evil invention, but I knew that I couldn’t survive without one or two around all the time.

 

“What do we do now?” Nick looked up at me.

 

I shrugged. “We make one hell of a crime scene for the cops to find, and then we call them, I guess,” I said over my shoulder as I jogged over to Stephanie. She was still sitting in the same painfully tight position; I guessed that she didn’t have enough blood flowing through her body to try to move. When I reached behind her back and cut the plastic zip ties binding her wrists, Stephanie moaned softly and collapsed against me.

 

“Isaac,” Stephanie moaned. “Isaac, I’m in so much pain.”

 

“You’ll be okay,” I told her tersely as I cut the binds around her ankles. I grabbed one of her hands in my own, ignoring the spark of lust that flashed between us. With Stephanie’s blue eyes locked on my face, I began rubbing the skin and massaging it, trying to get the blood flowing through her hands again. After a few moments, Stephanie began to murmur and whimper in pain. I hated hurting her, but I knew that it was working. Without this, she maybe could have lost a hand.

 

“What happened?” Stephanie looked at me. “How did you know to find me?”

 

“Val called me,” I said. “She said she had you here and she wanted me to give up all the arms I got from Sergey earlier today.”

 

Stephanie’s lids closed slowly over her blue eyes. It took me a moment to realize that she’d passed out—just from shock, I figured. It wasn’t terribly surprising, considering everything that she’d been through over the past couple of weeks. I could imagine that finding out Val’s true motivations had been a real blow to Stephanie’s spirit. After all, she and Val had built the Succubi from the ground up. Now it was looking like Stephanie was the only one out of all of them who wouldn’t be going to prison when this whole thing was settled.

 

“Boss,” TJ said in a heavy voice. “What do we do with her?” He pointed down to Jessica, who lay silently on the ground. Aside from her sobs, she wasn’t even moving. Her face was bright red and streaked with hot tears of anger and embarrassment. “She’s gonna make a lot of noise once I take the gun away,” TJ said in a threatening voice. “We have to do something—and quick!”

 

“I have a plan,” I said darkly. “Come on, guys. Go to the van and get some of the guns. Not all of them, say maybe about a third or a quarter. And bring that towel we keep in the back.”

 

TJ and Nick nodded and jogged through one of the concrete cracks in the warehouse. I kept massaging Stephanie’s hands until the color looked almost normal. Her skin still felt cool and clammy to the touch but I could tell that she was going to make it out of this and be totally fine.

 

“You’re gonna be okay,” I told Stephanie in a ragged voice. “Val’s going to prison, if she’s still alive. And this little bitch is tied up.”

 

Stephanie didn’t wake. Her breathing was calm, even. It reminded me of when we were kids, back when she was still Candace, and I used to sneak into her room. For a moment I was transported back to the time when she loved me. I closed my eyes and listened to the soft, even sound of her breathing, imagining that we were in the same bed. Stephanie had always been the lightest of sleepers and I’d had to be very careful as not to wake her.

 

“She alright?” Kyle walked over to me and glanced down. “I mean, is she gonna make it?”

 

“She’s been through a lot,” I replied sharply. “How’s Alexa? Did you see her here?”

 

Kyle shook his head. “I don’t think she bought into Val’s bullshit,” he said. “Thankfully. She’s back at the clubhouse with a couple of the other girls.” Kyle let out a low whistle. “I can’t believe these tricky bitches,” he said. “I’ve never seen anything like this before in my life.”

 

“Tell me about it,” I said, rolling my eyes. Suddenly, all of the Jungle’s Thorns problems seemed like nothing compared to what Stephanie had just gone through. I couldn’t imagine how it would feel to know that my best friend and confidant had been working against me from the beginning. It was a devastating blow. I wondered what Stephanie would do after she recovered. She’ll probably want to get the fuck away from LA, I thought.

 

Part of me was sad at that thought, and I couldn’t articulate why. Thankfully, Nick and TJ came running back through the warehouse at that exact moment, their arms loaded up with guns and assault rifles.

 

“This is some of it, boss,” TJ said. He was breathing heavily and he dropped the guns down on the floor. “What do you want us to do?”

 

"Get the towel and wipe down every single fucking gun in here," I said sharply. "We need to make it look like an Succubi shoot-out." I took one of the pistols and wiped it clean of fingerprints before grabbing Jessica's trussed hand and shoving the gun inside. "Hold onto this, bitch," I said with a grin. "Or don't, I don't really care. As soon as the cops get your prints off it, they'll know you were involved."

 

Jessica let out a squeal of frustration and rage and I chuckled. There was something about seeing her down that really cheered me up. Val was obviously evil, she had been from the start. But I was guessing that Jessica had been the innocent of the group, someone who had really played up her cuteness.

 

“You’re not gonna be so cute in prison,” I told Jessica with a smirk. “Everyone’s gonna see you for the snake you really are.”

 

Jessica’s face twisted into a fearful scowl. “Fuck off,” she said in her tiny, high-pitched voice. “I don’t need you!”

 

I chuckled again. “So, we need to drop the guns around here and make it look like the Succubi did, well, something bad,” I said. Val was still lying motionless on the ground. She was breathing, but blood was flowing from her leg at an alarming rate. I walked over to make sure she was breathing and was startled to see her eyes open and a lazy grin on her face.

 

“You think you can take me down?” Val sneered.

 

I laughed. “You’re already down, bitch,” I told her with a grin. “Now you just gotta wait for the cops to show up and take you to your new home. At least you’re already gay, you won’t have to worry about turning in the pen!”

 

Val growled and snarled like a dog. I kicked her in the ribs and she started whimpering and rolling around, clutching onto her leg and looking pathetic.

 

“Isaac?” Stephanie’s soft voice floated across the open air. “Isaac, are you there?”

 

I rushed to her side and got down on my hands and knees. “We’re getting you out of here,” I told her softly. “Don’t you worry, okay? Everything’s going to be fine.”

 

Stephanie no longer looked dazed. She looked very much aware of her surroundings, albeit uncomfortable. “I want to leave,” she said under her breath. “But first, I need to do something.”

 

I nodded. “Whatever you need,” I told her. “I’ll be right over here.” I walked over to Nick and TJ who were busy setting the guns up on the floor. They’d dropped another gun near Val and they were wiping it clean of their prints, trying to make it look like she was the one who had shot Tara. “You guys almost ready to go?”

 

“Yeah,” Nick said. “We gotta get another ride out of here, though. The tires on the van are blown from driving over that chain wire.”

 

I swallowed. “We gotta get rid of it,” I said. “We can’t leave it. They’ll trace it to us. Do we have any rags?”

 

Twenty minutes later, the guys, Stephanie, and I watched as the van exploded into a mass of red-orange flames. They licked up towards the dark sky, giving off a wall of heat that smelled like metal and oil. I had to step away from the burning van; the fire was so hot that it was making my face feel scorched and red.

 

Kyle had walked into town to look for a ride back. Now, we were waiting until he showed up. I’d managed to put a makeshift tourniquet on Val’s leg to slow the bleeding, but I could tell that she was going to be just fine. In a couple of weeks, she’d even be transferred out of the medical part of prison and into the regular pen. I grinned. Revenge was a dish best served cold, but I couldn’t deny that I liked it hot, too.