“You could’ve helped us. You must’ve heard our cries. We screamed the fucking house down before they gagged us.”
“I didn’t. I swear to God, I didn’t hear a thing. I wouldn’t ever leave someone to get hurt like that. I’m… I’m… sorry.”
“Too little too late,pumpkin. We wouldn’t have been anywhere near that basement if it wasn’t for you. You got us there, you left us there, and you let it happen. Now it’s our turn to fuck shit up.”
“What do you want from me?” I wrapped my arms around my knees, hugging myself, but feeling no comfort. I doubted I ever would again.
“We want your father. He needs to pay for what he did to us. What he did to all those kids. You’reourbait now, but Daddy dearest doesn’t seem to want to come out of the pedo-riddled shadows and face us. We’re stronger, but he doesn’t like older, stronger boys, does he? He doesn’t like it when we fight back.”
“I’ve no idea where he is. Please, I don’t know what else to say.”
“How about, sorry for destroying our childhood. Sorry for bringing us into your home to get violated by a pair of filthy, dirty paedophiles. Sorry for ever looking in your direction.”
“I’m not my father. I didn’t do those horrible, disgusting things to you. I didn’t even know they were happening, and I didn’t ask for any of this.”
“But they were happening. And now, you need to pay.”
“You, you’re psychopaths. Both of you. You’re crazy.”
“If we’re psychopaths, it’s because your father made us that way. He left quite a storm in his wake.”
I shuddered in fear and revulsion. I’d thought that the loss of Cill was the lowest I could get. That a life without him was the worst possible scenario, but I was wrong. A life without him, and living with the knowledge that my father had decimated so many young lives and left us all to deal with the aftermath, was so much worse. How was I ever going to make peace with that? I couldn’t. In that moment, I felt as if a bullet to my brain would be a kindness. The brothers taking their revenge out on me, and taking my life, would be the best outcome for all of us.
“You want me dead for everything my father has done? Fine. Get it over with. I don’t care anymore.”
“Oh no, little pumpkin, little dog. You don’t get out of it that easily. We’re keeping you until he shows his face. We will flush him out, even if we have to send you back to your mother piece by piece. Eventually we will get to him.Youwill help us get to him.”
Our boat was speedingthrough the water, and yet it felt like we were going at a snail’s pace, judging from the monitors in front of us. The distance between us and the dot that was Paige was closing way too slowly for my liking.
“Can this thing go any faster?” I urged, hoping Gus had some booster button hidden on-board somewhere.
“Not if you want to get there in one piece.” He carried on steering and checking his devices without giving me a backward glance.
I could feel the tension rolling off of Jackson as he stood next to me. He knew what I was going through. He’d felt the terror of having a loved one ripped away from him. It was soul-crushing, and yet you could never let go. I’d never give up looking for her. She was a part of me now. As essential to my everyday as air and water. I could never go back to being the man I was all those months ago. Care-free and living life from one meaningless encounter to the next. What was the point? I knew now what it meant to love someone more than you loved yourself. I’d have done anything for my Paige, and that included annihilating the men who’d taken her from me.
I bit my nails as the time ticked on, and then, as the radar showed we were close to the yacht, Gus cut the engines.
“I can’t get any closer without them hearing us. I hope you men are ready, because if they know how to use the equipment on-board, they’ll have already detected we’re here.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, but Jax beat me to a response.
“So what bloody use is it to us for you to stop here? Do you expect us to swim the rest of the way?”
Gus shrugged then led us back out of his cabin and pointed to a tiny row boat roped up at the rear.
“You’ll have to row the rest of the way, lads. That’s your best bet at catching them unawares. Remember to aim for the side with the ladder so you can climb up. Otherwise you’ll be bobbing about in the sea like a pair of idiots. Sitting ducks, that’s what you two’ll be.”
“Jeez, thanks for the vote of confidence, captain.” I saluted Gus and he laughed.
“Stay safe, boys. Get that girl of yours off there safely. I’ll be waiting here for you when you get back.”
We hauled the row boat up and into the water, then lowered ourselves in, ready to make the journey across.
“Are you any good at rowing?” Jackson asked, as he sat opposite me and fiddled about with the oars.
“Do I look like a rower to you? I know fuck all, other than we row at the same time or we’ll end up going around in circles.” Jackson rolled his eyes and started to row, and I joined in, urged on by the desperate need to get going and end this all tonight.
“Don’t drop your oar into the water, otherwise we’re fucked,” Jackson said, drily.
