Page 40 of Rattler's Revelation
I can’t stop myself from shuddering in disgust when Wade looks at me and licks his lips suggestively. He laughs at my discomfort as Billy drags Nadine and me outside.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: RATTLER
“What?” I shout, pushing out of the booth with Randy following suit. We stop at the ladies’ restroom long enough to double-check before rushing out the back door. The back of the restaurant is empty. “Where did she go?” I ask out loud, not expecting an answer.
“Look, they have security cameras. I’ll ask to check the feed,” Randy says, turning and retreating into the restaurant. “I need to see your security feed. Where is your security system?”
Our waitress opens and closes her mouth a few times before pointing mutely at the door near the end of the hallway. It’s closed, but the sign on the door says ‘Manager.’ Randy pounds on the door. At first, I don’t think anyone is inside, but then the door flies open to reveal an angry man with the worst combover in the history of combovers. He’s squat and chubby with oily skin and a moustache that looks more like a caterpillar crawled onto his lip to take a nap. I sneer at the man as Randy takes out his badge.
“We need to view your security feed,” Randy says, pushing past the man into the tiny, untidy office.
“What? Why? What the fuck do you want? Where’s your warrant? Who are you?” the man sputters.
“I’m Officer Randy Sterling, and he’s Rattler. A woman who came into this diner with us was abducted from your bathrooms and taken out back. I need to see the feed. Now!”
“You’ll need a warrant…” he starts, but I push past Randy and get into his face. There is a time for using the badge and a time for using threats.
“Look, you piece of shit. You have two choices here. My friend here is a cop; I’m sure he can get the warrant or anything else you need to compel you to show us that feed, or you can show us the feed without all the bureaucratic crap. If you demand the first, then my club and I will make it our life’s work to close this establishment down. How long do you think you’ll last if the Demon Dawgs decide to scare off all your customers? If you don’t want that to happen, then you’ll take door number two and show us the fucking feed, right fucking now,” I snarl.
The man gapes like a fish for a long second before he stumbles back and falls into his desk chair. “How far back do you need me to go?”
“Twenty minutes,” I say. Randy and I stand behind the desk as we watch the manager rewind the feed. When I spot the car speeding off, I tell him to stop and reverse more slowly. When he does, we watch as an old Ford sedan pulls into view and parks. A man exits from the passenger’s seat and opens the back door before disappearing inside the diner. A few minutes later, he exits the restaurant, carrying Bianca. Randy and I growl when the driver exits the vehicle and pops open the trunk. They toss Bianca inside the trunk before slamming it shut and hopping back in the car. When they take off, I turn to the manager. “Give me a copy of that.”
“I don’t know how,” the man splutters. I push him out of the way and copy the feed to Nadine’s USB drive. Pocketing it, I stand and gesture for Randy to precede me out the door.
“Wait, you won’t ruin my business, right?” the manager asks as we leave his office.
I shake my head as we head for the front door. The waitress waylays us.
“I packed up your food,” she says, handing me a bag with styrofoam containers inside. “I hope you find your friend.” The concern on her face prompts me to pull out a hundred and hand it to her. It will not only cover our order but also give her a hefty tip.
Once we’re in Randy’s vehicle, he wastes no time in driving us to the clubhouse. I hand the bag of food to Gramps, who is Wildcard’s soon-to-be father-in-law and a former member of the Demon Dawgs, who came home. “Put this in the fridge, I’m sure someone will eat it.”
I spot Chill and Viper, who are sitting with Hunter and Rafe, and head in their direction. “I need to talk to you. The bastards grabbed Bianca. We need to find them. Now.” I don’t say it, but my meaning is clear. We need to stop fucking around with Walt and get him to spill on the location of his father’s camp.
“Who has Bianca?” Rafe asks as he pushes from the table.
“Two guys grabbed her from the diner,” Randy explains. “One matches the description of Billy, the guy Bianca identified from Nadine’s neighbor’s description. The other is Tommy. I recognized him.” He hands Nadine’s notebook to Rafe, while I dig out the USB drive.
“I copied the diner’s security feed to the USB drive. We need to find the car. Did they show up at the storage unit?” I ask, remembering that Rafe and the others were waiting for Tommy to show up and investigate the reported break-in.
“They didn’t show. Stevie promised to call if they do, and I have uniforms watching the place. Give me the USB drive, we’ll go work with Spark to see if we can track the bastards.”
Once Rafe and Randy disappear down the hallway that leads to Spark’s office, I turn to Chill and Viper. “We need to talk to Walt and break him. He has to tell us where we can find Bianca. I can’t lose her. We can’t lose her.”
Viper’s eyebrows shoot up when she hears my last sentence. “We? As in who? You and?”
“Randy. The three of us. We’re a trouple,” I tell her, and Chill—no time to ease them into this. They need to know how important Bianca is to both of us.
“Really?” Chill asks with a smirk. “Interesting. We’re definitely talking about this later. I want to know how it happened. In the meantime, let’s take care of Walt. Maybe you should bring a couple of your friends along.”
Viper joins me as I lead the way to the room where we keep several snakes. Viper and I earned our road names in part because of our shared hobby. We maintain several venomous and non-venomous snakes as pets, but we also collect their venom in case we need to pass off a death as natural. I’ve lost count of the number of enemies we’ve injected and dumped in the desert. A few have been found, and in each case, their deaths were considered accidents. We have also used snakes to extract information from prisoners. It’s incredible how quickly lips unseal when faced with a hissing rattler or a deadly cobra.
“Are you and Randy sharing Bianca, or are the three of you…?” Viper asks as I grab two portable terrariums, while she snags the protective gear.
“Randy is bisexual. Turns out I am, too,” I tell her, glancing at her face as she hands me the goggles before slipping on her pair. Her expression doesn’t tell me what she’s thinking. “Is that a problem?”
She flicks a glance at me as she reaches inside the aquarium to coax Dalya out from under her rock. Dalya is a hissing cobra who shoots venom into the eyes of her prey. She’s terrifying and our greatest weapon. We’re not fucking around. “No, why would it?”
