Page 22 of Nauti Siren (Nauti 7)

He was tied, in a rather clichéd style, to an old-fashioned wooden office chair, because he was too damned cheap to buy the nice, if inexpensive, computer chairs that were so easy to find.

It had worked to restrain him, though.

Duct tape secured his wrists to the arms of the chair and his ankles to the legs. His face was swollen and pale beneath the blood that marred it. The top of his balding head was splattered with his blood, calling attention to the fact that perhaps he’d lost more hair since the last time Rudy had seen him several months ago.

Chester’s head lolled to the side a bit, while small, bloody bubbles filled and deflated at his nostrils with each breath.

He really was a distressing sight, but it couldn’t be helped. Rudy was furious. The loss of the delivery had the potential to do far more than just embarrass him. The loss of that delivery could bring some very nasty individuals into his town looking for him. The type of men one preferred not to piss off. Even one with Rudy’s power.

He couldn’t believe the stupidity.

This was what you got for trying to trust family to do a job right.

“Did you think I would just let this go, Chester?” Rudy asked as he straddled the chair he’d pulled over to the balding, overweight little bastard.

“Rudy, please. ” Sloppy, bleeding, one eye swollen shut, his lips split by the heavy fist that had pounded into them, Chester wept pitifully. “I did like you said; I swear. It was that new girl. She rented the car out. ”

“And now the delivery that came in with that car is missing,” Rudy stated softly. “We checked it thoroughly. ”

“Please. ” Chester choked. “You owe me, Rudy. You owe me. I’ll get them back. I swear I will. ”

He owed him.

Rudy agreed with his cousin for a change.

A six-year stint in prison for a crime he had been nowhere near had earned Chester a hell of a boon. But this . . .

Rudy shook his head as he propped his arms on the back of the chair he was straddling. Six years in prison for the rape of Rudy’s rival’s mistress came nowhere close to the millions of dollars in diamonds, sapphires, and rubies that were now missing.

The slightest awareness of another presence behind him had Rudy waiting patiently, the familiar lack of sound in his son’s movements pleasing.

“I checked the security tapes. She arrived about ten minutes before we did, messed around in the backseat, looks like she knocked over a bag onto the back floorboard. We found a receipt pushed beneath one of the seats for a craft seller for colored crystals and stones. There’s a chance the woman doesn’t know what she has. ” There was no opinion either way in the boy’s voice.

Well, perhaps Andre wasn’t a boy anymore, but as his mother would say, he would always be Rudy’s boy.

“And her name?” Rudy asked.

At his son’s lack of an answer, Rudy turned to stare back at him with a frown. Rarely had Rudy seen this expression on Andre’s face.

That look of concern.

Trepidation began to tingle in Rudy’s gut.

“Piper Mackay, from Somerset, Kentucky. ” The words were a harsh rasp of anger from a man who rarely allowed himself to show any emotion. “The investigation I did on the family after Marlena’s disappearance says she’s James ‘Dawg’ Mackay’s sister. ”

But now, Rudy knew why his son had hesitated to give him the information.

Dawg, Rowdy, and Natches Mackay had not just been instrumental in foiling Marlena Genoa’s plot to kill John Walker Jr. for breaking their engagement, but had also managed to kill Gerard Andrews, the sponsor backing her acceptance into the Genoa family.

“Coincidence?” Rudy asked.

“She’s staying at a hotel no more than two blocks from here,” his son answered. “Chester knows the manager there, from what I’ve gathered. ”

Andre didn’t confirm or deny the theory of coincidence, though Rudy knew he didn’t believe in such a thing. Rudy believed, though. He’d seen far stranger occurrences in his lifetime that could be explained no other way.

“This is a complication. ” Rudy sighed, turning back to glower at Chester. “Why is she here, in the city?”

“According to our contact at the hotel, she’s a clothing designer. She was here for a meeting with a backer,” his son informed him as Rudy stared at Chester, his eyes narrowed with a fury he found hard to control. “Getting into her room won’t be a problem. Once I get in, I’ll restrain her and reacquire our property. That should be the end of it. ”

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