Page 30 of Nest of Thieves
Orion advances and roughly grabs my arm. “You knocked him out. What the fuck is wrong with you?” His grip is tight, but I lean into it.
“Guess I’m a little crazy.” I slam my knee into his crotch.
Maybea littleis an understatement.
He releases my arm and doubles over. I smash the flat edge of the tire iron into his temple too. With a pain-filled groan, he drops to the grease covered concrete. I shove my shoe into his side, but he doesn’t react. Good. He’s out. The other guy is still working a socket wrench inside of the engine, completely oblivious to the chaos around him.
I sneak over and slip my arm around his neck, digging my knee into his back and pushing his throat into my hold.
“God. Daargalk.” He slaps at my arm but I flex, using all of my strength to keep him in place. He thrashes, but I have the advantage.
“Seven. Eight. Nine.” He doesn’t stop flailing. I furrow my brow and tighten my hold. “Ten. Eleven—finally.”
Releasing his slumped-over body, I step back and search the workstations. The men will be up soon, and they’ll need to be restrained before then. Zip ties. Wrenches. Bungee cords. There are a few hooks on the walls with chains hanging from them.
Those’ll do.
I grab three chains and a handful of zip ties and set them next to a steel support beam. I start with the guy slumped on the engine, pulling him off the car and dragging him to the pole. I sit him against the beam, wrapping the chain around his stomach and securing it with a zip tie. Then I bind his feet and hands. I do the same with the other two, barely getting Jay in place before he mumbles something incoherent.
Oh, good. He’s not dead.
I squat in front of him and put two fingers on his forehead and force him to look at me.
“Where’s Mac?”
“Thought you were his friend.” He groans and tries to rub his head but ends up jerking against the restraints instead. “The hell, bitch? Let me go.”
“Mmm. How about, no?” I grip his chin and lean toward him. “Where’s Mac?”
“I’m not telling you shit.” He hocks spit into his throat, and I jump back, sneering at him. The lob of saliva lands at my feet.
“That’s disgusting.” I scoff and shake my head. “I don’t want to hurt you, Jay. I need to know where Mac, Vette, and Lark are. Tell me what I want to know and I’ll leave you alone.”
“Don’t tell her shit,” Orion rasps, voice laced with pain. “Who sent you?”
“No one sent me. I came all by myself. You three should be used to women doing that by now, hmm?”
“Fuck you.” Orion slowly lifts his head and glares at me, wincing in pain. “You don’t know who you’re messing with.”
I make a surprised face and put my hand on my heart. “Oh, no. I’m really scared now. Why don’t I let you go and we can pretend like this never happened?”
“I hate sarcastic women.” Jay rests his head on the support beam and scowls at me. “They think they’re so funny.”
“First of all, I’m hilarious. Second of all, no one cares what you think, Jay. Especially not me.”
He cracks a grin. “Sure thing, sweetheart.”
“Ew.” I hate that nickname. “I guess if you don’t want to tell me, I could always torture it out of you.” I walk over to a tool chest and open the biggest drawer at the bottom. “Oh, this looks fun.” Grabbing a staple gun, I glance back at Jay and Orion.
They both pale when they see what I’m holding.
I don’t want to hurt them, but we’re talking about a thirty-million-dollar ring here. Laurence isn’t going to forgive me for losing something like this. He’ll try to find me, and if that fails, he’ll take blood from my family.
“Who wants to be reupholstered? I’m thinking blue for Jay and yellow for Orion.”
“You’re nuts,” Jay says, yanking against his chain.
“Maybe a smidge.” I smile and hold up the staple gun, pointing it to the side and pulling the trigger. The metal staple clatters across the floor. “Who wants to go first?” I take a menacing step forward.
