Brutal (18 page)

They start laughing, and Venessa allows Macy to win the fight. I know for a fact Venessa allowed it, because she has that maneuver down to a tee, and obviously taught it to Macy. Another woman rounds the corner, and she’s a tiny female with short, dark brown hair and some sort of tights on or some shit. The more I look around, I realize it’s not just a class; it’s the circus she was talking about. There’s a trapeze and some sort of cloth like device… What the fu—?

“Will you be joining us today?” asks the tiny female.

“Uh…”

“Micha, that’s Rogan, my uh…”

“Boyfriend,” I cut in. “I’m her boyfriend, and I’m just watching.”

“I’m Micha, the owner,” she says. “Sure you don’t want to give it a try? Aerial yoga is good for you.”

“No, I’ll just be over here. I’m waiting on a friend,” I say, she nods and practically skips away. That is one upbeat female. Besides, I’m a giant. I ain’t getting nowhere near anything held up by cloth or a rope. Fuck you very much.

Venessa, finished stretching, pulls Macy up and pulls her over to where I’m standing.

“Macy, meet Rogan.” She smiles. “Rogan, meet Macy.”

“Hey,” I greet her.

“You’re a big one,” says Macy.

“Stop being such a slut and shake his hand,” Venessa says, and this is a side of her I’ve never seen. Heard, yes. Seen, no.

“Now look what you did!” she yells. “Now he doesn’t want to shake my hand, he thinks I’m catchy or some shit!”

I’m a little uncomfortable right now, so I back away… I’m man enough to admit it.

“I’m kidding, Rogan.”

“But you really are slutty. Now, come over here and shake hands,” says my girl, and Macy stomps her foot first but comes back.

“Macy,” she says, putting her hand out.

“Rogan,” I say, grabbing her hand.

“I’m really not slutty or contagious.”

“Neither am I.” I smile.

I look over to see Venessa smiling. If shaking hands with her best friend makes her smile like that, I’ll cut the chick's lawn, and take her trash out, too.

“It’s nice meeting you,” she says, looking over at Venessa.

“Yeah, you too.”

She heads back to Venessa and Micha, and they start contorting their bodies onto the trapeze. Wow. Didn’t know my Angel could do that, but it does explain some things. I settle in to enjoy the show when Rafe opens the door. As soon as I spot him, I cut him off to head outside.

“Whoa man, who’s the chick with the black hair?” he asks.

“That’s the best friend, Macy,” I say. “Let’s go out to the courtyard.”

“Let’s stay here instead,” he says, still staring at the girls. “I didn’t know your girl could do that.”

“Neither did I,” I say. “Let’s go.”

“Always wanted to see inside this place.”

“You heard of it?” I wonder how he always knows this shit.

“The Detroit Flyhouse?” he asks. “Fuck yeah, I’ve heard of it. Not surprised you haven’t, though. Your girl's on the lira, that’s hot.”

“What the fuck is a lira?”

“Look and see for yourself,” he says, and I turn to see what has him drooling. My girl is wrapped around that thing swinging and smiling. She looks just like a real angel up there like that, like she was made for it.

“Enough eye fucking.” He laughs. “What was so important?”

“Gallo is getting in my way. He plans on sending a message to Briggs on Venessa’s behalf. He’s harassing Macy from County, so I need you to make sure Gallo doesn’t send someone after him, and keep him away from the phones. I don’t need to give Venessa any more reasons to ask that prick for help,” I say.

“He’s locked up, man, he can’t do anything.”

“He threatened to kill them both if Macy doesn’t change her testimony.”

“‘Think he’ll follow through?”

“I don’t know him well enough to say.”

“What’s the deal with the girlfriend, then?”

“Ex.”

“Okay, ex. He rough her up?”

“He more than roughed her up.” I explain what I did know, which wasn’t much. “Venessa found out, and had him put away. Boy's about to lose everything if this goes live, so he’s trying to shut it down.”

“I’ll check into it,” he says, looking determined. “Can we go back in there now? I want to watch.”

I roll my eyes, seeing no reason to stand outside by the bushes, because yeah, I want to see that lira one more time, but when we get in the girls are gone.

I approach the owner. “Michelle, where did the women go?”

“It’s Micha, and they ran out the back door,” she says, walking away.

This can’t be good. On cue, Rafe is right next to me when we barrel out the back door, but we both come up with nothing. Not wanting to go too far from our current location, we both look around to see what we may have missed.

“You hear that?” he asks.

“Macy,” I say.

“Rogan!” she says, running into me. “Venessa is kind of, uh, busy. I need you to get behind Roma’s and help her.”

“Grab the car, meet me behind Roma’s,” I say, tossing him my keys.

“Copy,” says Rafe. I head over on foot, wondering what the fuck I missed now, and how this woman keeps getting away from me. She’s fun sized for fucks sake!

Approaching on foot was what probably saved these fuckers' lives, because what I was witnessing was enough to put that shit in four wheel drive and paint the driveway red. I may be new to this guy girl shit, but there ain’t no way a man could watch his woman tussle with two grown ass mother fuckers and not want to go nuclear. Then it all got serious when one landed a punch, and by serious I mean she got pissed and seriously fucked the guy up.

I
was swinging on the lira, enjoying myself, when two men dragging a very unconscious woman caught my eye. The second I untangle myself from my current position, Macy does the same, sensing my mood. Knowing the boys were outside, I yelled at Macy to follow me, asking Micha to watch our stuff. Macy has marathon long legs, only she doesn’t run, so I had to trust she would catch up. When she did, I told her to find Rogan, and to be very fucking quiet about it.

I’ve seen some shit out here, but abducting a woman in broad daylight? Are you fucking kidding me? Had I been using the silk for that cocoon move I’m trying to perfect, the woman would be long gone, with me none the wiser. This pisses me off; the boldness of these assholes has my fuck-shit-up meter in the red zone.

I needed to wait until the men were focused on getting the woman into the van before I struck. I had to play this smart seeing as I’m unarmed so I decided to do it quickly. I took thug one out with a quick blow to the head, and he went down easy. Thug two, now having all of the woman’s weight, fell forward, and my right foot connected with his jaw. He was down, but not out, and he was also really pissed. He let her go and came at me, and his eyes let me know he was high as a motherfucker.

I let him rush me, and my luck paid off when he took me to the ground. Both knees took turns meeting his balls, and then he finally let go of me to hold himself. He got me pretty good a few times, but I wasn't impaired. Holding his nuts, there wasn’t much to stop me when I took my right fist and connected it to the side of his head. Playing it safe, I also picked his head up, holding him by the hair and bashed his head into the pavement, twice. Okay, now he’s out.

Coughing, I forced myself to stand, only to see a stunned Rafe followed by a furious Rogan. The woman needs help first, so I sit her up and immediately see she’s been heavily drugged. I start tapping her face to wake her up. Nothing. I open her eyes, and see that they are fully dilated. I lean in to listen to her heart, and everything in me freezes. The boys are standing over me, wanting answers. Rafe fishes out his phone.

“Don’t make that call,” I wheeze out.

“Why the fuck not?” he says, incredulously.

“Macy!” I yell. “Get over here! Rogan, check around here for a needle. Rafe, you check the van.”

Both have no luck in their search. Meanwhile, Macy and I check over the girl, NOT a woman, who was given far too much of a dose for her small body. We look at each other with horror.

“It can’t be,” she says.

“Then give me another option, Macy,” I say. “I know this girl. She comes in every Friday, like clockwork.”

“It just can’t,” she counters. “No one else knows except you, me, and the lab. But even the lab doesn’t know exactly what it is. I haven’t told anyone.”

“I count my doses, Mace,” I say. “I also clean up after myself.”

“Shit. There was this guy who came in while I was working a few weeks ago, asking all sorts of questions that I didn’t answer, because I knew he didn’t belong there. I’ve been so fucked up I forgot all about it,” she exclaims.

“We’ll talk about this more later,” I say. “We need to get her to a hospital.”

“This isn’t good,” she says. 

I look up at Rogan, who knows exactly what I’m thinking, how this coincides with the missing girls, because I know somehow it does. To my count, I’ve got Rhonda, Peaches, Baby, and now this club girl. I can’t tell her that, though. She would flip the fuck out.

“I want you to call in for the next few days, yeah? Switch up your routine. Give me some time to figure things out,” I demand.

“Dammit,” she says. “Fine.”

Rafe confirms the ambulance is on its way and that we need to go before the uniforms show up.

“Macy, I will fix this,” I promise her. In my mind, I promise to protect her, too.

“You can’t fix everything Venessa,” she says quietly. “I should have been smarter about this.”

“Fuck that! You’re the smartest person I know.” I whisper to her “This is my fault, let me take care of it.”

When she stays silent I motion Rafe over, giving him the nod to step in and take Macy.

“Rafe, you’re going to take Macy home, and make sure it’s clear,” I say, and he nods back again. Macy looks miserable, and I can’t say that I blame her.

“Come on, Macy let’s go get our stuff and get you home.”

“
W
hat the fuck is going on right now?” Rafe demands.

I can’t blame him for being pissed. I’m not sure if he’s put two and two together yet, but I am going to have a nice long talk with her when we get home. That’s if I don’t spank her first. Sometimes, I have to wonder if she’s that fearless or, just flat out insane?

“We’ll talk later,” I say. “But, first and foremost, you don’t take your eyes off Macy. Where she goes, you go, but this is business, so stay the fuck out of her sight. If someone is after her, you can’t be seen,” I emphasize.

“Let me get this straight. Macy makes the drug your crazy girlfriend's been using on the perps, someone found out, got their dirty hands on some, and has been using it to steal women. How am I doing so far?”

“Call her crazy again, and I’ll knock your teeth into the back of your fucking throat,” I growl. “I don’t know if this is coincidence or not, but you’re gonna shadow her until we figure this out. And you don’t tell her shit, you feel me?”

“Like she doesn’t already fucking know?”

“Obviously, she knows what happened here today, but Venessa doesn’t tell her the bad shit, and neither will you,” I demand. “If you do, I’ll find someone else.”

“She’s rubbing off on you, partner,” he says. “You gonna run this by the Captain?”

“I’ll handle the Captain.” I sigh. “You just handle Macy.”

“She got a new boyfriend or anything I need to be prepared for?”

“The only guy I know she hangs with is her partner at work. Don’t know his name.”

“Well this just gets better and better.”

“Listen, you wanted answers from Venessa as much as I did,” I say. “You in this, or what?”

“Fuck yeah, I am,” he says. “That girl of yours is going to get herself killed, hope you’re ready for that. I got the friend, you take care of captain insano.”

“I intend to,” I say. “I’m also gonna assume you meant that as a compliment.”

“She scares the shit outta me. You love her?”

“She scares the shit outta me, too.” I laugh softly. “Ain’t no name for what this is.”

At that, the ambulance stabilizes the girl, Macy hugs Venessa, then leaves with Rafe. As for me, I’m going to have a coming to Jesus talk with my girl.