Dark Vengeance Read online

Cropped blonde hair growing gray. Piercing blue eyes. A fit body in a gray dress shirt that was unbuttoned to reveal a tanned chest and abs. His lips were pursed in a smirk. He looked like he was in his forties. The photo of him standing in front of a tropical looking beach looked professional, like someone would use for a dating app.

  Who the fuck kept a framed, professional picture of themselves on their nightstand? I took out my phone and snapped a picture of it before setting it back.

  I glanced quickly at the art on the wall. I could be wrong, but they looked like original Damien Hirst pieces—one of a skull and another of a prescription pill.

  The room, like the rest of the house and bedrooms, was minimalist. But what it did contain was expensive and luxurious. The bedding was fluffy and had a creamy satin sheen. The occupant of this room clearly liked the finer things in life.

  A dark wood dresser was against one wall. I pulled open the drawers. There were neatly stacked T-shirts—all dark gray—in one drawer. Another held brand new identical jeans with the tags still on them. Another held new socks and new underwear. It was as if the occupant of the room—X—only wore new clothing. One drawer held a case with four expensive watches—all gold—all identical. Some expensive, famous brand I was sure.

  In the closet, there was a suit and four pairs of identical shoes on a rack.

  I looked at the closet again. It contained four pressed white shirts, four black blazers and four pairs of black slacks. Six hangers were empty.

  An overnight trip.

  In someone as organized and anal retentive as I guessed X was, that meant he was gone. He’d packed those clothes and gone somewhere.

  Downstairs, I searched the rest of the house, avoiding the kitchen. As I passed, I heard the dog give a low, half-hearted growl. There was a study with more books and an empty desk, a living room area, and a formal dining room. Everything was done in rich, luxurious fabrics and the art on the wall looked real. A large painting over the couch in the living room looked like another Hirst, an abstract painting this time.

  My last stop was the garage. There was an SUV and an empty space. I found the keys to the SUV hanging on a hook near the entrance to the garage and decided that would be the easiest way to get back to my bike. I left the SUV at the base of the driveway even though I was tempted to drive it all the way back to the beach.

  I tossed the keys into the woods and fished my bike out of the brush.

  As I headed back to the surf camp on the deserted road, I wanted to scream.

  Nothing about tonight had gone right. I hadn’t found Rose. I hadn’t taken down X. But I’d sure as hell left my mark. I was now a target. And so was everyone else I’d spoken to.

  The only possible bright spot was that I’d managed to get in and out of the house without hurting the dog.

  Makeda was starting the bonfire down near the beach when I arrived.

  “What the hell happened to you?” she said in alarm, taking in my appearance. I looked down. My shirt was covered in blood. She touched my cheek, drawing back bloody fingers. Apparently, my face and hair were covered in blood, as well.

  “It went to shit,” I said.

  She closed her eyes briefly and gave a loud sigh.

  “Are we in danger?”

  I winced and nodded.

  “I think so,” I looked down. “I fucked up.”

  She poked at the fire with a long stick and then blew on the emerging flames. I waited for her to answer.

  “We heard that X left for the mainland yesterday. And that he’d arrived with two girls.”

  My heart was racing. Half of me was turning to go back to the bike and head for the ferry.

  “Rose?” I said.

  “She fit the description of one of the girls. There was a blonde and a brunette.”

  “Was the other one Keiki?”

  “No,” she said. “Keiki ended up shooting up at some house in town. She and Dre never made it to X’s house that night.”

  “I need to go to Padang,” I said. I needed to stop him. To find Rose and kill him or hurt him badly enough that he would not come back to this island and hurt these people.

  Makeda reached for my arm. “Before you do, there’s something else.”

  I paused.

  “One of the girls he brought to the mainland escaped,” she said. “The brunette.”

  She pulled up a photo on her phone. “This is Joan.”

  The girl in the picture was pretty with light brown hair and green eyes and a dimple.

  “Find her. She might be able to tell you where X hangs out in Padang.”

  “Thanks,” I said.

  I was racing back toward the road when Makeda yelled after me. “I’ll take care of Dylan for you.”

  11

  X was standing in the parking lot of the Padang marina, fuming.

  He couldn’t believe it. Rose had gotten away.

  She had been his ticket to freedom.

  Jesus Christ.

  He’d already dropped off the other girl—the wet noodle—and been handsomely paid for her. It was insane how much sex traffickers would pay for a pretty blonde white girl in this part of the world. Especially for one who was an addict and would do anything for a fix.

  The men he supplied the girls to weren’t the worst of the worst. For instance, they never forced the girls to do anything—they simply paid in drugs. It was a win-win. X had zero guilt about it. Joseph might have felt bad, but X? No way.

  The girls could walk away any time they want. But the thing was, they never did want to walk away. They wanted to stay and get their drugs.

  With her gone, he was preparing to hand over Rose and something had gone horribly wrong. Back at the marina, he’d spotted the boat he’d been told would be there. It was a massive and imposing yacht. It was painted entirely black, probably like the heart of the fucker who was blackmailing him to get the girl.

  He’d sent Kue ahead, stationed near the boat. He would walk Rose over to the boat himself. It was when he was bent over his phone, crafting a text to his contact, that she’d gotten away. Despite tying Rose up, she’d managed to wriggle out of the ropes binding her wrists and ankles and open the back door.

  By the time he leaped out of the car and began to give chase she was halfway up the marina’s driveway. Kue was behind them, but it was too late. She slipped down an alley and when they reached it, it was empty. She was gone.

  “That way,” he shouted at Kue, pointing toward a hill heading up into the hills scattered with buildings. He’d take the other way, which was mostly an industrial area, to cut her off if she zigzagged. He raced through the streets, hoping to catch a glimpse of the girl. The sun had just set, but he could still see clearly down the shadowy streets and alleys. The area was mostly deserted, all the workers having gone home hours before.

  As he ran, he clutched his phone. It kept dinging and he dreaded seeing who was texting him. If it was his contact, who had most likely seen everything, he was fucked.

  But after fruitlessly searching the area for about ten minutes, he headed back to the marina. There, he paused, winded, and tried to catch his breath. The text messages were as bad as he’d feared.

  “We are also searching for the girl. Meet back at the marina at 2100 hours.”

  That was only two hours away. He called Kue.

  “No luck, boss.”

  This was bad. Really bad. He couldn’t show up back at the marina without Rose. If he didn’t find her, his whole carefully crafted world was going to blow up.

  Then his phone dinged. It was Kue.

  “A shopkeeper here spotted her. She’s heading toward the east side. Khan is meeting me there.”

  Khan was Kue’s twin brother who had come early to scope out the marina and who had gone into town to have breakfast like a dumb fuck at the exact same time X was due to arrive.

  “He better get his ass over there. He’s already fucked up enough today,” X said.

  The east side was the red-light district i
n town. Perfect. Money talked there. People would sell their own souls for a few American dollars. And X had plenty of those bills to pass out for the right information. Even if X didn’t come back to the marina with Rose, he was confident it would only be a matter of time before someone in that part of town gave her up.

  For a second, X hesitated, wondering if he should alert his contact as to where they thought Rose was, but then decided against it. Even though more manpower would be helpful, he was worried that if he didn’t bring Rose back himself, he would be punished.

  Punished.

  His mother was a master at punishment.

  When he graduated from high school, he’d come home from an all-night party and found his mother smashed—falling down drunk. It had taken him aback. If she had drunk during his childhood, she’d hidden it from him. But now she greeted him at the door wearing some sort of long, see-through robe. Underneath, she’d had on cream-colored panties and no bra. He could clearly see her breasts and her large, pointing nipples.

  He had been drinking, too, and realized he was staring. Quickly, he looked away, but she had seen. She gave a slow smile.

  “It’s okay. I know you’re a virgin, Joseph,” she said and looked pointedly down at the bulge that had arisen in his pants. “You can’t go off to college as a virgin. You need to know what to do when you meet all those Phi Beta Kappa girls. I’m not going to let you be ruled by your cock in college. You need utmost control of yourself so you can make a wise decision—a senator’s daughter would be nice.”

  “What?” His head was spinning. He was stunned that his mother was talking this way. His cock?

  But before he could comprehend her words, she was down on her knees in front of him, quickly unzipping his pants and had him in her mouth.

  She was right. He was a virgin.

  A helpless disgusting virgin who allowed his mother to commit depraved acts with him and on him for the rest of the summer “so he wouldn’t be a ‘sex-craved maniac’” when he went off to college.

  She had ruined him.

  He realized it at the time and couldn’t stop himself. Now, he was only turned on by older, dumpy women like his mother.

  The first hint of it was when he had a hard time getting it up with the prudish sorority girls his mother wanted him to woo.

  And then, right before he was set to graduate from college, his mother died. A massive heart attack. It was only then he discovered she was a pill popper – addicted to prescription pain meds. He’d never known or suspected.

  He thought he would feel grief, but he felt exuberant. He was free.

  And then it got even better.

  His mother had left him a million dollars. He’d actually thought his trust would be much more, but apparently, she’d been spending more than he realized.

  For the first time in his life, he had money of his own.

  His mother had doled out monthly allowances that allowed him to appear rich to the sorority girls, but every penny was closely watched and allocated.

  Now, suddenly wealthy, he went on a reckless spending spree: A Porsche. Vacations to Europe and Asia and Hawaii. An apartment in Manhattan. Designer clothes.

  Within nine months, he’d blown the entire million dollars.

  And then he was destitute. Without a monthly allowance, he was fucked.

  So, he sold his apartment in Manhattan and used the proceeds to rent a small crappy place while he figured out what to do next. He was down to his last dollar, eating beans and rice when the answer came.

  It was when he saw Mrs. Samantha Jackson and her ugly little dog walking in the park.

  That’s when he embarked on his new, lucrative career: wooing lonely, horny, rich women and then scamming them of all their wealth before moving on to the next woman.

  His days of poverty and punishment and control were over.

  No more.

  Joseph was dead.

  X was alive and well.

  He’d rather die than go back to that life.

  X would find Rose if it was the last thing he did.

  Dialing the number, he dreaded, he spoke rapidly, not waiting for someone to answer first. He had to come off as confident and not afraid. If he didn’t, he was dead meat.

  “This is your fault,” he said in Mandarin. “You didn’t tell me she was a goddamn Ninja. I drugged her, but she still got away. But not to worry, she’ll be back in my captivity by the end of the week at the latest.”

  The voice on the other end was silent for a few seconds. When the person spoke, X couldn’t tell if it was male or female. The voice was so high-pitched it sounded like a girl’s, a child’s voice. But what the voice had to say was anything but childish:

  “If you ever speak to me this way again, I will cut off various pieces of your body, starting with your nose and ending with your prick, and make sure there is someone to sew you back up so you can live the rest of your wretched life maimed and disfigured and unable to fuck or even take a piss without crying in agony.”

  The voice paused and then said, ““You have two days. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  X hung up the phone. He already had a plan. He would stay the night in Padang and have dinner with Ms. Mercedes. And then he’d go back to the island and get the girl. She wouldn’t leave Indonesia. Not yet. She still had unfinished business on the island.

  Her dog.

  The dog was the answer.

  That had been the only thing the girl had asked about.

  Not very smart.

  She had revealed her Achilles’ heel without even blinking.

  Stupid.

  During the ferry ride over, she’d threatened him. She said if her dog had a scratch on him, she would escape, and then come back to kill him in the worst way possible. If he managed to be gone before she returned, she said, she’d spend the rest of her life hunting him down and making him suffer a long, agonizing death.

  She would go back for the dog. And he would be waiting.

  He’d called Thom back at the house, but the idiot hadn’t answered. He suspected the bodyguard had passed out. He knew the man drank too much. Recently, it had gotten out of hand. He couldn’t afford to have a drunkard on staff. It wasn’t that bad when he wasn’t home, but what if he was sleeping in his bed and Thom got so drunk he didn’t hear an intruder? Not cool. He’d fire him when he returned home.

  For a split second, Thom not answering his phone sent a small alarm through him. Was there any chance Rose had returned and somehow managed to hurt the bodyguard? He laughed. Impossible. Thom was ex Special Forces. She was just a dumb girl. Like Kue and his brother Khan, he was the baddest of the bad.

  X shot the bodyguard a text telling him to spread the word—$5,000 for the dog—alive. For now.

  Once he had the dog, he would have Rose.

  It wouldn’t take long. Especially if the dog’s life was in danger.

  And he would make sure the dog’s life was in danger.

  12

  I wheeled my motorcycle off the ferry and then stood with my hands on the handlebars looking both directions.

  I didn’t even really know where to start.

  My first stop would be the red-light district. That’s where the other girl, Joan, would be.

  I swung by a boat with a fisherman working on his nets and greeted him, hoping he spoke English.

  “Hello,” I said.

  He grunted up at me. He had a wary look on his face. I couldn’t blame him.

  “I’m looking for a girl who might be in some trouble. I heard she might be in a bad part of town. Can you tell me how to get there?”

  He immediately frowned. “No place for you.”

  I breathed a sigh of relief. Thank God, he spoke English.

  I nodded agreeably. “I know. But it’s no place for a girl, either. Can you please help me?”

  Five minutes later I was on the road, my motorcycle humming beneath me, the cold night air making me pull the collar of my jacket up.


  Soon the neat and tidy shops fell away and I came into an area where trash was piled on street corners and people filled the sidewalks. Music piped out of several small businesses with lit neon signs.

  I killed the engine on my motorcycle and hopped off, wheeling it slowly to the side of the road, examining each face I passed. Then I saw some scantily clad girls and women standing at the entrance of a red-lit alley.

  As I approached, a woman who looked like she was in her late thirties, put her hand in front of a younger woman, warning her or holding her back. Then the woman came up to me alone.

  She wore a tight black miniskirt and low cut red T-shirt so thin you could see her nipples through it. She had full lips the same red color as the shirt and deep black eyes.

  “Fifty dollar,” she said.

  I smiled. “I’ll double that. But all I need is information. I’m looking for someone.”

  She frowned and her head swiveled, her black hair swinging, as she looked down the street in both directions.

  “Not here,” she said.

  “Okay. Where?”

  “You pretend you like me,” she said and then giggled loudly, grabbing my hand. Her hand was silky soft and I could feel her long nails pressing into my palm.

  Steering my small bike with one hand, I followed her down the alley.

  She opened a door and gestured for me to go inside. “Leave bike.”

  I shook my head. “Bike comes with me.”

  She frowned but then looked over my shoulder.

  I turned to see what she was looking at. It was a man, a small man blending into the shadows. The lights only caught his face. I saw him nod.

  The woman held the door open while I wheeled my bike inside. There was a small hallway and then stairs. “Bike is safe here.”

  I leaned it against the wall.

  Glancing back, I saw the man was still standing there, watching us. She nodded at him and closed the door.

  “We can talk here,” she said as soon as the door closed. “We don’t have to go to bedroom. Some men stay right here with me.”

  Lovely, I thought looking around at the dank space.