The Monster's Fury

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Cole POV

Sitting in front of this f*****g cunt the only thing running through my mind is how much I want to kill her. I want to slice that cocky smile right off her face, but I know that wouldn’t do me any good right now. I take a deep breath to try and calm down my anger. There’s a time and place for everything, another lesson dear old Dad ingrained in my head.

“Well, this brings back memories. The only difference is that your brother was the one sitting across from me. I wonder if the outcome will be the same.” She smiles.

“Don’t get too cocky, Sandy. Just because you killed my brother doesn’t mean you could do the same to me.”

“Oh?” Her eyebrow raises.

“Your father is in jail on death row, your brother is dead, and that was all done by my hands. You Sullivan men are just ripe for the picking these days.” Her arrogance is annoying the hell out of me.

“Why the f**k am I here Sandy?”

“Bring them in.” She raises her hand and bends her fingers, signaling her man behind her. It’s not the usual guy that she usually has following her. Which just confirms my suspicions– she has my Little Butterfly.

He walks out and a few seconds later comes back dragging in the two guys I had tailing her. They’re beaten up pretty badly. Their faces are swollen with bruises around their eyes. They have dry blood on their nose and lips. Their hands and feet are tied up too.

“You really did a number on them, huh?”

“Do you know another way to get people to talk?” I look at my guys and they’re shaking. I’m trying to figure out if it’s because of what Sandy did to them or because they’re scared of what I might do to them.

“You still haven’t answered my question. Why the f**k am I here?”

“How about you answer my question first…Why do you have men following me?” I take a deep breath. I only have to keep my cool for a little while longer.

“I think you know why, Sandy. Let’s not play dumb. Give her back to me and we can end this right here and right now. No harm, no foul.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She shakes her head. My jaw clenches as I stare her down. I know she’s lying and I really want to put a bullet in between her smug little eyes, but that’s too quick of a death for her. Sandy has never been someone who’s afraid to die, and after what my father did to her, the b***h is practically soulless– but everyone has a weakness. Sandy is no different.

“You know what I hate most?” I say standing up from my chair. Her bodyguard tenses up, ready to take me down if I make the wrong move.

“I don’t really care.” She says. I scoff at her arrogance. My phone vibrates in my pocket and the ends of my lips curve into a smile. It’s time.

“How’s business going Sandy?” Her forehead wrinkles as she tries to understand what I’m saying.

“I always wondered how you were always able to sell that place out every day. Your customers must really love it there.” She opens her mouth to say something but before she could, I pull out my gun and fire two shots.

A bullet for both of those t***s that were stupid enough to get caught. Sandy’s bodyguard tries to rush me but Sam jumps in front of me and throws a punch, knocking him straight on his ass. He pushes his foot against his throat so that he can’t get up again. Sandy draws her gun and points it at me and I do the same to her. Silence takes over the room. The only sound is from Sandy’s man choking under the weight of Sam’s boot.

“You’ve lost your opportunity to walk away, Sandy. Now all the bloodshed from this point forward is on your hands.”

“The only blood on my hands will be yours.”

“Are you sure about that?” I can hear her phone vibrate in her pocket and excitement runs through me.

“You should answer that.” She squints at me before slowly reaching for her phone. She picks it up and, within seconds, her face pales. She hangs up the phone and directs her gun at Sam.

“Remove your man or I’ll splatter his f*****g brain all over this floor.” I laugh, knowing she's losing her cool.

"I take it, you got my present." I smile mischievously. She points her gun back at me.

"Blowing up my club, killing all of those innocent people. That's a new low, even for you."

"I'm just getting started." I tread closer to Sam and the man he’s holding under his foot. I lower my gun and shoot him in the head without even blinking an eye. I stalk closer to Sandy but she immediately backs away, keeping a safe distance between us, never lowering her gun. I chuckle.

“You have 24 hours, Sandy. If she is not back in my possession in 24 hours, you’ll see how low I can get.” I walk out of the dingy warehouse with Sam following behind me.

“How many casualities?” I ask Sam as we both get into the car.

“Firefighters are still trying to put out the flames. Police have confirmed five deaths so far but they’re keeping everything quiet.”

“I’m sure Sandy has the sheriff in her back pocket. Get our media contact on the phone. I want the explosion at Sandy’s on the front page of every media platform by tomorrow.”

“But Sir, wouldn’t that hinder us from getting Ms. Santana back?”

“Sandy is never going to cave into my demands. She’s too proud for that. We need to make her crumble before she can do it to us.”

“Understood Sir. Where to now?”

“Back to the Sullivan house. I need to verify something.”

****

Unknown POV

I sit in silence on this dirty bed that I’m pretty sure is full of c*m from thousands of men and prostitutes. A roach crawls from the side of the wall and scurries across the leaky sink in front of me. I roll my eyes in disgust. I count down the days until I can finally leave this shitty motel and every day seems longer than the last.

I stand up to look in the mirror. My arms are a lot more jacked than they were before I came here. I guess 200 pushups every hour or so does a number on you, but what else can I do? Every day is the same routine: wake up, eat shitty food, workout, sleep, repeat. It’s like I’m in prison. I hear the doorknob rattle and quickly grab the gun under my pillow. I stand up and point it at the door. When it opens and I see who walks in, I sigh in relief and lower my pistol, putting it back under my pillow.

“You’re still so tense. No one knows you’re here. It’s always only me coming in and out.”

“You can never be too safe. I didn’t spend months in this hell hole for everything to go to shit.”

“You might be getting out of here sooner than you think.”

“What do you mean? What happened?” I raise my eyebrow.

“Cole had his men blow up Sandy’s bar with civilians inside. The number of casualties is still unknown, but it’s going to be hard for her to get out of this one.” I smile, knowing that this is exactly what I’ve been waiting for.

“Go back and watch Sandy’s every move. Find out who she talks to, what places she visits, anything and everything. They’re in the middle of a war now and after Cole’s bold move, Sandy is going to hit with something harder that could bring Cole down for good. Whatever that is, it’s what we’re after.”

Adrienne POV

“Gorgeous, wake up, we're here.” Hunter’s voice pierced through my ears, rocking the headache that I’ve been trying so hard to get rid of.

“Mmmm.” The only sound I’m able to grunt out as I try to open my eyes but fail horribly .

“You gotta wake up baby.”

“Ugh. Shut up. It’s your fault I’m like this. You kept me up all night with all of your sexy fuckery, knowing that we had to leave ass crack in the morning!” I yell and instantly regret it when my head starts to throb again.

“Someone’s a little cranky.” He snickers. I really want to hit him but I can only muster up the strength to sit up and rub my temples.

“I really hate hangovers and not being able to eat yet just makes this worse.” I want to roll my eyes but decide against it, knowing that it’ll only hurt me in the end.

“Don’t worry, we’re almost at Sandy’s. I’ll get you something nice and greasy so that Cruella can go back into hiding.” I press my lips together and squint at him, trying to hold in my laughter, but I couldn’t. His nickname for the little gremlin that comes out of me when I’m cranky, I have to admit, is kind of funny.

“The Good Mornin’ Burger sounds amazing right now. A nice juicy burger patty with an easy over egg, bacon and hashbrowns inside of it. Mmmmm, I can’t wait!”

“You’re drooling a little bit there.” He chuckles as he shakes his head.

“Wow, you’re really on a roll here, huh? The jokes are just flowing.”

“I can’t help it. You’re cute when you’re cranky. Your nose scrunches up like a little bunny.”

“I’m done talking to you until I get my burger.” I tease, turning my head to look out the window. We’re driving through town and I look at all the familiar stores and people walking around and I smile. It feels good to be back. It wasn’t until I left that I realized how much this place feels like home.

I look ahead to check how far we are from Sandy’s and I see a cloud of smoke in that direction. I look down at Hunter, whose head somehow ended up on my shoulder without me noticing.

“Hunter.” I call, while jerking my shoulder up and down.

“Hmmm?” He replies, not bothering to open his eyes.

“Is it me or is that cloud of smoke coming from Sandy’s bar?” His head jolts up as he quickly looks to see what I’m talking about.

“Brody, what the hell is going on? Where’s Sandy? Have you spoken to her?” Brody doesn’t answer, he just presses down on the gas to speed up. His silence brings my nerves to an all-time high. It’s not often that Brody doesn’t know what’s going on, especially when it comes to Sandy’s whereabouts.

The road to get to the bar is blocked off by police and a crowd of people trying to figure out what’s going on.

“We should get out. We’re never going to get through all these people.” I shout over the sounds of people banging on the car. Brody keeps driving forward and beeping his horn to get people to move out of the way. When we got to the front of the crowd, we were stopped by police officers. Brody rolls down his window and as soon as they see his face they make way for him to drive towards the bar.

My mouth drops from the scene in front of me. Firefighters were running in and out of the bar. Other firefighters were trying to tame the flames. We get out of the car and medics race past us trying to get to the screaming and injured people. There are people everywhere. Some burned, some with bloody wounds– screaming and crying. It’s hard to think– hard to process anything.

“Adrienne, stay close to me.” Hunter orders as he grabs my hand and follows behind Brody, who’s frantically trying to call Sandy.

We continue walking around the scene– over burning wood and hot metal. We end up in the back of the burning building and I was not ready for what I saw in front of me. Rows of dead bodies– burned, trampled, barely recognizable.

“Hunter, wh–what happened?” I choke, trying to hold back my tears. I’ve never seen anything like this.

“Hey, it’s okay.” He brings me into his chest.

“We’ll figure everything out. It’s okay.” His hand runs through my hair as he tries to sooth me.

“Come on, let's keep moving.” He gives me a kiss on the forehead and takes my hand.

“Brody, where the f**k is Sandy?” Hunter’s voice is deep and demanding. I can tell he’s tense– who wouldn’t be with all of this going on?

“I don’t know but we have to get you guys out of here.” We follow him but Hunter stops once he sees Lisa. I remember she’s the bartender that used to give me a hard time when I was working for Sandy because she had a huge crush on Hunter. She’s shaken up but she seems to be okay for the most part.

“Lisa!” Hunter calls out to get her attention. She looks towards his direction and once her eyes lay on him, tears start to fall.

“Hunter.” She cries as she runs into his arms, pushing me out of the way completely. I’m not sure if she even saw me, but I can’t blame her. She’s probably terrified.

“Lisa, what happened here?” He asks, putting some space between them, so she can talk to him.

“I– I don’t– I don’t know, everything was fine. It was a normal night, then all of a sudden there was a huge blast. I don’t know where it came from but it was chaos after that.” She’s trembling as she tries to continue, but Hunter stops her.

“It’s okay, you don’t have to finish. Try and calm down.” He puts his hand on her shoulder to try and comfort her.

“We need to go.” Brody booms, pulling our attention off of Lisa. Hunter and I look at each other, then back at Lisa. By the look on her face I can tell she finally noticed my presence. Her head c***s to the side as her eyebrows furrow.

“Adrienne? Wait– aren’t you supposed to be dead? What– What the f**k is going on?!” Brody’s eyes widen, letting me know that people weren’t supposed to know that I’m back yet.

“Let’s go.” He grabs my hand and pulls me away. Hunter follows behind us.

“Wait!” I can hear Lisa scream but none of us stop.

As we hurry back to the car, my head jerks side to side, trying to keep up with the chaos in front of me. A medic rushes past me, bumping me in the process and almost knocking me off my feet. I stumble but Hunter catches me before I can hit the floor. As I steady myself, someone in the distance catches my eye.

He’s wearing a black hoodie as if he’s trying to cover his face, but I can see it clearly. Half of his face is burned but it doesn’t look like it was from this accident. He doesn’t look like he’s in pain. In fact, he’s smiling, which sends a shiver down my spine. Who the f**k in their right mind would be smiling looking at something like this. Wait.. is he looking at me?? His dark eyes lock with mine and I almost stop breathing.

“Hey, you okay?” Hunter asks me, grabbing my attention. He’s standing in front of me, blocking my view from the hooded man.

“The guy with the hoodie, do you see him?” I turn his body and face him where the man was standing, but he’s gone.

“What guy?”

“I swear he was just there. He had on a hoodie and his face was burned. He was smiling, Hunter, like he was enjoying watching all these people suffer. What if he did this?” I start to run towards that direction but Hunter stops me.

“We need to go, Gorgeous. We can’t stay here.”

“But what if–”

“Sandy will figure all this out. We can’t add more trouble. Let’s go.” As much as I don’t want to listen, I know I have to. We’re in a complicated situation right now and I don’t want to make it worse by acting on a hunch. I just hope it’s only a hunch.