“Well, let me help you enjoy your night. I don’t know much about gambling, but I can provide hours of entertainment with my stupidity.”
A soft tinkle of laughter left her lips, sending a chill down my spine. Fuck, this woman was gorgeous, and I might have noticed how entirely amazing she was if I hadn’t been hitting on her left and right the entire time I was at the ranch.
We made our way to the casino and hopped from one table to the next, losing more money than we were making. And every time she thought about what she wanted to do, her brows furrowed in this really cute way, and her eyes crinkled at the sides. After an hour, I was paying more attention to her facial expressions than the cards on the table.
“Excuse me,” a man in a suit said, stepping up behind us. “I’m going to need you to come with me.”
The laughter on my lips died a little, but I was still riding that high just from being in her presence. That might have been a mistake.
“Why?”
“The boss wants to talk to you.”
I glanced at Krista and widened my eyes. “Ooh, the boss. Sounds dangerous.”
“Sir, we need you both to come with us.”
“Look, we’re just having some fun?—”
“That wasn’t a request.”
“And what exactly do you need us for? We’re not cheating. If you haven’t noticed, we’ve lost, well, more than we’ve made.”
The man glanced to his right and nodded. More men in suits converged on us, all of them in the same stance that said they were not here for a friendly chat. And if I had a weapon, or even a second person who could help me fight my way out of this, I might have taken my chances.
But Krista was with me, and I wouldn’t risk her getting hurt.
“Sure,” I nodded, taking Krista’s hand in mine, giving it a firm squeeze.
I could feel her hand trembling in mine. She was scared, but there was no reason for that. We hadn’t done anything wrong.
But when they led us into the back room and then to a door beyond that, I started to worry that this wasn’t about counting cards or cheating at Blackjack. We took a long hallway to double doors at the end of the hall, and when the men pulled them open, I froze in my tracks.
Women were being held behind bars, all of them clearly drugged.
Fuck, this was a trafficking ring.
Clenching my jaw, I chastised myself for not getting Krista out when I had the chance. I had really thought it was all about the casino being pissed at us for something, but this…
“What the hell is this place?” Krista asked quietly. “Why are those women behind bars?”
“Keep moving!” the man shouted, shoving us from behind.
I grabbed Krista just as she was about to fall forward, holding her tight to me to keep her upright.
Two men grabbed us, dragging us over to chairs. There was no way I was going down without a fight. Just as the man started to push me down, I ducked and spun around, slamming my fist into his kidneys. He bent over, heaving in pain, and that gave me the opportunity to move on to the next guy.
Slamming my foot into his knee, I followed it with a fist to the face, knocking him to the floor. I was grabbed from behind, and threw my head back, slamming my head into the man’s nose. Another man came at me from the front, but my arms were still pulled back. Struggling out of the hold, I wasn’t fast enough for the fist to the face, or the one that followed to the gut.
And even after all that, I would have kept fighting.
If only there wasn’t a man standing behind Krista with a knife to her throat. I stopped fighting instantly, breathing hardas I looked her over. By her appearance, she hadn’t gone easily either. She was a fighter, and that much was clear from the blood on her knuckles and the way her hair was disheveled.
“Get in the fucking seat or I slit her throat,” the man growled.
It wasn’t in me to stop fighting back, but this was Parker’s sister. How would I ever explain to him that I got his baby sister killed?
Slowly, I raised my hand and stepped back. Just as I was about to the chair, something hard slammed down on my head. My eyes rolled back in my head and everything went dark as I crashed to the ground.