Hearts and Aces (Kelsey's Burden Series Book 7) by Kaylie Hunter (great books for teens txt) 📗

enough, he was covered in enough blood to convince me he had killed the others. Still gripped in his hand was a long-handled hunting knife.

“I stripped him of his clothes,” I said, holstering my gun. “How did he get out of his cuffs again? Where did the knife come from?”

“The better question is, how’d he escape from the storage room?” Bridget asked. “The new lock has a plated cover on the inside of the room. It can only be unlocked from the hallway side.”

“Are you guys saying he had help?” Wild Card asked.

I dragged a hand through my hair. “Bones, find Whiskey and have him send his contractors home. Wild Card, get this asshole downstairs and tie him up for me. We’ll have to move him somewhere secure. Bridget, I need you to clean upstairs.”

“What are you going to do?” Bones asked.

“Clean the mess downstairs.”

Bones rubbed a hand down his face. “What kind of mess is down there?”

“The kind of mess you’re thinking is down there.”

“Fuck,” Wild Card said.

~*~*~

 I called Goat and asked him to bring one of the freight trucks through the field to Alex’s house.

Goat laughed. “Should I throw in the large rolls of the plastic wrap we bundle the clothes with?”

“That would be handy,” I answered. “I could also use a dolly, a dozen extra-large totes, and some bungee straps, too.”

Goat was silent for a few moments, but when he spoke his voice was low and serious. “Call off the security team surrounding the houses. The fewer witnesses the better.”

I tucked my phone into my pocket and turned toward Wild Card who was just finishing tying up our remaining bad guy. “Pull security for a meeting in my garage. Keep them busy going over the plan for tonight. I need at least an hour.”

“What are you going to do?”

I took off my cardigan and tossed it onto the couch before sliding the couch and recliner toward the far wall. “I’m going to get the bodies out of here before whoever’s working against us calls the cops and has us all arrested.”

I heard someone coming through the tunnel and held my finger up to stop Wild Card from responding. Haley stepped out, followed by Tyler.

“Bridget called me,” Haley explained as she tossed me a set of coveralls, then tossed a set to Tyler. “Wild Card, you should go. Do as Kelsey said and keep the guards’ attention away from us.” She opened a package and started stepping into a pair of bibs.

“Haley—” I started to say as I quickly pulled the coveralls on over my clothes.

“Do you have a plan to get the bodies out of here?” she asked, interrupting me.

“Out, yes, but I’m not sure where to take them.”

“I sleep for less than two hours,” Tyler grumbled, “and all hell breaks loose.”

“If only we could clone you, Tyler.” Haley grinned as she slid on a pair of elbow-length gloves and looked at me. “We need to hurry. I told everyone you were taking a nap at Lisa’s house.”

I stretched a pair of gloves over the sleeves of my coveralls, heading to the storage room. All three of us stepped back and tried not to gag when I opened the door. After a minute, Haley raised her head and pushed past us into the room. Tyler and I cringed, following her inside.

By the time we bagged the bedding, unchained the corpses from the wall, and emptied and cleaned the shit buckets, Goat was pulling the freight truck up behind Alex’s house. We wrapped the men with the long rolls of plastic, then lifted them one at a time into the rolling laundry bins that Goat had thought to grab. From there, we rolled each bin up the ramp and into the back of the freight truck.

Bridget came downstairs after the last bin was loaded. “I’ll help Haley clean the storage room.”

“Sounds good,” I said. “Tyler, move our remaining prisoner somewhere safe, but don’t tell anyone his new location.”

“You sure you don’t need me with you?” Tyler asked.

“She’s sure,” Goat answered as he looked over at me. “Come on. We’d best clear out.”

“Goat, I can handle it from here.”

“Get your ass in the truck,” Goat ordered, pointing to the passenger side.

I hurried around the truck and climbed inside.

“I’m guessing you don’t have a clue how to get rid of a body, let alone seven,” Goat said as he started the truck.

“I’m hoping as we drive down the road a brilliant idea will pop into my head. If I was in Texas or Florida, the wildlife would help me get rid of a body or two. But seven?”

“We can’t take a chance these men will ever show up on an autopsy table. That means we're heading somewhere no one else knows about. I need your word it will stay that way.”

I thought about Goat’s wife Marcy who disappeared, never to be seen again, after I assaulted her in a storage room at the store. “You have my word.”

“Good enough. Find us some music to listen to. It’s an hour drive.”

I did as I was told, pulling the long gloves off and fiddling with the radio until Goat started to sing along to a song. I leaned back into my seat and closed my eyes, wondering how my life had become so insane.

~*~*~

 “Wake up! We’re here,” Goat said, startling me awake.

I opened my eyes, looking around. An old cabin with its roof half caved in sat to the far right of the property. Between the truck and the cabin, an assortment of old furniture and appliances were scattered about, rotting and rusting.

“Welcome to my weekend getaway,” Goat said, grinning.

“You don’t live here, do you?”

Goat laughed. “No.”

“Is the property titled in your name?” I asked as