After dealing with Usatov earlier, I was suddenly very glad that Zac had just gone to the bathroom. "You know why I'm here. You're probably not going to like it though. Where is Lexie?"

He snorted. "That bitch is gone. I got Willow, they took Lexie. You'll never find her! If you let me go, maybe I'll tell you where she's going."

I reached around his head with the hand not holding the knife and held my fingers in front of my face. I may have cleaned my knife before I left my last victim, but I never did have a chance to finish getting all the blood off my hands. "Do you see my nails? That is dried blood. When I found out what was happening, I had to leave the last person I was questioning." I lifted my knife, making sure he could feel the pressure under his scrotum and his newly flaccid tiny dick. "What do you think I'm going to do to you if you don't tell me where she is, right now?"

I heard a tiny whimper come from his throat as he pondered the possibilities. Honestly though, it was a certainty that when I left here, he'd be dead. He just didn't need to know that. "I swear, I don't know where they're taking her. They called a few weeks ago, looking for repeat customers. My dad had told me what he did all those years ago. I know you killed a bunch of them, but not all. I guess the remainder hid out for a while, and now they were looking to restock."

I sighed, upset at myself for not digging deeper back then. I'd broken up one main base where I'd found 27 girls, all in bad shape, just like Lessa had been, and got them all to a hospital. After that I found as many of that group as I could, and I guess I took for granted that I'd gotten them all, but evidently it wasn't enough. "Give me something. A cell number, a car, anything. How did they contact you?"

He was trembling in my grip now, but every time he started to go limp, his body sagged onto the knife, and he straightened right up. "The guys that met me at Lexie's place, one of them went by Yakiv. I think he was from Europe and had a weird accent. I have his number because we had to coordinate meeting up to grab the girls.

"Where is the phone?"

He gestured to the nightstand, where there was an iPhone plugged into a speaker dock. No doubt he had it set up with a playlist to rape Willow to. What a sick fuck. "Right there."

I nudged him in that way, forcing him to walk gingerly to a nearby chair, and finally removed the knife before turning around and making him sit down. There was no point in tying him down, he couldn't get out before I killed him. I pulled out a second knife from the sheaths on my back, this one well balanced for throwing, and held it in front of his face. "I can hit the diamond on a playing card from 30 feet with this. You try to run and I'm putting it up your ass. Nod if you understand."

He nodded quickly, and I backed away to the bed, putting the knives on the nightstand and got to work, quickly untying Willow. She didn't need to be on display any longer at all. "Okay, you're almost out. Just give me a second," I promised as I took off the gag.

"We have to get her!" she cried out. "I can't be without her!"

"We will, I promise. I'm not letting anyone take away another member of this family." I finally got the rest of the ropes off her, and she was up in a flash, clutching at my jacket as she sobbed. I wrapped my arms around her, just trying to get her calmed a little before we got back to the business of finding Lexie. "Except Zac," I added in a whisper, only to her. "He's a dead man."

I looked around the room and noticed that her clothes were shredded and laying in a heap on the floor. He'd probably cut them off with scissors since he probably didn't need her getting dressed again. "I'm going to go look in our old room to see if I can find something to wear," Willow said through her sniffles. "I don't want him looking at me."

"Go. I'll take care of him. You can wait downstairs if you like." She nodded into my chest for a reply, and then headed for the bedroom door, pausing only to spit on Zac. She had good aim. He flinched, and then cowered when I approached him once she had left. "Get on the bed," I commanded him as I flicked my knife over at it.

He walked over gingerly, keeping his back away from me like I was going to surprise him. Once he was laying down, I used all the ropes to tie him spread eagle and then picked up his phone. Yeah, no shock, he was too lazy to even add a passcode. I went through the contacts and found Yakiv. Leaving up the contact information, I copied the number into my work phone, then dialed the number to a man I hadn't seen in 5 years, though talk to regularly.

"Hey Jessica, how goes it?" came the gruff reply after 2 rings. Yes, my new name might be Jessica, though I still prefer Jesse. I'd needed a new ID after my faked death, and that was close enough that I could remember it easily.

"Not well, Joe. The same group that you needed to bail me out from is back. They took my sister in law and her fiancé. I have the fiancé, but I need to find a phone for the other. This is a rush, I can't let anything happen to them," I explained quickly.

"Give me the number and you'll have it."

I quickly read off Yakiv's number and heard a grunt in response. "Okay, I'll have you something in 10 minutes. Do you want it on the tracker app?"

"Yeah, I'll be hunting them." Remember when I said my employer had deep pockets? It went way beyond money. I had access to resources that I never even heard of back when I was in the military. The tracker app was like Google Maps for driving directions, except that we could put the ID of anything into it to see you in relation to it. It didn't matter if it was a phone, or the bracelet I'd given Lexie, or a car with a satellite radio. If I knew how to identify it, someone on the other end would make it happen. And then when I found the target, I'd do what I did best.

They'd helped in other ways too. When I started my killing spree after losing Lessa, I thought my uncles might be caught up in the aftermath, and my employers made them disappear. No, not like that, but in a whole new identity way. Now John and Leo were Vince and Tom, living happily up near Boston. I'd given them Lessa's remains, I'd had her cremated per her wishes, and the urn was with them for safe keeping. One day I'd have them back with me and figure out where I wanted to spread them.   They'd done the same for me, and Jesse Day became Jessica Hunt. But Willow and Lexie would always call me Jesse anyway. I preferred that. I barely remembered my new name, except it was on my corporate credit cards, so I needed to keep it in the back of my mind.

"Perfect, I'll get right on it. Can I assume that you'll be taking some time to take care of this problem?" He knew me too well.

"You can. Hopefully, I won't need any assistance this time."

"Ha! I'll believe that when I see it!" he replied with a snort. "But good luck, I hope you get the girl back safe."

Yeah. Me too. I thumbed off the phone and looked down at Zac splayed out on the bed. "I'm going to ask you this one time, so think very carefully before you answer. If you say no, you're never leaving this room, do you understand?"

He nodded fearfully. "Yeah, I get it."

"Is there anything else you can tell me about the guys in Atlanta? Did they mention a city, or a state? Any scars? What were they wearing or driving?"

He closed his eyes for a moment, as if trying to imagine what he'd seen. Hell, it had been less than a day so this shouldn't be hard, but he was a moron so who knows? I heard a sound behind me and turned to see Willow coming back. She had a pair of tiny shorts and a yellow tee shirt, with a pair of sandals on her feet. I was glad she'd found some clothes; she didn't deserve what she'd been through.

"I packed some more for Lexie. All we had is old high school stuff here," she whispered as she moved up next to me. Good, she had hope. We'd need that. I wanted to keep that going in her, because if she lost hope, it could get ugly. "When are we going?"

"Soon. Very soon. You probably don't want to stay here for this though."

She shook her head rapidly. "No. I watched when you blew that guy up, and I'm watching this. I want to remember what happens to people that fuck with the people I love."

"Okay, that makes sense. Then do me a favor, go down to the kitchen and grab me any sharp kitchen knife. But go quickly, I think we need to get on the road."

She darted from the room at the same time that Zac opened his eyes. "They were driving a new Ford Explorer. Looked like an undercover cop car or something, with the windows blacked out. Indiana plates. I told you about Yakiv. The other guy was bigger, like a fighter. He's the one that broke the door down with a battering ram type thing."

"Battering ram? Like a metal cylinder with two handles?" That wasn't good. That was something that law enforcement used. Combined with the car they were driving, that wasn't a good sign.

"Yeah, like that. Busted the door right down," he confirmed.

"Okay, thanks."

Willow came back, panting a little since she was running with a knife evidently. "Here, I brought two. I wasn't sure if it mattered." She held out a steak knife and a little paring knife, and I just took the larger steak knife. Perfect.

"What are those for?" Zac asked, his eyes growing wide.

I picked up the gag that he'd used on Willow, and then walked closer to him. I took the knife, and with no hesitation plunged it into his body, right where his liver was. He opened his mouth to scream, but I stuffed the gag into his mouth, tying it quickly around his head. No yelling for you, fucker. "Thanks for the help, Zac. I'll send a lot more of your buddies to hell to meet you." Blood pooled quickly from the wound, but I left the blade in to maximize the time it took him to die. I wanted to torture him, to kill him slowly, but I needed to go.

I was going to say more, but Willow took that chance to take the smaller paring knife and stabbed him right in the balls, then pulled the knife out and stabbed again, skewering his dick and leaving the blade in him like an oddly shaped piercing. "Fuck you Zac!" she snarled, fury on her face. I could hardly be surprised that she wanted to do that. The blood flow from her first wound was a lot heavier, and it was quickly soaking into the sheets. I guess he wouldn't last as long as I thought!

I pulled her away, leaving both blades where they were. Without medical attention, he'd be dead soon, and unless he had a visitor coming quickly, that wasn't happening. The remainder of Zac's short life would be incredibly painful.

Good.

"Come on, let's go get your girl."