Twisted Steel: An MC Anthology: Second Edition by Elizabeth Knox (top 5 ebook reader txt) 📕

It was another ten minutes before he had an answer.

A figure emerged from the barn. A woman. Naked. Running.

Warning cries erupted behind her.

The blonde didn’t get as far as the fence before the jackals caught her.

Clenching his hands and forcing himself to watch, Quake held himself back from intervening. If Magenta was here, he needed to know. From the looks of things, she wasn’t the only woman they’d kidnapped.

“Fucking bastards,” Stone growled under his breath. “How many have they got in there?”

Ryder stroked his beard. “That’s a pretty big truck.”

Inferno shifted uneasily beside them. “Christ, we can’t just leave them down there.”

“Agreed,” Stone murmured. “We can’t let them reach wherever it is they’re planning to take them. We’ll need to hijack them en route.”

Quake rounded on him. “And Magenta?”

“I’ll bet you ten bucks she’s down there too,” his leader rumbled. “If they’re selling them in the sex trade, she’s worth some money.”

He hated the fact that Stone was right.

Their President pulled out his cell phone and punched in a number. “Doc? Yeah, Stone. Listen. We have a situation. It looks like a sex trafficking ring run by shifters. We don’t know how many victims or if we’re dealing with any humans, but at least one shifter we know is missing. Hopefully, she’s here. Either way, we can’t let the panel truck they’re using get to wherever it’s going but we’ll need safe transport once they’re liberated. Inferno, get me our GPS coordinates.”

He gave Doc a description of the place, what road they’d taken, and their current satellite location. “If you can head this way, I’ll call you with updates. Hopefully, you won’t be too far behind us. When it goes down, it’s going to go down quick. We’ll need to get the hell out in case they call for backup.”

Stone ended the call. Quake took heart, knowing help was on the way. Doc was a good man. They could always count on him to help—especially when a shifter was involved.

Ryder’s voice interrupted Quake’s thoughts. “I count eight men. No, wait. Nine. Isn’t that . . . ?”

“Phantom,” Quake snarled, his attention slicing to the jackal and the woman he was dragging along beside him. The bag over her head made it harder to identify her, but Quake would know those dangerous curves anywhere. “That’s Magenta.”

“You owe me ten bucks,” Stone reminded him with a grin. “Mount up and be ready to roll when I give the signal.”

Quake was a seasoned warrior with centuries of proving himself in battle. He readied himself, focusing his senses but unable to untangle the odd knot of fear in his gut. Given his experience, to feel it now was disconcerting.

They stayed hidden by the boulder. The truck rolled by, followed by the six Death’s Head motorcycles. Close behind them was a second transport—a cage like the one the jackal had described.

Casting a silent glance at Stone, he noted their President’s look of irritation. Wherever it had been parked, they’d completely missed seeing it. Fuck. It had to be the van they’d been searching for all damn day.

The bikers kept their distance from the panel truck, giving the dust a chance to clear before they drove through it. Once they hit the hard road, the truck and bikes took off, headed somewhere in a hurry.

Driving with their lights off, the Dragons fell in behind the cage with guns loaded and ready, watching the terrain for the best place to make their move. They needed a curve or hill—anything that would separate them from the pack and blind the jackals to what was happening behind them.

Seeing another bend up ahead, Inferno drew his gun, aimed at the rear tires of the vehicle, and fired off two shots. They blew instantly, sending the van skidding dangerously across the road. Quake chased after it until it jerked to a stop. Halting his bike and climbing off, he flipped on the high beam of his headlight to blind them and darted to the side to draw his weapon in the dark.

Inferno joined him. Stone and Ryder drove on, chasing after the truck.

The light from his bike illuminated the cage enough to see that one of the two men inside was Phantom. The passenger beside him had a hood over her head.

“I got this,” Quake whispered, keeping his voice low enough the others wouldn’t hear him.

“You sure?”

“Positive.”

Inferno backtracked to his ride.

The first jackal crawled out of the driver’s side with his gun raised. Quake took him out with one shot, hitting him between the eyes.

Phantom’s attention jerked to the window at the sound. Eyes widening when he saw someone was coming, he grabbed the woman beside him. Pressing the barrel of his pistol to the side of her hooded head, he kicked open the door.

“Come any closer, and her brains will paint the inside of the van,” he swore.

A bullet might not hurt Quake with his stone-like skin, but it wouldn’t help Magenta.

“Let her go.”

Magenta’s covered head moved in his direction as if she recognized his voice.

“No chance! We have big plans for this bitch!”

“I’ll just keep coming for you,” Quake vowed. “You won’t be able to eat, sleep, or take a piss without seeing my face.”

Phantom hissed through his teeth, “Not if you’re dead.”

He aimed his gun and emptied his clip.

The bullets didn’t harm him, thanks to Quake’s partial shift, but the cocksucker ruined one of his favorite shirts.

Magenta must have been counting rounds. As soon as his clip was empty, she lunged sideways, ramming Phantom to the far side of the seat. Bringing her bound hands up blindly, she clawed at her captor, trying to get past him to the passenger’s side door.

“Bitch,” Phantom spat, backhanding her so hard, her head hit the window with a sickening crack.

Glaring at him with a death-stare, Quake charged.

Scrambling over the front seat, the jackal fell out of the driver’s door in his hurry to escape. Climbing in beside Magenta, Quake carefully cut off her hood and checked her