Hendrix’s driver handed him a handkerchief as the people in line all scattered and ran, sobs of terror filling the air. Hendrix wiped his hands off calmly and cracked his neck. “The cameras are off, Mateo?” he asked the guy holding me.
“Yes, boss,” Mateo responded. I guess I knew his name now since he was the only thing preventing me from falling to the ground in shock. Hendrix didn’t look over at me as he nodded in satisfaction.
“Let’s go,” he told us before he stepped over the dead corpses and sauntered through the doorway that led inside the warehouse.
Mateo began to walk forward, dragging me along, and I cried out when my foot slipped in the blood seeping from one of the bodies.
“Get ahold of yourself,” he muttered to me in disgust, like I was offending him. “You’re going to need to have a stronger stomach to live in this world.”
“I never asked for this world,” I choked out, and then I threw up my dinner all over the front of him.
“Fuck,” Mateo growled as he let go of me and stared at the front of his shirt in shock.
“What’s the holdup?” Hendrix snapped, popping his head back out of the doorway and staring at us. He looked at the vomit covering the entire front of his guy but didn’t say anything about it.
“Coming,” Mateo said through gritted teeth before grabbing my arm again and dragging me towards the doorway.
I let him yank me forward, my body descending into shock in the face of all that had happened.
The music grew louder as we went through the entrance. Hendrix was obviously very familiar with the building. He went through door after door decisively until we stepped through a one and found ourselves standing on a balcony that overlooked a dance floor filled with hundreds of people writhing and dancing against each other. I’d never been to a dance club, and my eyes took in the black walls and red tables lining the outside of the dance floor. Red lights were blinking on and off, giving the whole club an eerie, otherworldly feel…or maybe a hellish feel was the right way to describe it. Since I already knew that Hendrix had a thing for red and black, it didn’t stretch the imagination to think that Hendrix owned this bar. But why, then, had he killed those bouncers if they were his employees?
There was a large black bar setup stretching the entire left side of the room, and red-tinted shelves were stacked up against a mirrored wall right behind it. At least ten bartenders were rushing along the bar filling people’s orders. Dread curled in my stomach as I looked down at the masses of people, and then back to where Hendrix was staring down at all of them, an unfathomable look in his eyes.
Was he going to…?
Hendrix abruptly turned left and walked along the length of the balcony to where there was another pair of doors. He disappeared inside, followed behind closely by his driver, and then Mateo and me.
We walked down another long hallway until the music behind us had faded and I could hear different music coming from somewhere up ahead.
The music grew louder as we approached a set of red filagree double doors directly ahead of us.
Mateo pulled me slightly behind him, making sure to still keep a tight grip on my arm as he did so. We stopped in front of the double doors and a growl ripped from Hendrix’s throat that had goosebumps springing up all over my skin. He pulled a revolver from the brown paper bag that his driver had given him and handed it to the driver.
“I won’t be needing that. I’ve decided this needs to be a bit more…personal,” Hendrix spit, and the driver gulped and nodded, gripping the gun tightly in his own hand.
Hendrix nodded at Mateo, and just for a second, his gaze finally flicked towards mine. There was something in his gaze, something that looked faintly like regret before he blinked, and anything I’d seen was replaced by steely-eyed determination.
Hendrix turned back around, took a deep breath, and then lifted his shoe and kicked out at the door, shattering the frame and sending pieces of the door flying. He burst into the room, and for a moment…there was only silence as everyone stared in shock at Hendrix standing in the doorway. I peered into the room and saw what looked like mountains of white powder on a table in the center of the enormous room--presumably cocaine--scantily clad women with dead eyes draped all over men sitting around other tables, and literally a stack of rifles in the back of the room.
This wasn’t good.
“I can explain,” a voice finally called out, breaking the silence. Apparently, that had been what Hendrix was waiting for because he leaped forward and transformed into…
A beast.
That was the only way to describe the hulking monster with red eyes standing where Hendrix was moments ago.
The monster was at least ten feet tall, sharp spikes going down the back of his black fur. I couldn’t see his face, but I could see the long claws extending out of his paws, claws that I’d had glimpses of before. The beast turned his head to look back at us, and I gasped as I stared into his red, glowing eyes. Serrated teeth that were more like a shark’s than a wolf’s filled his long snout. His chest heaved as the monster locked eyes with me, and I struggled not to scream as I stared back.
Time stood still for a long moment…and then it was chaos.
Screams filled the room as Hendrix’s monster turned back around and leaped at the nearest man in front of him. There was a loud ripping sound, and I jumped as the man’s head was suddenly thrown to the ground. It was like a red haze spread across the room as Hendrix tore through at least fifty people that had been in there, blood, guts, and body parts flying everywhere.
I closed my eyes and pressed my face against Mateo’s back to block out all the carnage, but what I’d seen felt engraved in my eyelids because the scenes replayed in my head continuously, even as I heard the screams. Mateo’s body was trembling slightly, and I could smell the fear emanating from both him and the driver. There was a particularly loud scream, and my eyes flew open as I realized that Mateo had let me go.
I didn’t think, I just pushed away from him and took off down the hallway we’d just come from.
“Finish them,” I thought I heard Hendrix’s voice order, but I didn’t look back. I just tore away as fast as I could.
I made it through the doors that led out into the balcony overlooking the dance floor and then hustled down the stairs towards the main level, not really knowing where I was going, but just trying to get far away from what I’d just witnessed.
People gasped as they saw me, and I knew I looked a sight. Blood was all over me from the massacre that I’d just witnessed. Screams sounded out a few seconds later from behind me, and I knew someone was following me. I was inches away from the door on the other side of the floor when a hand grabbed my arm and yanked me backward. I turned and saw a grim-looking Hendrix, and I lost it, pulling and shrieking, clawing at whatever I could reach with my fingernails.
I might as well have been tickling him with feathers for all the emotion he showed as I tore at his neck.
“Bad girl,” he growled before scooping me up and walking towards the doors I’d been trying to escape out of. Desperately, I knocked my head forward into his face, a loud crack sounding as I broke his nose. Hendrix sighed as blood began to fall down his face, mixing in with all the other blood that was covering him, and then he turned and tossed me right into the arms of a pissed-off-looking Mateo. I struggled in Mateo’s arms as well, but it was hopeless. I watched as Hendrix manually snapped his nose back into place until it was perfect once again and wiped at his face with a cloth that his driver had handed him.
I looked over Mateo’s shoulder only to see everyone dancing again, blissfully unaware of what had happened upstairs and not caring about the girl that was being carted off against her will.
I was taken down one more hallway before we passed through an exit that led outside. I gulped down the cool air that felt like nirvana compared to the humid, hot, sweat-filled air we’d just come from around the dance floor.
Taking a deep breath for good measure, I reared back and kneed Mateo in the junk, causing him to immediately drop me. I scrambled to my feet and took off.
I’d only made it a few steps before I was grabbed by Hendrix once again.
“Please let me go,” I whimpered.
“Never,” Hendrix whispered fiercely, the growl of his monster wolf threaded in his voice.
I’d been kidnapped by a monster.
There was a sudden sharp stab in my neck, and then everything mercifully went black.
* * *