Free Taken by Jacqui Rose Page B

simultaneously smashing the bottle of red on the side of the table, and lunged across to the man who was holding a dazed Alfie in a neck lock.
    Vaughn drove the jagged bottle into the man’s face, not as hard as he could, unwilling to do more than was necessary. The man fell to the floor, releasing Alfie as he dropped on his knees.
    Vaughn stepped back, not wanting to continue with the violence now all Alfie’s men had run to step in to get things under control. Managing to recover, Alfie bellowed loudly as his foot pounded a dark-haired man on the floor.
    ‘You motherfucking cunt. Who sent you?’
    The man didn’t answer and Alfie bent down, grabbing hold of the man’s arm and twisting it round as the bone threatened to snap at the shoulder.
    ‘You’ve got some brass fucking neck coming into my fucking club. Who sent you?’
    ‘Bellingham.’
    ‘Bellingham?’
    ‘Jake’s uncle, he’s a face from East Ham – he heard what you did to his nephew.’
    Alfie would’ve laughed if his face hadn’t been hurting so much and his front veneer wasn’t broken. He’d been shitting himself when the men came in; he’d thought it was the Russians after the mess-up with the heroin last month, or even the Davidson brothers from Stratford, who were fucked off with him over the fake credit cards he’d been selling on their turf. But Jake’s uncle? It was fucking laughable.
    ‘Give Bellingham a message; tell him Alfie Jennings says his nephew’s a useless cunt and if he ever sends his men to my patch again, I’ll come looking for him and he won’t be as lucky as his nephew was.’
    Alfie paused whilst he touched his nose, wincing at the pain. He turned his attention back to the man. ‘I want you to take him something back for me.’
    Alfie put his hand into his back pocket and pulled out the pliers he always carried. He nodded to two of his men who came forward and pulled the man up from the fall. One held him up and the other prised open his mouth, leaving Alfie to teach him a lesson the Jennings way. ‘Now say “ah”.’
    As Vaughn turned away from the violence, a thought struck him.
    Where’s Casey?
    Casey ran through the back room hoping to find a way out. The exit door was locked but there was another door slightly ajar, and she could see a flight of stairs behind it. Rather than stay in the back room or head back into the chaos, she decided it’d be safer to head up the stairs.
    At the top, Casey saw crates of wine and boxes stacked up neatly against the wall. She walked cautiously down the corridor hoping to find one of the doors open and a room she could wait in. The first door she tried was locked but the second opened and led to a storeroom full of large boxes. Almost unconsciously, Casey continued to look around. There were televisions, computers, Blu-ray players, iPods and iPhones, all boxed, plus a huge selection of Romeo y Julieta cigars.
    There was a door at the back and Casey, letting her more inquisitive side take over, quickly opened it to see what was behind it. It was a tiny bathroom.
    About to walk out of the storeroom, Casey heard voices coming down the corridor. She felt panic rise within her and she stayed motionless and waited for the voices to go past.
    The voices didn’t pass. Casey could hear them directly on the other side of the door. She saw the handle turning and immediately crouched down behind the largest box, hoping whoever it was wasn’t coming in to take the plasma TV she’d just hidden behind.
    The voices Casey heard were foreign. One belonged to a man and the other was female. Casey peeked around the box. She got a glimpse of the man, and saw that there were two women with him, not one as she first thought.
    She continued to watch, terrified she might make a noise. She saw the man push one of the women hard in the back as he opened the door to the bathroom. The woman let out a tiny squeal and was given another shove to stop her cry. Casey felt as if she should be doing