“You seem to be the only person okay with me leaving.” She was wary of this guy, and his gorgeous eyes were hard.
“Because I don’t want you here,” he said bluntly, “but I see no reason why you should die out there either, criminal or not. People have to do whatever it takes to survive.”
“Okay.” She nodded and began to walk off again. “If it helps, I don’t want to really be here, and I’m doing all this against my better judgment.”
She didn’t wait for a response as she strolled away. At least one of them was kind of on her side and, yet, also not. She was equally happy and upset by knowing where Quinn stood. He straight up didn’t want her there, and that was fine, but damn he could have told her in a nicer way.
By the time she made it back to her room, she wasn’t sure if this had been a good day or an incredibly bad one.
17
SAWYER
She was on her hands and knees, trying to crawl away.
A kick to the gut knocked the wind out of her. She gasped for air and turned blindly away from the blow, trying to escape. Why was he doing this to her?
A hand in her hair prevented her from making it very far, dragging her back to the light she wanted to avoid. She needed the dark. If he was going to do this, she wanted it to be in the dark.
She was tossed into the shining brightness and winced. She was completely drained and couldn’t get away from the kick that fractured her ribs.
“Are you done?” A masculine voice growled. “I told you to get rid of him and you didn’t.”
“He was innocent,” she sobbed. “He didn’t do anything to you!”
“He was a target that I gave you,” Axel roared. “Instead, I had to go in and get my hands dirty. I thought you trusted me, but this proves otherwise.”
“I didn’t agree to this.” She shook her head, tears still falling from her eyes. He lifted her by her hair, and she tried to pull away, only to have him to shake her roughly.
“I needed him out of the way, so he didn’t become a threat,” Axel snapped. “I can’t keep us all safe if you don’t do what you’re told.”
She tried to shake her head again. She had only killed the first guy because he tried to kill Axel. She loved him, but she didn’t want to do this. She didn’t want to kill people who didn’t hurt people. She never wanted this. Being a thief was one thing. Material things didn’t hurt people.
“My friends keep telling me I need a heavier hand with you,” he growled. “I told them that you would do anything for me.”
His friends. Monsters. He promised they wouldn’t be doing this forever, that it was temporary until they had enough money to settle down in a safe place. But those friends kept talking about things she didn’t know about. Prostitutes. Weapons. Drugs.
When another blow fell, she realized she was the one who was wrong. They weren’t the monsters—he was.
“I own you, Sawyer,” Axel growled. “You can either fall into line, or I’ll make your life a living hell. The choice is yours. If hurting you doesn’t get me what I want, then I’ll hurt someone you care about. If hurting them doesn’t help, I’ll start killing them.”
Ringing began in the background, but Sawyer didn’t know where it was coming from.
Sawyer groaned as her eyes opened to stare at the ceiling as her alarm went off. Two weeks she had been in this house, and nearly every night was a different trip down memory lane. Another nightmare. None of them were accurate. They were blended memories, different pieces of time smashed into one nightmarish experience. Axel had never expressly told her that he would kill someone she cared about, he just did it and that was that.
She brought her hands up to her face and felt the warm wetness. She had cried. She always did. Her room was frigid but not frozen, so that was a good sign at least.
She pushed the memories away. She wasn’t going to dwell on them, since she couldn’t change any of it. She hadn’t had this many nightmares in years, but she was also certain of the reason for them, so she didn’t let it bother her. She knew eventually they would pass and become less common. For now, she just needed to suffer through it. She wondered if they would stop completely once he was dead or behind bars.
Oh yeah, Sawyer was in now. She found herself roped in by Vincent’s idealism and the trust the others had for him. She still thought they were all going to die, but… this was her chance. This was her chance to pay Axel back for all the nightmares she had to suffer through.
The sun wasn’t up yet as she sat up in the bed. Two weeks. Time passed so fast outside of her nightmares. She trained with Vincent every other day, always tense and awkward like it had been the first time. She was with Elijah on those same days, now with Zander joining them for safety reasons. Both were friendly, and Zander didn’t ask any more questions about why she knew something. She and Quinn fell into a silence truce. He was cold and brutally honest, but a good teacher, although she hated every minute of her time playing in the dirt with him.
Jasper avoided her like the plague. She bit her bottom lip, knowing it was probably her fault. Starting only the day after she and Zander had talked, he had just shut down on her, refusing to be alone with her. Today, she planned on cornering him. It was Saturday, and she was done playing this stupid game with him. She would walk into a room, and he would find a reason to leave. He would come into a room, see her, and leave, saying he would come back. It was driving her bat-shit crazy and it was childish.
But first, she had something to do. She rolled out of the bed and pulled on a tank and some sweats before falling into her desk chair. She logged in and grabbed her headset.
It took a few minutes, but soon the video call was live. She was muted on her end, but she could hear him.
“Hey, Sawyer.” Charlie grinned at her. “How are things?”
She typed her response. They had planned this all week, and she wasn’t going to risk it by being heard.
Good. I’m having frequent nightmares, but I half-expected that. The agents aren’t so bad, though one definitely hates me. His wolves adore me, but he despises me.
“I’m sure it’s not that bad,” Charlie laughed. “Though… Sawyer, you aren’t the most likable person on the planet.”
You think I don’t know that, old man? Haha. How’s everything up there?
“Same old, same old.” He shrugged. “Let’s talk about what I’m sure is bugging you, though—why I ratted you out.”
She didn’t respond to that, looking away from the camera. She didn’t want to ask. She knew why he did it. He had wanted her out of the game, and, in the scheme of things, he could have done worse.
“Kid, you mean the world to me, and when they approached me, I saw an opportunity to get you a real chance at a good life,” Charlie began quietly. “I don’t have kids. My love and I didn’t get the chance, but you became one for me, and then you filled my life with so many more. If I could do one good thing for you, I figured this was it.”
Damn it, Charlie. I get it alright? I’m not mad. You didn’t tell them about me, so it’s fine. Why them, though? Why didn’t you just turn me in as a thief years ago, if this was what you wanted?
“Because turning you in would have put you in jail, which I don’t think you deserve,” Charlie sighed. “And I recognized those two from your old pictures and figured they would do anything to keep you safe from Axel and his crew. Those two being there was really the deciding factor.”
They want me to help them catch Axel and to become a consultant for the IMPO.
“Oh,” Charlie frowned, “that’s not safe for you. If you help them go after …”
Yeah, it’ll get me killed. I figure though, he already wants me dead, right? Why not try one more time to take him down?
“You always did want to try one more time.” Charlie nodded. “You just never acted on it before. The time was never right.”
Exactly. I’m here now. There’s no better time. I just need to keep myself out of prison. Catching Axel comes with
the risk of exposing myself.
“I don’t think you deserve prison, and I know everything.” Charlie shrugged again as he placed his arms on his desk. “Once I heard your full story, I didn’t think you deserved the sentence laid out for you. I considered it but… it never seemed fair to me. You didn’t ask for any of that and maybe they will understand.”
I don’t want to rehash all of this with you. Tell me about the gym instead.
“Ha, alright.” Charlie smiled at her, nodding. “Well, I’ve got someone here to see you and he can tell you.” He moved from the camera, and she waited, wondering which kid he had roped into joining the call.
She grinned at Liam.
“Sawyer.” Liam grinned at her.
Liam!!!! How’s college?!?!
“It’s been good,” he laughed. “I’m wondering something, though. Why did my school tell me that the next two years were paid? I thought they took all your money. I had a nest egg and was going to cover it, but then they called me and said it was fine.”
She leaned back, grinning madly. She had convinced Zander to get some of her money to his college. It took a few days of convincing, but he eventually relented and got it done. The money she had stashed away was for her students, anyway.
“You aren’t going to tell me, are you?” Liam laughed. “Come on, Sawyer!”
You know the answer already, stop playing stupid. Though, there is something else we need to talk about.
“Everyone is fine,” he confirmed for her. “No one has had any trouble since you left. We had a bunch of your cards made, though, and we’re keeping them on us, so we can get more people into the class if they need it.”
I can’t tell you how happy I am to hear that. Put Charlie back on for me. I have something to ask him really quickly, then I need to go.
“I’m here,” Charlie grumbled, leaning back into the screen for a moment. “I can read what you’re saying.”
How’s Travis?
“You wouldn’t believe it,” Charlie chuckled. “He’s sober and the IMPO hired him to portal them around.”
Are you fucking serious?
“Yeah, and they took him out of the apartment you put him in. I think your guys had something to do with it,” Charlie continued, grinning at her.
They aren’t my guys. I’ll ask them about it though. It’s good to hear he’s got a legit job now, though.
“Yeah.” Charlie nodded, “I can’t think of anything else.”
I should let you both go. I don’t know how long I have until one of them bothers me. My alarm was telling me it was time to go. Charlie, tell Liam who Travis is.
“I miss you, Sawyer,” Liam told her.
“Me too,” Charlie huffed off screen. “Be good, kid.”
“I will,” she whispered, unmuting so they would hear her. “Love you both.”
She disconnected after that, shutting her laptop. She dropped the headphones and sighed. She had no idea how often she could call them before it became dangerous, but she was aiming for once every few weeks. She couldn’t let them drift away, not like she had with Jasper and Zander as a teen.
She looked at the box of photos and flipped it open. Inside were little tied-together groups of photos, each a different day or different group of people. Her oldest stack was everything with Jasper and Zander.
Her second oldest stack were photos she took of anything while she was with Axel. Never him, she had burned those, but others, like a little boy, a prostitute’s four-year-old son. He had been such a sweet boy. Then there were the places. Rome, London, Venice and all the other places she had traveled with him. He never let her leave a city without him, not until the very end of their relationship. No one knew it, but Axel had been close by for every single one of her kills. Some of the photos in this stack also included a cat, a sweet, yellow-eyed runt. Midnight was buried in a tiny yard in Rome. The little boy… she had no idea.
That brought another wave of tears to her eyes.
Her most recent stack was her, Charlie, and all the kids from New York. She flipped through those. She was lucky enough, she even got a picture of Travis on his first day in the class, unsure and wary of everyone around him. It only took that one day for him to become a part of the group, though. Once he realized that everyone was there for the same reason, he was more at ease.
She blinked back more tears as she looked through the photos. So many of them. So many small battered children that she had been watching grow up into exceptional people. She made it to the first picture. One of Charlie and her about three weeks after she had healed from what Axel did to her. She hadn’t taken the photo, but she did have the only copy. Charlie was teaching her to fight, and while she had knife skills, she wasn’t any good at hand-to-hand at the time.
She held the set of photos to her chest and cried. She was never seeing them again; she knew it. She knew she couldn’t keep up with her lies and secrets forever. She was either getting out of this by going to prison or getting killed. It was a truth she hadn’t wanted to confront for two weeks, but now, seeing them, she knew it.
She just needed to choose which was the better option. Dying with her secrets, or being free of them and going to prison. Her stay would be short because Axel wouldn’t let her live long after exposing all of his secrets with her own.
18
JASPER
Jasper groaned and threw down the book he was reading. He couldn’t focus. Particle physics just weren’t cutting it for him today.
“You should talk to her,” Zander told him for the tenth time. Jasper was counting.
“About what?” Jasper growled. “What on earth do I possibly need to say to her?”
“How you feel.” Zander smiled at him. “I know that’s really hard for you, but I think it would help with… well, how you feel.”
“She…” Jasper shut his mouth before he said more. No. He wasn’t going there. Not with Zander or her.
“Alright.” Zander shrugged. “You continue trying to be an emotionless rock. You’ll crack eventually. You aren’t as good at it as Quinn and Vincent are.”
“Like those two could possibly be feeling what I am right now.”
“Who knows what they’re feeling? That’s the point—they are better at covering things up than you,” Zander chuckled. “Seriously, this ‘bottle it up and it will go away’ nonsense has never worked for you. I’m not sure why you’re still trying.”
“I’m not talking about this.” Jasper glared at him and grabbed his book from the desk. He stood up and shoved it on the shelf. “You have no idea-”
“Don’t even think I don’t get how you’re feeling,” Zander’s tone turned hard, and Jasper looked back at him. Zander’s neck was turning red. “I know exactly how you feel, but the difference is that I’m able to deal with it. I don’t stand rigidly in my own point of view and refuse to see it from her side.”
“She didn’t even look for us,” Jasper mumbled angrily. And there was no way Zander had no idea what he was feeling. None of them could even begin to understand, which made this so much harder on him.
“She was already a criminal, and, as far as she knew, we were still in the IMAS. We were people dedicated to taking the bad guys down. We still are dedicated to it,” Zander reminded him. “She made a decision to keep herself safe and out of prison. I can’t blame her for that.”
“I can!” Jasper snapped. “That’s part of the problem!”
He stormed out of the office and went straight for the garage. He wasn’t thinking, but he knew he wanted to get out of the house for a little while. He felt cooped up, suffocated, with emotions and memories, some that weren’t his own.
His dreams had taken a dark turn. Her nightmares were bleeding into his nights, and he couldn’t stop them. He knew more than he wanted to, more than she figured, more than the entire team could even dream.
Axel.
While most of the nightmares were just flashes and images to him, every now and then he got a word or two. Axel was
one that stood out. In her nightmares, Axel and blood were prevalent. Abuse. Fear. Pain. He caught the emotions that flavored every piece that he accidentally picked up.
Dream walking directly into her nightmares would give him the full picture, but he refused to cross that line. It would give him every piece of the puzzle, but damn, that scared the hell out him.
He didn’t want to know the things he already did.
“Jasper?”
He jerked to a stop, holding his keys. He turned slowly at his name and saw her covered in grease and oil, under the hood of their work truck. It was an old thing that was used for work on the property. It never ran right. He couldn’t ignore the sweat that made her tank top stick to her, outlining the hard lines of her body. Did she really need to be wearing white?
“Sawyer.”
“How have you been?” She seemed wary of him, and he was wary of her. He didn’t like knowing why there were dark circles under her eyes. They had grown worse over the last two weeks, and he wondered how she dealt with the nightmares that haunted her.
“Good,” he said curtly with a shrug.
“Really?” She raised an eyebrow and stepped closer to him.
“Yeah.” He gave a short nod and pointed to the Range Rover he was about to take. “I’m going into town. Tell them for me?”
“Can I come?” she asked him, tentative. He ground his teeth at the idea. It would leave him stuck with her, and he wasn’t ready to talk to her. He didn’t know how to deal with this.
“Why?”
“Maybe because I just want to hang out with you?” She threw her hands up. “Plus, I need to grab a few tools for this truck. I don’t have everything I need.”
“Fine,” he sighed, unlocking the vehicle. “Go put on… something clean, please.”
The Redemption Saga Box Set Page 20