“Fawn!”
I rip my arm out of the guard’s lax grip and sprint toward her, aware of Viper, standing from his throne and motioning to his guards. Two of them slide into view, aiming their rifles at my body as they block my way to Fawn, who lets out a low, piteous moan.
God.
“What the fuck have you done?”
I look at her over their shoulders. She’s kneeling on the marble floor like a dog. She’s alive—and whole—but she keeps gulping for air. She moves her neck, struggling with the rope wrapped around her throat, tied in intricate knots between her breasts, looping over her arms to force her in a bent-over position, and then binding her wrists together. Her streaming eyes beg me to save her.
“Nothing yet.”
Viper’s footsteps echo in the throne room. He steps closer to my wife and regards her with a small smile. Then he touches her head, and I slam my shoulder into the guards blocking my way. The butt of his gun hits my stomach, and I double over with the blunt pain. Then Fawn makes a desperate sound.
“She’s choking!”
A mad smile tugs at his lips. “Fitting, isn’t it? I don’t think she can last much longer.” He gives me an apologetic shrug. “I thought you’d be here faster.”
“What the hell do you want?”
“This is what I want, Roach.” His eyes burn like pale flames as he stares at me. “I want your pain as you watch your pretty wife die.”
Fawn’s horrible gasping sounds fill the throne room.
“Why?”
“You told her to kill me, remember? I didn’t forget.”
Of course I remember. The crippled blond boy was flat on his back, and I thought no one could see the murderous glint in his eyes, his fury at being humiliated.
I begged Pepper to kill him.
“But you lost,” he says, his smile widening. He reaches for Fawn’s head and digs into her hair, yanking her head up so that the rope cuts deep into her throat. “And you’ll lose again.”
The two guards shove me back, a third yanking my arms behind my body as I scream Fawn’s name. No, I can’t let it happen again. I shake free of the terror circling my chest, and I fix my gaze on Viper’s cold eyes.
“The only reason you’re alive today is because Pepper felt sorry for the poor crippled boy.”
“Shut the fuck up!”
I turn my head, staring at the ranks of men behind me. “Is this the man you want leading us? He hides behind his guards and preys on the weak. He’s nothing but a psychotic, weak-minded coward.”
“I’ll show you a fucking coward.”
He yanks on the rope, and my heart seizes.
“Leave the girl alone and fight me.” Even though it’s the last thing I feel like doing, I force myself to smile. “Or are you afraid you’ll lose?”
Viper looks at me, silently turning over my words in his head. His teeth grate together, the heat in his eyes palpable. He wants to fucking kill me, but he doesn’t want to let go of his upper hand. If he doesn’t, they’ll see him as the coward he is.
“Fine. In the end, I prefer it this way.”
He releases Fawn, who collapses to her side, her sides heaving. She’s okay. Thank God.
Then he grabs the pistol from his holster and slams it against someone’s chest.
“Now we’re both unarmed.”
Yes.
This is a lot better than I hoped for. The fucking moron agreed to a fight with me—a world-class assassin.
“Stand back!” he orders them all. “I want no one to interfere!”
“No one to save you, Viper.”
He removes his jacket, letting it spill on the floor, and I do the same as the guards open a path for him. A syndicate member, one of Viper’s thugs, approaches the dais as he throws a suspicious glare my way.
“Sir, I don’t think this is a good—”
In just a few seconds, Viper grabs the gun hanging on the member’s hip and buries it in his stomach. A loud crack splits the air, and the member slumps to his knees with a guttural moan, blood streaked across the white marble. The ranks waver slightly, but Viper doesn’t notice. He tosses the gun aside and it skitters over the marble.
“When I’m through with you, I’ll decorate this room with your insides. You’ll watch me choke her and fuck her, and then you’ll die.”
“You’ll never touch her again.”
“Kill him, Viper!”
Several cheers break out in the crowd, but I refuse to let them break my spirit. He takes a step down, his eyes focused on the stairs for a moment.
Then I launch.
I seize his arms and shove, knowing that all I have to do is use the floor as a weapon. His scream of fury hits the ceiling as his back hits the marble. My knees pin his chest down and I grab his head, relishing the pain flickering across his eyes as I slam him into the hard floor. A solid punch crashes against my ear, and pain explodes like a flash of light. Intense and furious, and then gone. His heavy arms shove me aside, but I get to my feet quickly and curse myself.
Viper straightens himself, laughing off my attack, but even he must realize that he’s outmatched. He can’t hope to beat me in a fair fight. The asshole could have just gunned me down right there, but he let me goad him.
Shouts echo in the cavernous throne room as I circle him, my fists raised to my chin in a traditional boxing form. Viper glances at the people surrounding us, a nervous smile playing on his lips. Two quick steps forward and I swing at his face, thinking him distracted. A vicious uppercut lands on my jaw, and I instinctively block my face, but two sharp jabs hit my abdomen. Fuck. The blows knock the wind out of me, and I stagger back. Viper takes the bait and a roundhouse kick to his stomach makes him double over. My elbow smashes into his back, and he drops to the ground, rolling away before I can aim a kick at his head. I don’t let that bastard up. My boot slams into his stomach as he gets up, and then my knee shatters his nose, whipping his head back in a trail of blood.
The crowd roars, and I pounce on his struggling body, pinning my knee right over his throat. I crush it slowly, glee soaring through my chest as a horrible wheeze leaves his bloody lips. I press down harder, watching Viper choke to death as savage triumph runs through me.
“How do you—fucking—like—it?”
Then his arm moves and red slashes across my vision in a burst of sharp pain. A knife. I see him clutching it within his sleeve. He meant to slash my throat, but missed. I get up as he slashes again, the blade whistling through the air.
“Cheat!”
The word rings through the cacophony, and my heart pounds against my chest as Viper struggles to his feet.
“You’ve already lost.”
“I AM NOT LOSING!”
The childish scream rings in my ears before he launches himself forward, desperate but still skilled. I throw myself backward, avoiding his wide arcs, until suddenly my back presses against the wall. He lunges, and I twist my body to avoid the streak of metal. It screams as it glances off the walls, and then I grab his arm and head, smashing them both against the stone. The knife drops, and his pupils contract as he watches his last defense clatter to the floor.
“Viper, let us help you!”
“STAND BACK!”
He backs away from me, his hands searching the walls as the crowd refuses to part for him. He grazes the frame of a portrait hanging on the wall, and then finally the handle of an ancient, axe-like weapon.
Fuck.
It breaks off the wall, and Viper leaps forward, his hair swinging wildly around his mad face. The blade is old, but still lethal looking. My hand closes over something wooden, and I tear it from the wall. Viper’s scream of laughter hits my chest as I grab the only goddamn thing in reach, a fucking portrait of some old man who looks vaguely Asian.
His axe splits the painting in two as I block his overhand swing. I jump backward as the pieces fall to the ground.
“CHEAT! CHEAT!”
A chant erupts around Viper, and he swings his axe
at them, overcome with rage.
“SHUT UP!”
The loud noise persists. I dodge behind a column as the blade comes whistling out of nowhere, and then I wait for him to swing again. I’ll just let him swing and tire himself out.
Except that the blade is lodged in the marble.
His muscles flex, but it doesn’t budge.
“CHEAT! CHEAT!”
I tackle Viper, and his back sprawls on the floor. My arm twists around his neck like a snake, my legs trapping his body. My bicep flexes against his throat, and dimly I feel his blows crashing over my head.
The horrible, rattling sound of death echoes through the throne room as I crush his windpipe. His fingernails dig into my arm, leaving long red marks. His tongue lolls out of his mouth, and I know because I’ve done this so many times that he’s only seconds away from death.
“This is for Pepper.”
Not just Pepper, but all of those he made to suffer. And there must have been hundreds.
“Viper!”
One of his thugs elbows through the crowd, his face stricken. He aims a gun at me. The gunshot ricochets off the floor as another member shoves him. Someone collapses—the victim of gunfire—and then it’s pandemonium. They jump over Viper’s supporter, punching, kicking, and stabbing any part of him they can reach.
Viper’s body gives one last shudder and then his hands fall limp at his sides. Even if there was some flicker of life left, he wouldn’t be able to breathe through his crushed windpipe. I let him fall from my chest, and his body hits the floor with a sort of mundane finality. His blood-red eyes are still open and staring. Rage boils up in my chest as fighting erupts around me. I want to stab him, ruin his fucking face, and set his body on fire.
Fawn.
I give his body one last kick before I burst through the crowd and find her, still slumped over on her side.
“Fawn!” My eyes burn as I flip her over, stomach freezing at the sight of her bloodless lips.
“Silas, here!” A man crouches beside me and hands me a knife. I do a double take as I recognize his very familiar face. But Paul’s dead. No, it must be his twin—Peter.
I saw through her rope, and Fawn immediately takes a deep gasp as it snaps off her neck. Paul—Peter—hands me a jacket as I pull the rest of the ropes off, and I wrap it around her freezing body.
“Here, sit down.” He gestures toward the chair Viper used as a throne.
I lift her in my arms as Fawn takes deep, shuddering breaths, tears squeezing out of her eyes. My heart clenches in profound relief as I sit down with her cradled against my chest.
“Michael.”
“I’m here, baby. I’m here and I’m never leaving.”
* * *
Viper’s dead.
His men are with him.
Hopefully burning, rotting, or otherwise being tortured in whatever Hell accepted their souls.
It doesn’t feel like enough. Not when I can still see his marks on her neck, and not when she told me what happened when I left the apartment.
Across the apartment, Fawn sits at the kitchen table, poring over documents as anger pulses inside my chest. I’m pretty fucking pissed, all right. She confessed everything when she was released from the hospital a few days later. My heart broke when she dissolved into tears in my arms and told me what happened. I was furious, but I didn’t have it in me to yell at her when she was in so much pain.
But now she’s out of the woods, and I’m ready to yell. I stare at her across the room as she reads diligently, oblivious to my feelings.
“Fawn—”
“We should set up a charity for all of his victims.”
It cleaves me in two to remember all of those kids he kept hostage under deplorable conditions. We took them out, but there was the problem of where to put them. Many of their parents were dead. I made the decision to create a living space for the orphans, and there were plenty of women willing to take care of them full-time. I guess it’s a better job than opening up your legs for the entire syndicate.
“Yeah, maybe.”
“Cool.”
I suspect she does this on purpose, because she knows I’m mad at her.
“We need to talk.”
I use that kind of tone that brooks no argument, and a frown spreads over my wife’s face. She flinches as I yank the chair next to her and sit down.
“I know what you’re going to say.”
“No, you don’t.”
“I love you. That’s my only defense.”
Tears spring to her eyes, and I hate the way my heart flies out to her. I want to gather her in my arms and kiss her hair. I want her neck, arching for me, and her lips.
What am I supposed to say?
“After promising me you would never put your life in danger like that, you did it again.”
“I swear to God I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
I know.
And somehow that burns. I feel the anger, caustic like acid, ripping away at my insides.
She reaches out, tentatively touching my face, and I reflexively grab her hand. Touching her is like a balm. I grab Fawn’s lithe hips and pull her onto my lap. I bury my face into her chest and blow out a deep breath. God, I need her.
“I know you’re stressed.”
Stressed doesn’t even begin to cover it. I’m the de facto leader of this syndicate, and, holy shit, it’s a lot of work. I have a stack of paperwork a foot high to go through. I’m a fucking hitman, not an office drone. How the hell am I supposed to get through all this shit?
“Maybe you should delegate more. Or look into reinstating the Council.”
“Because democracy worked out so well for you guys.”
Fawn falls silent at my acidic tone, and I blow out a deep breath.
“It’s not that, really. It’s Viper.”
“What about him?”
There’s nothing but a sour taste in my mouth. “He didn’t suffer enough.”
“Michael.”
I flinch at the sound of my real name. Uttering it here feels like a betrayal, like I don’t deserve to be called that anymore.
“You have to let it go.” She takes my head in her hands and my heart pounds with the closeness of her lips. “We’re together and we’re whole. That’s all that matters.”
Her mouth is hot against mine, and it sparks a fire that surges down my body. I kiss my wife back, moaning as my cock throbs with a needy pulse. She wraps her arms around my neck, deepening the kiss as electricity spreads over my skin, and then I lift her up. She squeals in delight as a low growl reverberates in the back of my throat. I walk into my bedroom and I deposit her gently over the bed.
Suddenly I can’t wait another second to rip the clothes from her body and taste every fucking inch of her. It irks me slightly that the last time we fucked, Viper was hiding in a closet. She was so stupid to taunt him like that. Stupid, but brave.
God, I fucking love her.
I yank on her pant legs so violently that for a moment they fly through the air. Then I take her panties into my fist and I rip them off her creamy thighs. She sits up and grabs my belt, a ferocious look in her eyes as she rips it off my slacks. Her small hand curls over my cock and squeezes hard, and then she slips her fingers behind the waistband, pulling it slowly down so that the fabric feels like a caress.
I move her hands away and let my pants fall to the ground. Then I touch her flat stomach, my fingers curling around the edge of her white t-shirt. Her nipples stand out like pins, and she’s been teasing me with that shit all day, hoping I’d give in and just fuck her. Fuck the pain away. The anger. Everything.
My dick sheathes inside her, and her mouth opens with that surprised gasp that I love so much. She wraps her legs around my waist, giving her body to me. Her pussy tightens around me, gradually opening to my thickness. My mouth finds her tits, and I circle my tongue around her stiff nipples, sucking them hard as I thrust.
She’s mine.
Forever.
&n
bsp; The ecstasy blows through me when our mouths meet each other, and it’s a soaring feeling. I’m riding high on her. She cries out as I pound her, emptying my seed in her womb. And when she’s milked every drop and she lies in a pool in my arms, my mind burns. The high is gone, and I’m simmering.
Let it go.
* * *
It looks exactly how I remember it. The rocks are still weathered white with salt and the battering of restless waves. The Sutro Baths ruins sit in the middle of the beach and the Bay, the stagnant water pungent even from this distance. Tourists walk all over its foundations. There’s the cave to the right, where Pepper and I used to play. And there’s the beach.
Families are spread out on the sand, enjoying a rare afternoon of warm sunshine. Wet sand sticks to my boots as I trudge into the sand, past a couple lazing over a beach towel. I walk right into the shallow water where Pepper died. The wind from the ocean feels like her breath, and I stare out into the blue. The unusually warm weather feels like a gift from her, along with the breeze playing with my hair.
“I’m sorry,” I speak into the wind. “I’m sorry I didn’t do more to help you.”
For weeks there was nothing but the claw of hunger in my stomach. The dizzying pangs. Nausea. I clutched a discarded chocolate wrapper, licking at the foil for crumbs of sugar, anything that would stave off death.
Pepper found me. She gave me an apple. A whole one to myself. I didn’t even know how to eat it. I was too weak to chew, so she mashed it for me and fed me. The other kids told her to let me die. He’s too little. He’ll never make it.
Pepper gave me life.
And the grief hits me suddenly, hard and strong, like a punch to my gut. I drop to my knees, not caring about the water soaking through my slacks or the sand pooling around me. I dig my hand into the sand where she fell, and I wish with all my heart that I could turn back time and bring her back.
He’s dead. He can’t hurt anyone else, ever again.
Anguish clutches my heart in a vise as I curl into the fine grains.
I can’t keep torturing myself like this.
My faith in God is tenuous at best, but I keep looking around the beach for a sign from Pepper, telling me that it’s okay to forgive myself and move on. I wait, the water slowly soaking through my slacks.
His Secret Baby (A Bad Boy Romance) Page 39