by Hope Anika
Lucia. Ben.
Fucking Ivan.
“Focus,” he told himself. Because getting dead wasn’t going to help anyone.
He moved closer to Misha, cutting an angle through the pine stand, and found a good ambush spot. Then he waited. Less that a minute later, the tall, broad form who was Ivan Dragovitch’s brother walked past. Big and solid and thick with muscle; this might hurt.
Sam went at him sideways with two punches: one to the kidney, and one to the throat. Then he kicked the guy’s feet out from under him. When Misha went to his knees, Sam stepped up behind him, wrapped his arms around that thick neck and pressed hard into the man’s carotid artery. But the son of a bitch was huge and strong as a bull, and he threw himself sideways in effort to dislodge Sam’s hold, his fingers gouging into Sam’s arm, his head slamming back into Sam’s ribs like an angry ram. Sam followed him down, swearing. Christ, he didn’t want to have to kill this asshole. Leaving a trail of bodies in their wake was not—
A brutal fist to Sam’s face; blood burst from his nostrils.
“Goddamn it,” he growled and punched the man he held viciously, once, twice, three times in the temple. Misha sagged to the ground.
“Fucking stay there,” Sam told him and stood, his leg throbbing, blood leaking down his chin. In a heartbeat, Misha was rolling over—playing fucking possum—and silver flashed, then he was aiming a large steel gun—
Sam caught the weapon and lifted it; the gun discharged, and the only reason it didn’t deafen him was due to the narrow black silencer on the end. He slammed his head into Misha’s nose and felt it crunch; Misha’s hold on the gun faltered, and Sam ripped it away and brought it down violently against Misha’s skull. One, twice, a third time, until blood flew, and again the man fell limp beneath him. Sam stayed put, breathing hard, watching with narrow eyes, and when he was certain Misha was truly down and out, he rolled to his feet, took a step and—
A knife stabbed into his calf. Sam turned and kicked Misha in the face with the business end of his steel-toed boots. More blood, but the stubborn bastard lurched to his knees, and reached for the blade that was still stuck in Sam’s leg.
“You stupid fuck,” Sam snarled, not sure if he was talking to himself or his opponent. He kicked Misha again, a swift, brutal blow to the guy’s ribs, but Misha only grunted and began to climb to his feet.
Fuck it. Sam again swept the man’s feet out from underneath him, caught that big head as he went down and twisted violently.
Snap. He dropped Misha’s body to the ground.
So much for not leaving death behind them.
“You killed him,” Alexander said, and Sam started violently. He looked over to see the boy standing only a handful of feet away, bucket and fishing pole in hand.
“He didn’t give me much choice,” Sam replied. He wiped the blood from his nose, tucked Misha’s 9mm into his waistband and pulled the knife from his calf, wincing, glad it had only penetrated an inch or so. Still, he was going to bleed like a stuck pig. “You should have stayed put. You didn’t need to see that. I’m sorry.”
Alexander only shook his head, his face growing cold. “They know what he does. They don’t do anything.”
Sam wiped the bloody knife on his jeans, folded it back together and held it out to the boy. “Put this in your pocket.”
Those pale eyes met his. Alexander took the knife and turned it over in his hand. It was a nice one, good grade steel, a smooth, abalone-shelled handle. After a moment, he slid it into his coat pocket, and Sam turned to peer through the trees.
He could see the long, narrow outbuilding that sat behind the cabin, a faint wash of aged gray through the trees. But there was another dickhead out there besides Ivan—Enrique—and—
A woman’s cry sliced the air, fury and pain and terror given piercing sound.
“Lucia,” Alexander said and dropped the bucket and poles. Sam had to grab him with both hands and lift him from the ground to prevent him from running to her.
“No, goddamn it,” he growled, even though he felt sick and furious and wanted nothing more than to run like hell toward that scream. “Just fucking wait. There’s one more. I’m not going to be able to help her if I run into some asshole’s bullet.”
The boy’s gaze snapped to his. For a long, breathless moment, they stared at one another.
“You have to trust me, son,” Sam told him in a hard voice. “This is what I do.”
Alexander nodded, but Sam’s grip only tightened.
“Say it,” Sam demanded. “Say it so I know you’ll do what the fuck I tell you to do. I have to be able to trust you.”
Those pale eyes were wet, terrified. “I promise. But you have to save her.”
“I will.”
Another cry rent the air, followed by the loud crack of another branch breaking, and Sam went back to ground, pulling Alexander down with him.
“This time,” he told the boy. “Stay here.”
He moved carefully out into a small break in the open pine and halted low, behind a large chunk of granite. The sky was growing darker, casting the land in deep violet, and the rain continued to get heavier. Thunder was steady now, and above the spears of jagged pine, lightning tore through the sky in thick, deadly webs.
The robins gave a sudden cry of alarm. Crack. Close. Much closer than before.
Sam slowly, carefully peered around the stone. Son of a bitch. The guy was less than three feet away.
Sam reared back. He had only seconds before Enrique was there, right beside him. Surprise was his only element, and since a punch to the kidneys, and a punch to the throat had been so effective with Misha, Sam gave them another whirl. But Enrique was faster than Misha had been, and his fist caught Sam under the chin before Sam could slam his knuckles into Enrique’s larynx. Sam shook his head, his mouth full of blood, and put his boot in Enrique’s gut. Enrique bent double, and Sam didn’t waste any time, tackling him to the ground, wrapping an arm around his throat, punching his knees into Enrique’s vulnerable spine. This time he didn’t bother to give the guy the benefit of the doubt. His head was pulsing, he was bleeding, and his fucking leg hurt. No more talking. Sam tightened his arm around Enrique’s neck, and when Lucia screamed again and adrenaline surged through him like a runaway freight train, he snapped it like a toothpick.
A fucking trail of bodies. Perfect.
Sam climbed from Enrique’s body and looked around carefully, his heart like a hollow drum, endorphins spearing through him like whiskey. He forced himself to stand still, to look and listen and wait.
Nothing.
He turned to look at Alexander. The boy hurried toward him from his hiding spot.
“Stay close,” Sam told him and spat a mouthful of blood to the ground. “There might be more.”
“Ivan.”
“Yes,” Sam said grimly.
Daisy began to howl, hair-raising, unholy sounds that made Alexander take a frantic step, but Sam stopped him.
“Behind me,” he ordered. “We don’t know that Ivan is the only one left.”
“He is,” the boy said with certainty.
Sam hoped like hell the kid was right, but no way was he counting on it. So he kept Alexander behind him as they hightailed it toward the cabin, his eyes sharp on the woods around them, listening to the birds, aware of the storm getting stronger. Closer. They were almost to the woodshed behind the cabin when a man’s voice suddenly shredded the silence, shrill and crazed—you fucking cunt!—and Sam’s heart threatened to stop. He began to run. Along the end of the shed, around the corner into the narrow space behind the cabin, past the parked ATV—
And found an ocean of blood. A dead man. And Lucia, who sat motionless in the middle of it all. Beside her a large man lay on his back, the small ax Sam had been using to split kindling protruding from his chest.
So much goddamn blood.
Lucia looked up at him, her eyes dark. Her nose was bleeding, and her bottom lip had been split open. But she’s okay. She
’s—Sam’s gaze slid down, and he saw the bloody bite on her neck. A fucking bite. And he felt sick again, with rage and guilt, and the need to kill a dead man. The shirt she wore was in shreds, and she was bleeding from knife wounds at her collarbone—Jesus, her breast—down her arm, across her stomach and—
He turned and blocked Alexander, who’d just come around the corner, from seeing her. “She’s okay. Go check on Ben.”
The boy tried to get around him, his face white, but Sam side-stepped into his path.
“Go,” he said.
“But…”
“Now,” Sam told him. A calculated risk, to send the boy into the cabin without him, but the kid didn’t need to see Lucia like that—and fuck if that pool of blood was hers—and his father’s goons wouldn’t hurt him, and Ben did need someone to make sure he was okay. Not a good choice—and he fucking knew it—but Sam couldn’t bring himself to leave Lucia sitting in that lake of blood.
“She’s okay,” he repeated to the boy when he hesitated. “Trust me.”
Alexander didn’t want to go, and Sam realized in that moment the kid loved Lucia, even if he would deny it, even if he didn’t know he felt it.
Sam reached out and cupped his narrow shoulder. “Check on your brother. I’ll take care of her.”
A long, level stare full of unspoken warning, and then a reluctant nod. The boy turned and ran for the cabin.
Sam pivoted to look at Lucia. She was staring down at her hands, which were covered in blood. Every inch of her was awash in red. Jesus Christ. How much of it was hers?
His heart slammed into his ribs, and he strode into that wet, crimson pool and knelt slowly before her. The coppery scent of the blood made his stomach turn; so many fucking wounds. He reached for her slowly, carefully. She flinched away.
“You’re bleeding.” He grit his teeth in effort not to grab her and haul her into his arms. To be calm. “Let me help you.”
Nothing.
“Lucia,” he whispered, his chest tight. “Look at me.”
Still, she didn’t move. Didn’t blink. Barely breathed.
Sam reached out and gently cupped her unbruised cheek. So fucking cold. Too cold. “Sweetheart.”
Lucia jerked away and blinked, as if suddenly coming awake. “I killed him.” Her gaze went to Ivan; her voice rose. “I killed him.”
“I know, baby.” Christ. What a fucking day. “I’m sorry. But now he won’t hurt anyone else.”
She turned and looked at him then, her face bleeding and bruised and spattered with blood. “Yes. I had not thought of that. Thank you.”
She stared at him with eerie calm, as if she wasn’t soaked in blood and bleeding. In shock. Her hands shook violently.
Sam reached for her again, slower.
“Come on, Lu,” he coaxed quietly. “Those wounds need treatment.”
Her gaze flickered to the bloody slash on her breast, then back to him, and Sam said, “Yes. Let me help you. Like you helped me.”
She seemed to consider it for a long moment and then nodded. Sam cupped her arms, and they were cold and clammy and slippery with blood. But as he moved to lift her to him, Alexander suddenly came back around the corner of the cabin toward them, and as soon as Lucia saw him, she began to fight Sam’s hold.
“No, no, no, please, Sam, do not let him see me like this. Please. Look at me, oh dear God—”
“Calm down, sweetheart. I won’t let him see.” Sam turned and put himself in front of her as Alexander skidded to a halt. The boy’s gaze jerked to Ivan. The ax.
“Ben?” Sam asked.
“He’s okay,” Alexander replied breathlessly. “Daisy woke him up. I told him she saw a skunk, and that you and Lucia were getting firewood. He doesn’t know what happened.”
“Good.” Sam said. “Thank you. I need you to go back into the cabin and heat some water on the stove. Use that pot we found. And then get Lucia’s first aid kit out and put it on the table. Keep Ben inside, and keep him calm. We’ll be right behind you.”
Alexander looked down at the pool of blood, then at Sam. “I want to see her.”
“No,” Sam told him.
The boy darted around him, just out of reach, and screeched to a halt at the sight of Lucia, who made a soft, mournful sound and tried to turn away.
“L-Lucia?” he whispered, going pale. His hands fisted at his sides, and his eyes went to Sam, then back to her. “Are you…are you okay?”
She took a deep, shuddering breath and turned her head to meet Alexander’s worried gaze. “Sí, mijo. Please do as Sam asked. I will be right there.”
But Alexander’s eyes were tracking her wounds. “Did Ivan do that?”
“Alexander,” Sam growled.
“Sí,” Lucia said simply.
The boy looked at Ivan’s body, then back to her. “I’m glad you killed him.”
A soft, sharp sob broke from her, and Sam said, “She’s going to need that hot water.”
Alexander nodded. He took a step back, then another. His gaze touched Sam’s.
“I’ll take care of her,” he told the boy again.
For a long moment, that pale green gaze searched his, but whatever the boy saw was apparently good enough, because he whirled back toward the cabin and took off.
Sam turned back to Lucia and found her trying to unbutton her blood-soaked shirt, but her hands were shaking so violently she couldn’t get the buttons undone. Sam brushed her hands aside and simply tore it open, sending the buttons flying.
Her bra was pale yellow; blood had soaked into the thin fabric and turned it a gruesome orange. It was cut where Ivan had slashed her breast, and torn where he’d bitten her. Sam stared at that shredded hole, at her bruised and bloody flesh peeking through, and felt the darkness that slumbered within him awaken with a vengeance. His skin rippled; his blood turned hot, and his heartbeat became a vicious throb at the back of his throat.
Donavon Cruz was a dead man walking.
Sam was going to see to it himself. Fuck Tony, fuck proof.
He’s a fucking corpse.
“I’m sorry,” he said harshly, the words raw, painful.
“This is not your fault.” Her voice wavered. “I knew he would come.”
Sam bit back the words that burned on his tongue, and carefully stripped away her shirt. Don’t argue with her. Not now. Even if this was his fucking fault, because he never should have left her at the cabin alone. Never should have assumed he was close enough. And now she’d lost something—had it fucking taken—and it wasn’t something he could ever give back.
Way to protect her, you fuckwit.
Christ.
“Sam,” she whispered, but he only shed his coat and stripped off the t-shirt he wore under his flannel. He had a bottle of water in one pocket of his coat, and he opened it and wet the shirt.
“Sam,” she said again, a hint of annoyance in her, and he felt relief.
But he didn’t respond. Instead he applied one corner of the damp cotton to her face and, as gently as he could with a faint tremor of rage shaking his hands, began to clean her up.
“Sam,” she growled, and her hand caught his, still trembling, still too goddamn cold.
He met her gaze, a sheen of glittering gold speared by dark, earthy green.
“This is not your fault,” she repeated.
He said nothing and went back to wiping the blood away.
“Difficult man,” she muttered. “You will listen to me.”
Sam only continued to wash her off as best he could. The cuts were all fairly shallow—which was some kind of goddamn miracle—but those bites… The site of them burned into his gut, all the way through to his spine, and he knew he’d never felt such incendiary fury, never hungered for blood as much as he did in that moment.
Beaten and bitten and fucking cut. The regret was like acid.
“I’m sorry,” he repeated.
“No,” she snarled. “I won. Not him. Do not be sorry.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“Stop.” Lucia gripped his flannel with both hands and tried to shake him, and Sam realized how weak she truly was. “I do not want your regret, Sam. Your sorrow. This was inevitable. But I am still breathing. Please let that be enough. Please. Because it has to be enough for me.”
Christ.
Sam stared at her, his heart beating like a drum, the rush of his blood a dull roar. She stared back, her eyes dark, her mouth trembling, and he tossed down the shirt and slid his arms around her, careful of her wounds. She shuddered when he pulled her into his arms, and a low, mournful sound escaped her. Her arms wrapped his waist; her fingers clutched at his shirt. He felt her breath on his neck.
“It’s going to be okay,” he whispered in her ear.
“Sí,” she said.
And then she began to cry.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The fire was almost out.
Alexander stared at the small, blackened chunks of wood coal, where only the tiniest ember flickered, and felt panic surge through him. Lucia needs hot water. And then he realized there was a small pile of kindling and several cut up logs sitting behind the stove, and he made himself take a deep breath.
You’re freaking out.
But he couldn’t get the images out of his head. Sam, kicking Misha’s ass. Snapping Enrique’s neck. Lucia. The blood. Ivan.
Dead. Ivan the Terrible was dead.
The knowledge was so overwhelming that Alexander knew if he hadn’t seen it, he wouldn’t have believed it. And he wondered how Ivan had found them. How—
“When’s Lu coming?” Ben demanded from his spot on the bed, where Daisy sat beside him, still trembling from excitement. “I want her to come now.”