by Madison Faye
Vlad grinned. “Why don’t we go for a walk?”
Chapter 12
Chloe
“So I guess I’m not the only girl to wind up stuck on this mountain, huh?”
The girl was blonde, with sharp green eyes that twinkled as she grinned at me.
“Stuck, huh?”
The huge, handsome man next to her raised a sharp brow, his hand sliding around her waist and pulling her tight to him as she giggled.
“I don’t seem to remember you complaining much when I asked you to marry me.”
Katrina blushed, biting her lip and turning to kiss his shoulder.
“I only complained a little bit.”
Braun, her fiancé, rolled his eyes, chuckling before he nodded at us. “Come on up. I swear to God, her closet is slowly taking over the whole fuckin’ place. She’s got plenty you can borrow.”
Katrina gave me a “see what I’m dealing with” type look before she turned and kissed him slowly. “It is not.”
He just laughed as they stepped into the house.
Braun was another of the men living up on Blackthorn, along with Vlad, Austin and Dallas — the two brothers in the old ranger station, and the very mysterious sounding Axe. I got the impression that none of the men were that close — I mean, they’d all come up here away from the rest of the world for a reason. But they did all help each other out when needed.
Braun and Katrina’s worlds had collided a few months before, when she’d escaped up to Blackthorn to dodge a life she never wanted, where her rich family was going to marry her off to some asshole. One snowstorm and a very cozy cabin later, and she found the happy ever after she never expected with the rough mountain man currently at her side.
…Vlad had given me the story on the hike over. Needless to say, it was a story I could connect with pretty hard.
Their house wasn’t nearly as lavish a Vlad’s but it was cozy as hell. They were also clearly adding on to what had been just a small cabin a few months before. Now, there was a second floor, a new wing, and the framework of more rooms being built off the back.
“So, I take it your castle up there on Coffer’s Peak survived the fires?”
“Jealousy isn’t your color,” Vlad tossed back at the grinning Braun, who just chuckled.
“Hey, you can have your big lodge, brother. I’m more of a cabin man.”
Vlad grinned. “I think we all were fine. I checked in with Austin and Dallas the other day.”
“Axe?”
Vlad frowned, but shook his head.
“Eh, I’m sure he’s fine,” Braun shrugged. “That guy freaks me out anyways.”
“He’s… unique,” Vlad growled, frowning.
I chuckled to myself, trying to imagine whatever type of man that had these two men — both well over six feet of pure muscle — looking concerned.
Katrina tugged on my arm, laughing and shaking her head at the two men. “Alright, let’s leave these two gossip queens to their rumors. Our room’s up here.”
I laughed, following her up a flight of stairs to the second floor. Again, the place wasn’t as elegant and spacious as Vlad’s lodge, but it was gorgeous — homey, cozy, and when we stepped into her and Braun’s room, I gasped at the view. One whole wall of the place was all windows, and as amazing a vista as Vlad had, I couldn’t imagine looking out over the postcard-perfect view these two had out their bedroom windows.
“Oh, yeah,” Katrina ginned, waving her hand at the view. “Yeah, I hate to say it, but you get used to it.”
“It’s amazing.”
“Hey, I hear Vlad’s place is pretty spectacular.”
“It’s pretty incredible, but this is…” I whistled. “Holy crap.”
She grinned. “Thanks. Braun can take all the credit for the new additions. Alright, let’s get you some clothes, girl.”
I made a face, glancing down at my ridiculous outfit of one of Vlad’s old t-shirts and a pair of gym shorts that I was swimming in.
Katrina just laughed though. “Oh, please, trust me. I’ve been there.”
The two of us both blushed at the same time, grinning at each other.
“Let me guess, you never in a million years saw it coming, huh?”
I shook my head. “Never.”
“What’d you do before?”
“Before?”
She smiled. “Before you pulled a me and fell in love with a mountain man.”
I blushed, but I knew she was right. I had fallen in love.
“I’m a— or, I was…” I frowned, shaking my head. “A teacher. First grade.”
Katrina’s brow shot up. “No kidding? You know...” She shrugged sheepishly. “I mean, it’s just an idea right now, but I thought it’d be amazing to start a school up here on Blackthorn.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah! I mean, it’s not like we have kids yet—”
Her cheeks went red instantly, but she grinned and shook her head.
“But there are other families that live down the mountain a ways, or in the rural towns around here, and the closest schools their kids can get to are hours away. I dunno, it’s just an idea I’ve been toying with.” She sighed, looking at me and then jerking her head to what I could see was a huge walk-in closet behind her.
“Let’s get you a new wardrobe.”
****
Half an hour later, I was a whole new me as I walked back down the stairs. Braun whistled light-heartedly, but when Vlad turned and bared his teeth at him, he chuckled and threw his hands up.
“Hey, Comrade, I’m just messing around.”
“Mess around with your own woman,” Vlad growled, his muscles tensing before he turned and leveled his fierce gaze at me, making me shiver with heat.
“Well, yeah, gladly,” Braun chuckled, pushing past Vlad to scoop Katrina into his arms.
“You look beautiful, angel,” Vlad said quietly, moving towards me and sliding his hands around my waist.
“Better than naked all the time like some sort of feral forest girl, huh?” I whispered.
“Trust me that I far prefer you naked, princess,” he growled quietly, his eyes burning into mine. “But you look fucking gorgeous right now.”
“Thanks,” I said quietly, biting my lip.
“Hey, Comrade.”
Vlad sighed, arching a brow before he turned back to Braun.
“I can think of a better nickname, if you insist on using one.”
“Better than Comrade?” Braun grinned. “I doubt it. But, hey, c’mere, I actually need your opinion on something.” He nodded towards the back of the house, to the makeshift door out to where the new addition was being built.
“Those big, wide-swing doors you’ve got off your living room?”
Vlad nodded as he followed Braun towards the new addition.
“I’m thinking about stealing the idea for the deck I’m going to put up after this wing goes up.”
Katrina rolled her eyes at me. “My house, the endless DIY project. You want a glass of wine or something?”
“That sounds—”
The explosion took the breath from my lungs.
I screamed — or at least, I think I screamed — as I whirled to see the smoking, flaming hole in the wall where the door to the new addition had once stood.
…Where Braun and Vlad had just been standing.
Then I know I screamed, my very soul screaming as I ran towards the ruined, blasted wall.
“Chloe!”
Katrina tackled me from behind, bringing me to the ground behind a sofa as something — many somethings — went whizzing over our heads. It was all a blur, and all I could think was running towards the smoke and the fire to see if Vlad was still alive. And none of what was happening really clicked — not Katrina tackling me, not the whizzing sounds, not the glass in their windows shattering, and not the holes peppering the walls behind us — until I saw the men with guns running towards the cabin.
Oh God.
Chapter 13
<
br /> It felt like I was back in the forest fire.
Everything burned.
The blast had sent me hurling to the side, crashing through some of Braun’s framework. I winced, the ringing in my ears the only thing I could hear and the burning pain in my side the only thing I could feel. I was face down and covered with half-burning wood and debris, and I roared as I tried to heave it off of me.
My blood roared like liquid fire through my veins as I bellowed. I grit my teeth, digging my heels into the dirt and shoved up, roaring as I knocked the boards and debris off. I staggered to my feet, my ears still ringing and my head still swimming from the blast as I swept my eyes over the carnage.
Where the fuck was she?
I could see through the smoking hole in the wall where the door to the addition had been, but from what I could see, the whole house was empty. No sign of Chloe, or Katrina. I grimaced, my hand going to my side and feeling the hot wetness staining my shirt — blood. But I pushed that away. That could wait.
…I knew a grenade blast when I saw one. Or felt one. And I knew it only meant one thing.
They’d found me. I didn’t know how, but I knew it was the bratva. I shoved aside a piece of burning wreckage, staggering towards the house, when there was movement near me. I whirled, just in time to see another piece of wreckage get shoved aside as Braun lurched to his feet. Blood trickled from his forehead, and his shoulder looked like it was probably out of it’s socket, but he was alive.
“We have to move,” I growled, whirling and moving towards the house.
“What the fuck was—”
“Very bad people,” I hissed. I grabbed a piece of broken wood with a nail jutting out the end of it and brandished it in my hand. It was a crude weapon compared to what I was sure was waiting for me, but it was better than nothing.
“The fuck do you mean, very bad people?” Braun snarled, grabbing my arm and yanking me around. His eyes blazed with the same fury and fear that I knew was in mine.
“What the hell did you bring down on my—”
“Da! There he is!”
We both whirled at the voice straight from my homeland, and when I saw who it was, my blood turned to ice.
Boris, standing in the blown out hole into Braun’s house, grinning and shaking his head. His gold rings glittered on his fingers, as did the chains around his neck resting on his fat gut.
“You break my heart, Vlad,” he said, in thickly accented English. English, not Russian, which meant he was putting on a show.
Something tightened inside of me.
This wasn’t just for me, this was for—
“Vlad!”
The sound of Chloe’s voice pierced my heart and sent me roaring into action. I bellowed, storming towards Boris and towards her voice coming from inside the house. But suddenly, his gun came up, and I skidded to a stop with the barrel leveled at my fucking forehead. I dropped the weapon in my hand, letting it drop back outside the house.
“I see you meet nice American girl, yes?”
Boris grinned wickedly, and when I looked past him into the house, my heart sank.
Chloe and Katrina were on their knees in front of the fireplace, facing me. And behind them stood two of Boris’s goons, with guns trained on the back of both of their heads.
I saw pure. Fucking. Blinding. Rage.
Every single muscle in my body tensed — coiling as if to spring. Like I wanted to go literally through Boris — tearing him in fucking two to get to the woman I loved and the other innocent with a gun to her head.
“Kat!”
Braun knocked me aside, charging right for his woman.
Boris’s gun butt made short work of that. Braun groaned, and Katrina screamed as the big man went slumping to the ground, blood streaming down his head from a fresh wound. I hissed, snarling as I balled my fists and leveled my rage at Boris.
“Let them go,” I hissed in Russian.
“Nyet.” Boris chuckled darkly, shaking his head. “No, my friend,” he spat, switching back to English. “No I think I will not be letting them go.” He shook his head. “You hurt me, Vlad. I give you a good job, I take care of you. I give you opportunity. And what do you do? You spit in my face.”
“I was done with your dirty work, you piece of shit,” I hissed, baring my teeth at him.
“No, you thought you were done.” He smiled. “And today, you will be, I promise. But first, I’m going to make you watch.”
Something broke inside of my chest. My heart. A horrible, aching chill ran down my back as I realized what was happening.
“No, you son of a bitch,” I snarled, taking a step towards him. Boris brought the gun up, but I didn’t fucking care anymore. I walked right to him, roaring down at him as he pressed the barrel into my forehead.
“Me!” I screamed. “You want me? You get me! But not them! Not her!”
I looked past him, locking eyes with the one thing in this world I’d found that made me feel like a human. I locked eyes with Chloe — the woman I loved, and I shook my head.
“She goes free. You get me.”
“No!” Chloe screamed and went to stand, but the piece of shit behind her shoved her back to her knees. I snarled, pressing harder into Boris’s gun as I turned my eyes back to him.
“You wanna kill me, you fat fuck?” I growled. “Then do it. But she—”
“Oh, Vlad,” Boris chuckled this wheezing, sneering laugh. “My boy, I am going to kill you. But first…”
His lips curled into a wicked smile as he turned to Chloe and Katrina behind him.
“But first, I make you watch as I take something from you, yes?”
The man in me with the woman he loved in danger wanted to roar, and smash, and destroy, and probably get himself killed trying to save her. But then, there was the other part of me — the trained, honed, practiced killer who’d spent most of his life perfecting this skill. Inside, yeah, I was screaming and losing my fucking mind. But the trained part of my mind took over — scanning, calculating, looking at trajectories and vectors.
I looked right at her, my eyes locking on her tear-stained ones.
No fucking way was I going to lose the love of my life when I’d just found her.
And then suddenly, I saw a bigger picture. Time seemed to freeze, and I looked past her. And slowly, my jaw tightened.
Slowly, I knew what was about to happen.
“How’s that right knee of yours feeling?” I growled down at Braun.
He scowled, looking up at me. “Fuck you. If they hurt Kat I swear to fucking God, I’ll kill you with my bare hands before they—”
“How’s your knee?” I hissed.
His eyes narrowed at me, and then suddenly, the understanding I’d hoped for sparked in his eye.
I turned towards Chloe.
“Angel.”
“Vlad—” her voice choked. “It’s okay. This isn’t on you.”
Yes it is.
“I just want you to know—”
“I love you too,” I said quietly, before she could even say it. Tears streamed down her face, and my heart was fucking breaking, but I knew what to do.
“The first time we met, face to face in my house, what did you do?”
She stared at me.
“Vlad—”
“Whatever you have to say, make it fast,” Boris spat in Russian, making his two goons chuckle as they drew back the hammers of their guns.
“You woke up in my house, you followed me into the living room, and you…”
She frowned, and then suddenly, I saw it. I saw the understanding in her eyes. Her gaze pulled from mine, and I watched her eyes dart to the side, and then I could see that she saw what I did.
Good girl.
“Angel,” I said quietly, my muscles coiling and readying to spring.
“Do it now.”
The whole thing happened in the blink of an eye. Chloe spun, snatching the fire poker from the side of Braun’s fireplace and swinging it up hard. The man be
hind her roared as the iron hook caught him in the cheek, sending him sprawling back.
I lunged, and Braun had understood what I was trying to tell him. His leg shot out, catching Boris behind the knee as I crashed into him, sending him toppling over. I moved like I’d done this a million times.
I lunged over him, snatching the gun up as he dropped it, rolling across the floor and coming up to level it at the bewildered man behind Katrina.
“Don’t you dare fucking miss—”
Braun’s words cut off as I squeezed the trigger, sending the piece of shit behind his woman staggering backwards with a hole in his chest. I fired again, putting one between his eyes and dropping him like a bag of bricks.
“Motherfucker!”
I whirled at the sound of Boris screaming at me in Russian. He charged towards me, pulling a second gun from his jacket, pulling the hammer back, and leveling it at me before I cold even turn to bring mine to bear.
Oh fuck.
To this day, even with my trained perception and reflexes, I have to admit — Braun came out of fucking nowhere. The big man roared as he slammed into Boris from the side, hauling him up in his arms and throwing him through the wrecked hole in the wall. He roared again, charging after the big mobster, when suddenly, he froze, poised at the edge of the gaping hole.
“Oh, shit.”
I jumped to my feet, taking the distance in two strides as I brought my gun up. But there was no need.
Boris lay motionless, his eyes open, blood pooling around him, and his head lying right on….
The stick. The one with the nail through the end I’d dropped when I’d realized they had Chloe. Boris had landed right on it when Braun tossed him through the hole in the wall.
And now it was over.
I was across the room and sweeping Chloe into my arms in an instant. She sobbed, throwing her arms and legs around me as I pulled her tight and seared my lips to hers.
“It’s over,” I said quietly.
And it was, even if I could barely believe it.
“You mean, you having to run?”
I looked down into her eyes and nodded. I tossed the gun away, knowing that day was the last time I’d ever need to use one. Ever.