by Nora Ash
Brian’s eyes narrowed and his jaw tightened, but after a few seconds, he nodded. “Fine. Forty-five percent. But I need to see some commitment from you before I lend you so much as a cup of fucking sugar.”
Louis and I exchanged a glance. We’d expected as much.
“S’long as we can keep it below the radar, you’ve got the Steel empire available, Perkinson. What do you need?”
He pulled out a folder from a drawer in his desk and slid it across. I opened it and saw a printed-off picture of a man’s face on top of a small pile of papers.
“I need this guy gone. And I need you to see to it, personally.”
I pressed down the numb sensation spreading from my gut to my limbs. A hit. Of course he wanted a hit. It was the number one way of showing loyalty in our world—once you took a man’s life for someone, they had you in their palm.
“What’s he done?” Louis asked, when I couldn’t take my gaze off the picture. He looked like your standard thug: bad skin, broad neck, cold eyes.
“Thought he could skim a couple of thousand off the top on the latest heist he did for me. I need to send a signal to the rest of my men. You know how it goes.”
We did know. It was just how it went in our world—a life was not worth more than a measly few thousand pounds, not when loyalty was on the line.
I’d killed before for the same reason—both Louis and I had. And every single time I’d hated it with every fiber of my being. I’d done it, because it was “for the Family.” Or so I’d told myself, when I’d wake up in the middle of the night with the memories of men I’d murdered haunting my dreams.
This time, it’d be a man who’d never crossed me in any way.
I stared at the picture and wished with everything I was that I could have been someone else.
“We’ve got a deal.” Louis’ voice didn’t betray the emotion I knew was tightening his chest as he leant over the desk and shook Perkinson’s hand. I knew he felt like I did, though we’d never talk about it—I knew we wouldn’t. Talking about it made it too fucking real.
I also knew he always cried in the dark solitude of his room after a hit.
I dragged my eyes from the image, inviting the numbness to spread into my chest as I looked at our new ally. If we wanted to save ourselves and our brothers from our father, this was something we had to do. For the Family. Only this time, it wasn’t a meaningless motto spoken to keep us in line.
“We’ll take care of it.”
Norman Wallis sat slumped in the chair we’d tied him to not twenty minutes ago, blood and brain matter leaking from the hole in his temple.
He’d begged for his life. They didn’t always. Sometimes they threatened and cursed, and that was so much fucking easier to deal with.
I glanced at Louis, who slung back the first of what I knew would be many drinks, leaning against a crate in the abandoned warehouse we often used for this part of the business.
“Jeff’s on cleanup,” I said, purely to fill the silence that’d echoed through the space since Norman had uttered his last plea.
“Please, I have a son,” had been his last words. I didn’t know if it was true or not. Not that it mattered.
I looked at the gun in my hand and bit my lip at the faint tremble making it shake in my palm.
The far door into the warehouse slid open with a rumble and Jeff stepped through, his helper Fred in tow. They were carrying plastic wrapping and buckets filled with what I knew to be chemicals.
“I’m off. See you in the morning, yeah?” Louis looked at me over his shoulder for the shortest moment before he nodded at our men and strode off.
I stared after him, wishing he’d stay and knowing how fucking terrible it would be if he did. That was the one downside of our twin-bond—that we always knew, without a shadow of a doubt, what the other was feeling. And right now, neither of us wanted to feel anything. Even if the darkness seemed to press in all around me, and I needed him so fucking bad. He was my safe place, the only peace I knew, and fuck, I needed peace from the horror screaming in my brain more than I needed the air in my lungs.
An uninvited image flickered through my brain.
I breathed out through my nose, frowning at the floor as the memory of how fucking good I’d felt with Audrey in my arms last week. How confoundedly calm I’d been. At peace.
No.
No fucking way.
I’d already made my decision when it came to her. My world was too dark, too bloody dangerous. And this kind of shit was exactly the reason why I needed to stay the fuck away from her. She was way too gentle a woman to get dragged into my shit, just because I needed to hold someone to get through the night.
I threw my gun on the nearest wooden box and flexed my tensed hand to erase the feeling of the metal against my palm.
A soft thud from where Jeff and Fred were rolling the body into a black tarp drew my attention, and I bit the inside of my cheek until I tasted blood as I saw them roll Norman Wallis up like a dead fish.
If he did have a son, he’d never know what’d happened to his father. There’d be no body to identify, no grave to visit.
No final resting place for the man I’d killed to save my Family.
13
Audrey
“Liam?” I stared up at the redhead outside my door and wished I was wearing something other than my ugly pajama pants and food-stained T-shirt.
I hadn’t heard from him in almost a week, he hadn’t responded to the text I’d sent after three days of obsessively staring at my silent phone, and I’d thought… I’d thought I’d never see him again. But here he was, leaning against my doorframe in that casual way he had, as if I hadn’t just spent a week trying to desperately glue my broken heart back together.
“Hey, love,” he said, and then he reached for me. His hot lips crashed against mine with a desperate urgency I hadn’t expected, and I opened my mouth for him on instinct when his tongue swept against the seam. He pulled me close against his body, his hands curving around my backside until all I could feel was his heat and the hardness of his body against mine.
Only when he dipped his hands into my pants did I find the will to pull away.
“Liam—”
“I’m sorry I didn’t call,” he interrupted, his hands tightening around me as if he couldn’t bear to let me go. His gray eyes, dark with a desperation that didn’t reflect pure sexual need, swept over my face, the plea in them impossible to ignore. “I’m so sorry.”
“What’s wrong?” I asked, worry making its way through the shock of seeing him and the ache of longing in my stupid heart. “Did something happen?”
“Nothing you can’t fix,” he said, his voice hoarse. When he pulled me tight against himself and buried his nose in my messy hair, I didn’t resist. Not until his hands delved back into my pants.
“Liam… I can’t,” I mumbled into his leather coat as I clasped onto his wrists to stop his advances. “It’s that time of the month.”
He pulled back enough to frown down at me. “What do you mean?”
I arched an eyebrow at his obvious ignorance. Guess a player like him rarely hung around a girl long enough to experience that side of things. “I’m on my period.”
“Oh.” His stroking hands didn’t stop, but he gave me a quick glance. “I don’t mind. I just…” Liam paused, regret flickering across his taut face and he finally stilled. “You’re not feeling good, are you?”
I gave him a pained smile. Apparently the dark circles under my eyes were more pronounced than I’d thought. “Sorry, no. I won’t be up for that sort of thing for a few days. If you’d called first, I would have—”
He touched a hand to my cheek, silencing me. “I know, I’m an arsehole. I’m sorry, Audrey. I didn’t mean to just show up on your doorstep like this.”
Something had happened. As he stood in my doorway, that inner joy he’d always seemed to radiate was gone, and he looked so… lost. Scared.
I reached out and grabbed his hand. He
followed me when I pulled him into the hallway and shut the door after him, but when I began guiding him to the bedroom, he stopped, still with his large, warm hand clasped in mine.
“No, you’re not up for it, love. It’s okay.”
I sent him an admonishing look and tugged on his arm until he followed me again.
“Audrey…” he said once I stopped next to my bed. Despite his objection, I could hear the longing in his voice.
I raised up on my tiptoes so I could press a gentle kiss to his lips, and then I sank to my knees in front of him. Comprehension dawned on his face, and the look of gratitude flittering across his features nearly took my breath away.
I hadn’t done this with him before, despite the many times he’d brought me over with his skilled tongue. He hadn’t asked, and I’d been too busy recovering from the onslaught of sensations he poured over my body whenever we’d been together to think of it. But now… The sound his zipper made when I lowered it made anticipation trickle down my spine. I pulled his already half-hard length out, and he breathed a harsh gasp that made me clench. My abdomen gave a small spasm in warning, making me grimace at the dull pain.
“You okay?” Liam closed his hands around my face, tipping it up a bit so he could catch my gaze.
“I’m fine.” I turned my head to kiss his palm and then, I wrapped my hand around his cock. “Just relax and let me take care of you.”
Liam hissed in response and released my face.
He felt heavy and so warm against my palm. The silky soft skin grew taut as he rapidly grew to full size, pulsing in my hand with the deep thrum of his heartbeat.
Smiling at his obvious need, I swiped my tongue out and gave him a lick from the frenulum, up over the broad rim, and around the head before I opened my mouth fully and took him in. My jaw protested at having to open so wide, but the raw moan that tore from Liam’s throat drowned out any discomfort. When I moved my head further down, his hands found my hair.
“Audrey.” It was a hoarse whisper, and when I glanced up, I saw his eyes were clenched shut, his whole body tense with strain, but the hands in my hair never pulled or forced. He just kept them there while I moved my lips up and down his thick shaft, tangling in the messy strands as he moaned.
I didn’t tease him, could sense he needed the release rather than prolonged pleasure, so I worked his cock rhythmically, up and down, over and over, until his breathing was fast and shallow and his hands tugged on my hair.
“I’m close,” he grunted, and I was about to move away and finish him off with my hand when I looked up and saw the intense pain in his eyes, so completely raw and unfiltered it hit me like nothing had before.
Logically, looking back, the instinctual urge to soothe whatever it was that hurt him so badly shouldn’t have made me want finish him with my mouth, but for some inexplicable reason, it did. I wanted him to give me his pain, his desperation, his torment, until he had nothing left, and so I sucked him hard while he groaned and came.
The salty taste of his essence filled my mouth, making me swallow on reflex as I stilled my movements and braced against his thighs.
“Audrey…” His voice was softer now, but still ragged with his panted breath. “You didn’t have to do that.”
I let his softening cock slide out of my mouth, giving the head a peck before I looked up at him. “I wanted to.”
He released my hair and stroked a thumb over my lips. And then his face cracked with grief and he slumped to his knees in front of me. I don’t know if he reached for me before I reached for him, but soon, he clung to me while sobs wracked his strong body.
I held him for the better part of an hour, silently stroking his back until eventually, his sobs quieted and turned to slow, deep breaths.
“Do you want to talk about it?” I asked when he finally pulled his head up from my shoulder to look at me.
“I can’t.” Liam’s gaze locked in mine, and my stomach flopped at the emotion in his eyes. But it wasn’t pain anymore. It was something else, something that made my heart ache.
“I’m sorry I came to you like this. After not calling for nearly a week. You deserved better.”
I shrugged, trying not to show him how much I’d longed for him, like some stupid teenager with a crush. “It’s okay, it’s not like we’re anything more than friends with benefits, I get it.”
Liam shook his head and reached for my hand so he could interlock our fingers. “I thought we agreed there wouldn’t be any bullshit between us.”
I opened my mouth to protest, but he continued before I could. “I’m not good at this. I’ve never… I’ve not cared for a girl like I do you before. I don’t know how to be your boyfriend.”
Boyfriend.
The word hung in the air between us, suspended by the silence as my heart took an extra couple of beats.
“Do… do you want to be?” I asked, unable to quell my incredulous tone. One thing I’d been certain of from the very first moment I saw Liam Steel was that he was a player. Multiple women, no commitments… everything about him screamed that I should stay away, that he wasn’t what I was looking for. And yet I’d known I needed him like I needed the sun since that first date.
And I’d known I was in love with him since our last night together.
I’d tried to suppress it, because I knew only heartbreak lay down that path. Until he stood in my door with pain written across his face. Pain, and a yearning that mirrored my own.
Boyfriend.
Liam grimaced. “Audrey… I’m not one of the good guys. And I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“I think it’s too late for that,” I said softly. “I… there’s something about you that I…”
“I know. I feel it too.” He rubbed his free hand across his face and drew in a deep breath. When he looked at me again, there was more of his old self back in his gaze. “I need you to tell me… if you could choose… if you’d never met me that day in the park, you’d continue on with your life as always, and you’d be safe. Or… we were together, but… something awful might happen. You might get hurt. Which would you choose?”
I wrinkled my nose at his cryptic question. “Something awful?”
“If King Kong suddenly climbed the Eye, or giant spiders roamed the streets,” he said, as if that explained anything.
“Ew. Giant spiders, really?” I shuddered.
Liam made a vague hand gesture. “It was the worst I could come up with off the top of my head.”
I sighed. “I’d probably take the spiders. But I’d also never leave my apartment again.”
He smiled, but there was a touch of strain in the set of his sensual lips. “I need you to be sure, love.”
“Why? What’s this about, Liam?”
He rubbed his face again and exhaled deeply. “It’s about me being a selfish fuck. I don’t want to leave you alone, even though I know I should. It’s not fucking fair! I’ve never felt like I do with you in my arms, nothing’s ever felt this goddamn right, but I… if you get hurt because I can’t stay away, then I…
“I can’t even tell you, that’s the most fucked up thing. Just know that… if we keep seeing each other, I can’t promise you… There is a very real chance you could end up getting hurt. And I need you to tell me that that’s not a risk you’re willing to take. I need you to tell me to leave, because I don’t think I can do it if you don’t.”
I put my free hand on top of his and looked into his eyes, searching for what I’d been too scared to even hope to find there. Until tonight. And I found it. This was the man I was meant to be with. This redheaded player with his easy smile and his demons he couldn’t tell me about. This was it. He was it.
“Liam, I don’t care. I just want to be with you.”
“Audrey—”
“No. I don’t care. No bullshit, remember? You asked me to choose, and I did. I pick you, spiders and all. Just promise me… promise me this isn’t just some fling for you, okay? Because I…” I paused, not quite capable of sayin
g the words even though everything inside me ached to tell him. But it was too much, too soon.
I love you.
“If we’re doing this, I want it to be the real deal. I can’t… I can’t do casual.”
He smiled then, but despite the relief in his eyes I saw the sadness in the set of his full lips. “I don’t want casual, either. But I wish you’d choose differently.”
I shook my head, pinching my lips with determination. “It’s not a choice.”
“I know,” he rasped, before he pulled me into a kiss. It was soft and tender, and it made warmth flood through my veins and fill my blood with a happiness I couldn’t remember ever feeling before. When he withdrew, there was nothing left of the confusion and worry in my body. Only the warm buzz of the joy I’d always felt whenever he was near me.
“So we’re doing this?” I confirmed.
“Yeah,” he said. “We are.”
I gave Liam a wide smile before I climbed into his lap. My boyfriend’s lap. “Guess that means you’re coming with me to my dad’s birthday dinner, huh?”
14
Louis
“Where are you off to?” I raised my eyebrows at my twin as he walked into the kitchen, wearing a pressed shirt and smart jeans. Not completely unusual attire for him, but he looked somehow… neater than usual. And he was fiddling with his cuff, like he usually did when he was nervous.
“Audrey’s dad’s birthday,” he said with a grimace.
Audrey.
My stomach dropped with uncomfortable foreboding. The little prude he’d picked up from a pub a few weeks ago. I hadn’t asked, but I knew that’s where he’d been sleeping most nights this past week. With her.
This was the longest he’d ever been with a girl before—that either of us had, and I wasn’t stupid. He liked her. Fuck, he was going to a goddamn family birthday with her now? He more than liked her.
Worry mixed with something else, something dark and painful I didn’t want to prod further twisted in my gut. We both knew we couldn’t afford distractions right now, and getting attached to a bird was about the dumbest fucking thing he could have done. Soon as you cared for someone, they became a weakness. Just look at fucking Marcus—he’d only narrowly avoided death because he lost his head when his girl was in danger.