Hell Bent

by Heather Killough-Walden

  “I can’t believe you’d be so bloody stupid, Bella!” He roared at her, his words melding with the thunder that cracked above them. “You’ll get yourself killed!” His face was inches from hers, his blue eyes boring holes into her soul. His accent had deepened with his fury.

  “Fuck you, Jack!” She screamed into his face. “How could you do this to me, you goddamned son of a bitch! I trusted you!” She tried, with all her might, to yank her arms out of his grip. All she could think about was how he’d violated her trust, lied to her, and continued to lie to her over and over again. How many times had she unknowingly bared her body to one of his men by undressing in front of a window where the curtain wasn’t completely shut? How many times had she gone to the doctor for things she didn’t want the world to know about – only to have his men give him a detailed report? And she wondered, too. She wondered how many other things he knew about her. Had he had her researched? Would he even tell her if he had?

  She couldn’t trust Jack, despite the fact that he’d put his trust in her and she had never – not once – violated that trust, even though it hadn’t always been easy. That really hurt. It hurt. It hurt so bad that she desperately wanted to make him hurt more.

  Annabelle wanted out of Jack Thane’s world – the Business and all of the wrong that it stood for. At that moment, in fact, Annabelle sort of wanted to die.

  She bucked in his grip, bucked against the pain inside, the bricks behind her tearing the skin on the backs of her hands as she twisted madly. The rain had soaked them both, and her ire-fueled strength finally allowed one arm to slip free. It was her right arm, and her sprained shoulder screamed at her as she quickly balled up her fist and struck the side of his face as hard as she could.

  Jack’s head snapped to the side under the impact. His left ear began to ring. Thunder cracked again overhead, lightning illuminating the alley.

  Pain and frustration got the better of Jack and he grabbed her wrist roughly again, using it to spin her around, jerking her back against his chest. He then twisted the injured arm up behind her back until she cried out in pain.

  “Stop fighting me!” He bellowed.

  “No!” Pain arced through the right side of her body, but he didn’t let up. “Let me go!” She sobbed into the wet night as he grabbed her other wrist and proceeded to twist it, too, behind her back, until he had both arms firmly under his control.

  “You lied to me Jack!” She yelled the accusations, even as he placed both of her slim wrists into his left hand and used his right to pull her against him. “How many times did you lie to me!”

  Jack could feel her trembling against him and he desperately wanted it to stop.

  “I’ve never lied to you, Bella!” He yelled into her ear. “Not once! Now, stop fighting me!” He growled the last part, angry at her for hurting herself as she fought him, and frustrated, at the same time, that any of this was happening.

  “You bastard!” She fought wildly in his grip, wanting nothing more than to get free and turn around and rip his head off. He knew her struggles would cause her injury, knew she was bruising in his grip. But he wouldn’t let her go. Not for anything.

  Jack was in Hell. His heart was breaking; he couldn’t believe how badly it hurt. He couldn’t believe the harsh efficiency and detachment with which he was capable of apprehending the woman he loved even as she cried in his arms. Cried because he had hurt her. And because he continued to do so – in so many ways. He had never told her a bald-faced lie, but he’d kept things from her, and to her, there was no difference between the two. And he knew she was right.

  “You spied on me, you drugged me up,” she cried, “what else have you done?” She tried, one last time, to yank away from him, but it was a pointless action, done out of her uncontrollable fury more than anything else. “I hate you, Jack Thane.” She finally sobbed, her head falling forward in defeat. Her hair cascaded in wet locks around her hidden face, but her body shook with each pathetic sob, and the trembling wasn’t letting up. She shook with pain, both physical and emotional.

  Something inside of Jack snapped.

  “Boss?”

  Jack knew they were there. He’d heard them coming down both sides of the alley. Jack looked up and, while still holding Annabelle’s wrists in one of his gloved hands, he held out his other for the cuffs that he knew his employee would supply.

  Without a word, one of the men came forward, handed him a gleaming steel pair of cuffs, and then stepped in front of Annabelle to hold her arms still as Jack slipped them onto her.

  Her head snapped up when she heard them click into place.

  “You’re going to keep me locked up, Jack?” Her tone skated the thin ice between hysterics and despair. “And I didn’t think you could be any more cruel to me.”

  In a self-deprecating tone that Annabelle had never heard him use before, Jack laughed. It was a nasty laugh, pitiless and cold. “You have no idea, luv.” He roughly took hold of her upper arm then and pulled her toward the end of the alley, where a black luxury sedan with dark tinted windows idled patiently, waiting for its passengers.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  “They say that only a woman he loves can drive a man to drink.”

  Jack gently set down the empty shot glass and looked up. He didn’t say anything as Avery took a seat beside him and waved the bartender over. “Pint of ale, mate.”

  The bar tender nodded and poured the amber liquid into an ice-rimmed glass and set it down in front of the Hell’s Angel.

  Jack looked away.

  “How long has it been?” Avery asked, nonchalantly, as he eyed the man beside him, who, as he was himself, was dressed from head to toe in black biker leather.

  Jack didn’t answer.

  “Heard about the scene in London,” Avery said next, turning the mug so that he could get a grip on its handle and take a long swig.

  Still, Jack said nothing.

  “Heard it was because you’ve been keeping an eye on your girl without her knowing about it.”

  “You hear a lot of things.”

  “Aye,” Avery nodded. The silence stretched between them for a minute.

  “Also heard she was bloody fast and that you were bloody lucky she didn’t decide to just blow your head off.” Avery said then, as he took another swig and then set his drink down, sighing. “She’s a good shot, eh?”

  “She is.”

  “And she’s fast.”

  “So what?” Jack muttered. He was on his fourth shot and was just now starting to feel the second one. Some of the pain inside was numbing a little, finally, and he frankly couldn’t bloody wait until he couldn’t feel a fucking thing.

  “So, I know why she’s mad, JT. She’s lost here, in this world,” Avery gestured to the bar around them and England, beyond. “Where she doesn’t belong – or at least, doesn’t think she belongs.”

  Jack listened quietly, his gaze steadily ahead as he reached for his fifth shot glass and Avery gently slid it out of the way. Jack’s jaw tensed and his gaze rose to meet Avery’s – sapphire meeting amber.

  “You’ve taken away everything she’s ever known, mate.” Avery continued softly. “And then you went and told her that part of what she thought she knew wasn’t true. She was never safe in her own bubble. Just think about it, JT. It’s a hard blow.”

  “It saved her life, Avery.”

  “I know, mate.” Avery nodded, placatingly. He glanced at the shot of brown liquid that he’d moved and looked thoughtful. “Listen up.” He swung on the stool and picked up the shot, downing its contents himself. Jack watched him with a mixture of interest and irritation. Avery swallowed it with a clenched-teeth expression and then continued. “You and I both know that what you do is dangerous. So dangerous that once you’re in, you’re in forever, or you’re dead.”

  Silence. But Jack nodded. Once.

  “So, what if I told you that I’d decided I’d rather kill people for a living than walk into another classroom and deliver another l
ecture to a bunch of rich kids who don’t give a fuck about what happened the day before yesterday, much less two hundred years ago?”

  JT narrowed his gaze at his friend. Avery was a professor of British history at Oxford University.

  Being a Hell’s Angel was sometimes a little like being Batman. One mask for the day. One for night.

  At work, Avery wore a long-sleeved button-up shirt that hid his ink. To his students, he was Professor Avery Valentine. None of his pupils would know who he was if they saw him in that bar, at that moment, dressed in black leathers, an earring in his ear, and having a private conversation with a paid assassin.

  He took another swig of his beer, as if to chase the aftertaste of the shot and then asked, “What would you tell me?”

  Jack was distracted enough by Avery’s proposal to give that thought for a moment. Avery was a capable man and in good shape. Jack had never personally seen him chase after anyone or pull a gun and shoot, but he knew that Avery kept himself up and had no compunctions about panning someone’s head in. And he was fairly good at that, at least.

  “I’d tell you to get some training,” he said, his tone flat, his words soft. “And I’d think about it.”

  Avery smiled, cocking his head to one side. “Really?” He narrowed his own amber gaze. “And you don’t even know whether I can shoot, mate.” He lowered his voice and leaned in a little. “Who’s the safer bet, JT? Me? Or Annabelle Drake?”

  Jack blinked. The alcohol was beginning to buzz through his blood stream now; the world fuzzing a little around the edges. It had been twenty years since alcohol had made it past his tongue, and it was hitting him hard. But he wasn’t so far gone that Avery’s words didn’t hit him where it counted.

  “You want me to induct the woman I love into the Business?” Jack asked softly. Right now, all he wanted to do with the woman he loved was have her brain washed until she loved him again and then fuck her brains out for the remainder of his life.

  He’d never been so unreasonably furious as he had been in the last two days. Never, in his life. Not even when Adam Night had led him into the catacombs in France and allowed him to get lost for a full day and night before sending someone to the rescue. Not even then, had he felt the rage in him that he had felt for the past forty-eight hours.

  He was so out of it that he’d been handed Godrick Osborne’s file, assigned him as a mark, and he didn’t give a whit. He only cared about Annabelle.

  “Nah, JT.” Avery shook his head. “I’m not telling you to induct her. She’s already been inducted, hasn’t she?” Avery said, making the sign of a gun and shooting it three times at an invisible foe.

  Jack knew he was referring to the men Annabelle had killed in the tunnels under Columbia, and he wondered how his fellow Hell’s Angel had come by that information, as well.

  “Besides,” Avery shrugged gently. “She was involved the moment you decided you were going to invite her into your life, mate. The only way out of this mess now is to give her what she needs to be able to protect herself.” He paused, for effect and to let the information sink in. “You’re pissing in the wind if you think she’s going to just let this go with enough time, JT.” Avery shook his head, his look serious and sad at once. “Your only hope is to arm her well and call off your guard. Allow her the solitude she needs.”

  Jack thought about that for a moment. Why hadn’t he ever considered it before? Annabelle was fast and strong and a better shot, even, than he was. She was a natural – uncanny with a gun of any kind. Of the first ten rounds she’d ever shot under Jack’s supervision, five of them had hit the target’s center. And it had been moving at the time.

  So, why had the idea of her being an assassin completely escaped him until this moment?

  Because it hadn’t escaped him. He had thought of it. He’d just ignored the idea. Because he didn’t want to lose her. He couldn’t lose her.

  “I know you think you can’t live without her, JT. And I believe you.” Avery told him. “But you’ll have to, anyway, if you don’t make some changes soon. Like yesterday.”

  Jack turned back to the bar and ran a hand through his hair. He was feeling light headed. Christ, he thought. I’ve become a god damned light weight.

  “She has no job, she has no way of determining her own future. Women don’t stay happy very long under those conditions.” Avery finished off his beer and set it down with a satisfied clunk. “It’s a better plan than keeping her under lock and key, is it not?”

  Jack took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “How the hell do you know so much, Avery?”

  “Word gets ‘round, mate,” Avery said, pushing his empty mug toward the edge of the counter so that the bar tender could pick it up. “And I’m married.” Avery smiled a telling smile.

  Jack turned to his friend and studied him closely. It had been a few years since he’d last seen him, but he hadn’t changed any. The man didn’t age.

  “Thanks, mate.” Jack stood then, clapped his friend on the back, and headed toward the door of the bar. It took some effort to walk steadily.

  “By the way, JT,” Avery called after him. “Stella says ‘hi’.”

  Jack turned around.

  “She says to give Clara and Ian a hug for her and asked me to tell you to stay out of trouble,” Avery chuckled softly. “I’m fairly sure that last bit was her idea of a joke.”

  Jack finally smiled. Stella was Avery’s wife. Jack had been best man at their wedding. He nodded a goodbye, then, and left the bar, his alcohol-fevered brain trying its best to formulate a plan as he stepped out into the Essex night.

  Alex knocked gently on the door to Annabelle’s rooms. “Miss Drake?”

  “Come in, Alex.”

  He opened the door and stepped inside. Annabelle was seated at the window, reclined in a large plush chair, sipping on a cup of tea. Alex crossed the room to stand beside her. “How you doing?” He asked softly.

  She looked up at him. There were dark circles under her eyes. He cringed when he saw them. Jack wouldn’t be happy that she wasn’t sleeping. Hell, Jack wasn’t happy at all these days.

  Annabelle didn’t answer. She just smiled gently.

  “Can I get you anything?” He asked then, suddenly simply wanting to ease the pain he saw in her light brown eyes.

  “No, thank you.”

  “Mr. Thane has given me permission to get you anything you desire, Miss Drake,” he said as he knelt on one knee beside the chair. “I have a laptop. You can go online.”

  Annabelle’s gaze narrowed at that. She put her cup of tea down on the table beside her and turned to face Alex. “Oh?” She asked softly. “I’m sorry, Alex, but for some reason, I have a hard time believing that Jack would just give me permission to check my email or join an online forum at this juncture.” She shook her head. Electronic signatures were too easily traced. It was a dangerous world, and their immediate quarrel with one another aside, Annabelle and Jack would probably agree on the fact that there was still a bad guy out there somewhere to contend with.

  Alex sighed. “No, he wouldn’t. But he doesn’t mind if you wish to use it to do something that doesn’t reveal anything identifiable about yourself.”

  Annabelle’s ire was mounting. She knew where this was heading and it really rankled. “Like what, Alex?” She asked, keeping her tone even.

  Alex swallowed. He shrugged. “Like shop?”

  Annabelle stared at him. “Shop?” She asked. Her voice had lowered to a whisper. “Shop?” She stood slowly, and Alex stood with her. She looked up at him, so used to Jack’s towering figure that Alex’s lesser height didn’t so much as phase her.

  “What is it with you men?” She went on, moving around the chair and effectively forcing Alex to step back. His expression had become distinctly nervous. Annabelle’s voice hadn’t raised above that deceptively calm whisper, but goose bumps were riding up his arms.

  “I’m in a cage, Alex. I’ve lost everything I’ve ever known.” Suddenly, as if saying as
much drained what little strength she had, Annabelle stopped in her tracks and sighed. She shook her head and ran a hand through her hair. “Even Jack.” She whispered. “So, unless you can buy freedom and a second chance on Craig’s List, I think I’ll pass for now.”

  Alex watched her standing there, seeming so diminished. Like a flower without the sunlight.

  Make her happy, Alex. I don’t care what it costs or what she wants – as long as she doesn’t leave the complex. Just make her happy…

  Jack Thane’s orders echoed in his head. Alex racked his brain as he watched Annabelle Drake head back to the chair she’d risen from and sink down into it once more. She laid her head back and closed her eyes. Her pale lips parted. Alex recognized exhaustion when he saw it. And this exhaustion was mental as well as physical. Sitting there in a shaft of sunlight, her gold hair shimmering in waves around her pale features, she looked like a fallen angel.

  She put her fingertips to her temples then and began to rub. Her brow furrowed.

  Alex took a deep, slow breath and chewed on the inside of his cheek. And then his hazel eyes brightened with an idea.

  “Have you ever had a massage, Miss Drake?”

  That got her attention. She sat up and blinked. Sunlight reflected off of the amber specks in her almond eyes. She turned to face him.

  “What?”

  “There is a woman here in town who gives incredible deep tissue massages. Mr. Thane has used her several times.” He shrugged helplessly. “I’m just shooting in the dark here, but I wondered if it would make you feel more comfortable.” He paused, then added, “help a little with that headache you have?”

  Annabelle watched him for several long moments. And then she blew out a sigh. “Actually, I’ve only had one massage in my whole life and it wasn’t deep tissue.” She turned back toward the window and stared out at all of London below her. Her head was pounding. It had been doing that a lot lately. Her neck and shoulders were basically one solid knot from not sleeping. Tension.