by Marks, Teir
In
the
Beginning
The Family Series
Teir Marks
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Copyright © 2020 Teir Marks
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For those of you that have always wanted to walk the wilder, darker side of love with a bad boy/girl that treated you so good. The story has continued just for you! Dive in and get lost!
1
World War III was very close to taking place in his house, and Grae wasn't sure if it would be between Synn and Kylen, or Nyela and Kylen. What he did know was that shit was about to hit the fan in more ways than one.
When he had gotten the call from Synn while he and Maleiha had been on their way back from her parents' house, he knew something was going on. Even before his older brother had told him, “Shit's happened”. What he had not expected to walk in on, however, was his baby brother with his hand around their oldest sibling's girlfriend's neck.
The events that followed happened, for him, in slow motion.
Grae watched as Nyela broke Kylen's grasp on her neck, throwing a right his way only for him to block it, using his other hand to grab her by the throat before spinning her around into a chokehold.
It wasn’t long before she was elbowing him in the side. His little brother grunted but didn't let her go. It seemed to Grae; he was trying to put her to sleep.
His eyes went to Synn, and he could see that shit was about to go up another level, and as much as he wanted to see if Kylen could indeed sleep Nyela, he didn't need their oldest sibling stepping in. Things would definitely get broken, and he, for one, didn't feel like cleaning it up.
Inclining his head ever so slightly, Ashton, Emery, and himself moved as if they were reading each other’s minds.
Grae locked his arm around Kylen's neck, sweeping his legs, but not allowing him to fall to the floor. The sudden action causing his baby brother to release Nyela, who fell forward, he assumed from being a little lightheaded, but Emery was there to catch her. He glanced over to find Ashton standing with his arm against the top of Synn's chest; their older brother pressed against the wall.
“Somebody tell me what the hell is going on here.” He heard his little beauty demand.
He looked at her, as his brother struggled in his hold. However, her attention had been taken by something else. Following her line of sight, he saw a woman sitting on the stairs. What looked like a towel wrapped around her ankle as blood seeped through it.
Grae had never seen her before, but could only guess she had come with one of his siblings. His eyes then quickly scanned the rest of the people in the room, and he found that Sutton was bleeding from her shoulder. Though not as bad as the woman with the ankle wound. He put two and two together that she must have come with Nyela and Sutton.
“I was doing that before the spawn of Satan attacked me,” Nyela stated as Grae watched her turn glaring eyes to his baby brother, who had stopped struggling. So, he let him go, prepared to snatch him up if he had too.
“Fuck you. I could kill you for shooting, Doll.”
At that, Grae lifted a brow. He was confused as to why Nyela would have shot her own best friend. From what he had heard, the two were like sisters. At that moment, he decided that if his brother charged her or tried to attack her again, he would let him. At least for a bit. If someone had shot Maleiha, he would have killed their asses by now. In retrospect, he supposed his brother was warranted to have choked her to sleep.
“Stop this bullshit ass arguing and explain to us what's going on,” Maleiha stated.
Grae watched her as she made her way over to the woman on the stairs as Nyela began to speak. He listened to her tell them that the three of them had been out and were followed from the time they got to the first place they had gone. How they had gotten themselves cornered and how she had to shoot Sutton in order to save all of their lives. She also informed them that she had a man in her trunk.
“Emery and Ky. You go get him out.” Grae instructed.
“No.” His beauty stated. “Let Ashton go with him. Emery, I need you to get me all the medical supplies you have. I can't tell what kind of wound I'm dealing with yet.” She then turned her attention to him. “Baby, I need you to move her into the kitchen. Preferably right under the light.” He nodded before heading towards them as she turned to Synn. “You need to go calm down. Have a drink or something.” She told his older brother before walking over to Sutton.
Grae smirked to himself. His little beauty was taking charge.
Maleiha was reeling from what Nyela had told them and the fact that she had actually shot Sutton. She understood it had saved their lives, but she wasn't sure she would have been able to make that call if she was in her position. She admired and felt sorry for her at the same time. The former, because it took an extremely strong person to make that decision. The latter, because she knew that Kylen would hold a grudge over this shit forever.
As she surveyed the wound on Sutton's shoulder, she deduced that it was only a graze. However, it would still need to be cleaned and disinfected. That could wait until she got the other woman finished with.
Grabbing Sutton's hand gently as not to scare her, because she had this Bambi like look in her eyes, Maleiha led her to the kitchen behind Grae. Once they were in there, she gestured for her to sit while she went over to where her boyfriend had sat the other woman.
Emery came back a few moments later with medical supplies and gloves, and Maleiha could hear shuffling going on. She presumed that Ashton and Kylen were coming back inside with the man that had been in Nyela's trunk.
She went about carefully cleaning all of the blood away after washing and gloving her hands. When she had, she saw that the bullet was still in her ankle. She mentally sighed. For once, when patching these people up, she would have liked for the bullet to have gone straight through, though she would prefer that they stopped getting shot altogether.
At least she wouldn't have to go deep into her ankle to pull it out. The end of the bullet was sticking out enough to where she could grab ahold of it, and pull it slowly. She probably should have given her something for the pain before she started, but this wouldn't take long.
She pulled the bullet out, apologizing a few times for the pain it was causing. Once she had it out, she cleaned the ankle again, disinfecting it before placing some thick gauze over it and wrapping it.
Maleiha then made her way to Sutton after washing her hands and gloving them again, who was now joined by Kylen. He was standing behind her chair, gently running his fingers through her hair. Maleiha was surprised he knew how to do anything gently, but refrained from saying so.
Once she had Sutton's wound cleaned, disinfected, and covered, she turned her attention to the other people in the kitchen. She hadn't noticed that everyone had joined them. Even Synn, who was standing against the door frame. She often got like that though, when she was in nurse mode. Her surroundings seemed to fade away.
Removing her gloves, she threw them in the trash before rewashing her hands. After drying t
hem, she made her way over to Grae, who was sitting on one of the bar stools. He pulled her to stand between his legs.
“Now that we've gotten the craziness out of the way...mostly, I'm Maleiha.” She introduced. She knew two of the women in the room, but she was unfamiliar with the other three and thought it would ease the tension a bit if they all introduced themselves to each other. “I don't know if all of you ladies know him, but this is Grae.” She then stated, gesturing.
So, they went around like that introducing, themselves. The ladies, as well as the siblings, though Maleiha knew them all, she wasn't sure if the other women knew them. She learned that the other women were Larkin, Korrae, and Luna. She liked all of their names and figured whoever had come up with them must have been pretty creative.
“S..so w-what are we going t-to do?” Sutton questioned, and Maleiha had been thinking the same thing.
“The safest thing would be for you all to stay here and not to go out alone,” Emery spoke.
That wasn't a big deal to Maleiha. It's what she pretty much did anyway. However, as she looked at the other women in attendance, she could tell that Korrae did not seem to be a fan of the idea. If she had to guess, she would say the other woman was still trying to process what was going on, and the look on her face told Maleiha she wasn't taking it too well.
Korrae was, for lack of a better term, stuck. She had taken everything that was being said in, but it was taking it a minute to sink in fully. What she knew for sure, though, was that someone had tried to kidnap three of the women for their involvement with these people, and here she was dating one. Why was this happening to her? The first time she let her wall down, and it happened to be for...hell, she didn't even know.
A part of her knew that he had been too good to be true. Now, she was finding out that he was, what? A criminal of some sort. It was just all too much.
She was numb, and while she could introduce herself when they were all going around and doing it, she was lost otherwise.
What truly amazed her was that all of the women seemed to be taking the news with a grain of salt. She figured something must have been wrong with them. That was the only reason she could come up with for them being so relaxed about it all. It was the only thing that made sense to her.
Her musings were cut short by Emery speaking. She was aware that someone had asked a question, but hadn't paid much attention to it. It was only the answer it garnered that had her head snapping to the only female Amato sibling.
“The safest thing would be for you all to stay here and not to go out alone.”
“You're kidding, right?” She questioned with disbelief. “You all are the reason that the three of them were attacked, and you want us to stay here with you? No. There is no fucking way.”
“It's either stay or die. I'm assuming you don't know how to defend yourself. So, you'll most likely die.” Nyela told her with a shrug, and Korrae could tell that she was not going to be a big fan of this woman.
“N-Nye.” Sutton scolded. Or well, Korrae assumed she was trying too, but it merely came out sounding more like a little mouse squeaking.
“What? It's true.” Nyela then responded.
“Korrae,” Maleiha called gently, and she turned her attention to the other woman. “I know that this is a lot to take in. And though her delivery could have been better, Nyela's right. As Emery said, it's safest for us all to stay here. Ashton wouldn't let anything happen to you.”
Korrae turned her attention to Ashton, who was leaning against the table beside the chair she was seated in. He hadn't said anything at her outburst, and she couldn't read the look in his eyes, but she would be lying if she said that she didn't feel a sense of safety when she was with him.
Though she still thought that all of this was crazy and there were several questions she needed answers too, she liked living. So, she figured she had no choice but to do as was being suggested and stay with them. She could go to the police. That thought had crossed her mind for the briefest of seconds, but she also knew that meant the possibility of Ashton getting in trouble, and no part of her wanted that even though she was skeptical about him now.
Sighing, she simply nodded. Resigning herself to the fact that she would be under the same roof as these people for who only knew how long.
“Now that we've gotten that out of the way. Let's talk about how you three were able to come out of being kidnapped with only two wounds and what seems like a bit of ease.” Korrae heard Ashton state, and she had to admit she was wondering the same thing.
Ashton voiced the question, though he was already sure he knew the answer. He had come up with his theory, found the smallest amounts of evidence that admittedly he was piecing together by a thread, and shared it with Grae. His older brother hadn't been so sure but told Ashton to go with his gut, because it was usually right.
The room was silent for several moments, and the look in Nyela's eyes was enough to tell him that his suspicions were indeed correct. Though he knew she was trying to keep her face neutral, her eyes, for a split second, betrayed her, and he saw all that he needed too.
“Answer him,” Synn stated, and Ashton knew that his brother was curious to know the answer as well.
“Let's just say Sutton, Luna, and I deal in acquiring and taking care of certain things for people,” Nyela spoke.
When she didn't elaborate, Ashton decided to step in. “I think we can fill in the rest of the cracks. After all, we're familiar with Abraxas. You actually did a job for us.”
At those words, he watched his brother push off the door frame. He knew that Synn wanted answers, but right now was not the time to question Nyela. They still had other things to take care of.
“Bullshit,” Kylen spoke. “You mean to tell me that you and Sutton are assassins.”
“No,” Nyela stated. “Sutton takes care of the technical aspects.”
Ashton watched as Kylen opened his mouth to say something else, but was cut off by Emery.
“You can question that as much as you want to later. We have a guest in the basement that requires some emcee services. We also need to take them to get clothes and anything else they need since they'll be staying with us for a while.”
“Em is right,” Grae spoke. “We need to take them to get what they need and get whatever answers we can from the man downstairs.”
Ashton nodded in agreement. “Kylen and I searched him. He had a cellphone, but it wasn't on. We tried to turn it on, but I'm assuming it's dead. I’ll get a charger for it.”
“Okay,” Grae spoke. “Let's go and get back so we can get down to business.”
Ashton pushed himself off the wall and placed his hand on the small of Korrae's back. Getting her to move forward and out of the kitchen with the rest of the people in there.
Once they were outside, he opened the door for her, and they got into his truck. He sent a text to Treece with Korrae's address and asked her to meet him there. If someone was out to get them, he wanted to be prepared and having an extra person there as back-up would put him a bit more at ease if something happened with Korrae around.
The ride to her house was silent, and he knew that she was still taking in everything that had been said. Knew that she probably had a million and one questions she wanted answers too and he planned on giving them to her. Just not at that moment.
He could have initiated the conversation. He really could have, but he didn't want to start in the wrong place and overload her. He figured that the simplest thing for both of them would be to let her dictate the direction and speed of the conversation when it came about and for him to just follow it.
When they pulled up to her house, Treece was parked out on the street, and he saw Korrae tense up. Reaching over, he placed a hand on her thigh, drawing her attention. She didn't shrug him off, so at the moment, that was a positive enough sign to him.
“It's just Treece.” He informed her. She nodded, and he got out of the car, going around to open her door for her.
Treece
was out of the car by this point, and he introduced the two women. When they got to her front door, he took her keys from her and unlocked the door. Going in first, checking and making sure no one had broken in, and was lying in wait.
When he was satisfied that there was no one there, he made his way back outside and allowed Korrae in. He and Treece stayed in the hallway as she packed up clothes and personal items in her bedroom and bathroom. He wanted to give her privacy to do so, and yet, be within hearing range if something happened to her. Because if something did, he knew he'd lose his shit and any control he had.
2
Nyela leaned against the wall, feeling the smallest bit fidgety. She wasn't typically like this, but the intensity of the green eyes staring her down were heavy. They felt like an actual weight on her skin, searing into her soul.
They had been standing there in silence for several minutes that felt like hours. She knew she should have said something, but wasn't sure that she knew where to start. So, she figured she would wait for the question and then supply an answer.
Synn was leaning against the desk in his office, peering, it felt like, through her entire being.
She shifted. She was getting tired of the silence between them, but she also knew if she waited on him to break it, she would be waiting a lifetime.
“If you have something to say or ask, Synn, just do it.”
He didn't respond to her. Simply stayed quiet.
Nyela figured he was doing it on purpose. She had already stressed to him that she didn't like it when he did that. Yet, he was doing it again.
“I'm...an assassin for hire.” She finally stated, getting tired of the game of silence they were immersed in.
He remained quiet at her admission. She had expected him to say something, anything. Even if it was his usual few words. What she had not expected was for him to grab a knife out of nowhere and launch it at her.