Chapter 17
Cockwomble — noun — A male directed insult. A completely useless person that spouts constant bullshit.
— Dima to Shasha
DIMA
I was on my belly, eye to my scope, scope aimed at my target—or Shasha’s target—and there was a kitten on my back.
One that was wearing a jingling collar that was driving me insane.
The worst part was, if this was a fuckin’ pet, whomever owned the pet was allowing the cat to be really far off from anyone’s home.
I was in the middle of a field, on the edge of a city, about to take a shot that most snipers couldn’t take.
Oh , and the target was a woman.
A congresswoman.
Shasha hadn’t specifically asked me to take this shot, truth be told. He’d asked me to keep an eye on the woman, and I had.
I’d watched her ‘pretend’ for hours at a party in the middle of the city on the rooftop of her home as she celebrated her win back in November .
Only , when she wasn’t celebrating, she was going to her penthouse apartment, into a bedroom, and beating the absolute dog shit out of a little boy that was clearly not hers.
When she was done, she’d kiss him, and the kid would cringe, and definitely not because he’d just been beaten. Because he’d been hurt in other ways.
How did I know this?
Because he was chained naked to a bed.
My stomach was in knots as I watched the kid take one more beating before she headed back upstairs.
I would’ve taken the shot way before now had the kid not been in the way the entire time.
I was confident in my abilities to take a shot, but not confident enough to take the shot when a little boy, probably around the age of seven or eight, was taking up most of the scope.
The moment she got back upstairs after getting her fix, I turned my scope back to the window below, looking as the kid curled into a ball and cried, big, hulking sobs.
And I knew right then and there that the shot was going to be taken.
In the middle of her party, in the middle of Dallas , because I would not let her go down there and do anything else to that poor child.
When she was by herself, standing on a raised platform and waving and laughing, I stilled my trigger finger and listened to the speech she gave.
I’d tapped into the DJ’s setup after he’d gotten there, and heard everything that he had to say, the music he played, and anything that someone uttered that came close enough.
But now everyone and everything was quiet except for her, allowing me to hear everything that she had to say over her speech.
“ I want to thank you for your patience,” she smiled. “ It’s been a few months since I’ve been voted into office, and I just want to say how thankful I am. How happy that I am to be here and make a difference.” She smiled and raised a glass in the hand that she’d just used to beat the shit out of a little boy. “ I want to make a change in this world. In our great state of Texas . I want to…”
I took the shot, not wanting to hear another lie come out of her mouth.
In the months that she’d been in office, she’d accomplished nothing. She’d signed on for numerous bills that hurt this country, the men and women that would defend this country, and anything and everything that she could put her name to that would be touted in the media for all to hear.
Oh , and she’d signed onto the bill that would affect Shasha and me and would give the government the ability to go digging into our lives, in any way they needed, giving them blanket permission across the board to do whatever they wanted, when they wanted, and how they wanted.
Our constitutional rights?
Forgotten if we were suspected of being a part of an organized crime family.
My almost college degree in criminology was screaming as I read that particular bill.
That’d been the reason that I’d gotten the degree in the first place, so I knew my rights.
But apparently, the men and women that wrote that bill, and agreed with it, wanted nothing more than to strip those rights.
The shot was true, and her head exploded like a pumpkin being dropped from a three-story building.
Blood , bone, and brain matter went everywhere as her head was pretty much annihilated.
After the shot took place, I didn’t waste time.
The kitten didn’t react when I took the shot—it was quiet, and truthfully, unless you knew what you were listening for, you wouldn’t know that I’d just shot a rifle—and I took that as a sign that the cat needed to come home with me.
Only , when I finally got the cat free of my back, I turned to see that the cat wasn’t alone.
The cat distribution system had finally found me, and with it came four kittens in varying shades of brown, white and orange. All with collars, indicating that they were someone’s pet.
Though , I felt like it was more likely that someone was selling them, based on how fuckin’ cute and fluffy they were.
“ These are ragdoll kittens.” Nastya’s eyes went wide. “ You realize these are like two grand a pop, right?”
“ Four ,” Milena said. “ Look .”
I didn’t bother to look, because I didn’t care.
But Keely took the phone from Milena’s hand and started to read.
“ Plano woman begging for the return of her kittens. According to the KRMW News reporter that met with both the wife and the husband, after an argument about the smell of ammonia from the amount of cats in the house, the husband, Jack Leo , decided to take the cats and give them to good homes instead of selling any more of her ‘puppy mill’ kittens. Jack Leo , a local window business owner of Bright Windows , says that he and his wife are getting a divorce. According to Leo , Natasha Leo , his wife, has been breeding cats since they met. But it’s gotten out of hand to the point where she has hundreds of cats inside and out, and it’s ruining his life. He sold off over a hundred cats and kittens in the past month while Natasha Leo was visiting Russia to acquire more cats to breed.” Keely looked over at the cats in question. “ Doesn’t look like he found them a good home. Sounds like he might’ve dumped them. Do you think there could be more?”
“ Maybe he found a home for all of them but the ones that I found,” I shrugged. “ I can go back and look in a few more days.”
“ Not now?” Shasha joked.
He’d seen the news.
He knew what I did.
He also knew why it was a little too hot right now to go back and search for any other kittens.
“ We can all go,” Maven said. “ Say we were driving by and saw a couple of cats if anyone asks questions.”
Maven didn’t outright know that I’d done anything tonight, but if she had a working brain—which she did—she’d know I’d done something.
But before I could say anything more, Keely sucked in a breath.
“ Holy shit.”
“ What ?” I asked, startled with how hard my heart jumped inside of my chest at her gasp of outrage.
“ Look at this!” she cried as she started a video back up. “ This is the congresswoman that was killed tonight. Look what they found locked up in her bedroom!”
Shasha’s eyes narrowed as he looked at the video.
“ Screen share that with the television,” I suggested.
She did, and we all watched as a little boy was carted out of the building wrapped up in a cozy looking blanket.
The video buffered right at a specific moment in time, and my being froze inside.
“ Um ,” I said carefully. “ That looks like…”
“ Apollo .” She inhaled swiftly, her head whipping around as she stared at Cutter . “ That looks like Apollo .”
A look of complete horror crossed over Cutter’s face.
Then , “ It fits.”
The raspy “it fits” had my heart literally jolting inside of my chest again.
“ What’s going on?” Shasha asked.
“ Two years ago, Apollo’s son, Tavi , otherwise known as Octavius Abram Reins , went missing. Apollo’s wife at the time took off and went back to her home country. Or so she said. He’s spent the last two years looking for them and found nothing.”
“ You’re sure that it’s Apollo’s son?” I asked curiously.
“ There’s no doubt in my mind. Because all of them have that little birthmark right there.” She got up and pointed at the screen, which was still frozen and buffering. “ That one right there on the side of his neck. It’s a heart. Every last first-born boy has had it for eight generations now. Plus , they have the bluest eyes. Like the sky in the middle of a sunny day.”
Now that she pointed it out, I had seen the eyes and the birthmark on Apollo before.
“ Fuck ,” I said. “ Call him.”
Cutter pulled out his phone and left the room.
Hours later, when we were lying in bed, Keely had her head resting on my chest. Neither one of us was asleep, and both of us were thinking.
The last couple of hours were crazy.
Apollo had literally stormed the hospital looking for his son, and it’d been on every available news outlet that was broadcasting.
The congresswoman dying, and then the little boy they’d found chained up in her bedroom, had been on every news outlet that was known to man.
And Apollo trying to get to the little boy? That’d made national news.
But he was there now, and the little boy was safe.
“ Do you think that she was hurting him?” Keely asked.
I swallowed hard. “ She was.”
“ How ?” she asked.
“ From what I saw? She was beating the shit out of him,” I said.
Hopefully my other suspicion was wrong.
Hopefully , he’d only been with her for a short time.
The setup in her place, from what I could tell, didn’t say long-term.
But …
“ I’m glad you killed her,” she whispered into my chest.
I pulled her in deeper. “ I wasn’t going to until I saw.”
She ran her fingers between my pectoral muscles.
Which , of course, caught the attention of all the fuckin’ cats we still had.
Two of them pounced, causing Keely to giggle.
I , on the other hand, winced.
“ Their claws are very sharp, darling,” I teased.
“ Whoops .” She laughed, then sobered. “ She’s why I don’t want children.”
I squeezed her to me and turned, displacing the cats that’d tried to take up residence on my chest.
The cats fell behind me and curled close, uncaring that they’d been moved.
I pulled her in close and said, “ You don’t have to have children, baby. But know that if you do, if you decide you want them with me, I’ll fight with my last breath to keep them safe.”
“ Apollo is a strong man. He’s military. He’s a badass. And he wasn’t able to protect his child,” she pointed out.
“ Apollo trusted the wrong girl,” I countered. “ I would never betray you like that. You know that in your heart.”
She sighed. “ Apollo is heartbroken.”
“ Yes ,” I agreed.
“ I’ll keep thinking about children.” She pressed a kiss to my throat.
I squeezed her tight. “ Good .”
Because why the hell did the idea of Keely being pregnant with my children make me want it so badly?
Because you love her , you dumbass.
My inner voice had never steered me wrong before.
I would make this woman mine forever, and eventually I’d give her babies.
Lots of them.
So many that she had no choice but to stay home and take care of them with me, and never think about working, or the ugliness of the world ever again.
Sounded a lot like heaven.