Chapter Thirty-Seven
Charlotte
P ure chaos is what I hear coming from downstairs. I move to the door but Venom stops me.
“I have to help him!”
“There’s more guards on this floor. Let me check it out first. You stay put like a good little pet.” He taps my head and I pull away with a grunt.
“If you’re not back soon, I’m going out there!”
“Kill anyone who enters this room, besides my charming self of course.” Venom hands me a knife and walks out of the room.
It takes every ounce of self-control to not run out of this room. The screams, the gunshots, the absolute mayhem, has my nerves so fried. But I try to tell myself, if the fight is still ongoing, Reaper is still alive.
The door opens and in strolls Venom looking a bit disheveled from his regular put together demeanor.
“We can move,” he says, pushing back his bright hair.
I walk through the door, straight to the banister and look down to the foyer. Fredrick and several guards with guns stand in front of who I assume is Reaper, although I can't see him. There’s too many of them!
“Reaper!” I cry out.
Something goes flying into Fredrick’s eye as gunshots ring out. Someone suddenly grabs my arm, yanking me back. I twist and come face-to-face with one of Fredrick’s men. I quickly send my palm up into his nose. He drops my arm and I punch him in his stomach as hard as I can which causes him to bend forward enough for me to grab a hold of the back of his head and push it down at the same time I bring my knee up into his face. The man staggers back and falls onto his ass. I quickly pull out the knife from my waist band and pounce on him, sending the blade repeatedly into him until I’m sure he’s dead.
I look over to the door where Venom leans against the frame with crossed arms.
“My, my. You are an exquisite creature.”
“You must have seen him coming! You could have helped, ya know.”
“I could have, but I much prefer to watch you kill, little minx.”
“You are ridiculous.”
Four men run down the hall toward us.
“I thought you took care of everyone up here!” I yell at Venom.
“I left a few alive so we could play together.”
“This isn't a game, Venom!”
“Oh, but I’m having so much fun with you, darlin’.”
I stand my ground next to Venom as the men charge us. It’s almost easier when a target is coming at you. You can use their momentum against them.
As the fight continues downstairs, Venom and I engage in a twisted dance together as we take on the four men.
Soon, flames and smoke engulf the hall, pushing us back into the safety of the room I was being held in. One surviving guard follows us in, but Venom swiftly ends him with a slice across his neck, then plants a shiny boot into his chest, sending him back out into the fiery hall before he slams the door shut.
“Do you think he got out? I don't hear any fighting anymore. Do you think he’s okay?”
“I can’t be sure, darlin’, but we need to get ourselves out of here.” Venom moves to the balcony and right as he kicks open the doors, the main entrance is blasted open and Reaper comes barreling through the flames.
“Reaper!” I run to him. “You came.”
“Of course I came for you. Are you okay? Did they hurt you?” His frantic eyes scan my body.
“I’m fine, but oh my god, you’re the one who's hurt!” I say, assessing all his wounds.
“It's nothing. I'm fine. I’m glad you're all right.”
“But you're burned, Logan! Look at your arms. And your leg, you're bleeding. That’s not nothing.” I bring a hand to his cheek where half his mask is missing and cuts cover his face.
“It's a pain I welcome, a pain I’ll gladly accept, because it led me to you.” He grabs my hand, squeezing it, “I'd walk through fire again for you, anytime, without thought, recklessly, because I love you, little savage. I’m so fucking in love with you.”
I smile wide and let out half a sob as he continues. “You make everything worth it. I’d risk it all for you, my own destruction and the pain of a broken heart, I’d risk the flames of my enemies, but I won't risk living my life without you. I’m so sorry about earlier. I was being an idiot.”
“Huge idiot.” I laugh.
The inferno begins to take over the doorway behind him as we stand in the center of the room, holding on to each other like one of us might turn to ash at any moment.
“What a truly sweet moment folks. But need I remind you, the house is on fire,” Venom says from the balcony.
“You!” Reaper storms toward him.
“Wait! Wait!” I stand between them, hands on Reaper’s chest. “He helped me.”
“The fact that he’s here says all I need to know. He was involved!”
“Reaper, please. He saved me. Terrible things would have happened to me if not for him.” He meets my pleading eyes, then looks back to Venom.
“Get out of here now. Before I change my mind.”
Venom tips his head and gracefully climbs over the balcony banister and disappears.
“Come on, we gotta go,” Reaper says as more flames and smoke consume the room. He limps toward the banister and climbs over it. “I’ll jump down, then you follow. I’ll catch you.”
I nod, and he drops, landing hard and falling to one knee with a loud grunt of pain.
“Are you okay?”
“Fine. Come on.” I climb over the railing and look down. My vision spins and the fall suddenly looks so much further. “I got you. Jump.”
I look back to the room and the fire is now licking the framing of the balcony doors. There’s nowhere left to go. I look back to Reaper and jump.
The fall is quick, but I land in Reaper’s arms and he holds me firmly against his chest. As he starts to walk away, still holding me in his arms, I remember Lily.
“Reaper! Lily, they stabbed Lily and last I saw, she was bleeding out! ”
“I found her and called for help. When I left her, she was alive and an ambulance was arriving.”
Just as my nerves start to ease a bit, a loud bang fills the night sky and Reaper falls. His knees crash to the ground, but he still manages to hold me up.
“Fuck!” he grumbles.
“Stop!” a man’s voice calls from behind us.
Reaper helps me stand then struggles to his feet and turns around to face the man.
Fredrick Doyle stands a few feet from his burning home. He looks nearly unrecognizable. One eye bloody and mangled and his other eye just about swollen shut, face covered in blood. Half his clothes and various parts of his body are burned, flesh melted away. He takes a step forward with a limp and wipes some blood away from his mouth with his free hand. His other shaky hand holds a gun, aimed at us.
“You took my son, you piece of shit! You think you can just walk away?” Reaper moves further in front of me, shielding my body, ready to take more bullets for me. “You owe me a life!” Fredrick shouts before two more shots are fired.
Reaper flinches as one more bullet finds its target.
“No!” I cry out.
Reaper falls to one knee again.
“Run, Charlotte. Get out of here!”
Another sharp sound slices the air, sounding different than the previous shots and Fredrick's head blasts open as he falls to the ground.
“Well, that was rather anticlimactic,” a voice with a southern accent says from the shadows. Venom emerges and saunters toward us, nudging Fredrick with his booted foot as he walks by him. “Guns just aren't as fun as poison, don't you think?”
Before I can even think about what I’m doing, I throw myself at Venom, hugging him.
“Is that what I have to do to get some affection from you, little minx? Blow off some heads? Give me a list.”
I pull away and swat his chest. “Thank you, Venom. I thought you left.”
“Well, darlin’, I was on my way but then I got this nasty little feeling in my chest and had to make sure you got out alright.”
“Thank you,” I say with a smile.
“Yes, Marcus, thank you,” Reaper says as he limps over to us.
“I’d say this makes us friends now, Bone Reaper. You should call me Venom.”
Reaper rolls his eyes. “Thank you, Venom. I’ll owe you one.”
“I would say there’s nothing you could offer me, but there is one particular little minx I wouldn’t mind borrowing.”
“Don't push it. She’s taken and off-limits.”
“Ah yes, I see that. Treat her well, Bone Reaper.” Reaper nods at him. “Look at us, working things out with words. There’s hope for us yet.”
The sound of sirens fills the night sky and Reaper looks at me. “We have to get out of here.”
I look at Venom once more. His typical cool and playful expression is now serious and almost somber. “Stay feisty, little minx. Till we meet again,” he says with a tip of his head and a soft smirk.
“Goodbye, Venom.”
He turns and walks away into the night.