22. Grey #2
Predictably, they backed down and I was on my way again.
Just in time to see Amorette on the arm of mother fucking Ramos.
I broke into a run, but they slipped through the exit door before I could reach them. If I didn’t catch them before they got to the service elevator, we might lose Amorette in the very real sense of the word. And not to some ridiculous suicide honor death Lafe had tried to offer her.
Was she fucking stupid?
The door was firmly shut by the time I got closer. A stumbling man reached for the door, and I shoved him into the wall to get him out of the way.
“Hey!” he slurred.
But he was already forgotten as I stormed past him. The hall Ramos walked her through was the one that led to the private garage. At fucking least it was a long stretch of hallways to get there.
I took off into a sprint, and once I rounded the corner at the end, there they were.
He’d just pressed the elevator button, and she was smiling, chatting happily at his side.
Didn’t we just talk about what kind of world this was? There were pawns and queens. She was doing a damn fine job of setting herself up as a pawn.
I loved the fight in her, but I could do without the stupid.
Walking off with a stranger? Fuck.
Walking off with a stranger after I explained this world to her? She needed to get her ass spanked as soon as we were back at the compound.
He smiled, speaking his broken fucking English when I knew he was fluent.
What an idiot.
When he glanced up, the bashful smile I was sure she bought dropped from his face like a heavy fucking stone.
At least one thing was good about this. I hated Ramos with a passion. He was the happy soldier who handed me over to Vicente last week. And he’d just touched what he should have known was mine .
Vicente wouldn’t do shit to avenge him. Even if he did send him down in the first place. Shit, that was probably why he wanted to go to the conference room. Now, who was the idiot?
The satisfaction sweeping through me when he took a hurried step back didn’t dim the rage that had been simmering in my chest for the last hour, at all. So, when I barreled into him, catching my shoulder in his stomach, and rammed his body into the wall, I laughed.
This was going to feel great. Exactly the outlet I’d been looking for when fucking was off the table.
Ramos grunted and Amorette gasped. But I didn’t pay any attention to her. I’d deal with her in a minute. Right now, all my focus was happily on this motherfucker in my arms.
Stepping back, I gripped his collar in my fist and landed a punch across his cheek. Then his nose and left eye.
I was an equal opportunity fighter, and every inch of his face was about to be one giant bruise. If he lived long enough to bruise that deeply.
It took four punches for the blood to appear. Six for it to spray against the wall when I clocked his jaw, snapping his head to the left.
His grunts settled into long, low groans from the consistent pain dealt across his face. I long stopped laughing, but I was mesmerized by the blood.
“Grey. Please, stop.” Amorette tugged on my arm, tears in her voice. “He didn’t do anything. Please. It was me. I asked for him to take me to a taxi.”
Her words faded into the background as I grew bored of his face and dropped him. As soon as his body hit the floor, I reared back and kicked the shit out of him. I preferred to use my hands and feet occasionally, except right now I wished I had a nail-filled bat.
Each hit I got on him expended a little more energy, releasing endorphins through my body. This was why I fought. This was the monster Vicente had turned me into.
Funny, I’d never considered myself a monster.
Yet when I glimpsed at the look of eclipsing horror on Amorette’s face, I knew she saw me as one. She, who was so narrow-minded, couldn’t see underneath a pretty mask if it bit her in the ass.
I’d be this monster because this was who I was.
Ramos? He was one of Vicente’s senior guards. He was also, on occasion, a scout for Maikel. He made my crimes look like petty child’s games on Amorette’s supposed scale of morality.
Stupid girl. She was about to leave us for a trip back to the Gallery. Or worse, a ride straight to Vicente. And that , she should fear.
The bloodier Ramos got at my feet, the more I leveled down. After I landed a strong kick to his face and his skull, nose, or whatever, crunched from the force, he stopped moving.
I sighed, a smile playing on one end of my mouth. That was just what I needed.
Amorette stood in the same spot. She’d long stopped trying to pull me away from Ramos. My little fighter was tenacious, but no match for my strength. She was barely a gnat around my head when I was lost to the blood lust.
Tears streaked down her face, tinged in black from her mascara. She wasn’t looking at me. She only had eyes for the waste of space at my feet.
“I killed him,” she whispered to herself.
Rolling my eyes, I grabbed her arm. Not hard enough to bruise, but enough so she’d know running wasn’t an option. “Yeah, poor fucking him,” I scoffed, unable to keep looking at her.
Shit. I thought we’d had a connection. Maybe not the sweet love ordinary people fantasize about, but an attraction. A mutual respect.
But now?
After she pulled this shit? She was lucky I was here to save her.
“You didn’t have to do that.” She tried to yank herself away, but it was pointless.
“Oh yeah, I did.” Some of the fury I’d worked out over Ramos’ flesh leaked back in through the cracks, trying to fill me up again. Vicente was too close to settle down entirely. I needed to get out of here, fast.
She didn’t say anything else as I walked her to the elevator and scanned my phone, then hit the button for the top floor. That was as close as we’d get to the helipad.
I used my free hand to text Parker and let him know to meet us there. So much for all my plans.
“What about the fight?” she said, her voice firm but shaky at the same time.
“Who gives a fuck? My manager will deal with it. I’m suddenly tired of being here.” I pocketed my phone as we got out on the top floor and headed toward the stairwell.
She was quiet the rest of the way. But when we reached the helicopter, under the dark night sky illuminated by the city lights, she turned away from me.
“You should have taken your anger out on me, not him. Not when I asked him to help me.” Her words grew steadier until she was spitting fire at the end.
“I want to go home. Can’t you understand that?
My life isn't here. It can’t be.” Her hands curled up into tight fists as she spun back around. Tears once again falling freely.
Yeah, it sucked, but I was wrong about her. I wasn’t about to spend my time chasing after a woman who didn't have two brain cells to rub together.
I laughed—a long, loud, disbelieving laughter.
“Sure, keep telling yourself that. But I don’t touch women. Never have, and I never will. This is the time when you decide what you can live with. Be careful who you ask to help you, little wicked love,” I sneered. “Because then you’re just as guilty of turning people into your pawns.”
Her chin dropped.
I shocked her.
Good. Maybe this was a lesson she’d remember.