Chapter 49
Chapter Forty-Nine
Azrael
Czar shoves the glass of Scotch in my direction while I take a drag of the joint Jensen procured from somewhere. The tension crippling my body slowly edges away with each inhale.
“Go ahead and explain,” I ask Jensen, pushing aside the way it comes out as an accusation.
“The moment you left, I went back inside and just had a feeling to check on your room. But I heard voices in the kitchen.” I sit forward, and he continues. “I listened outside of the door, Elizabeth explained we’d left. She obviously didn’t realize I’d not gone with you.”
Fucking Elizabeth!
“You think she was in on it?” Czar asks.
“Absolutely,” Jensen says.
“She’s been fucking watching you all this time, Azrael,” Czar asserts, and I take a drink of the Scotch.
“We knew I was being watched. We’re all being fucking watched.” I glare in Czar’s direction, hoping he can read between the lines. “But fucking Elizabeth?” I shake my head at her betrayal.
“Doesn’t surprise me.” Jensen lifts his shoulder. “I just didn’t expect her to feed another woman to the wolves, knowing what the fuck they’re capable of.” The venom in his tone is evident.
“What the fuck are we going to do? With Hevan, I mean?” Czar asks, and I’m slightly taken aback by my brother’s concern for the woman I love.
I clear my throat. “Leave that to me.”
“She’s on his radar, Azrael,” he snipes out, getting to his feet.
“You think I don’t know that?” My voice grows louder. “We just lost our fucking baby, Czar.”
He swallows hard. “You’re right. I’m sorry.” He takes his seat again. “I just …” He drags his hand through his hair. “I’ve no clue how to fix this for you.”
The truth behind his words constricts my chest. He’s always been the same, the fixer. The one who takes control.
The leader.
Silence hangs heavy in the air. My thoughts of Czar and every action he’s undertaken in order to protect me over the years play on repeat in my mind.
When I always believed he was simply a good brother, the one to take the fall for me, I was missing the fact he was a quick thinker; he was ten steps ahead of me, not just having my back, but covering my front too.
He should have been the older one. The balance in him is full of equal measure. I’ve always seen his softer side as a weakness, but for the first time, I see it as a strength.
It allows him to have a perspective someone as hard as me struggles with. The compassionate side a family craves and a business mind should be aware of.
Czar would never allow the trafficking of children. Ever. Hell, it wouldn’t reach the stage of discussion if it were left to him.
Where I’ve remained silent on the matter until now, and I’m beginning to wonder if our enemies have seen me as compliant despite the truth being I never intended to allow it to happen.
No, Czar is fearless; he might rule with his heart sometimes, but at least he has one.
Czar has always been seen as the spare heir, but truly, he’s the underdog; he’s the one who would come out fighting when nobody suspects it.
Where I have been trained to follow my father’s leadership, Czar has been creating his own path and connections, working silently in the background for when the time comes.
He’s the perfect heir. Though my father chooses to overlook it, he’s going to wish he hadn’t.
“What happened next?” I ask Jensen, brushing off the realization.
“I heard him approaching the door, and I slipped into the shadows beneath the stairs.” He blows out a deep breath as if reliving the anxiety he was feeling.
“I was grateful Elizabeth didn’t follow him out; she would have seen me without a doubt.
But the bastard was so hell bent on getting up those stairs he practically ran up them. ”
The thoughts of him rushing the stairs with excitement at the prospect of hurting Hevan makes bile swim in my gut.
He leans forward. “I had to think quickly, Azrael.”
“Go on,” I coax.
“I went straight out to the garage ammunition cabinet and grabbed the machine gun and a couple of grenades.” Czar’s eyes dance with excitement while listening to Jensen.
“Then I launched a grenade toward the old bastard’s G-Wagon, careful not to hit it.
” My forehead creases, and he goes on to explain.
“He needed an escape, as much as I wanted to blow the fucker up.”
“Then I radioed through to security, telling them we had a breach while giving your father the opportunity to run. I hid in the shadows and every guy they sent in my direction I shot up his legs, then I moved around to below your bedroom window and shot up toward the balcony, careful to take out the bottom windows just in case …” I flinch as he recounts shooting the balcony; if Hevan had been anywhere near there, the glass could have torn her up, or even worse, a bullet.
“I kicked the gun into the garage pit and rushed inside.” He hangs his head. “But I’m no fucking hero. I’m sorry I didn’t do more.”
“Without you, she would have been in the auction by now, or dead,” Czar says, and my knuckles tighten around my glass, but he’s right. Without Jensen acting quickly, tonight would have been an entirely different story, and I wouldn’t only be mourning the loss of a baby but the woman I love too.
“Whatever you do next, I’m by your side,” Jensen says with conviction, and it’s as if he can read the intent in my eyes, because he side-eyes Czar.
What I do next will not just be for myself but for Czar too.
For La Familia.