Chapter Twenty-Three
Livia
I’m so confused as to what is happening right now.
“Why is she saying that?” I ask Callen with an accusatory tone in my voice. What is going on?
“She thinks we’re going to take her granddaughter away.”
“Why would she think that?” I am outraged now as I go toward the woman who is sobbing so much that her whole body jerks.
“Because the mother sold her five-year-old daughter to a sex trafficker so she could get her next fix just before she was killed by the bear. And they’re coming to collect her. This is the little girl’s grandmother, Mrs. Peters.”
Ice spreads over my skin and into my veins. I look at the little girl in the cot; she”s so tiny that she doesn’t even look like she’s five years old. I’m wrecked with rage and sorrow, and I want to scream and cry that a mother could do that to her own daughter.
I don’t even feel guilt that she was eaten by a bear; I don’t think she deserved less, and the intensity of my thoughts adds to my fury.
“Mrs. Peters. My name is Livia.” I put my arm around her, and all I feel are bones as she quivers. I take off my jacket and put it on her shoulders, and she’s looks at me with sad suspicion. “We’re not going to take your granddaughter. I want to help you. Please, trust me,” I say softly.
“I tried to protect little Hazel, but I can’t fight for her any longer. I’m old and tired, and you’ll take her away because my daughter took your money, and little Hazel will be hurt. Bad men—” She starts to cry again, as more tears roll down my face.
“No, that’s not going to happen. Trust me. No one is going to take your granddaughter away.”
“Mrs. Peters, we’re here to help you,” Callen says. “The men who your daughter sold Hazel to won’t come for you. Both you and Hazel are under our protection now for as long as both of you live. No one will dare touch you. You’re safe now, and we’re going to get you out of here.”
Mrs. Peters looks at me as if she’s looking for validation, and I nod. The relief I see wash over her changes her features. The gauntness in her face fills up with hope as she starts to sob again. Behind her, little Hazel starts to cry so softly that I can barely hear her.
Callen is on his phone, and I go to pick up the little girl. But even through the many layers of clothes her grandmother made her wear to keep warm—and thankfully she is—she’s so thin, I’m afraid I might break her.
Hazel wraps her tiny arms around me at once, and I try to soothe her, but my heart keeps breaking for her and her grandmother. I can’t imagine what would have happened to her. That kind of world is so far beyond anything I could imagine, and she’s so little.
Callen steers us back out of the building, and it isn’t long after that a well-dressed, kind-looking woman and two men, who look like bodyguards, emerge from an SUV that had just pulled into the front of the building.
They talk quietly to Callen before the woman comes to take Hazel from me. I hesitate, still worried for the little girl.
“Where are they going?” I ask Callen.
“To a house that will become their home. Cassie is a trained nurse and will help them set up. They’ll have everything they need.”
“I’ve already set everything up, Mr. Ursid. I’ve taken care of all the groceries, and the pantry, fridge, and freezer are full. I’ve also bought some clothes for the time being, but I’ll add more to their closets later on,” Cassie says.
“I want to go with them.” I’m determined not to have Hazel out of my sight.
“No,” Callen says, his voice stern enough that I don’t argue. “They’ll be all right, Livia.”
“They’re going to be fine, Mrs. Ursid.”
I balk at being called Mrs. Ursid; the address feels so intimate that I can’t help but blush. But I push those things aside quickly, still not convinced that the little girl and her grandmother are going to be okay.
“Little Hazel will go to school when she’s ready. I’ll be taking care of Mrs. Peters’ illnesses and helping her regain her strength. You have my word, Mrs. Ursid.” There’s an earnestness in Cassie’s voice that I trust.
“You can visit them when they’re settled in, Livia,” Callen says, and suddenly the dark weight of their well-being is lifted.
I hand the little girl over to Cassie, but she clings to me for a bit before she’s forced to let go. Callen removes his jacket and makes me slip into it; my body immediately sinks into the warmth he left behind.
“Did you know she sold her daughter before she died?”
“No.”
“You didn’t have to do this, but you did,” I say softly.
“As I said, she was a crack whore, and if she had family, I intended to compensate them. It was only when I was trying to find out who they were that I discovered what she had done to her daughter.”
“She deserved to die.” A tear rolls down my face, but I wipe it away quickly. I know it’s a terrible thing to say out loud, but I mean it. Callen saved the little girl and her grandmother. He also promised Mrs. Peters that she was under their protection now and no one would touch them. I believe him.
I’m lost in thoughts, wavering between what would have happened to Hazel and being grateful she was one child who was saved. I don’t pay much attention to where we’re going until my gaze darts toward Callen when he stops in front of a nice-looking house with a picket fence.
“Will you hold this for me?”
He removes a ring from his finger and hands it to me. The warmth of his skin lingers on the ring, and I can’t understand the dire need to slip the gold band onto my finger so I can keep his warmth the same way his jacket did. I must be going mad.
“Why?” My brows knot in confusion.
“Because I’m going to kill a man, and I don’t want to get any blood on it. My grandmother gave it to me.”
“What? Why are you going to kill a man?” Did I just say those words out loud?
“He’s an informant in our organization and he must die.”
He doesn’t wait for me to respond before he slips his muscular body out of the car with all the grace of a predator.
My heart starts to beat painfully against my chest at the thought that someone in that house is about to die. But I’m more shocked at how Callen can go from protector of the innocent to cold-blooded killer in one afternoon. He’s just shown me who he is in two moves.
Ten minutes later, he returns, and there are no signs on him that he took a man’s life.
I don’t say anything, and neither does he. We drive in silence all the way to their home and my prison.
“Thank you,” I murmur before I hurry out of the car and upstairs to my cell. I take in some much-needed air. It’s the first time I’m completely alone, by that, I mean the first time I’m free of Callen’s eyes on me, stoking a deviant fire in me that I didn’t know existed, confusing my mind so utterly that I couldn’t think straight.
He made me think he was a hero, and then he showed me he was a killer in his next breath. Still, my body finally gets to breathe, and I sigh in relief.
After peeling off my clothes in a daze, I step into the shower immediately, washing off my emotions, yet I can’t stop thinking about what would have happened to little Hazel if it weren’t for Callen. And then I think about the man Callen had just killed for being an informant.
I also keep telling myself that one weighs much more than the other. Saving a child from being trafficked means more than killing a man for being an informant. Dear god, these are thought processes I never thought I would have in my entire life.
Still, I don’t know what to make of my time with Callen, but I soon decide there’s nothing to make of it. They’re my enemies. They’re keeping me against my will. They married me against my will. I’m a pawn in their power game with Kirill Yenin. Nothing more.
As I step out of the shower, I’m at once conscious of how warm it is around me while outside the weather has turned for the worse. Again, I’m so relieved that Hazel and her grandmother are in a house with warmth, food, and comfort.
I find a pair of brand-new underwear that fits me perfectly, and then I slip into a soft knit long-sleeved slip dress.
It’s only then that I notice that I still have Callen’s suit jacket and that I slipped his ring into its pocket without thinking. The ring his grandmother gave him. The one he didn’t want to get blood on.
I need to give it back to him.
It takes me another ten minutes to orient myself in this massive house before I find their bedrooms.
The first bedroom I step into––because the door is open––smells woodsy and spicy. I immediately know it’s Deacon’s room, but I don’t know how I make that connection. It’s just natural and instinctive. My body trembles as I remember his touch.
The next room has a deep but fresh citrusy smell, and I know without a doubt it’s Mason’s. More wetness clings to my pussy, and my clit starts to throb so hard that I have to press my thighs together.
When I finally come upon Callen’s room, the fragrance of amber and musk hit at the same moment that Callen emerges from his bathroom with nothing, but a towel wrapped low on his waist.
My gaze rushes down the length of his body, his chest sculpted to perfection, and his abs nothing but layers of brick. I can’t help but notice the considerable bulge that the towel barely conceals, and my pussy, already wet before I entered his room, is now drenched.
Rooted to a stop, refusing to take a step further into his bedroom, I hold out his ring for him and his jacket in my other hand.
“I forgot to give this back to you,” I say, completely flustered.
Callen strolls toward me. My breath dies in my throat. Automatically, I take a step back.
“Are you afraid of me, Livia?” he asks as he grabs me, takes his jacket, and throws it across the room. He effortlessly and smoothly pins me against the wall in his bedroom while I’m still holding his ring. He lowers his head, his mouth inches from mine.
“Yes.” But it’s not for the reasons he thinks I’m afraid of him. He touches my cheek, and I moan. He lowers his hand and lifts the hem of the dress I’m wearing until I feel his hand on my thigh, traveling up on my bare skin to the vee between my legs.
It’s everything about the three of them that scares me. They’re so different, but I can’t seem to separate them. I just can’t. So there I stand, my breath erratic pants as Callen pushes aside the underwear. A shameless gasp leaves my lips as he strokes his knuckle down my pussy.
“Fuck,” he growls, and the sound he makes in his chest unearths that unknown side of me.
My pussy starts to pulse, and my clit swells under his touch. I’m too weak to control myself and too far gone to respond differently.
Callen flicks the towel off his waist. The heat of his body and the enormous size of his cock engulf me. I’m momentarily taken back to when they took my virginity. My pussy pulses with the memory of feeling their hardness inside me.
He picks me up off the floor so that I’m in line with his cock, and then he grasps my right leg and lifts it so that it rests against his hip, opening my pussy for him.
Desperation catapults through me. I don’t know what I’m doing, but I keep myself open for him. The instant he guides his cock to my entrance and then uses the broad head of his shaft to part my folds, I cling to him with both my hands.
Callen thrusts his thickness into me, stretching my flesh all over again to take him. But my body is already familiar with the feeling of having them inside me and eagerly softens for him.
His growl whispers against the side of my neck. He strokes my clit as he ebbs and flows inside me, firmly but slowly and deeply. My whole day flashes past my mind’s eye, and every breath and every thought is centered around his presence.
I think of what he did to protect little Hazel when he could have just left her there. Killing a man for being an informant pales in comparison.
My mind melts in unison with what my body is doing. The heat I feel under his touch and his possession ignites a forest fire in my soul. A climax builds from the other side of me and I take it the same way I’m taking Callen’s cock.
A blinding hit of pleasure soars through me as I come, clutching the length of his cock to me as if I never want to let go.
“You belong to us,” he says, roughly, hoarsely in my ear, holding his cock still inside me while my world shatters. Only after the last spasm does he pull his length from me, glistening with my wetness. He kisses my forehead and then takes a step back away from me.
My confusion soon gives way to embarrassment that scorches my skin. Without looking at Callen, I hand him the ring that I’d been holding in my hand the whole time and flee his room.
I don’t know what’s happening to me anymore.