21. Amorette #2
Then we passed the section where Grey had sat me last time.
It wasn’t roped off. I glanced up at Grey, even as his gaze was trained ahead and his jaw was clenched tight.
When I looked at Andre, his head was straight, yet his gaze constantly scanned over the room.
Both men had death grips on my hands and with each step, they seemed to box me in tighter.
We headed right for the corner, where a platform stood behind a glass wall. This hadn’t been here the last time. I twisted to take in the glass from where I’d stood before, and I would have noticed this if it had been here.
As we approached, the guard blocking the entrance moved to the side and unlatched the rope.
Inside the small box, there were six chairs. Directly behind the last two chairs was a door almost hidden in the corner. Anyone not inside would undoubtedly presume it was part of the wall.
Two men joined us inside, as the other three placed themselves at the entrance and in front of us on the floor.
It was strange. When we’d traveled in the past, men had come with us, but it wasn’t so militant as this.
Everyone seemed on edge, like they were all waiting for Vicente to blow up the building or shoot us down.
Grey took one seat closest to the glass and tugged me down in his lap. It was rough, nothing like how he was with me at their compound.
“What the hell is this?” Andre sat down in the seat next to us. “Do you enjoy being a sitting duck?”
Grey dropped one hand on my knee and placed the other on my lower back. “This is bulletproof glass. There’s an exit behind us. This is my way to keep Amorette from the masses while ensuring they have a front-row seat to see that she’s mine.”
I expected Andre to respond back with some sarcastic quip, but he didn’t.
Instead, we watched the floor. The fights started, and the sound came through to us on a speaker in the corner.
The first two seemed like amateur fights.
The crowd loved it, but they were also only half paying attention.
People weren’t pressed to the ring or even navigating toward it.
Grey’s phone would go off periodically, and he’d bark orders to whoever was on the other line. At least, that was what it seemed like. Everything he said had been too fast for me to understand.
“If Vicente is here, where is he?” I asked, glancing between Grey and Andre.
“Don’t know, don’t give a shit.” Grey pressed his nose into the side of my head as he moved his hand a little higher on the inside of my thigh. I almost stopped him. Only there was no sexual intent in his touch. This was for show.
“You better, because he’s heading this way right now,” Andre said lightly. When I turned to him, he hadn’t moved a muscle, yet everything about him seemed strung tight.
I followed his gaze. There was Vicente, with another man, walking right toward us.
He had his own small entourage, though nothing like the men we had surrounding us.
I’d seen Vicente before from afar. Never up close, not when I was completely sound of mind.
When I was taken, his face swam in and out of my head through curtains of darkness while he carried me.
I couldn't have recognized him on the street. Except…
My breath stuttered in my chest as I got a good look at him. Andre and Matías were almost carbon copies of him. He could never deny them.
Grey pulled me closer against his chest as he sat up straighter, yet he didn’t stand up. Our men outside the box closed in, blocking his entrance. Vicente flicked his hand, but none of the men moved.
He gave an order in Spanish, and the men responded in kind, but still, they barred his way.
When he looked up, he met my stare with cold eyes. Chills erupted down my arms. I’d thought Parker’s were cold, but they were nothing like this man. He was a true psychopath.
“Andre, Grey. Tell your guards to stand down, or they’ll not live to take another breath.” He pulled a gun out of his suit jacket. The people closest to him shoved others in the crowd to get away.
I started forward, but Grey locked his arm around my waist.
“Let him in,” Andre called to the men as he slouched down a little more and kept his arms crossed. They moved, and he and his companion strolled up the steps, ignoring how the club quieted.
The angry rock club beats still vibrated the glass, but the people were all turning toward our platform to watch the show.
“I didn’t expect you boys to actually come tonight,” Vicente said as he motioned for his friend to grab a chair. He did, and set it right in the space between us and the glass. There wasn’t much, and it was cramped, but Vicente made it work.
The man with him was unassuming, with brown hair and a mousy expression on his face. He wasn’t even particularly big. There was just something about him…
“Care to tell us why you’re targeting us? You all but declared war on us in a very public way,” Andre said as he reached for his glass. The ice clinked together as he lifted it to his lips and took a sip. It wasn’t alcoholic, but Vicente wouldn’t know that.
Out of the corner of my eyes, I could see the delight seeping out of Vicente. I kept my attention on the other man. I could have sworn I’d seen him before.
“All but?” He laughed good-naturedly. “Just by taking your slut, I’ve let everyone know you’re worth less alive than dead. That you’re still here at all is actually quite amazing.” Then he made a sound of revulsion. “Pathetic is more like it.”
“Why?” Andre pushed, leaning forward to brace his elbows on his knees.
“We’ve always done everything you asked.
” He was as good as emotionless as he pressed Vicente for an answer.
I wasn’t sure it mattered. Vicente was obviously crazy and narcissistic.
The kind of person he was, he made decisions because they pleased him, not because any logic was involved.
The way Andre was so nonchalant pulled my gaze back to him. His face was passive even though this had to be eating at him. A lock of dark hair fell in his face and he brushed it aside.
I glanced up at Grey to find him glaring at Vicente. He, at least, had a lot of pent-up anger.
“Like you really expect me to believe that. You four have always had your rebellions. Even the small ones. But it suited me to let you live and let everything play out as it would.” He rose to his feet and motioned to his friend.
I’d seen him before…
He met my gaze and winked.
I gasped as they started toward the door.
“Why are you here tonight?” Andre asked, not bothering to contradict him.
That man, he was at the back of the courtroom when I left that day…
“Curiosity, really.” Vicente walked to the door. “Don’t think this visit places you on my good side. There’s no going back now.”
I shifted on Grey’s lap and something dropped to the floor. The man with Vicente stepped forward and picked it up. As he handed it to me, his lips curved up into a slight grin.
Drunk snaps of memory flashed in my head. Being carried, being lifted from a car. A face above mine—a face exactly like the one standing over me now.
“A pleasure to see you again,” he whispered as he tipped an imaginary hat. Then he followed Vicente down the steps of the box.
The rest of the club came alive like life as they knew it wasn’t about to end.
“That man…” I said, following them through the club. People parted for Vicente just like with Grey. Maybe even more so.
“What about him?” Andre asked as he tossed back the remaining contents of his drink.
“He was the man who took me.” In a flash, I was deposited in Andre’s lap and Grey was gone.
“Fuck,” Andre cursed as he bundled me against his chest and stood up. He dropped me to my feet and caught my arm. Then we were rushing out of the box too. “Tony’s barely more than a gnat, but Vicente takes a slight to everything he didn’t explicitly approve of.”
We rushed through the crowd, which wasn’t hard. They were still separated from where Grey ran through. At the other side of the club, right in a hallway, Grey had the man smashed up against the wall. Vicente was nowhere to be found. I breathed a sigh of relief.
The last thing we needed was an all-out fight with Vicente in the club.
Grey whispered against the man’s ear, but he didn’t say anything. How could he when Grey had his forearm pressed against his neck. When the man sputtered without any coherent words, Grey cracked his fist into his face.
Again and again.
Each time his flesh met the man’s, I jolted.
This was just like the last time. Grey was going to kill him. There was no doubt in my mind that this man had minutes left of his life, if that. The only difference was that this time, Andre wrapped his arms around me.
Whether to comfort me or hold me back, I wasn’t sure. No matter what the case, I was glad for it. I gripped his hands over my stomach as Grey laid waste to the man who ruined my life.
There was another difference.
Every spray of blood, every grunt of pain, I reveled in it. I was glad Grey was the bloodthirsty man he was. At least today.
Because of this man, I lost the life I’d built for myself. I lost my sister.
Nothing else mattered at this moment as much as knowing the man who took it all away couldn’t destroy anyone else.
When the man took his last breath, Grey wiped his bloodied hands on the inside of his suit jacket. Then, chest heaving from exertion, he came right to me with his arms open. Andre let me go, and I stepped into his warm, bloody embrace.