Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
Chelsea
I expected to see Jones with a minion or two in tow, but it wasn't him who walked through the door.
Instead, a woman stepped into the room. Around my age, maybe a handful of years older, her hair was cut short to frame her face. Her septum was pierced with a simple silver ring. Rows of matching sleepers decorated her earlobes.
She stalked towards us, the thighs of her leather pants making a swishing sound as she walked.
"I see you're awake," she said smoothly. The soles of her tall boots clicked on the floor as she walked toward the bed.
Atlas was on his feet now, watching her carefully.
"What an astute observation," I said sarcastically. I sat up, keeping the sheets over my breasts. I didn't give a shit if she knew what we were just doing, but I wasn't giving her an eyeful either.
She smiled, but the look in her eyes was shrewd and dangerous. "I'm known for my astute observations, Doctor Miller. And my ability to get what I want."
"What do you want?" Atlas stayed near the door, watching the couple of minions who'd entered the room behind her.
She ignored him. "I suggest you fix your clothes.
Carlos will be here soon to have you all moved to another location.
He told you about that, didn't he?" She didn't seem to care either way.
"If you think he'll wait for you, you better think again.
He won't hesitate to haul you all out naked in front of everyone.
" For some reason, that seemed to irritate her.
"I'm sure he wouldn't," I said.
"He better fucking not," Dallas growled. "He'll have to go past us."
She snorted derisively. "Sweetie, he'll just kill you if you get in his way."
I bristled at the threat. Not to mention her calling him sweetie. "If he wants my cooperation, he better not touch a hair on any of their heads."
"It's not your cooperation he wants," she said. "He doesn't care about that. He has other people to cooperate with him."
"Then he can let us go," I said, pretending I didn't understand exactly what she was referring to. Both of us knew exactly what she was saying. Jones would take me, whether I was willing or if it was by force. Men like him didn't stop to ask permission. Or forgiveness.
"You know he won't do that until he’s done with you," she said. "If he ever is. Let me tell you a few things." She grabbed a chair from the side of the room and pulled it over to sit in front of us. She twisted around to nod at the minions. "You can go."
One of them opened his mouth to answer, but she stared them down until they backed out the door and closed it behind them.
"You're very sure we won't kill you now you're alone in here with us," Atlas remarked. He stepped around the chair to stand beside her. His arms were by his sides, but his hands curling and uncurling as if he was ready to wrap them around her throat and squeeze. None of us would stop him.
"You won't do that," she said, barely looking at him. "You know if you do, you'll be next. And we're supposed to be on the same side, remember?" Now she looked up at him and gave him the same dangerous smile.
"Maybe I'll kill you," I said to her. "I'm not on the same side as him." I gave him a glare Storm would have been proud of. I wished he was here to do it himself. He would have done a more convincing job of threatening her.
"Then he'd have to stop you." She jerked her head towards Atlas. "And if he didn't, how would that look?"
"What do you want?" I was done with her bullshit. If she'd come here to say something, she might as well go ahead and say it.
"Do you know who I am?" she asked.
I almost said I didn't, but realised I knew exactly who she was the moment she stepped into the room. "Nyla Fox. Carlos Jones' right hand."
"I prefer the term 'successor,'" she said.
"Can you take over from him today?" Jay asked. "Because he'd be dead then," he added, in case anyone missed his meaning.
"Works for me," Dallas muttered.
I would have agreed, but I had the impression she was more dangerous than Jones. Although, she probably didn't have a cock, so that was a bonus. Unless she decided the guys should please her. In which case, I would kill her.
"Are you suggesting there might be some kind of conflict between Carlos and me?" One of her perfectly shaped eyebrows twitched upward, a piercing there glittering in the overhead light.
"Carlos Jones is an asshole," I said bluntly.
"There's conflict between him and me. There's going to be a shit load of conflict between him and my family when they come looking for me.
If there isn't any between you and him, then you can look forward to a slow, painful death alongside him.
" It wasn't even an empty threat. That was exactly what would happen.
All of us held grudges and had long memories.
Nyla smiled. "You're everything I expected you to be. Finally."
I frowned at her. "What are you talking about?" She couldn't possibly be implying what I thought she was, could she?
She leaned forward and placed her hands on her knees. Her nails were long, painted matte black. "You and your friend getting shot at. How is she doing, by the way?"
"Fine." That was all she was getting from me. She didn't deserve to know anything more about Sadie. The fact she knew my friend existed was bad enough.
"I'm so glad," she said, clearly not giving too many shits either way. "Then there was India, and Sierra. Such a shame to lose both of them, but it was what it was."
Beside me, Dallas stiffened at the mention of India's name.
Did Nyla know he had anything to do with that?
Judging by the way her eyes slid to him and back again, she did.
Jones must have told her after Atlas told him.
At this point, we might as well have written it in the sky.
It seemed she wasn't going to retaliate. Not yet at least.
"Is there a point to all of this?" Atlas demanded. "Maybe you could get to it. Like you said, they should fix their clothes before Jones gets here."
She glanced at him dismissively before her intense gaze was back on me.
"You don't get it, do you? There was a reason behind everything that happened.
Remember Belinda Simmons? Did you ever wonder how she found out you used to be a stripper?
Did you wonder how Dominic King knew? How the press found out yesterday?
Did it occur to you that people being shot, or shot at in your vicinity, might not be coincidental? "
"Of course I have," I said sharply. "Belinda just did some digging around. She spoke to some people?—"
Nyla laughed. "She wished she was that intelligent and capable. No, she was tipped off."
"By you?" Atlas asked.
"People who work for me, yes," she said. "Because I told them to. They encouraged her to look into you and ask you questions. She was only too happy to."
"Why?" I frowned at her. "Why would you bother?" What was I missing here? I didn't even know this woman. Why would she go to so much effort to insinuate herself into my life?
"Because it was fun," she said. "And because I knew what you'd do. Belinda Simmons was getting too close to a couple of things I didn't want her near. I needed her taken care of."
"Why not get someone else to do it?" Atlas asked. "Why involve Chelsea?"
"Because I know who she is," Nyla said, without taking her eyes off me. "Who she really is. I know she's been in denial for a long time and that's frustrated some people."
"Boo fucking hoo," I said sarcastically.
Okay, I was finally ready to embrace that side of myself, but was she really saying she pushed me to it?
That she engineered everything which happened to us just so I'd step back out of my comfort zone and into the crazy lifestyle I'd worked so hard to stay out of?
All of the blood, sweat and tears were because of her? Why?
I stiffened my back and raised my chin proudly. I outranked her and we both knew it. She didn't get to push me around.
In theory.
"I get to decide who and what I am."
She laughed. "If I had a dollar for every time someone told me that, I'd be richer than I already am. I've been pulling your strings from the start and you've been dancing on them like a good girl."
How far would I get if I launched myself at her and wrapped my hands around her throat? The guys wouldn't stop me. At least, Dallas and Jay wouldn't. I wasn't so sure about Atlas.
"You killed my boyfriends," I said, my voice stony cold.
Her expression became serious. "That wasn't me. That was all Carlos. Which brings me to my point."
"It's about time," Atlas said under his breath.
"I was aware of his attraction to you," she said slowly.
"Jealous?" I asked.
She snort-laughed. "Hardly. Him killing your boyfriends helped me, in a way.
It should make this easier for me." Her eyes were stone cold.
Talking about three men dying didn't even reach her.
She might have been talking about what she ate for dinner the night before.
Of course, people like her were familiar with death.
So much so it didn't matter. As long as it wasn't them, then they didn't care.
Until yesterday, I would have been horrified. But now I was starting to understand how anyone could become like that. At some point, you had to switch off or it would destroy you from the inside out. And yet, she was still talking about my guys.
They weren't nothing. They were everything. They deserved better than to be a footnote in the conversation. So much better.
There was that urge to strangle her again.
I curled my hands around the top of the sheets and struggled to push the grief aside.
I couldn't lose it, not in front of her.
Not in front of anyone. I was done being vulnerable.
I had to be made of steel. Stronger and tougher than I'd ever been.
Able to bend but not break. Nothing else would get me through this.
These next few hours and the rest of my life.
"How could them dying help you?" I asked.
My tone was tighter than the top of the drum.
So tight if I touched it, it might snap.
Rage barely contained. Ready to grab a drum of oil and light a match to set everything on fire.
Right now, I didn't care who got burnt. If they got in my way, they'd be incinerated.
Don't lose your shit , I told myself. That's what they want. If you do that, they win.
I was not letting them win. My guys didn't die for nothing. Their deaths meant others would suffer, would pay for taking them from me. I'd see to that if it was the last thing I did.
Nyla leaned even further forward. When she spoke, it was barely a whisper, only loud enough for us to hear.
"Them dying changed everything, you have to admit that. Because it made you angry. Angrier than anything I could have done to you. I need you angry. Because you're Carlos' weakness. Together, we can bring him down."