Chapter 4
Alexander
Her blonde hair hangs around her face like a shield. I itch to brush the strands back but I keep my hands on her waist, resisting the urge. Her big blue eyes stare up at me with curiosity and hatred, but it’s the sight of lust mingling in the depths of them that has me wanting to say fuck it to my rules and claim her.
To claim her would be to kill her.
Her innocence shines in her eyes—her mouth suggests she is older than her eighteen years but her eyes are what give her away. They show you everything without meaning to. She is impressionable and hardened from something that hurt her in the past and I find myself needing to figure out what that was and destroy the cunt. I shutdown that line of thought, she is a means to an end and it has to stay that way.
“You are the only one who seems to know where the rapist is.” She flinches as if my words physically hurt her. Her eyes darken and her features harden. Her grip on the front of my shirt tightens as she presses in closer, ghosting her lips over mine which has me tensing in surprise. It takes a lot more self-control than I want to admit to keep my impassiveness.
“Do what you must, I’ll never give up my brother.” My upper lip pulls back in a snarl. I shove away from her and the darkness that lurks beneath the surface of my skin bristles at me for not inflicting pain. She grunts out her annoyance as I turn my back and stalk away. I make it four fucking steps before I grunt when something smacks me in the back of the head. I whirl around to see the bottle of water she had resting on the floor in front of me. I dart my gaze from it, then back to her. I was fully prepared to ignore her temper tantrum until she cocked her hip and placed her hand on it smirking.
I rush her, her eyes widening in terror at the sight of me coming at her. She doesn’t have time to react. I grab her waist and toss her into the air like she weighs nothing and she shrieks in fear. I don’t use my hands to break her fall. I push forward and trap her against the door with my body, her legs and arms banding around me by instinct. Her breathing is erratic and her eyes are as round as saucers.
“What the fuck?—”
I cut off her tirade before she can continue. “You ever fucking throw something at me again and I’ll show you who really has the biggest set of fucking balls out of the pair of us. Do you understand me?” I yell, her nostrils flaring, clearly not liking my tone or the way I just manhandled her. Truth is, I don’t give a fuck what she wants or what pisses her off. She is here for a reason and once she gives me the intel I need, she’ll be sent packing and never thought of again.
“Fuck. You,” she screams in my face.
“Not even in your wildest fucking dreams would I let your vulgar ass touch me.” Her mouth slackens as her eyes fill with indignation. Victory has never felt so fucking sweet. My train of thought is corrupted when her legs tighten around my waist and her fingers tangle in the back of my hair. She tugs on the strands, tilting my head back far enough so she is looking down at me, clearly loving the height difference between us now. Her blue eyes are filled with a cunning look. She slowly bends down and runs her nose along my jaw, a small moan escaping her and without permission my hands grip her ass to keep her steady. She darts her tongue out and licks the shell of my ear. I hiss in both intrigue and surprise. I loathe to fucking admit it but my cock is hard.
Her lips ghost over the shell of my ear just as she grinds down and feels what she is doing to me. All my threats from a minute ago are proven redundant now.
“Hmmmm,” she purrs in my ear, my hold on her ass turning bruising as I war within myself to either keep her steady or help her grind on my dick. “See, this is a game you will lose.” I grind my teeth so hard they begin to ache. “Want to know why, Alex?” She doesn’t give me a chance to reply. “You like to think you are the one calling shots but you’re not. I am. You showed me your hand when you didn’t rape me while I was passed out. You gave me clothes and water. You let me out of the room and allowed me free roam of your house. You just let the wolf into your straw house and I’ll blow this motherfucker down before I ever give up my brother.”
I release my hold on her and step back. She clearly anticipated the move because she lands on her feet with a smug smile. When she opens her mouth, to fire another insult I’m sure, I go with a different tactic of shutting her up. I wrap my hand around her throat, force her head back, then smash my mouth to hers. She turns to stone for a split second until I lick across her lips. She gasps, granting me the access I need. I swipe my tongue across hers and have to force my groan of pleasure down at the taste of her. Her hands fist the front of my shirt, I’m unsure if she wants to pull me closer or shove me away, but I don’t let that deter me as I step forward, forcing her back against the door.
She grunts into my mouth but I swallow the sound. I start to forget the reason why I started kissing her when she kisses me back with a hunger only matched by my own. The kiss turns from exploration to a fight of dominance, our teeth clashing as we fight against each other. The moment I wrap an arm around her waist and pull her against me so she can feel my raging hard on, she relents and allows me the control I fucking crave. Her submission strokes the darkness inside me.
“Alex.” At the sound of my name, I jerk back and take a step away from her. I try to appear unaffected when I face Omen but I can see from the look in his dark eyes that I failed. I hear Tatum panting beside me, gasping for air. I feel exactly like she does. I'm just better at hiding it than she is. That kiss was supposed to be a test to see how far I could push her, I was never meant to enjoy it or crave another taste of her. “We got a situation,” he says, then darts his gaze between me and Tate. I see her from the corner of my eye ducking her head in shame.
“Give me a minute,” I say. He nods then stalks off. I know without a doubt he’s pissed at what he just witnessed. I turn to her. She keeps her gaze on her feet and nibbles on her bottom lip, avoiding my gaze. I reach out and grip her chin, forcing her gaze back to mine. The sight of unshed tears in her eyes has my breath lodging in my throat and anger brewing in the pit of my gut. She flicks her eyes away which just has me hardening my hold on her chin. She winces, then skirts her gaze back to me. I’d much rather see the fire burning in them than that look from a second ago. “Me not chaining your ass up wasn’t me showing you my hand. That was me treating you like a human being.”
“Do you treat all the people you are going to kill like that?”
This fucking girl makes it hard not to want to strangle her!
“No, just the ones I’m trying not to fuck.”
“I thought you wouldn’t touch my vulgar ass ?” she throws back at me.
“Did you miss the part where I just kissed you?”
She shrugs. “I may have been a participant in that.”
“Clearly I was talking out of my ass,” I grit out.
“Nice, so you are a killer and a liar—noted.”
I release her and step back, then run a hand through my hair in frustration. “Look, I’m sorry. I shouldn't have kissed you.” Her features pull taut, I can see she is uncomfortable. “It won’t happen again.”
“And if it does?”
“It won’t,” I bite out.
“You just admitted to being a liar so how can I trust you?”
“Jesus fucking Christ!” I snap then throw my hands in the air. “I swear to God I have never met someone so annoying and infuriating!” I growl.
She beams and bats her lashes. “Well, thank you. You should get used to that because I’m not planning on telling you shit, Alex, so you may as well chain my ass up.”
All traces of emotion vanish from me when I step forward, she can see the darkness rising to the surface inside me. Her body stiffens and her mouth remains shut as I glare at her.
“Stop pushing me, Tatum. I’m not like the other guys you know. I have a breaking point. I swore I would never harm any woman or child, but if you continue to taunt me and remain tight lipped, I will tie your ass up and I promise you I won’t stop until I break down your carefully crafted walls and force you to face the demons of your past. I’ll make you beg for death but I’ll never grant you that freedom until I’m done playing with you. I hope he loves you enough to trade his life for yours, because if you don’t give him up soon, I’ll break my own vow and start sending him pieces of you—starting with your tongue.”
She pales and stumbles back a step. I leave her standing there looking like a fish out of water. I no longer care if she escapes through the front door, she will learn soon enough there is nowhere for her to run out here. We are surrounded by thousands of acres, there is nothing out there but open land. It seems like a sick joke that my last name is Denver and I live on the outskirts of the place itself. This ranch has been in my family for generations. I never wanted anything to do with this place but my sister loved it here so much.
I find Omen and the other’s gathered around Halo, who is sitting at the counter in the kitchen with his laptop in front of him. As I approach they all look up at me, none of them have to say a word. I know Omen has already told them what he witnessed between me and Tate a moment ago. I ignore the question in their gazes and ask.
“What’d you find?” Pope shoots me a look that only a teenage girl could pull off which has me scowling at the fucker. “Mind ya fucking business,” I grit out. The cunt laughs which just irritates me more.
“Dez is the one tracking us.” Halo’s tone is filled with rage and I can’t blame him, we’ve flown under the radar for years. My release from prison and the murders happening at the same time has fucked us.
“I need a meet. The only way to prove we didn’t do this is to have a sit down.” All four of them stare at me with wide fucking eyes and varying looks of outrage. Before they can all start firing off their dislike of this decision I push on. “We can’t afford for them to get in the way. Going after that little cunt is already going to put us on the chopping block.”
“I don’t give a fuck. I’ll take whatever those dicks throw at us as long as that cunt is dead,” Vatican declares.
“Agreed. Smooth shit over with them now so we can move freely, then we strike. They’ll come for us with everything they have when they realize we did it,” Halo says.
“Let them come. I’m ready to meet my maker with the blood of that motherfucker on my hands,” Omen agrees.
“The decision is yours, boss. Just know we all have your back and will do whatever you say,” Pope adds.
I run my gaze over each of them and nod. Five years ago I bought our freedom and that is a decision I will never come to regret. The only thing I regret in life is not being there to protect my sister. I should have been by her side, but instead I was too busy trying to build the Denver Kings. We aren’t a crew, gang or an MC club. We are a family.
“Set up the meet with Dez. If they aren’t covering their tracks, then they want this meet as well,” I announce.
“How many men do you want watching your back?” Omen asks. The Denver Kings is country wide, we don’t have a banner or a fucking patch to state who we are. We run our business undercover so if any one of our locations was busted no one would be able to trace it back to us. That is the only way we have been able to operate as per our deal.
“The five of you and that’s it. They can’t know about the rest of our operations,” I mutter, pissed off that I still have to worry about those fuckers figuring out that I reneged on our deal. At the start I had planned to adhere to their rules, but then I realized I would never be a blue collar type of guy, and I had four guys relying on me to keep them fed and sheltered, so I went back to doing what I know. My own parents disowned me. They lost this place a couple of years ago to the bank. I had the guys swoop in and buy it while I was locked up, there is no way I would ever let my sister’s dream be sold to developers. My parents hate who I am and blame me for what happened to their daughter. I can’t say I blame them, the things I have done would make any parent disown their own child.
“What about her?” Vatican says, flicking his chin behind me. I peer over my shoulder to see Tatum standing there, looking uncertain. I can’t say the look suits her but the sight of my clothes on her body does. Fuck! I push that thought away and narrow my eyes.
“She remains here.” Her jaw locks and the twin balls of flames in her eyes rise as she glares at me.
“ She is standing right here.” I raise a brow at her outburst.
“You are irrelevant, Miss Lawson. Your wants and needs are not something that will be taken into consideration. You will remain in my straw house until I say otherwise. No one here will help or aid you in any attempt to escape. Welcome to your gilded cage.”
“You’re a real fucking prick, you know that?” she snaps back at me.
“So I’ve been told, but as you can see, I don’t give a flying fuck what you think.” She reels back as if I hit her. I refuse to allow her reaction to have any sway on me, so I turn back to my guys. “Send me the details when Carnage responds. I’m heading to bed. We leave in the morning to head to the warehouse.” Halo opens his mouth but before he can utter a word I add, “Yes, she will be coming with us. Now, how about you fuckers stop worrying about the girl and do your fucking jobs.” I ignore their snickers as I spin around and stalk past Tatum, heading out the back door.