Chapter Twelve
Orion
I rolled up the cuffs of my sleeves, my shirt was far too expensive to be ruined with blood stains from this asshole.
I shook out my fists, cracking my neck and enjoying the feeling of my bones popping. I had quite the tension built up lately, no thanks to the angel spoiling my nightmares, and this fucker was about to experience my release.
The sun had long since fallen, hiding the hut in the shadows of the gothic night. There was nothing around for miles, just this old slaughtering shelter positioned on the farm I purchased in the Finger Lakes, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t appreciate the irony in the name of the local agriculture.
Hell, it was part of the appeal.
The business had gone bankrupt a few years ago and I seized the opportunity to purchase the land.
The greenery was over 7.32 acres, secluded in a rural town that rarely had any activity. Other than the odd tourist getting lost, the area was left unseen to most.
The owner, Mr. Wallis, was too drowned in debt to ask questions he had no business knowing the answers to, especially when I offered way above the purchase price .
So now, Mr. Wallis lived in a quaint three-bedroom home in Pennsylvania while my team and I had a private domain for the extracurricular activities that came with the job.
“Time to wake up, sunshine,” said my right-hand man, Cole, before emptying a bucket of iced water over the captured head. The man gasped painfully, breathing at a rapid pace as the water sent shockwaves over his drowsy body.
I was not one to judge; Lucifer knew I had my fair share of issues, but Cole was one hell of a crazy bastard. I recruited him when he was released from juvie, the idiot got himself locked up for biting his stepdad’s ear off like a freaking Pitbull.
After reviewing his file, I concluded his stepdad had gotten off lightly and had my lawyers work on his release. He was let out forty-eight hours later and was working for me within two. Cole was part of the veiled team. The men who got their hands bloodied when others couldn’t, or when I wasn’t interested in carrying out the work myself. And he was good. Not as good as me but fucking crazy enough to come close.
As was Atlas.
If only Emmy knew the shit he’d done.
De Luca Securities was the front company, the Fortune 500 business the public perceived, specializing in high-tech and personal security for high-class businessmen who needed an extra level of protection in their homes or offices. Maybe both.
But underneath the public fa?ade was where most of my time was spent. Investigative services, as I preferred to call it, focused on a specific selection of my clientele. The type of men who needed more advanced methods of protection—or retaliation—and couldn’t be seen getting their hands dirty but seemingly developed a grim rat infestation. Rodents, untrustworthy fuckers.
So, when services were required to help wean out the snakes slithering in the grass, sinking their poisonous venom into anything they could get their fangs into, you could say I was happy to have my team lend a hand.
However, now and then, when I felt a particular bubble of frustration clawing up my spine, I had no issue having my hands dripping with blood while I gave the guys a night off.
Cole let out a feral laugh when the man struggled, horrified to find his hands and ankles zip-tied to the metal chair. His face paled substantially, and his horror-stricken eyes flitted between me and Cole, wondering who he should fear the most.
On first instinct, they always assumed Cole with the frenzied, bat-shit crazy look in his eyes and his toothy grin. Especially when he was glaring down at you like he just escaped from an insane asylum, as Emmy referred to it.
She doesn’t even know half of it.
But my insanity was quiet, calm, deceiving .
It created a false assurance of security and safety before the deadliness crept up on you in the silence of your peace and obliterated every shred of hope you had lingering in your soul.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” our guest spurted, throttling in his chair. If he didn’t stop, he’d soon find himself face-first, tipped over on the floor.
Cole barked a throaty laugh at the man’s struggles, and that seemed to only aggravate him further. “Do you know who I am?” he hissed. “Just wait.”
“You’ve been a busy man, Mr. Lawrence,” I said calmly, confirming we knew exactly who he was, though there was a sharp edge to my voice that caused him to still. “Senator Tony Bishop sends his regards.”
Tony Bishop was a longstanding client and had inevitably become a good friend of mine since he first acquired services from De Luca Securities.
Bishop’s poll ratings were always out in front, he was the people’s favorite. But when you were considered the one to beat, snakes seemed to find their way into your basement. However, those snakes didn’t realize Bishop had a king cobra in his court.
In the lead-up to his re-election, his opponent’s team managed to get their hands on Tony’s medical assessment which happened to outline the details of his recently diagnosed stage two pancreatic cancer.
While curable, it didn’t stop the decline in public faith that Bishop was well enough to hold residency. Nor did it stop the opponent’s team from running bullshit propaganda that Bishop was dishonest and couldn’t be trusted.
Naturally, Bishop reached out to help find the weasel who betrayed him and sold the information to the other side. Considering he, his doctor, and his two right-hand men were the only ones privileged to Bishop’s diagnosis, a six-year-old could have traced it back to the convulsing swine in front of me.
Traitorous fucker.
Trust was a lesson I had learned early on in life and the lesson was: don’t. You could only rely on yourself in this game called life.
Having your dad die in your arms when you were eight years old because he overdosed on fucking crack when he was supposed to be looking after you would teach you that.
Or when your mother dropped you and your sister off at a US police precinct when you only spoke goddamn Italian so she could run off to sell her body for drugs.
Or when you were twelve years old and took a beating from your bastard of a foster dad because you dared to ask for your ten-year-old sister to get medical treatment when she had meningitis .
Or having one of your “guardians” force you to please her friends when you were fourteen years old, locking you in the basement for five days without food or water if you didn’t comply.
There was no arguing my circumstances forged me into a bloodthirsty, vengeful bastard. I had no shame in admitting it. The truth was, once you got a taste for revenge, it was addictive.
Fred’s horror-filled gaze found me. He was racking his brain to place my face, albeit it was mostly hidden in the shadows of the dimly lit room. The faint light from the single bulb that hung above us did little to calm his vivid imagination.
“Who the hell are you?” he asked, his fear wafting off him like fumes and polluting the air with his trepidation.
“Crazy,” I sighed. “But that’s the wrong question, Fred.” I clicked my tongue. The sound of my heavy footsteps thundering against the concrete ground filled the space as I intently made my way toward him. “You should be asking what I’m planning to do to you.”
I almost chuckled when I saw the vein throbbing in his forehead, the pulse fluttering in his neck. “What… are you… planning?” he stuttered, panic evident in his tone, his eyes flittering between Cole and me.
God, this feeling.
It was fucking orgasmic watching the hope drain from someone’s eyes, their memories rewinding back to the point where they had first fucked up, before slowly torturing them for the information you needed and they started singing like a canary. Sweeter than honey.
I lowered myself so Fred and I were level, the deathly glint in my eyes sending his heart rate through the steel roof. A sadistic grin drew on my lips. “Pain,” I told him, my voice assertive. “A fucking shit load of pain.”
The incessant ringing of my phone allowed a break for the vibrating Fred.
He let out a weak whimper, muffled by the plastic bag wrapped around his face, and his head fell back. Moron thinks I’m done with him.
At this point, he was unrecognizable. His face was colored in blues and purples, his eye sockets swollen and tripled in size, his nose had fattened and been broken, his clothing torn, and his skin was drowning in blood. Though the latter was mostly a result of my handy nail gun.
I passed the nail gun to Cole, who placed a clean cloth in my hand. When I pulled out my phone, I saw Atlas had rung four times .
“You’re like a needy girlfriend,” I answered, albeit begrudgingly. “Four calls, Atlas, really?”
I could practically hear the roll of his eyes through the phone. “There’s a problem,” he declared, failing to expand any further.
He never was one to get straight to the point.
“And?” I grunted. There’s always a fucking problem.
There was hesitation from Atlas before he finally sighed and said, “Miles Vaughan.”
I instinctively frowned, the familiar name made my blood run cold, and the tension I worked out with my new friend, Fred, built back up again, winding tight in my shoulders.
“He’s in town.”
I pinched my brow. “Does she know?”
“No, and I want to keep it that way.”
I remembered the first time I heard about Emmy’s abusive bastard of an ex-boyfriend. It was safe to say by the time Atlas had finished rounding up the details, I was contemplating finding him and strangling him with his own bloodied intestines.
The only reason the fucker was still alive was because he’d been sentenced to three years in Franklin Correctional Facility and had spent a year of that time getting a restraining order against Atlas.
The judge had granted his restraining order provided Miles stayed away from Emmy and made no attempt at contacting her. So far, he hadn’t.
Atlas was certain he would continue to leave Emmy alone once he was released. I’m not so certain. And judging by the perturbation edged in Atlas’ tone, I was betting I was right.
The sound of my jaw clamping shut was audible, even to Cole who watched me in suspense, his brows pinched. “Let me guess,” I gritted the words through my teeth. I fucking knew this would happen. “He’s looking for her.”
Atlas hesitated, reluctant to admit I was right from the onset. Eventually, he blew out a breath and said, “He’s hired Doug to find her.” He clicked his tongue. “Naturally, Doug rang me straight away.”
The idiot can’t even hire a PI well.
Doug was a private investigator contracted under De Luca Securities. Though, when I didn’t need him as much, Doug worked as a freelancer. He was exceptionally skilled at what he did, a compliment I didn’t give lightly. It didn’t matter whether you were drowning in the Bermuda Triangle or were hiding with the damn geckos in the Amazon Rainforest, Doug would find you. And then he would bring you to me.
“Fucking idiot,” I snorted. “Keep Doug feeding him breadcrumbs till we find out what he wants with her.”
The matter needed to be handled delicately so Miles couldn’t accuse Atlas of being in breach of the restraining order. It was nothing the De Luca Securities attorneys couldn’t fix if he did, but it was a ballache I could do without .
As far as Miles was aware, Emmy had continued her studies at Columbia and had headed West to the Pacific Coast as she originally planned.
“Already sorted, but there’s something else.” Of course, there is . “I’m heading back to Montenegro in a few days, and I don’t want Emmy living alone while that crazy bastard is searching for her.”
Don’t ask what I think you’re going to ask.
Don’t do it, Atlas.
Do. Not. Fucking. Do. It.
“How do you feel about a roommate?”
Goddammit.
Abysmal . I felt abysmal about Emmy as a roommate.
“Do I seem like a fucking babysitting service?” I grumbled, not attempting to hide the strain in my voice. How the hell was I supposed to forget the girl existed if she lived in my penthouse?
“Look, I know the two of you have had a few… difficult … encounters,” he pressed. Poor guy, he didn’t even know the half of it. “But there’s no one else I trust to protect her while I’m gone.”
A slither of guilt slid down my throat, settling in my stomach and filling me with dread when I heard the sincerity in his voice, reaffirming that I needed to ignore whatever pull there was between Emmy and me.
“She’d never agree,” I insisted, rather pointlessly. He wasn’t going to drop this, but the attempt was still there.
Atlas let out a heavy sigh through the phone. “I wasn’t planning on giving her much of a choice.”
“That hardly seems fair.” To me .
“Since when do you care about fairness?”
He had a point.
“Plus, you owe me.”
“How’s that?” I chuckled, ignoring Fred’s whimpers in the distance. I shot Cole a look, warning him to quit playing with his new toy while I was on the phone.
“For putting up with your stubborn ass. It’s not easy work, you know?”
“Oh, like you’re such a treat.”
Atlas gasped. “I’m a delight.”
“Your ass must get jealous of all the shit that comes out of your mouth.”
“Bastard,” Atlas laughed. “So?”
After a few silent moments, most of them where I quietly hoped Atlas had a sudden change of heart, I let out a painful groan. There wasn’t a universe in existence where I was going to leave my best friend’s sister alone and vulnerable.
“Fine,” I snapped. “Now leave me alone, or Miles’ restraining order won’t be the only court order piling up against you.” I heard him chuckling as I abruptly cut off the call before I could change my mind .
I turned back to Fred, the inevitable regret of my decision already hanging over my head like a stormy cloud. I motioned for Cole to remove the plastic bag from his head and crouched before his battered body.
The fear in his eyes was still fucking orgasmic. “Change of plans, Fred. It’s going to be a long night.”
Mark my words. That girl is going to be my undoing.