61. Chapter 61
Chapter 61
VIVIAN
A tech takes me from the triage check-in to the curtained area where Kent is. His eyes are closed when I go in, and he looks so peaceful albeit beat to hell. He has oxygen in his nose and EKG leads on his chest. A rhythmic beep comes from the monitor above his bed, and his breathing is noisy as he gingerly moves his chest to get air in and out through his mouth, his nose too swollen to attempt to provide him the air he needs.
His eyes open slowly and he sees me, the beeping on the monitor increasing. “Vivian,” he croaks through cracked lips, wincing as he does. “I’m glad they got ahold of you,” he grunts out.
I step closer, worry painted on my face. “What happened, Kent?” I ask softly, looking him up and down.
“Declan,” he whispers.
“But why?”
Kent swallows slowly and pulls in a ragged breath. “He wanted me to push something through, a bill.” He wheezes in more air and then he grabs his side and starts coughing, the monitor on the side of him alarming.
“What bill?” I ask once Kent’s coughing settles down, totally confused.
“An FDA regulation,” he gasps.
“I don’t understand,” I say. “FDA…his company doesn’t own a drug company.”
Kent shakes his head. “Not yet. They want to get one, but they want everything in their favor to make money.”
“Oh,” I say, nodding. “So you refused?”
“Yeah,” Kent says, closing his eyes and grabbing his side. “I won’t put people at risk.”
“Of course not,” I agree. “I would hate that.”
“And he wanted you,” he said, his eyes opening and boring into mine.
I raise my brows. “Me?” I ask in surprise.
He nods and reaches forward, grasping my hand. “He asked me to leave you alone. I told him we were just friends, but he beat me harder when I said I wouldn’t leave you to a thug like him.”
Kent falls back, sucking air in, shallow breaths working hard in order to accommodate his broken ribs. The monitor alarms go off. I let him hold my hand, and he squeezes it emphatically as he fights to calm his body back to relaxation. Once he is settled, his lips part, and he looks at me under his lashes, seeming exhausted by the effort to speak with me.
I lean forward and Kent turns his face to me, ready to accept my lips on his, but I angle my face to his ear. “That is a beautiful performance, Kent. Now tell me the fucking truth,” I whisper and lean back to examine his face.
Confusion covers Kent’s face, his monitor beeping quicker as his heart rate rises. I remain stoic as I monitor his response just as closely as the equipment attached to him.
“W-what do you mean?” Kent asks, still holding the confused, constipated look on his face.
“I know there is no drug company, I know there is no bill, and I know that Declan didn’t beat the hell out of you because of that.”
“Vivian…”
I use my hand that is still holding his and pull him to me, causing him to call out in pain as he is lifted from the bed. “Declan would never ask you to leave me alone; he would tell you. And if you refused, you wouldn’t be alive right now,” I inform Kent in a whisper. “He loves me too much to let someone bother me. And you, Kent, are like a fucking cancer, one he’d have just removed,” I explain to him and then release his hand.
“So tell me what really happened.”
Panic has now seized Kent’s face, coupled with pain. “I told you—”
“A story,” I fill in for him, “and if you don’t get to the truth, it will only get progressively worse for you.”
He shakes his head. “He and his thug brothers—”
The curtain is roughly jerked aside, and said thug brothers enter calmly, shutting the curtain behind them, flanking me. The heart monitor starts to go crazy, and Slade walks over and shuts it off.
“Where is Declan?” I ask calmly.
“I-I…”
I stand and put a hand on Kent’s leg. “Tell me,” I say encouragingly, sweetly even, but Kent just shakes his head quickly. My anger flips quickly to rage, and I ball up my hand on his leg and land a hard jab to Kent’s balls and grind down. Kent goes to call out and Axel covers his mouth with his leather-gloved hand.
I had never understood why Declan had always said he would do anything he had to in order to protect someone that he loved. I couldn’t understand the way he was willing to hurt someone else if his family was threatened. I couldn’t imagine ever going to that length or why any sane person would need to be violent. The rage he felt at someone alluding to his family, to me, was something so foreign to me.
It wasn’t until about thirty minutes ago when Axel and Slade had showed up at my condo and told me what had transpired and that someone had Declan that I felt what must have been a flicker of what Declan did. And now that I have a way to get a piece of the puzzle to get him back to me and Kent won’t give me what I need, I completely understand the need to destroy. I am taking great satisfaction in making Kent hurt. I don’t care that he had bamboozled me, but the fact that he has Declan, my Declan, and he is keeping him from me makes me eager for him to hurt.
“This is a sample of what I will do to you. I believe you’ve had a sample of what Declan will do to you, but you’ve got no idea what Slade and Axel can or will do,” I hiss at him. “If you’d like to avoid your sampling, you better fucking tell me where Declan is.”
Axel releases his hand from Kent’s mouth after I ease up on his balls, but I leave my fist there. “I don’t know where he took him,” Kent squeals.
“Where who took him?” Slade cuts in.
“Heath, my brother.” Kent’s eyes go wide when he realizes he probably let too much slip.
“What is his plan?” Axel demands. Kent doesn’t answer immediately, and I move to punch his balls again.
“He wants to torture him and destroy the Falco brand!” he shouts before I make contact.
“Why?” I ask, completely taken aback by that answer.
“Because he stole it all from us and killed our father.”
Slade comes forward and gets into his face. “What’s your name, fucker?” he demands.
“Kent—”
“No,” Slade cuts off, “what’s your real name?”
I sit and watch their interaction, completely confused by the question. What the hell does Slade mean, his real name?
Kent starts shaking under his gaze, and then he loses what little color he has left when Axel moves into view, adding another level of threat. “August Lexington,” he says.
This means nothing to me, but it means everything to Axel and Slade, whose eyes quickly slide to each other’s and back. Slade reaches across Kent’s body and pulls a gun from under Axel’s suit jacket. Kent’s eyes bulge as Slade takes the gun and points it first at his face, and then he keeps moving, pointing it at his chest and finally nuzzling the barrel at Kent’s groin.
“Tell me where my brother is,” Slade whispers.
Kent shakes his head. “He wouldn’t tell me. He said—”
Slade cocks the hammer of the revolver back, and it gets Kent’s attention and he starts speaking rapid-fire. “He has a warehouse in Maryland. It’s underground, on a piece of land that is worthless that we couldn’t sell. I think—”
“You should know,” Slade informs him.
“It’s on Packard Street, in Baltimore.”
Axel has already taken out his phone and texts something. He watches the screen and then he nods at Slade.
Slade puts his PR smile on for Kent. “You stay alive for now, Gussy,” he says, “just with a little less.” Slade pushes the gun straight into Kent’s shrunken cock.
“No!” Kent heaves out and Slade pulls the trigger. Kent’s eyes roll back into his head as the gun clicks into the empty chamber.
“People’s imagination causes more damage than bullets can sometimes,” he tells me.
“Let’s go,” Axel announces, and turns on his heels.
We leave the empty hospital wing that Slade was able to have Kent put in for our visit. The wing is now named after Marielle Falco and will be a cancer center thanks to a ginormous donation from Falco Enterprises. We exit out a back door to a waiting motorcade of black Suburbans.
“Vivian, you take this one back to your house.”
I take the gun Axel had given me, which is actually loaded, and point it under Slade’s chin. “I’m going, Slade.” I used to be terrified of guns, the thought of touching them abhorrent to me. But when I went to school, I had decided to take a gun safety course to try and face my fear, a challenge we had been assigned in one of my classes. I had actually fallen in love with shooting and the feeling of being able to protect myself. I now know how to handle all manner of weapons, and my aim is wicked good when I go to the range.
I stare Slade down with the gun to his chin and am proud of the control I have with the weapon, and the knowledge that I am able to handle the powerful thing in my hand conveys my point to him. Slade gives a small nod, and I pull the gun away.
Axel looks over at me. “I like you,” he says to me. I give a small laugh, remembering the first time I met the mostly silent brother and he had told me the same thing. Then I follow them to the first SUV and climb inside.
I’m going to get my life back.