16. Ghost
GHOST
Fury, unlike I’d ever known boiled in my veins as I held my woman covered in some asshole’s blood who dared to touch her.
Everyone knew our reputation, and that man thought he could act as he pleased because of who he was in the criminal world.
Jean-Claude would be the perfect poster child to show how fucking serious we were about protecting what’s ours.
That dead bastard might be the son of one of the most respected members of the Milieu or French mob, but I felt no regret about what happened.
We’d worked with his father on many occasions helping him clean up messes he couldn’t be tied to.
The Venturi crime family was well known and incredibly active in the European criminal world.
Our only hope is that Francois, his father, would understand that his son left us no choice.
Magnus might be a trigger-happy psycho when it came to Harper, but he wouldn’t have made that move without giving the idiot an out.
“Shot him,” Harper mumbled.
“What’s that, angel?” I asked, using a napkin we had in the car to clean off some of the blood from her face.
“He should have shot him before he licked me,” she said more clearly this time. “That Suit thought he could drag me around like a whore. He fucking licked me,” she bit out, anger flashing in her eyes.
My gaze flicked up to Jaxson’s, who was driving, his hands turning white with how tight he was holding the steering wheel.
“What else did he say to you?” I asked. Jean-Claude had never liked us, feeling we were beneath his family. The bastard enjoyed finding ways to piss us off or undermine what we did to make himself seem more important.
“He wanted me to leave you and go with him. He thought it was disgusting that you all like to share,” she shared, raising a hand to stop my pathetic efforts to clean her up, causing me to meet her blue eyes. “I don’t agree with him. It’s not disgusting.”
I couldn’t help but smile at her, pressing a soft kiss to her lips.
“I know you don’t think that, angel. Some people just can’t see more than one way to live and love.
You’d think being French, he would have a more open mind, but he’s more concerned about image.
His father hires us to deal with problems they can’t manage, and it infuriates him that his family needs to call in help. ”
“Did you know he was staying at the hotel?” she asked, shifting to sit up a little straighter, releasing my hand.
“We did know he was at the hotel, but he was supposed to be gone on a yacht with friends for the evening. Regardless of that, he wasn’t someone we considered to be a threat to you in any way,” Jaxon explained.
“There were two other people we kept a closer eye on who were staying in town at that hotel, but Jean-Claude wasn’t part of the watch list. In fact, we haven’t run into him for a year, but with things going on with Dax, it could be they know we turned down the contract on you. Word of that thing travels fast.”
“He did say something about there finally being a prize you wouldn’t kill.” She mused while using another napkin to try and clean off the blood from her hands.
Everything in me wanted to call Francois and demand retribution for what happened tonight.
He should have had better control over his son.
Only a man who believed he was impervious to being killed or stupid could do what he did tonight.
Thankfully, getting home was easy, and Jaxson didn’t bother driving close to the speed limit, so we made it back to the house in a timely manner.
Jaxon got out first and took Harper from me, making it easier to get her out of the car.
“I can walk, you know,” she argued as I opened the front door to let them both in.
“There’s no doubt you can, but should you?
Up until a few minutes ago, you were in quite a state of shock.
Besides, you’re not the only one who’s been freaked out by what happened.
Something awful could have occurred, and I was the one who told Magnus you didn’t need to be escorted,” Jaxson said as he brought her right to the bathroom.
He set her on her feet, peeled the dress off, then sat her on the stone bench, turning on the water.
That done, he stripped out of his clothes smeared with blood from her.
Looking down at myself, I wasn’t much better, having had her cuddled up in my arms. Slipping off my shoes, I yanked off my shirt, tossing it with theirs.
We would need to burn them later. While it was a crime to do that to the dress Harper had been wearing, it was standard practice.
While she was here, a golden glow had started to appear, and it had set the emerald of her dress off to perfection. Our night had been going so perfectly. How could that twit fuck it all up for us?
Soon the three of us were naked and washing all the evidence of what happened tonight off Harper’s body. Jaxson was dealing with her hair while I had loofa duty, making sure to scrub every inch of her beautifully soft skin.
As we cleaned her up, the toll of what she’d just gone through started to show as she sagged against Jaxson, and her eyes started to flutter closed.
Confident I’d gotten every speck of blood and other matter off her, I grabbed the towel and started drying her off.
Jaxson dried and brushed her hair, then helped to get her in one of our T-shirts.
“You won’t leave if I sleep, will you?” she asked, her voice sounding as tired as she looked. “I don’t want to be alone if I wake up from a bad dream or if I start sleepwalking again.”
“Don’t you worry, gorgeous, the last thing we are going to do is leave you,” Jaxson promised, kissing her temple, then started to massage her head. “Now, sleep. One of us will be with you at all times, no matter what.”
“Good, you make me feel safe,” she murmured before her breathing started to even out and was truly asleep.
Sitting next to her across from Jaxson, I pulled out my cell and called Magnus. “Harper okay?” he demanded the moment he answered.
“Yeah, she’s asleep. Barely made it through the shower before she started to fade, but she’s gonna be fine,” I answered. “Now tell me what the fuck is going on.”
The talking in the background started to fade as Magnus moved to another location. “It could be worse. I’ll just say that. Looks like Francois is here too, so we have a meeting with him tomorrow, and he wants us to bring Harper. He wants to hear the story from her lips.”
“Like fuck that is going to happen,” I said with a snarl. “That bastard of a son already did enough damage. There’s no need for her to meet that dick.”
“We are having the meeting in a neutral and public place. He doesn’t dispute that his son was in the wrong.
He wants to hear the full story,” Magnus explained, the frustration clear in his tone.
“That’s not something I can give him since I walked in after they’d been talking.
Her face told me all I needed to know, and it was screaming, get me the hell out of here. ”
“Are you okay with this?” I countered. “If you tell me you are okay with putting her through this because it will be safer for her in the long run, then fine, but don’t you dare let this prick push us around, or what you did is pointless.”
Magnus growled into the phone. “You don’t need to tell me what’s at stake here, Casper. I’m the one who pulled the trigger, not you.”
“So you’re saying you wouldn’t do it again?” I challenged him, needing to know how serious this situation was.
“In a fucking heartbeat, I would pull that trigger. He touched what’s ours,” he roared into the phone, making me pull it away from my ear.
Even Harper stirred in her sleep at the sound of his fury. Jaxson soothed her, whispering into her ear, and she settled down again.
“Then we go to the meet, she tells her story, and we leave, right?” I questioned, needing to know how involved all this was.
“It better be, or I’ll be wearing his blood next,” Magnus bit out. “I have to check in with Arief and apologize for causing a scene in his hotel. Losing our favorite restaurant would be the worst thing out of this situation.”
“Glad you can keep things in perspective, Mag,” I teased. “Hurry home. She wants us all here, safe and in bed with her.”
“That is exactly where I want to be. Nothing will keep me from getting there as fast as I can.”
With that said, the line went dead, and I was left talking to air. Rolling my eyes, I tossed my phone on the nightstand and curled up against Harper. She moved so she could hide her face in my neck and let out a soft sigh.
God, if I weren’t lost for this woman already, I would be in that moment.