Chapter 2
Luca
He’s alive. I’m on my feet and running up the stairs before anyone can ask me what’s going on. I burst into the lying bitch’s room and Angel glances at me over his shoulder. It angers me when she grins, though she’s in extreme pain.
“Where is he?” I demand.
“Now that would be telling, wouldn’t it,” she quips.
I close in on her, only Angel blocking her from me completely. He is her savior at this current moment, and she doesn’t realise how lucky she is.
“I ain’t warning ya again not to fuck with me. Tell me where you’ve got him.”
Angel finishes wrapping her hand and stands. “What’s going on?”
I pass him the phone. With him distracted watching our brother, it doesn’t take much to get him to move out of my way. I drop to my knees and rip off the bandage Angel just finished working on.
I press my thumb into the open wound, and her scream has every brother running up the stairs. It’s music to my fucking ears.
“You’re gonna tell me where he is, now.”
“F-fuck… Y-you!” she spits breathlessly.
I dig my thumb in harder, and the bitch passes out. Standing, I wipe my thumb on my jeans, wiping her blood off.
“Seriously, are we cutting her to pieces now?” King asks as he arrives in the doorway.
Angel passes him the phone and there’s no more questions. Silence replaces even our breaths.
“Ford’s alive. He has been all this time,” I tell them all, not that they can’t see it for themselves.
“Yes!” Trey hollers.
I glance back down at Effie and she’s still out for the count. All this time, she’s kept him alive as a pawn to use. Unfortunately for her, she has run out of time to use it.
“Angel?”
Rudi’s voice breaks through the tension rolling between my shoulders, and Angel calls out for her to join us. Our resident nurse is about to come in handy.
The brothers move out of her way, and she stops short when she sees the state Effie’s in.
“Why is she missing a finger?” she asks.
The prospect leans in the room and admits, “That was my mistake.”
Eyes wide, she clarifies, “You mistakenly cut her finger off?”
Angel pulls her against him, kisses her, then tells her, “Don’t worry about it. Can you wake her up and get her cleaned up. We need her alive, more now than ever. Ford’s alive. She’s got him.”
The phone is passed to her, and she grins at me. I don’t give a shit whether she’s happy or not, I need her fixing Effie up.
I step to the side and out of her way. I take the phone back and watch as Ford sits up. His movements are slow, and he winces until he’s settled on his ass.
“Ford?” I say into the phone.
Perhaps he can hear? He doesn’t look around for my voice. I scan the screen looking for a microphone option but find nothing. We can obviously only see him but not communicate.
Effie comes around with a gasp and tries shuffling away from Rudi.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” Rudi tells her. “I’m here to make sure you don’t get an infection.”
“Tell your boss not to stick his fucking thumb in it then!”
“Um, I’m not going to do that. I’ll just clean it if he does it again. Now, hold still.”
Angel moves closer to keep Rudi from Effie’s futile attempts to get at her if she chose to, but I’m a little impressed with my VP’s old lady. She’s stronger than I gave her credit for.
“Where is he, Effie?” I ask again.
“No. You want to know, we make a deal. You can do what you like to me, I won’t ever tell you.”
“Tut-tut. Is this you doubting me again?”
“Oh I fully believe you, but I’m not dying in this shithole for nothing.”
Leaning back, I brace my foot on the wall and sigh. “Now don’t go surprising me with your answer, but I’m guessing, you wanna trade his location for your life? Go on, tell me I’m wrong.”
“You’re not wrong. It’s a fair trade.”
“A fair trade?” I snap. “A fair fuckin’ trade? You’re deluded if you believe I deal in what’s fair or not. And even if I did, your life isn’t a fair trade for our brother.”
“Then kill me, cause I’m not saying.”
Rudi finishes binding her hand and leaves the room. I barely register Angel leaving with her.
I cross the room and stand over our prisoner.
“You have nothing left to live for. The Haywards own the city now. Your men are either dead or gone. And by the time Trey finishes his tech shit, our companies will have all your money. If we were to release you, you can’t even afford to stay a night in a shitty motel.”
Her eyes widen, but she refuses to give in. “I’d still be alive.”
“Okay, say I let you live. What’s to say Ford won’t track you down and take you out?”
“He’d have to find me first.”
“Without your money, that game of cat and mouse is over.”
Defeat smashes any hope she might have occurred. I wait to see where she takes this next. I’m not kept waiting for long.
“I could help you get situated in the city…”
“Don’t need your help.”
“I could…” Defeat once again wins, and she slumps against the wall.
“There’s nothing you can offer me or my club. So that leaves me with causing you astronomical pain until you give up where Ford is.”
“You said… you said your men wouldn’t vote it in!”
Arching my brow, I tell her, “The game’s changed now. Every second counts.” Over my shoulder, I ask, “What say you, brothers. Let’s vote, anyone against using whatever means possible in getting Ford’s location?”
Maxwell: “Nay.”
Warren: “Nay.”
Trey: “Nay.”
King: “Nay.”
Angel: “Nay.”
Tilting my head, I smirk, making sure she’s looking me in the eye. I say, “Nay.”
Her throat moves under her heavy gulp of fear. I crouch down to her level, pulling out my knife.
She tracks my every moment and flinches when I press the blade against her cheek, the tip bringing a spot of blood to the surface.
“Tell me where Ford is.”
Her lips turn white, pressing them together that tightly. A small hiss escapes though as I drag the blade over her cheekbone.
“Tell me.”
Nothing.
“Tell me,” I sing-song.
Her mouth opens, but still, nothing comes out.
“You’ll give him up soon enough. I promise you that.”
“She ain’t gonna give him up,” Angel points out.
“She will.”
“Luc, she ain’t the average woman you meet on the street. She was born into this life,” he argues.
“Most grown men would break with what I’m gonna put her through.”
I bring up the live feed on Effie’s phone. Ford’s asleep and it looks like he’s gained a black eye since I last saw him a few hours ago.
“Someone is still working for her. They either haven’t heard she’s been taken down or they believe she’ll be back,” I murmur.
I click out of the feed and scroll through the call log again. One of these numbers has to belong to whoever’s in charge of keeping an eye on Ford.
I guarantee she would’ve kept close tabs on him, keeping him as her get-out-of-death card.
“Trey!”
He appears at my side, and I hand him the phone. “See what you can find out about these numbers.”
He walks off and I snag a cigarette from Angel’s pack. Lacing it between my fingers, my mind won’t rest.
“How’s Victoria?” Angel asks.
“She’s getting through it. She looks at River and sees all the things he’s gonna miss out on with Ricky gone.”
“Rudi wants to take her to this new spa place that’s recently opened up. It might do her well to get away for a few days.”
A few fucking days?
“Where is it? And why go for so long?”
Angel huffs out a laugh. “It’s just outside the city and it’s what women do, Luc. Every so often they go to spas and relax and shit.”
Narrowing my eyes, I ask him, “You’re okay with your wife going off for a few days, are ya?”
“Of course I don’t want her away from me at all, but it’s not like she ain’t coming back. And after she’s missed me as I’ll miss her, she’ll be on me like crazy.”
“You should reconsider your marriage if she’s only on you after going away for a few days.”
“Fuck you, sweetheart.”
Warm hands run through my hair, fingernails scratching over my scalp. Tor envelopes her arms around my neck and leans down to whisper, “It’s later.”
Covering her hand with mine, I turn my head to face her. “I shouldn’t keep you waiting any longer, then.”
It seems my wife is on a mission and one I’m all to happy to let her lead. I’m as hard as granite by the time she locks us inside one of the spare rooms.
She stands before me, slipping her finger under her dress strap and sliding it off of her shoulder, one by one.
As usual, my old lady is bare of underwear.
I should be angry about it but it’s not like anyone else knows.
And if they’re thinking about what’s under my wife’s clothing, then I’ll show them why that’s a mistake.
“Why have you still got your clothes on, baby?” she purrs taking a step toward me.
Shrugging out of my cut, I hang it from the doorknob and whip my hoodie and tee over my head. I discard them on the floor and work my belt until my jeans and boxers are down around my feet and I’m stepping out of them.
There’s this smile she gets when we come together and I haven’t realised it till now, after not seeing it at all since River’s birth, that she wears just for me. This smile, it’s mine. It’s a thirst but confident I’m the water she needs to survive.
It’s the first time I’ve seen her body fully naked since the birth and like she was made to have my kids, she’s still as perfect.
There are a few shimmering lines on the tops of her thighs and a couple on her lower stomach.
If possible, I grow harder. They’re there because of me.
I thought marrying her and knocking her up would be the final tie that bound her to me, but I was wrong.
My marks on her, as permanent as ink, are there for all fucking eternity. I step closer to her and lower myself down to my knees.
As hungry as I am to be inside her, I need her to not only see nothing has changed. I need her to feel it right down in the depths of her soul.
Tracing my fingertip over each one, I slap her hand away when she goes to cover them.
I lick each one, slowly, drawing it out, hoping this is never a concern she will have.
I kiss my way across her lower stomach and down to her pussy.
Her fingers sink into my hair and grasp on tightly.
A shuddery breath escapes her. I hook her leg over my shoulder and grin when I look up and her head is flung back knowing how good she’s about to feel.
“I’ve missed your tongue,” she says on a sigh. “So, so much.”
“We’ve got a lot of time to make up for. You ready?”
“Yes!” she hisses out as I trace her clit with my tongue.
There’s nothing about her that’s changed.
If anything, she feels better in my arms now.
Her skin is silkier. Smoother. There’s a little more to hold onto as I drive my tongue into her entrance.
And her breasts, larger than normal but still fit perfectly in my hand.
There is nothing about my wife that doesn’t have me obsessed with her.