Chapter Thirty-Eight
I was scared to death, but as I sat on the musty bed in this room, all I could think about was escaping.
Unfortunately, I was in this old house under the watchful eye of Aram and my father.
They’d abducted me from the street, and as promised, had someone draw blood from me.
As we awaited the results of the test, I supposed they meant to keep me bound, but I wasn’t gagged, so I screamed.
My father came over to me and covered my mouth and nose with his large hand.
I squirmed the best that I could, mainly so I could at least breathe as he was pressing down so firmly that I couldn’t move my head enough to get any air.
I also pulled at the binds, keeping my hands in place, before I gave up because I knew I would need to preserve my energy before starting back up again.
My current predicament had been a result of me fighting back once I’d arrived at this godforsaken place.
Using a few of the moves I had learned in self defense class, they did little good for me, so I did the only other thing I could.
After disabling them enough to gain some space, I’d tried to run, but it had been for naught.
Two were able to overpower me so Aram could inject me with what I assumed was a sedative since it’d knocked me out and had me feeling a bit drowsy even now that I had come to.
Unfortunately, I had come to in the room where I was tied to a chair.
My face throbbed not only still from Aram’s strike in the car, but the subsequent ones I’d endured from trying to defend myself earlier.
My arm also throbbed from where the blood had been taken, and as I looked down at it, my flesh was already starting to heavily bruise.
“Please, Papa. Don’t do this to me,” I’d then begged the man who’d sired me, only to have him smirk and laugh in my face.
“I told you she’d be a feisty one,” he’d said to Aram. “ Truly like her mother, you’ll have to take her by force.”
To have him insinuate that he had raped my mother was more than I could bear to handle right now.
Aram would never be able to touch me without using force, as I would never willingly lie down with him.
Even in the most tempestuous of times with Kingston, he’d never taken me against my will with violence.
Hell, he could’ve taken me the night of his cousin’s birthday party, but he’d respected me enough not to fully take advantage of me when I’d obviously been drugged.
Oh, what I wouldn’t do to see him one last time.
Throughout this whole ordeal, I was convinced he would find me.
Not only did he have the means to track me, I knew he loved me and would have to trust that I was genuine when I’d told him the night before that I loved him, too.
Because of our admissions, he’d have to know that I never would’ve left willingly.
Even when he’d hated me, he’d protected me. He would now, too.
I have to believe it.
And I did. Since there was little I could do right now, I stayed as quiet as I could and silently observed the others.
Despite his duplicity, my father didn’t seem to be at ease at all.
He was second-guessing his alliance with Aram.
I knew this man, or at least enough about him to know when he was scared, nervous, or, at that moment, both.
I couldn’t really appeal to him when he had his hand over my mouth. Relaxing as best I could, he eventually turned his attention to me and loosened his hand. “If I uncover your mouth, you will shut up, or else I’ll make it to where you can’t talk at all. Am I understood?”
I nodded, and he slowly removed his hand completely. When he did, I was tempted to scream again, but I doubted anyone would hear me anyway, so I busied myself with sucking oxygen into my lungs once more.
“When are we going to get these results?” My father asked Aram.
“We can’t rush this. I have to know for sure before I accept her as payment for your debts. I’m sure you understand, Boris. It’s like waiting for the check to clear the bank before zeroing out the account. And in your case, she needs to be worth every zero I’m paying for.”
“She will be. Ekaterina might be strong-willed now, but she will comply. Let her get used to the situation, then she’ll?—”
“Her compliance is hardly an issue. I have ways to guarantee that,” he said before turning his leering gaze at me. I shivered slightly, which he caught because he grinned, revealing even, white teeth, then continued. “She’s not a virgin, but her womb must be.”
I was so sick and tired of men being so concerned with my fucking womb.
First, it had been Kingston, and now Aram.
Women in this day and age were allowed to say when and if they had kids at all, only I had signed that liberty away when I’d agreed to marry my husband in return for protection from the very man who had gotten to me anyway.
This was all on me, though. I’d been the one to foolishly escape my bodyguards and had trusted someone I now knew beyond a shadow of a doubt couldn’t be trusted.
I’d wanted so badly to believe him, as he was the only family I had left.
Once I got out of this, I wouldn’t care if he lived or died, as he was now dead to me.
“I’m not?—”
My words were cut off the moment I heard a crashing noise from downstairs. Immediately, my father, Aram, and their two men all tensed.
Kingston. Do I dare dream it is you?
“Get the girl and take her outside,” Aram told my father, and for the first time in my life, I saw him jump into action as if he was a simple soldier, and not a Bratva Pakhan himself.
I’d never seen my father acquiesce to someone so completely, and so easily, that I was a bit in shock as he untied my hands.
The moment he did, I tried to get up, and a wave of dizziness washed over me.
It was likely a lingering side effect from whatever had been injected into me.
I went to take a step forward and nearly toppled over.
My father grabbed me, then hefted me over his shoulder as he looked for somewhere to go.
He must’ve realized he wouldn’t get far because he made a beeline for the balcony instead.
I sucked in additional oxygen the moment I encountered actual outside air, and then I looked down and could see what looked like Nolan’s SUV and a sports car I did not recognize in the driveway.
“Kingston,” I cried out, and it was met with a sharp strike to the face.
At this rate, my cheek would swell to twice its size. I had no idea why men always seemed to want to hit there first. When we were taught to disable a man with a strike to his groin, they must’ve been taught the same but with a strike to our jaw.
I wasn’t bound any longer, so I did not have to take this. Using my elbow, I jabbed it into my father’s rib cage, causing him to bellow out in pain. It wasn’t successful enough because as I tried to slip past him, he grabbed me.
This time, I fought the man I’d once loved and idolized above all others, and I used my fists, elbows, feet, and head to try to break free.
I would hear him grunt each time I was successful.
I just had to wear him down. My father got a few blows in on me, too.
And just when I thought I had gotten him where I needed him, he yanked me backward by my hair, then I heard the cracking of wood.
“Kingston,” I screamed as I fell backward, along with my father.
We both hit the metal awning with a thud, yanking my head away from my father. I was able to grab onto one of the few spindles still upright. It hurt like hell, but I had gotten used to having my hair pulled since marrying Kingston.
“Ekaterina,” I heard before another loud thud sounded below.
Looking over my shoulder, I screamed again as I saw my father on the ground with an expanding puddle of blood underneath him.
I was shaking profusely now, and as I tried to hoist myself back onto the floor of the balcony, the wooden spindle began to crack further.
I was about to join my father if I didn’t act quickly.
I was still a bit dazed from the drug, but I tried my hardest to no avail. Tears were now streaming down my face, and I didn’t even recognize the one calling my name as I could see nothing through the curtain of tears.
“Ekaterina. It’s okay. I’m going to help you,” the man said.
It wasn’t Kingston, Nolan, or Eli, but I had heard it before. That thickly accented Irish voice and calming tone. “Cillian?”
“Shhh,” he said. “It’s going to be okay.”
And I believed him as he grabbed my wrists, then pulled me to safety.
I could finally breathe once there was something other than metal or air beneath me.
At least until it also made a creaking noise.
I tried to scramble to my feet, but ended up wobbling.
Instead of falling to my death, he swept me up into his large arms, then carried me back inside.
We had no sooner entered the room when I heard a gunshot. Then another. “Kingston,” I cried out, and I knew Cillian had tensed up as well, especially when it went quiet.
Finally, the door was flung open, and my prayers were answered. In the doorway stood Kingston. “Puisín,” he rasped to me, and quickly hurried over to me. “What did they do to you?” he whispered.
I was about to respond, but I heard another gunshot. Was it Aram? Nolan? The two men with Aram? Or was it...?
“Eli’s down,” I heard the moment Nolan appeared in the doorway.
“Fuck,” Kingston cursed.
“Noooo,” I cried out. My very own protector had been injured, or possibly killed, and all because I had snuck away after knowing the danger that could befall me out there.
“Their two guards are down, but there is no sign of Aram or Boris.”
“Her father’s dead,” Cillian said to him.
“And soon all of you will be, too,” I heard Aram say.
Another shot rang out, and this time, Nolan fell face-first to the floor. I screamed, Kingston growled, and Cillian attacked the man. The gun slipped out of Aram’s hands and went crashing to the floor. It was too far for me to grab, but Kingston and Cillian wouldn’t need one.
Cillian dropped to his knees to check on Nolan, who was squirming in pain, and I saw the lethal focus in my husband’s eyes. The way he held the weapon...The calm composure he was displaying...The hollow deadness in his eyes...I knew in that moment that Kingston had killed before and would again.
I had no sooner thought it when a final shot rang out around me, and this time Aram fell to the floor.
Unlike Nolan, there was a rapid puddle of blood expanding under him, and no movement whatsoever.
He was dead. But as Nolan groaned while trying to sit up, I saw the black under his shirt and realized he had a bulletproof vest on.
The next hour passed by in a blur. No police were called.
In fact, the only call placed was to a clean-up crew of Kingston’s.
This seemed to be normal to all the others, and it struck me in that moment that the Branningtons were every bit as dangerous as my father had ever proclaimed them to be, but not where I was concerned. At least not anymore.
After the crew Kingston called had arrived, he carried me downstairs and outside to the SUV. Eli was injured, but like Nolan, he had come prepared for battle. Once we were all in the car, the others took off their vests, and I knew they all had been prepared. Everyone except for me.
“Are you okay, puisín?” Kingston asked me.
“I am. Can we just go home?”
“I have something to do for Daideó, but I’ll fill him in on what happened here. After, I’ll meet you at your place.”
“See you soon, Cill,” he said to his cousin, then I watched the blond speed away in his sports car.
We soon followed, and as the adrenaline began wearing off, I snuggled against my husband.
He was still so rigid, and I knew there would be hell to pay for me later, especially as I had been responsible for all of this happening.
As if he suspected I knew he was mad, he finally relaxed, then kissed his way to my ear.
“Once I know you’re physically fine, I’m going to spank that ass until you can’t sit.”
“I would expect nothing less,” I murmured as I snuggled even closer to him.
“You could’ve been killed, or worse, taken to fucking Armenia.”
“That’s exactly where he’d planned to take me, but I knew I’d never make it there.”
“How could you know such a thing?” he asked me.
“Because I always knew you would find me. After all, a promise is a promise. A vow is a vow. You swore to always protect me, and I swore to?—”
“That marriage wasn’t real, but the one we have soon will be. I love you so fucking much, and the thought of never seeing you again made me?—”
“I love you, too.” I dropped my head back, and when his eyes met mine, my lips parted as he seized my mouth with his. I clung to him as he ate at my lips and mouth before pulling away.
“Are you sure that you’re okay?” he asked me again. “I can take you to the?—"
“I am. You’re here with me, and everyone that mattered survived. All I want to do now is go home.”
“You heard the lady,” he said to his men, and they headed straight there.