Chapter 15 Sly
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
SLY
She bites her lip as she studies the phone, small fingers trembling with uncertainty.
The realization that she’s never chosen anything for herself settles like frost beneath my skin.
That thought alone makes me want to dismantle her sad excuse for a brother piece by piece, until there is nothing left to recognize him by.
Resting back against the headboard, I try to calm my anger.
It was something I learned to do from a young age after watching my attorney father help murderers and rapists walk free.
I questioned him on it, but he beat me until I couldn’t walk straight.
I learned to keep my mouth shut after that.
So I knew, partly, what it must have been like for Wren, growing up in a house where she wasn’t allowed to speak her mind.
Over the years, I cultivated a deliberate calm, never reacting, only listening and filing everything away, biding my time until I possessed both the judgment and the force to set things right.
That day came in the form of Chester Beaten, a thirty-three-year-old man who had kidnapped and raped a nine-year-old girl.
My father had gotten him off on a technicality, one I can no longer recall. What I do remember with vivid clarity is that Chester was guilty. So after my father got the case declared a mistrial, I took matters into my own hands.
Chester was my first, but not my last. During the days I worked from the comfort of my home as an accountant, at night, I stalked the men my father had helped walk away without any sort of repercussion for killing or raping others. Then I removed them from this world, deeming them unworthy of life.
It’s why I wanted to know more about her brother.
There was certainly more going on there than meets the eye.
My fists clench angrily with the knowledge that he’d been grooming her.
Was his plan always to sell her to who we believed to be Ivan Sokolov, the man who ran the entire goddamned Russian mob?
I realize we only had the initials from the note and his first name from her. Maybe we were wrong. Please be wrong.
“Wren?” I ask, making her look up from the phone where she’s lying on her stomach on the bed.
“Yeah?”
“Do you know Ivan’s last name?”
Everyone’s eyes move to me, and one by one, they start to clue in to my line of questioning. Maybe we’d get lucky, and the most prominent mobster in the world wasn’t trying to get his filthy hands on our girl.
She frowns as her eyes dart to the side in thought. “I think it was Sokolov? Something like that.”
“Fucking shit,” Pete hisses at the same time a loud bang echoes throughout the room.
We all turn to see Jagger shaking out his fist, chunks of drywall crumbling to the ground where he just punched a hole in the wall.
“Do you know him?” Wren asks, sitting up as she glances around at all of us.
“Not personally. But he’s the head of the Russian mob.”
Her eyebrows disappear behind her bangs as her jaw drops open. “The mob? Like the mob-mob?”
I nod. “What do you know about them?”
“I don’t remember anything specific. Just that they were like organized gangs, they carry guns and kill people who get in their way.
I think it was like a whole family involved?
I’m not sure,” she says as her shoulders drop and she shakes her head.
“I don’t remember much else. I’m not even sure where I learned that from. ”
I lean back and nod. “That’s pretty accurate.
Ultimately, it’s about power, control, and money.
They deal in drugs, guns, gambling, and debt.
You cross them, you disappear. You pay late, you lose more than money.
You get in the way, you’re buried six feet under, no questions asked.
And once you join, they don’t let you leave alive. ”
Jagger drops on the bed beside me as she asks, “And you’re saying that Ivan is in charge of this… mob?”
“He runs the biggest mob in the world,” Pete adds with an angry glint in his eye. “He’s probably the worst person to have as an enemy.”
“Why would he even want me?” Wren asks before leaning over and grabbing her bottle of Dr. Pepper off the nightstand.
“There’s no way to know for sure,” I say, measuring my words carefully so I don’t upset her. “But it’s probably because he wanted the perfect trophy wife. Someone he could parade around on his arm and would be… obedient.”
She frowns down at her drink. “I used to think being obedient was a good thing.”
“It can be,” I say, swinging my legs to the floor and keeping my eyes on her. Jagger’s hand clamps my upper arm, and I glance over my shoulder. He narrows his eyes and shakes his head.
“Trust me,” I tell him. He only shakes his head harder. I lift my chin. “Let. Go,” I say firmly, narrowing my eyes on his fingers still on my arm. He stays silent, so I add, “Jagger, I won’t warn you again.”
He points to his eyes, then to me, and I huff out a breath of unamused restraint. “You’re watching me, I get it.” He lets go of my arm, and I turn back to Wren as she places her drink back on the nightstand.
We’d brought her several varieties to try with dinner tonight and let her pick her favorite. One way of helping her figure out who she was.
“I don’t understand, am I supposed to be obedient, or not?” she asks, her head tilting to the side in genuine curiosity.
I take a moment to consider how to answer her question without confusing her further.
“It’s not that straightforward.” I hold up my palm, stopping her from responding, so I can explain. “Tell me, what was something your brother asked you to do that you didn’t enjoy?”
“Practice the piano,” she replies instantly.
“Okay, so he’d tell you to practice, and you did, but you didn’t like it. So why did you do it?”
“Because he asked me to. And he’s my brother, and I thought…” She licks her lips, her eyes darting to the side nervously before she finishes. “I thought I had to do what he told me.”
“Come here.” I beckon her over, and she quickly climbs off the bed and moves to stand in front of me. “Give me your hands,” I tell her, holding my hands out, palms up. She places hers in mine, then looks at me expectantly.
“Now, tell me why you just did that?”
“Did what?” Her brows pinch in confusion.
“Why did you come over here and give me your hands?” She tries to pull away, but I just pull her closer, between my parted knees.
“Because you told me to,” she finally answers.
“But did you want to come over here? To give me your hands?”
“I—” She cuts herself off, uncertainty tainting her soft voice. “Yes.”
“You could consider that you were being obedient in both cases; the difference now is you have the ability to say no.”
I see the idea click as her eyes widen fractionally with awareness, and she slowly nods.
“Take off your dress,” I tell her. Her eyes widen as she gasps, taking a step back. I feel Jagger’s hand slowly wrap around my bicep, as if reminding me he’s still there and won’t let me take this too far. But I’m just proving a point.
“I… Why?” she asks in worry, her eyes darting around the room.
“That feeling right there,” I say, pointing to her chest. “That’s your inner voice telling you that you don’t want to do it. Do you feel the difference between that and when I asked you to give me your hands?”
She nods, and I see her visibly swallow. “Wren, we want you to listen to us, so we can keep you safe. Sometimes being obedient is a necessity to keep you safe. But sometimes, we might, unknowingly, ask you to do something that you don’t want to do.”
Jagger releases me as I reach for her again, and she gives me her hand so I can pull her back to me. My heart softens at how easily she already gives herself to me.
“And let me make something perfectly clear. If anyone, including us, asks you to do something sexual that you are uncomfortable with, you tell us, right then and there.” I push her beautiful, long black hair behind her ear and tilt her chin up slightly so she’s looking directly into my eyes.
“One day you’ll trust us enough to know that we might try to push your limits from time to time, but we never want to make you do something that makes you uncomfortable. We also have to trust that you’ll speak up. You never have to put on an act for us, little bird. Do you understand?”
“I think so,” she says with a nod.
“Good girl. Now, why don’t you grab one of the shirts you bought today, take a shower, and change? There’s a clean towel in there for you.”
She bites her lip and nods. Is it just me, or do her cheeks seem extra rosy right now? What I'd give to know what she’s thinking. I watch as she grabs a T-shirt and a pair of her underwear and slips quietly into the bathroom.
As soon as we hear the shower running, Pete lets out a laugh as he lies back on the other bed and runs his hand down his face. “That girl is something else.”
“She’s so naive. I hope she’ll remember what I said, and tell us when to stop.”
Jagger whacks my shoulder, and I wince, turning to him with a frown. He thrusts the phone in my face, and I read it aloud. “You should know when to stop. If you can’t tell what’s going too far, you have no right to touch her.”
I try not to bare my teeth at him in anger. “Who died and made you the preacher?” He reaches for the phone, but I pull it out of his reach. I know I’m acting like a child. The guy can’t speak, but questioning my restraint and telling me I can’t touch her just pisses me off.
He holds out his palm for the phone, and I almost hand it to him, but at the last second, I toss it over my shoulder, onto the other bed, making his eyes narrow on me.
“You got something to say?” I ask with a raised eyebrow.
His fists clench tightly as he glares at me.
“Didn’t think so.” I move back to lie beside him, my hands folded behind my head.
In a flash, he’s straddling me, his hands around my throat as he bares his teeth at me.