3. Riley
Riley
I ’m sorry, did he just say his property ?
Creepy Guy’s still wheezing beside me like a deflated tire, and his sidekick’s vulture talon is still death-gripped around my leg.
But it’s the Russian who worries me the most. He rolls in like the beautiful calm before the storm you can spot on the horizon.
I can’t see him, not with the fucking sack still on my head , but I feel him everywhere.
An electric charge sparking through the air, curling across my skin.
The way he’s handling these thugs? He’s confident. Controlled. And very, very dangerous.
He’s also straight up delusional and under the wildly mistaken impression that women are property.
That I’m his property.
Before my what the fuck meter makes it to my mouth, the hand shackled around my ankle tosses my foot like trash. “Fuck off! She’s property of the D’Angelos.”
Wait…
What?
My brain hiccups.
Are you telling me these morons who attacked me work for my new in-laws? The D’Angelos? What kind of sick fucking family is this?
And who the hell did my sister marry?
“Which D’Angelo?” the Russian asks, voice low and clipped.
No fear. No awe. Just casual curiosity.
And my question exactly.
While they snarl at each other like two dogs in a cage, I start moving. Slow and awkward, I scoot away, flying blind one gravel-scraping ass-cheek at a time.
Graceful? Not in the slightest.
Just trying to stay low and small, and out of the line of fire while I tug-of-war with this knot.
In the meantime, Numbnuts doesn’t back down.
“Mr. Andre D’Angelo,” he announces, slow-motion sounding out the name like it carries divine weight.
The way this knot’s fighting me, I kind of wish he’d sound all his words out like a second grader. Really shove some extra syllables in there and buy me a few precious seconds of not dying.
And maybe give me a clue to who Andre is?
Enzo, King of the Damned, introduced me to his brothers, and I remember them. An Andre, I do not.
Aside from their sister Trinity, there was Smoke, Mateo, Dillon and Dante.
My pulse kicks up a storm as a set of steel-blue eyes floods my mind.
Dante .
Dante looks exactly how I imagine dark, obsessive, tortured Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights would—only with a bad-boy edge that screams stalk her first, woo her later .
We’d only spoken once—briefly, over the phone—but one thing was crystal clear: the man, with his dark, touchable waves and full, frowny lips, had an agenda.
And it had nothing to do with me. At all.
So, back to the matter at hand.
Who the fuck is Andre?
A deep, Russian growl slices through my thoughts. “Andre?” he asks, like he’s plucking the thought straight from my skull. “Andre… D’Angelo?” A small chuckle erupts, and dies swift. “Is that name supposed to mean something?”
“Everyone knows Andre D’Angelo,” Numbnuts offers. “Knows you don’t fuck with him.”
“I don’t,” the Russian says flatly.
That makes two of us. Though I doubt his confusion comes with zip ties and a head sack.
“Last I checked,” he murmurs, his thick accent sharpening tight like a blade, “this is my territory. My territory, my property.”
I huff under my breath.
I can’t believe I’m being battled over like the last free weight at the gym.
Creepy Guy finally dislodges his balls from his throat and chimes in.
“Yeah? Well, you should learn to count, comrade . Two of us. One of you.”
Color me surprised the loser can actually count that high.
“First of all,” the Russian says, calm as smoke, “I’m not your friend.”
His voice moves around me like vapor, slipping through the air, in and out, everywhere at once.
Hard to pin down.
Impossible to ignore.
“And second,” he goes on, footsteps slow and circling, “you’ve got ten seconds to leave or I’ll send you back to your boss in ziplock bags. Parts labeled for easy assembly.”
A beat. Then, to my surprise, the asshole actually backs down. “Fine. No need to go to war. We’ll just take what’s ours and leave.”
Shit.
I’ve managed to inch myself around the side of a car, but footsteps rapidly approach. A gruff hand clamps down on my shoulder— hard .
My cry is instant.
“I’ll make this simple,” the Russian interrupts. “Put a finger on what’s mine, and I’ll put one of you out of your miserable existence. For good.”
All of a sudden, the vise-grip on my shoulder tears away. Almost as instantly, a razor-whizz of something slicing past my ear, followed by a feral, pain-laced howl.
Then, a grunt.
Then a strained, “What the fuck?—?”
“A hira shuriken ,” the Russian says softly, slipping into sedate lecture-mode as he wades through his lesson.
“ Argh! I’m going to k-kill y-y—” The man’s words crumble away.
Professor Russian continues, “A Japanese throwing star. Tipped with monkshood.”
“Monkfruit?” Creepy Guy slurs, already writhing.
“Monks- hood ,” the Russian corrects. “An unimaginative but rather nasty poison. First, the burning sensation. Then vomiting. Heart palpitations. Rapid-onset paralysis…Shall I go on?”
Pause.
“And before your friend reaches for his weapon, I’ve got another one, right here.”
By the sharp gasp, I’m guessing Tall, Dark, and Russian just flashed another star during his teachable moment.
Ragged breaths chop through the silence before the weight of him slumps hard against the car.
“Without treatment?” the Russian adds, casual as ever. “You’ve got about thirty minutes. Maybe forty-five. I recommend hauling yourself the next block over. Hail a cab. If you’ve still got the strength.”
Frantic and fleeing, a gallop of clumsy footsteps retreats. But…only the one set of steps.
Two feet scurrying. Not four.
Then a hand fists my hair, yanking so hard a bolt of pain sears through the rough fabric covering my head. My body is jerked like a rag doll—the toy he’s determined to drag off the playground and take with him.
I suck in a sharp breath, clawing at his arm, nails sinking deep enough to draw blood.
His grip only tightens. “I’m leaving. And I’m taking her with me.”
“Using a woman as a shield?” the Russian tsks, his voice lower, more lethal than before. “Looks like I killed the wrong douchebag. An error I’ll soon remedy.”
Then— smack.
So fast. So furious.
A full half-second passes before I realize… it wasn’t me.
Numbnuts’ grip releases—the puppet master dropping the strings, and the puppet with them.
I fall.
No, not to the ground.
I’m caught midway by something solid. Unmoving.
The Russian.
“Stay here,” he commands, sliding me safely onto the hood of the car with the care of a fine porcelain doll secured high on a shelf.
A breath later, chaos explodes around me.
A hit.
A grunt.
The unmistakable crack of bone meeting bone.
Then another.
Then another.
I tune out the sounds.
Don’t think. Don’t breathe.
And for fuck’s sake, Riley, stop crying.
It’s going to be fine.
Everything’s going to be fine.
Because even with my wrists still bound, my finger finds the knot?—
wiggling in, working it loose. Until finally, it pries free.
I yank the cover from my head, and for the first time, I see him.
Or rather, his back.
Dark hair. Fitted, black shirt. Expensive slacks. Dressed to the nines… for street brawling.
A beast of a man. The Russian.
His fists rain down on Numbnuts, who’s sprawled on the ground beneath him like butchered meat.
Two relentless fists jackhammering my assailant into pavement with terrifying endurance, blow after blow.
Grunts.
Thuds.
I lose count.
A gurgled beg. “Please. Let me go. I swear, I won’t tell Andre.”
“Tell Andre?”
“Who you are,” the man chokes out, hushed and seething.
A heartbeat of silence.
Then, a throwing star glints in his hand as the Russian drags a path down the pinned man’s cheek.
“Think you can outrun it? Outmaneuver my throw? What happens if you get hit?”
A wheezing, desperate gasp.
“I’ll have”—He thinks hard—pant, pant—“thirty minutes”—pant, sputter—“to get to a hospital…”
A soft tsk of disappointment. A contemplative pause.
“I lied. It’s more like five. Ten tops. But on second thought, you touched what’s mine. So… why wait?”
The star hits his throat so deep, the guttural cry cuts short.
Nothing but wet, sickening sounds.
I swallow a scream and slap both hands slap over my mouth.
The Russian straightens.
His head tilts.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
He hears me.
And— fuck .
I run.