5. - Kayden -
Chapter five
- Kayden -
K ayden Haeven stared at the strange girl in front of him. He couldn’t place her age, but she looked like she was in her twenties. A bruise blossomed on her right cheek, and her light eyes held fear, but she snarled, pulling up her top lip. Her tenacity had surprised him, fighting for her life like a feral cat. Her hair was a mess, with auburn pieces sticking to her face.
He liked the spattering of freckles over the bridge of her nose.
Minus the hideous trench coat she was hiding in and her wild hair, she was actually very attractive.
What was strange was that Kayden couldn’t hear her thoughts, which made two people in one day that he couldn’t hear. That had never happened before.
Kayden took a step towards her, and she straightened her spine, lifting her chin. The fear in her eyes hardened to defiance.
Kayden grabbed her chin and tilted her face. The blue of the bruise was deepening under her freckles and her cheekbone was already swelling. Kayden brushed his thumb over it, pressing slightly, and she hissed, batting his hand away and bringing her own hand up to cover her injury. He let his arm fall to his side, the other still had the gun trained on her .
“Did you kill him?” Kayden asked the girl.
Her eyes shifted to the body on the ground before finding Kayden’s face again.
“I don’t know,” she rasped and clutched her stomach, taking a step back. Kayden mirrored her with a step forward.
“I can’t hear him.” Kayden said to his brother.
“I can’t either.” Jason said from behind him. Kayden kept looking at the girl in front of him, who was watching as Jase moved to the body on the ground, checking for a pulse. “He’s still alive.”
Kayden let his eyes roam from the girl’s face to the Range Rover’s open door, and down to the body. Finally, his eyes landed back on the girl. He smiled, baring his teeth, and he saw her fight a flinch.
“I have a theory.” Kayden said to his brother, still looking at the girl. “We need to separate them.” He finally looked at his brother, who cocked an eyebrow at him. Kayden rolled his eyes. “Just indulge me.”
Jase gave him a nod of agreement and stood back up, grabbing the older guy’s legs and dragging the body towards the house. The back of the guy’s head left a smear of wet blood across the driveway in its wake.
“Further,” Kayden said.
After Jase gave a few more drags, he paused. Jason gave another nod, eyes wide. Fascinating, Kayden thought, the idea of what they’d discovered in this driveway hitting him like top-shelf liquor. Jason dropped the man’s legs and jogged back to his brother’s side.
“Who are you?” Jason snarled at the girl, leaning in to loom over her.
“Who am I?” the girl’s voice was shrill. “Who the fuck are you?” She shoved Jason’s chest and took a few quick steps back, trying to get some distance between them. Kayden laughed at her boldness. Both of them now had their guns pointed at her.
Another explosion erupted from the house, and the girl glanced over their shoulders to the home that was burning down behind them, the fire reflected in her pretty blue eyes. He could hear the glass shatter, but they were far enough away that they were safe from flying fragments. For now.
The smell of burning flesh was permeating the air.
“We need to leave.” Jase said, pulling out the Rover key and unlocking it so that the alarm finally stopped blaring.
The girl shifted on her feet. Kayden could see her calculating whether an escape was possible, her eyes darting to the trees across the driveway.
Jason shook the nose of the gun at her. “Uh-uh-uh, you’re coming with us.”
The girl’s muscles tensed, but before she could bolt, Kayden reached out and grabbed her wrist, yanking her in close to his body so that her back side was flush against him. She was tall for a girl, coming up over shoulder height on his six foot three frame.
“No running, Little Fox.” He bent his head down so that his lips were close to her ear and whispered, “We have some questions for you.”
The girl’s free hand shot up to his face, either ready to slap him or scratch him. Kayden wouldn’t find out, because Jase caught her hand midair, crowding her between them.
Kayden felt the fight draining from her body as she realized she was trapped.
“Will you behave, or do we need to tie you up?” Jason asked her.
“I’m not going with you,” she said defiantly, but made no further move to dislodge herself from between them.
“The only control you have over this situation is how much force we need to use to get you in the car.” Jason stepped away from her. “So I’ll ask you one more time. Will you behave, or should I get the ropes from the trunk?” Kayden knew Jason hoped she’d run. More than the chase, Jase loved to tie up his playthings.
The girl hesitated for a moment before turning around in Kayden’s arms and looking up at him, seeming to decide that he was the safer option between the two twins. She bit her bottom lip and looked at the ground, a blush creeping up over her cheeks.
“Can I pee before we go?” she asked, not looking back up.
“What?” Kayden said in disbelief.
“Do you want me to beg?” She finally lifted her gaze from the ground and locked eyes with him. There was a grimace of disgust on her face at the very idea, but her eyes held steady. “I’ve been in that car since I woke up hours ago, and unless you want me ruining your leather seats, I want to pee before we go.” Her voice was mocking, but her cheeks darkened.
The purple of her bruise mixed with the pink of her blush, and it might have been the most attractive thing Kayden had ever seen.
“You slept in our car?” Kayden asked, letting the girl go and taking a step back to get a better look at her. She just crossed her arms and looked away, not answering his question.
“You can’t go in the house.” Jason said, rousing Kayden from staring. “It’s on the brink of collapse.”
“I’ll go in the woods,” she volleyed, looking at Kayden.
“Nice try. We need to leave before this whole place comes down, and I’m not wasting time chasing you through the woods. Us catching you is an inevitability.”
“Please,” she finally begged Kayden.
“Just let her pee, Jase. It’s not a big deal.”
“Fine, but I’m putting a leash on her.”
“You’ll do no such thing!” she shrieked, finally turning to look at Jason.
Kayden caught her wrists again, pulling them behind her back. She didn’t fight him, but he held her in place while Jason went to the trunk of the Rover. He came back with a spool of black rope. He slid the rope around her neck, tying it off like a collar before handing Kayden the slack.
“Take your dog for a pee, Kay.”
There were tears tracking down the girl’s cheeks, her nostrils flaring in anger. Kayden was so used to interacting with people based on their thoughts, or avoiding people because of their thoughts, that he felt a little lost in orbit to be around a woman who he couldn’t hear.
For some reason, Kayden didn’t like that this girl was crying because of them.
He frowned at her.
“Don’t cry, Little Fox.”
“I thought I was your dog?” she retorted back, wiping her eyes with the sleeves of that stupid coat she was wearing.
“Here,” he said, and passed her the rope to hold. It was a peace offering, to save her from the degradation of him walking her to the forest as his brother intended.
She took the rope, but didn’t thank him.
They walked to the tree line together in silence. Kayden gestured to the first large tree and she stepped behind it to relieve herself.
“Just so you know, I’ve peed in worse places, so don’t go thinking you’ve won anything!” she called out to him.
He gave a smile she couldn’t see in response.
When she finished, she trudged back toward the car, shoving him slightly on her way.
“What’s your name?” he asked, catching up to her in the driveway.
“Fuck you,” she spat at him.
Even with the rope around her neck and being forced to pee behind a tree, this girl wasn’t breaking. That made Kayden laugh, because a challenge was so refreshing after years and years of boredom. He could practically taste it on his tongue, and it tasted divine.
Jase was already waiting for them in the driver’s seat.
Kayden didn’t bother frisking her. If she had a weapon, she would have used it instead of fighting so viciously. The girl slid into the back seat and Kayden shut the door, noticing the square cut out in the exterior metal before getting into the car. Jason maneuvered the Rover down the long driveway, turning onto the highway back to the city. They left a bonfire behind them as Kovack’s mansion burned to the ground.
In the rearview mirror, Kayden watched the girl glaring at the two of them from the backseat.
“That man you hit will die,” Jase said as he drove, just to be cruel, just to crack her. But she looked like a girl that did what she needed to survive, and a girl that wouldn’t break over it.
She just turned her steely gaze away from the front seat and looked out the window, not responding to his brother’s jeer.