Chapter 25 Jade
Fuck.
I’ve done a lot of things I didn’t want to do in my life, but this might take the fucking cake.
I have a brother, a family even, yet somehow I don’t feel better.
It doesn’t feel like I used to imagine it would when I was a little girl waiting for someone to save me.
The memory of that little girl almost feels as if it belongs to someone else.
I haven’t needed anyone in a long time, but I used to dream of being saved.
I would fall asleep with the hope that someone was looking for me, that they would come rescue me, and that my time in the rings would become a terrible memory.
Nobody ever came, though. I rescued myself and made it my job to save those around me. I became what they needed, what I needed, but never got.
Now, my dream has twisted into another nightmare. My own family might be responsible for the hell I had to survive for so long, alone.
At least now I don’t have to face it alone anymore.
The guys feel more like family than anything I’ve ever experienced before.
The thought of losing any of them haunts me more than the idea of my own death.
They want to help me, but I’m still not sure it’s the best idea.
If I thought I could stop them, I might have tried, but I know it’s no use.
I saw the determination in their eyes the other day.
It was the same look I used to have when I looked in the mirror.
Knowing I had to do whatever I could to save the girls.
I don’t need their protection, but their willingness to stand with me makes me happy, even if it scares the shit out of me and confuses me all at the same time.
I’ll have to settle on keeping them safe the best I can. Which means we need Dom and Leo, no matter how much I hate to admit it. They have so much inside info, so many connections, things we can’t possibly get our hands on. Trust me, we tried before we made the call to them.
The Bratva aren't just some gang, and they aren’t stupid. It doesn’t matter how good we are. They’re in a whole other world, and they’ve been doing this for longer than we’ve been alive.
Elio is more than willing to help us, but even he can only get us so much.
The Italians haven’t always gotten along well with the Russians.
While Elio’s father was close to Ivan, we’re pretty sure that was only because Ivan helped him sell his daughter.
Since Elio took over, they have been on good terms, but that’s only because he respects Mikhail.
Elio never trusted Ivan, so they kept everything strictly business.
Having him randomly push for more might send the wrong message, and the last thing I want is to put Elio in danger because of me.
Unfortunately for me, no one else seems concerned about their own well-being. Everyone can agree on one thing, though, and that’s that Ivan will die. I don’t care who does it or how, but he can’t live after what he’s done to Elio, to my family, to me, and who knows how many other girls.
We have the outline of a plan, one that I really hate, but it’s a start, and in order for it to work, we need Dom and Leo.
Which is why we’re currently sitting at Hopper’s waiting for them to show.
Part of me hopes they don’t come, so I don’t have to face them, but I know better.
I saw the way Dom looked at me. I know he cares and thinks he did the right thing.
I just don’t know if I agree or if I even want him to care.
Fuck, I’m a mess; I hate feelings.
“Jade!”
Kratos’s voice snaps me from my thoughts, and I look up to find him watching me from the booth, just like the rest of them. Judging by his tone and the look of concern on his face, it’s probably safe to assume that wasn’t the first time he called for me.
“You're going to wear a hole in the ground, Demon,” Spencer snaps at me with a forced smirk. They’re all worried about me, rightfully so, considering I lost my shit the last time I was in a room with them.
The guys insisted we didn’t need to ask Dom and Leo for help.
They didn’t want me to have to do this if I didn’t want to, but we all know we need them.
Needing people stresses me out, but I’ve been trying not to let it get to me. Apparently, I’m failing.
“Well then, I’ll just fall into hell and be exactly where I belong now, won't I?” I snark back with a smile as I walk back to the booth.
The guys aren’t any happier than I am to be here, but they sure are doing a better job at hiding it right now.
Well, everyone but Kratos, that is. His already alpha-asshole energy is through the damn roof today.
I don’t blame him. Dom was his friend, or so we thought. Was it all just so he could get close to me? And why not just tell him? I don’t have the answers to any of those questions, so I don’t bring them up. Honestly, I don’t know if there's an answer that will justify his actions to him, anyway.
I just need Kratos not to kill Dom on sight, or at least not until we get the answers we need.
Kratos sits at one end of the booth, which makes it easy for me to crawl up into his lap. His mood might be sour, but he still opens his arms so that I can curl up on him the same as always.
“You can’t kill Dom,” I tell him, getting right to the point because they could show up any minute now, and I need to know he isn’t going to lose it the second they walk through the door.
His eyes spark with amusement when he looks at me, but his arms tighten around me, and he raises a brow in challenge.
“Why would I do that? I’m not the one with the nickname Killer.”
“No, you're not, but that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t kill him anyway, and for the moment, we need him. Both of them,” I say with a sigh, hating that I just admitted that out loud.
“Do we, though? I’m sure Leo knows plenty.
Why put up with both of them if we don’t need to?
” He’s joking. I know he is. I can see it on his face.
But even still, the idea of him killing Dom makes me pause.
I’m pissed at him, and I think that Kratos’s feelings of betrayal are more than valid, but could I handle watching him kill him?
Could everything they’ve been through be fake? All those years? Could he kill someone he saw as a brother?
Could I watch him kill my brother?
I honestly don’t know, and thinking about it only confuses me more.
“I won’t, at least not right now,” he says, dropping a kiss to my forehead when I’m quiet for too long. I’m not sure if he knows where my head just went, but he always seems to know what I need, and right now is no exception.
I nod in silent thanks before I lean in and kiss his lips.
Kissing each of the guys is always so different, amazing, and wonderful in its own way, but with Kratos, it’s like coming home.
He’s always been there. Ever since I found him, he never ventured far, damned and determined to be whatever I needed.
I don’t know how I missed it for so long, but I see it now.
“Dom and Leo are here, boss.” One of the guys Kratos recently promoted in Dom’s absence calls out from down the hall, and I feel Kratos’s body tense beneath me.
I peel myself out of Kratos’s arms to stand once again, this time leaning against the table. The booth, with the guys at my back. It feels both strange and reassuring to have them all here.
“Send them in,” I call back, my voice cold and detached, the way I need to be to handle them.
I half expect the new guy to wait for Kratos’s approval, seeing as none of them know who I am, but he doesn’t.
Maybe it’s my tone or the fact that Kratos doesn’t object.
It doesn’t really matter. What matters is the sound of their feet as they head down the hall toward the club's open floor.
It’s only been a few days since we last saw them, but when they walk into the room, I feel like it’s the first time.
Now that I know what to look for, I can see the similarities between all three of us.
The most noticeable being our eyes, as Elio pointed out.
But there's more than that. The shapes of our faces are close, our jaws, mine and Leo’s full lips, the angry set of their eyebrows that pull just the same way as they look at us.
Fuck, how did I miss this?
If I didn’t know Leo was our cousin, I would believe he was our sibling. Whatever genetics we got from our mothers must have been strong as hell.
I stare at them without shame. I don’t care what they think. I needed to see them to believe one hundred percent, and now that I have, I feel the truth of his words as they really sink in.
I have a brother. A brother who’s been right under my nose for years.
Talk about a slap in the face.
Dom’s eyes find mine as they close the distance to us, and I look away quickly.
He looks like shit. The dark circles under his eyes let me know he probably hasn’t slept in a few days, but that’s not that crazy in our line of work.
Sometimes, the job gets the best of you.
It’s his eyes that I can’t stand to look at.
Eyes so much like my own that reading them is as easy as it would be had I looked in the mirror.
They swirl with so much sadness, and even though he doesn’t speak a word, I know what he wants.
Forgiveness. His eyes silently begged me to understand—to hear him out. But I can’t. I won’t, and even if I found a way someday, today is not that day.
“Jade.”
Leo nods at me in greeting, but I ignore him. We’re not friends. They need my help, and I need theirs. This is business, nothing more.
“Elio can’t be here, but we have a plan. One that we need you both to be part of if we want it to work,” I tell them, getting right down to it.
“Well, we're here, so let's get this figured out,” Leo says, sweeping his arms wide and smiling as if this is the highlight of his day. “I can’t say I haven’t imagined the day I would get to see you in full force. Even as kids, you were a determined little shit, always following Dom around, demanding to train with him.” The smile on his face is almost fond as he looks at me, but his eyes shine with mischief, and I know he’s not done.
“What an honor it will be to work with the infamous Froggie.” He winks at me, and I clench my jaw to avoid snapping at him. He knew what he was doing. I just don’t know why he did it, and until I do, I won’t feed into his games.
Not when I know that’s what he wants.
The club is pretty empty, thankfully, but even with the five or six people around to man the minor things like security and stocking the bar, I know they heard him. It would be impossible not to with how loudly he spoke.
Silence follows his statement as we stand, staring each other down. The smile on his face doesn’t waver, though, and something about all of this feels familiar. As if my mind remembers a time with him, even if I can’t pull the memory to the surface. Maybe we were close once upon a time.
“Boss?” Atom calls from the hall where he’s standing watch. His gaze jumps from Kratos’s back to me, and I see the question in his eyes. Looking around the room, I find the others looking the same way, as if in disbelief at what Leo just said, but unwilling to question it.
Smart.
“Everybody out!”
Nobody moves for a second, as if frozen, before they all start moving at once. Fumbling with glasses and tripping over their own feet as they scramble to the exit without a word.
The idea behind Froggie was to instill fear in those who deserved it while keeping myself safe from being known while in the rings. I had to be a nobody there in order to fly under the radar.
Clearly, it worked, maybe a little too well.
I have to bite down on the inside of my lip to keep the stupid grin off my face as I watch them.
These men work for a ghost, happy to do what they can to make their way up a ladder to a glory they probably all picture differently.
None of them knew their boss had been here for weeks, watching.
None of them were willing to question a command that could get them killed.
I wouldn’t kill them for that, obviously, but they don’t know that.
“Cute,” I snap at Leo as the door falls closed behind the last of them.
He shrugs as he walks toward me, stopping just a few feet away. “I try.”
I stare at him for a moment, trying to merge the Leo I thought I knew these last few weeks with this new version, the real version.
Some things are the same. His easy smile, the jokes, and the teasing nature.
But the one thing that really stands out is how he holds himself.
He’s no longer blending in. He’s center stage.
His eyes sparkle with the promise of violence, the same way mine do.
I’ve always thought years in the ring made me this way, but looking at Leo, I wonder if I wasn’t always meant to be this.
Maybe I was born a monster after all.