Chapter 5
Ava
When I’d first seen him, my clit had pulsed with desire. I’d done my best to hide it and keep myself calm, but images from the night before came rushing back with wild abandon. I’d tried to swallow all of it, but there was a part of me that wanted to feel his hands on me again.
But this…
This was not exactly what I’d had in mind.
The goddamn fucking bastard had no right.
I’d given his men the slip early this evening and I had made it all the way inside the tower looking for information by myself.
I’d searched everything on the security head’s computer after I’d blasted his head off, but I’d found nothing that would connect my father and the Venuti other than camera evidence of him entering the building on three separate occasions.
That wasn’t enough. I needed more than that.
I needed names. Contracts. Something. Anything really.
I still had so many questions and none of them had been answered even though I’d made it this far.
I had a hunch that there would be something in the kingpin’s penthouse, maybe on his computer or maybe there was a physical paper trail in a records room up here somewhere, but I needed to get searching before any more of the vampires showed up.
I was getting dangerously low on my sunfire bullet supplies. There had been more guards posted inside the building than I had anticipated.
“Release me, you prick! I don’t have time for this,” I yelled.
“You’re going to make time, little human,” he scowled, and I pounded my fists against his back.
With me still draped over his shoulder, he swept his arm across the surface of the desk, clearing off more than half of it.
The rustle of crinkled papers was deafening, but it was masked by the pounding of my blood rushing to my ears.
I shrieked with fury as he tossed me face down against the wooden surface.
Immediately, I pushed my hands against the top of the desk, intending to spin around and punch him in the face, but his palm firmly slammed against my upper back, stopping me before I could get any leverage whatsoever.
“Toboe, meet Ava. My mate,” he continued.
“I’m not your mate, asshole. Let me go!” I yelled. I reached back and tried to swing at him, but he captured my wrist and pinned it behind my waist. No matter how much I twisted and turned my arm, I couldn’t break free. His grasp held tight.
Shit.
This wasn’t good.
For the first time that night, fear flickered deep inside me, forcing me to reevaluate the situation I’d gotten myself into.
I’d made all the preparations in the world to deal with Lawson if he happened to make an appearance tonight, but still he had managed to put me at a disadvantage. I struggled as much as I could, but it was all in vain. Just like before, he subdued me with just his strength alone.
He reached down and pulled off my combat boots one by one.
I tried to kick him in the face, but he seemed like he was ready for that too.
Without even a moment of hesitation, he reached around my waist and unbuttoned my black jeans.
He was so rough that I heard the button pop free.
It clicked quietly when it bounced off the hardwood floor beneath me.
He jerked my pants down and the zipper broke, but I doubted he very much cared.
I renewed my efforts to escape him as he exposed my panty-clad bottom and my thighs.
He left my jeans pulled down to just below my knees and when I tried to kick them off, I only succeeded in tangling them around my ankles.
He chuckled and my face reddened, whether with fury or with shame, I wasn’t sure.
I tried not to think about the reason why.
“I think I’ll leave those just how they are,” he mused and a string of expletives that would have made a sailor blush flew off my lips. I slapped my free hand against the desk and tried to push up. I screeched with anger when I didn’t move even a single inch.
I could do one-handed pushups, for Christ’s sake. I should be able to do this.
“Let me up, motherfucker!” I yelled.
He ignored me, refusing to acknowledge a word I said.
Instead, he just gripped my panties in his fingers. I halfway expected him to pull them down just like he had my jeans, but he didn’t.
He tore them clean off.
I should have known he would. Every single word died on my lips as a piercing volley of agony blossomed across my pussy.
The fabric didn’t tear as easily as the ones he torn from me last night, which meant it hurt far more this time.
He wrenched them from in between my thighs, pinching my folds and scraping against my clit hard.
I tried to breathe through the pain. There was no fighting it.
There was only surviving its terrible sting.
I prayed for it to lessen and when it finally did, I just closed my eyes and sighed in relief.
“Would you like to continue?” he asked purposefully.
“No,” I squeaked, still trembling from the aching soreness in between my thighs.
I swallowed hard, trying to cope with the residual pain. There had to be a better way to handle this. Showing him my fury at his heavy-handedness hadn’t gotten me anywhere, simply earning myself a very sore pussy as a result. I closed my eyes and just focused on pulling air in and out of my lungs.
“Good,” he murmured, and my muscles tightened with restrained fear.
There was something about his tone that made me hold my tongue.
There wasn’t even a sliver of gentleness hidden in his words, nothing that spoke to the man I’d seen yesterday, the one who had held me and comforted me after he was through with me.
He didn’t address me with anger or even frustration, but with a measured even calm tone that felt far more dangerous.
Every word of defiance that I’d planned to utter died on my lips and I chewed the inside of my cheek. I settled on a new tactic.
“Lawson. Wait. Please,” I began, ensuring to keep my voice quieter and softer, hoping to appeal to his gentler side before it was too late.
“Please. You have to let me up. I need to search Nicolai’s computer before the rest of the vampire clan find out the tower has been compromised.
I need information and I know it’s somewhere in this penthouse.
So please, I’m asking you to let me up so I can finish what I came here to do. ”
“You’re going to have to wait, little one. You’re in need of a hard lesson first,” he warned, and I stilled.
Dammit. Consider that strategy dead in the water.
“I won’t allow it,” I spat angrily, and he cleared his throat.
“I don’t think you quite understand the gravity of what you’ve done, little mate.
This is my city, and it is my responsibility to deal with the ramifications of your impulsive decision to pursue vengeance or whatever this is.
More important though, it is my duty to see to it that you are punished for it,” he declared, and I struggled in his hold.
“You have no right,” I sputtered.
“I have every right, little human. Not only have you killed dozens of members of the Venuti clan, but you’ve murdered the head of it.
Maybe you hadn’t realized it, but the tower was manned by a skeleton crew.
There’s more of them hidden away somewhere.
I don’t know where yet, but I’m going to have to find out.
You see, Nicolai has family, vampires he’s sired that have been groomed for centuries to take over in his place should the need ever arise.
They’re going to want answers and if they don’t get what they want, it’s going to end badly, especially when they find out it was you that did all of it,” he scolded.
I pressed my lips together.
I knew the Venuti had something to do with my father’s death. If I couldn’t find the answers I needed here, I would find them eventually.
“If you had just answered my questions last night, I could have helped you. You didn’t have to resort something like this to find whatever you’re searching for, mate,” he continued softly.
“I did what I had to do,” I scoffed. He simply didn’t understand. This was more than just a quest for vengeance. I needed to do this to clear my family name. I needed to know my father hadn’t just cracked and turned into a monster that day.
I needed to know. For me.
“In my world, impulsiveness is not something I can allow. I need answers and you’re going to give them to me,” he demanded, and I struggled against him.
“I won’t tell you anything,” I yelled.
“I’ve run out of patience, little human. You will tell me everything,” he snarled.
“Do your worst,” I said as courageously as I could. He chuckled softly and that twinge of fear deep in the pit of my stomach magnified tenfold.
The sound of him pulling his belt from the loops of his pants echoed all around me and I stilled. With my bottom entirely bare and on display over the massive desk, his intentions soon became all too clear.
The first time the belt slapped against my skin was a shock.
It was far louder than I expected and that caught me off guard, but the line of fire that followed quickly grasped my full attention.
It felt warm at first, then blazing hot and the eventual burning sting made me rise up on the tips of my toes as I tried to take it.
The second and third followed in quick succession, cruelly punishing and painfully harsh.
I hadn’t realized how deadly serious Lawson had been before.
I did now.
The fiery lash of the belt was like a vicious brand on my naked backside.
I tried to use my one arm to push up against the desk so that I could escape him and run, but with one arm he held both my wrist and my body firmly in place.
I gave it everything I had, but it was as if I was doing nothing at all.
He was far too strong, his species far more powerful than a simple human like me.
“Wait!” I cried out.
He didn’t.