CHAPTER 13
Evren
Haunted – Chris Grey
The Enforcers arrived on the scene an hour after Crimson cleaned up the mess.
The bodies were gone, but the blood remained.
There was enough of it for them to conclude multiple murders had taken place.
They will probably never try to interfere. At least, not yet.
It was a gang settling scores with another gang.
There isn't enough proof to justify getting involved, not enough to prove who it was.
The leader of that little gang is tied up in the warehouse. Neo is playing with him, probably scaring the shit out of the fucker.
I wish I were there, but the gunshot wound and blood loss have left me a little dizzy.
So instead, I'm in my apartment, completely naked and not caring in the slightest.
I'm home. Why should I cover myself?
Ren stitched me back together—gunshot wounds are too serious for those tiny, shitty nanobandages.
I'd have burned through at least twenty of the damn things just to patch the hole.
In a week or less, I'll be back on my feet like nothing happened, thanks to Kairo-9's medicine.
Probably less than a week, I can't stay here doing nothing, I simply can't.
I scroll through my comm.
I pace around, trying to occupy my mind, ignoring Lira's texts and calls.
Not now.
I've got something better to do like finding that girl.
Something about her refuses to leave my mind, and I can't figure out what it is.
But one thing's for sure—when I find her, she'll regret crossing paths with me.
I'll probably beat the shit out of her, drag her back to the warehouse, chain her up, and whip her until she begs me to kill her.
That's what I usually do to disrespectful fuckers.
Why should I treat her any differently just because she's a woman?
She's already proven—to me—that she can fight. That she isn’t weak, she is unpredictable, infuriating and she has a fire capable of burning everything down.
Afraid of nothing, but she will be soon.
I type her physical description into the database, but no one in the Lower Layers looks like her.
Does that little bitch come from the Upper Layers?
That would actually be better.
A rich daddy's girl sneaking into an illegal street race and picking a fight with a gang leader?
The thought is almost funny.
Imagine what that would do to her perfect image, a rich Upper begging the gang leader from the Lower Layers.
That would be the best satisfying thing ever, put back in place some Upper.
I heard the government put the entire Upper Layers under lockdown because of the slaughter.
How thoughtful.
I'm almost flattered. Almost.
I bet she spent the day all alone, maybe thinking about me, about how and when she'll see me again.
I pace around my apartment again, drinking Nitro after Nitro.
I'm restless.
I keep typing on my comm, searching through records, but the tiny screen is starting to piss me off.
“Fuck this.”
I swipe the data over to the Glass Panel by my window--floating screens appear in front of me.
Now that's what I'm talking about.
Stalking on a grand scale.
I crack my knuckles and start typing again, pulling up every database I can access.
If she really is an Upper, she has to be in here somewhere.
A grin spreads across my face.
Things just got a lot more interesting.
I start typing her physical features again—Long, straight black hair, heterochromia plus her approximate height and weight and her piercings.
The search turns up nothing.
No name, no pictures.
Nothing.
I hurl my comm against the wall.
“Fuck!” I shout.
My chest heaves with each breath, and the sudden movement sends a sharp pain through my side.
The pain dampeners dull it, but I still hiss through my teeth.
She's a fucking ghost.
I take a long sip of Nitro before setting it down hard on the counter.
I need to move. I need to get rid of this fucking frustration.
I pull on a pair of pants, then a compression gym shirt that molds to my muscles, put my boots next.
I leave, stalking out of my apartment, take the stairs two at a time.
The night air slaps me in the face, cooling my body but doing nothing to calm my nerves.
Instead of driving, I head toward a bar not far from my place. A double-sided bar where there are actual whores.
One where I know I can always find a cunt to let out my frustration.
I could go to Lira, have sex for free, but she'd be too clingy and demanding, so fuck that.
The bar sits on my territory, so everyone knows who I am.
I can have free sex here too. In return, I keep the randoms from causing problems.
Protection has its perks.
I step inside, cross the main room, and head toward the back.
The girls are there.
Never drugged, there are rules, and they're treated well enough that nobody complains.
“What are you here for, handsome?” one of them asks, walking toward me.
Her long, copper-red hair is slightly messy. Her breasts are on display, bouncing with every step, and she knows exactly what she's doing.
My cock starts hardening, I palm myself through my pants.
I don't waste time.
I grab her by the hair and slam her face-first against the mattress, pinning her there.
I unbutton my pants.
She lets out a gasp as I pull her lace panties down and push into her in one powerful thrust.
I growl into her ear.
She's slightly loose, but I don't give a damn. I don't give her time to adjust before I start moving, frantic and uncontrolled.
I need to get it out, I need to burn through the frustration clawing at my insides.
My hips slam against her ass, the sound becoming a primal rhythm beneath her cries.
“That's it, scream for me. Be the perfect little bitch and take it.”
I close my eyes, never losing the rhythm of my unforgiving thrusts, driving deep before nearly pulling out until only the tip remains, then slamming back inside.
My grip shifts from her hair to her hips, I use them to pull her back against me with every thrust.
Then it hits me.
The fucking image of that rich girl in front of the convenience store, running barefoot in a dress that probably cost more than my apartment.
The hair, the body, the height, the way she didn't back down from that bionic man.
That was her.
Those fucking pale eyes I only caught a glimpse of that night.
My rhythm falters then stops completely. My chest rises and falls with each ragged breath.
The realization makes me grin.
I pull out without even finishing, leaving the bitch aching for my cum that she would never get. I pull my pants back up and leave without saying a word.
Now I know where to look.
I walk back to my apartment, grim determination mixing with satisfaction.
I hack into the Upper Layers' security system, the one that registers every identity.
Ren made it possible.
He spent a month working on it, but he succeeded and installed his program on every monitor in the gang's network.
Ren is fucking smart when it comes to this shit, hacking the Upper Layers isn't easy.
It's almost impossible and if you get caught, they don't fuck around. He calculated everything, one hour per day, never at the same time. Always careful not to leave a pattern behind.
I know a little more about her now. I know where she was at a specific moment in time.
She must have been at an important party that night.
I just have to find it, using the date, the description, the place. The facial-recognition data from the Upper Layers' drones, which record almost every corner up there.
I just need the two to match.
I pace around my apartment, ignoring Lira's pleas to come over and fuck her.
I should—I should go to her and use her.
But right now, I want to discover who the fuck troublemaker is.
The way she defied me, the way she didn't care who I was, the fact that she headbutted me and kicked me.
That's all the reason I need to find her.
My nose isn't broken, but it still aches every time I sniff or sneeze.
Until the system finds a match, I'll take a shower.
The water is scalding hot, beating down on my back and shoulders.
My forehead rests against the cool tile of the shower wall, my eyes squeezed shut. My hand drifts down my stomach, fingers trailing through the water and soap.
I'm hard, I got fucking blue balls from not finishing with that whore.
My breath hitches as my fingers wrap around myself.
A low groan tears from my throat as I start stroking slowly, my grip tight, my head bowed beneath the punishing spray.
I pump my fist faster, my hips rocking into the tight circle of my hand.
Water sluices over my knuckles.
“Fuck.” I grit out, the word lost beneath the roar of the shower.
My orgasm crashes into me, sharp and fucking frustrating. I shake with the intensity of it, I finally got the frustration out of my system.
I stay there for a moment, my forehead pressed against the cool tile.
A sudden beep cuts through the silence. My head snaps toward the sound.
Finally.
Two fucking long hours. That's how long it takes the system to find something.
Otherwise, I'll drive up there myself and wait until she shows up, look in every corner of this shitty city if I have to, until I catch her.
I stalk toward my open living space, not bothering to dry myself, and look at the floating screens.
A picture flashes onto the display.
Her.
My eyes widen slightly before my lips curl into a slow, satisfied smile.
I walk toward the screen and zoom in.
She's younger, way younger. Maybe sixteen.
But it's definitely her.
The fire in her eyes, I'd recognize it anywhere. It's carved into my memory.
She has her lip split and one cheekbone is bruised on the picture.
Back then, she was already trouble?
I swipe the picture aside.
There it is.
Her name, her information.
“Riven Laordie.” I say her name aloud, rolling it around in my mouth, tasting the sound of it.
I like it, but troublemaker fits her better.
“So, who are you, Riven? Let's see...” I swipe through the files. There isn't much, but there's enough. “Born on the thirty-first of March, 2309..."
I keep digging, but nothing catches my interest more than it already has.
I'm about to close the screens when my hand stops mid-motion.
Laordie.
“Laordie...” I repeat it under my breath. “Laordie...”
I pace once across the room
“Why the fuck does that name ring a bell?”
Then it clicks, I freeze.
My gaze drifts back to her picture.
“Oh...” A grin slowly spreads across my face. “Riven. You're Adrien Laordie's daughter. One of the highest-ranking members of Kairo-9's Central Authority.”
I laugh.
Goddamn, she's rich.
Rich rich.
But she didn't look like it during the race—Not at all.
What the fuck were you doing in the Lower Layers? I wonder how a girl like you ended up there.
I dig deeper into the files, my curiosity shooting through the fucking roof.
One file is encrypted.
Whatever's inside is important enough to hide. I'll leave that one for later. Let the mystery unfold a little longer.
I go back to the basic information, then I see it.
Her address.
The government should really encrypt this kind of information. This is sensitive shit.
If a man with bad intentions got his hands on it. How exactly would they stop him?
What a shame.
I shake my head and a slow grin spreads across my face.
I found you.
Now I'm going to make her pay for crossing paths with me.