Chapter 23
GRAYSON
That message from Axl: Come now. Will arrange for your pick-up, that had brought me to this.
Emme sat on the deck of Axl’s super-yacht, bound, blindfolded, and shaking.
Even in the low light, I could see that she trembled.
The chopper had dimmed its lights, and this boat had been barely visible, from a distance. The pilot deserved a medal.
Subterfuge and secrecy?
“This vessel will still show on radar, Axl,” I observed. No doubt he had bought off several people. There had been killing tonight. Dark red smears stained the decking near the chopper.
He nodded from where he stood, hands in the pockets of his brown trousers, lording it over the scene. Behind him a man lay bound as if half cocooned—with tape wrapped all over his bloodied head.
“You remember Wolfman?” He indicated the man.
“Fuck. Yes.”
“And I know you heard what dear little Emme said at the pub. Wolfman’s real name is Martelle, and he took it upon himself to kidnap both Emme and her friend.
“Why am I not surprised? Figures.”
Well, it didn’t really, not until I saw this, tonight.
Now though, I knew. Axl and his richer friends, and this Martelle, they were mixed up in dark enterprises.
Human trafficking? Drugs? I didn’t have those facts.
Yet. And if Axl had brought me here, I was about to be either killed, or shown some of the truth.
However, there was Emme to deal with, to comfort, even. I took a step and kneeled beside her, placed my hand on her back, noted that she was still fully clothed and unharmed. Something to be grateful for.
“I’m here, Emme.”
She nodded, cautiously, unseeing but knowing my voice, I assumed.
“My friend, Charity?” she croaked, still shaking coarsely. I could hear her teeth knocking against each other.
Axl answered. “Martelle told me she’s dead. Raped and killed by him. I have photos from his cellphone. I’m sorry, Emme.”
“Oh.” She lowered her head and sobbed.
This struck me as deeply as if Charity were someone dear to me. It hurt me because it hurt Emme. That simple. That she had loved her friend this dearly had made her into someone I liked far too much for my own well-being. The history between us was instantly even more twisted.
This surge of care for her, it unbalanced me. To screw around with a nobody, a fucktoy, that was easy. But to want to do it to her, now?
I was a horrible person.
How do I want to fuck thee, let me count the filthy ways—this, while my hand was on this sweet, grieving girl. And I wanted to scream at the appalling injustice of this night.
I sighed.
I said nothing and watched Axl. He was my friend, but this was a side of him I could not fathom.
He waved off the one man who seemed to be a bodyguard, sent him off down the internal stairs, with the metal steps ringing at the impact of his boots.
He disappeared below, and it was only the four of us.
Axl drew a pistol from inside his navy-blue jacket and locked his gaze on me. “Martelle overstepped, and I thought you might want to do this. Either way, he isn’t going to live past tonight.”
When the bound man rolled and made noises as if to protest, Axl stopped his movement by planting a foot on his back.
“Your choice.” He handed me the gun, grip-first. “Shoot him.”
I took the gun, bowed my head, letting the weight of the weapon rest on my other palm. “We release Emme, first. You’re not killing her.”
It was not a question.
“No. I wasn’t going to. Ever. I am not that man.”
The unsaid conclusions in my head solidified. He wasn’t, but he also planned not to let her go. How could he?
“She’s mine, not yours.” Time to stake my claim.
Axl smiled, enigmatically. “Ours. If you want to cut her ties, here.”
He tossed a sheathed knife that landed beside my foot.
“What else are you armed with? An RPG?
“Not today.”
I placed the gun on the deck as I cut the ties on her wrists, then carefully unwound the blindfold and helped her to her feet. She swayed, and I tucked her into my body with my free arm and retained the gun in my other hand.
“You want me to kill him.”
“He killed her friend, took Emme without permission.”
As if anyone could give that permission. On the other hand…
I catalogued things. I had Emme, alive and well, if mentally distraught, yet why had Axl summoned me? He could have kept me out of the loop. Friendship, and…he still wanted Emme.
“Both of us keep her?”
“Yes. But I need you to kill this one, first.”
I frowned. “Does that earn me brownie points?”
“It lets me trust you, more. I’m sorry, Grayson.”
I grunted, thinking. “Leverage,” I whispered and smiled at Axl. “You swear you didn’t plan this?”
He shook his head. But I did not quite know him as well as I thought.
“Considering this man, was your friend, I should let Emme choose who to shoot. You or him. We both know she can.”
I heard her suck in a breath.
Axl raised an eyebrow. “Go on.”
“I know Martelle kidnapped them and deserves this, because fuck trials and the snail-slow arm of the law. I’m sure you would never be involved in what was done to Charity. You brought me into this because you’re offering me a piece of Emme.” I pulled her closer when she stiffened. “Shhh, girl.”
Axl nodded. “We both get to have her.”
“Except.” I studied the deck, the tied man. “This is back to square one. We have to keep her hidden and under control or risk exposure. Which is why I am letting Emme choose who to shoot.”
I handed her the pistol.
“Oh.” She was silent and cradled the gun. Undoubtedly, she was stunned, and so was Axl.
His face cleared, though, and he glanced at me. The man had an inkling of what I intended here.
She raised the pistol, let it waver from Axl to Martelle, and back, and I was fucking impressed. Shaken, devastated, she was still threatening Axl, and yet I was certain she would not shoot him.
“Swear to me you had nothing to do with Charity being…” As she spoke each word, her voice had firmed. She inhaled, and her shoulders heaved. The gun shook. “Tell me you had nothing to do with her being hurt.”
Axl nodded imperceptibly, and a sober expression appeared. Steady gaze, no mockery, nothing but what I saw as his honest face. “I did not. I would never have done this or ordered it to be done, Emme.”
Of course an honest face did not, infallibly, show all the nuances. He knew this Martelle far too well and had kept so much from me.
“Okay.” She sniffled, swallowed, then moved her aim and put a bullet into Martelle, who jerked and groaned. Then she advanced a couple of steps until she was over him and shot point blank into his head.
“Fuck! You fucking asshole!” Emme pulled the trigger again.
She turned, glaring at me, though her mouth wobbled. This night would unhinge anyone. I offered her my hand, and she gave me the gun, grip first. I flung it into the sea.
There was no splash. It vanished into the night and the gray waves. The boat rocked lightly under my feet.
“Good girl.”
Axl let out a long breath while I hugged her against me. Her face was hidden in my chest, and the tremors were back. “I won’t ever let you be irrevocably hurt, Emme. But you’re ours now, remember that.”
She said nothing, only clung to my waist, my shirt.
Her hands were like those of some fae creature, digging in and wrenching at me.
It would take a while to get her over this, but I was a patient man.
I ran my hand up her back to her neck and encompassed it, holding her there and massaging. That seemed to calm her.
I eyed Axl. “Have you got his phone? The images? I assume you have that execution recorded?”
“I do, you smart bastard.” He pointed upward at the shadowed overhang from the cabin. “Then again, if you weren’t smart, I doubt we would have stayed friends so long.”
Lazily, I saluted him with a finger to the temple. “We’re all in this together now. Complicit in killing him.” And again, he understood the all. One goes down, all go down. Play moderately nice with her, or else.
Though nice was a fluid word.
He came over and handed me the phone. Blood was leaking from the corpse, but I didn’t care. Dead was dead. I assumed Axl had ideas on disposal and cleaning. Rich friends meant deep criminal pockets. I didn’t want to be involved in that side of things, but Axl gave us protection.
“This.” I tapped a few images of Charity, bloodied ones, scrolling across them. They were dark stills. “Are you sure she’s dead?” I raised my head.
“He said so.” Axl jerked his head toward the dead guy. “You think she is alive?”
“She could be.”
“I’ll make enquiries. Though all the men on the other boat are dead.”
I blinked. That was a lot of dead people.
Whether I was right or not, investigating this would make Emme happier, and now I knew I needed that. I needed it for balance because I wanted to see that side of her. Also, where was the fun in taking someone to the depths of terror and pain if they were already there?
I kissed the top of her head. Negotiating this was going to be difficult and the biggest thrill of my life, even with Axl in bed with us.
I pointed at him and shot Axl a measured frown. “You will behave, too. I give zero fucks as to what filthy waters your alternate ego swims in. Keep me and her out of it.”
He bowed. “You have a deal, sir. Except that we will be going to the CNC parties. That is not negotiable.”
I thought it through, still massaging my thumb over Emme’s nape. “Not often.”
“No. Not every week.”
I rolled my eyes. He was fudging things already. Without Martelle, though, those parties might be fun, a very dark and electrifying fun.
“It’s a deal, Satan.”
He smiled.
EMME
I hung onto Grayson, needing his large, anchoring presence to keep myself from disintegrating. My legs barely worked. I had killed a man, put two bullets in his head, and made his brains leak out along with far too much blood. He had deserved more. I wanted to kill him over and over.
Doing that did not bring Charity back to me.
If Grayson was right, she might be alive, and I planned to make them follow every lead, by pleading if I had to, by begging on my knees.
I understood what had been done to me now. Grayson had been somewhat cruel and calculating in the middle of this fucked-up situation, for which, I curiously admired him.
Blackmail. This was pure blackmail. They had videoed me killing someone who was tied up and defenseless. I was a murderer, and if I went to the police about anything they did to me, I would incriminate myself.
I raised my head, unearthing myself from my sanctuary, buried against his chest. “Find Charity for me, please?”
“I plan to.”
“Her body was not on the trawler, Emme.” Axl looked out over the sea. This boat was large enough to render the small waves into an imperceptible rise and fall of the deck. “She could be anywhere or fathoms deep by now.”
Grayson squeezed me to him again, crossing both arms over my back. “We will look for her, but you’re ours now, Emme. You will have a collar on you soon. Do you understand and agree?”
I nodded, though I was unwilling to say so in words. This wasn’t CNC anymore. It was consensual blackmail or something. I couldn’t even explain it to myself.
Everyone had limits, even me. But what happens when you are forced to say yes when you wanted them to force you, but not quite the way they ended up doing it?
“Good.”
I closed my eyes. Despite the tragedy of tonight, and the future dark promises and threats he’d made, I felt safer with him holding me than I ever had before. I opened one eye and looked at Axl from my shadowed refuge.
Except for him. He was definitely the one who scared me most. Although he wouldn’t truly hurt me, not with Grayson to stop him.
Maybe I needed both of them. Was this some perverted love we were exploring? I shook away that thought.
I drew a deep breath, and it shuddered as it came back out.
Someone was dead because of me.
Maybe two people were. My throat closed in, and tears sprang to life, rolling down my face and onto Grayson’s shirt.
The screams and cries Charity had made swarmed my mind. I would never forget her. No matter what happened next. I began to shiver again.
The wind picked up and whistled by.
“Axl! We need to get her out of this wind!” His words rumbled from his chest beneath my ear.