Chapter 4
KENNA
I didn’t do it.
Eyes bored into my back when I walked into training the following morning. And it was not because I was five minutes early. Laney and Neenan hadn’t accused me of anything last night, but I could see the questions form in their eyes. In silence, they escorted me to my bedroom, each step heavier than the last as they walked me to my coffin, poised to dig my grave any time afterward.
But no one came for me.
No one shanked me in the line for breakfast. Traitor wasn’t screamed in my face, nor a gun drawn. Only whispers permeated the air. And when I caught Grant’s gaze, it was downright lethal, but, like my Mamma always told me, trust can’t be gained through words but through actions.
I wouldn’t plead my innocence, I’d show it
So, when Grant announced the topic of training, I stood calm and collected.
“A special guest joins us today to show you the tactical superiority of knife wielding skills in hand-to-hand combat.”
I inwardly groaned. Knives were slow in defensive scenarios, inefficient, not to mention messy, so I preferred guns to blades. There was no crime scene cleaner on the battlefield, nor a launderette that would take bloodied leather as I’ve come to know.
Conflict was the core of my upbringing. Dad taught me how to combat it while Mama dispensed it. Yet, despite the rough hands my brothers and I were dealt with, our family was a unit, which made this training session child’s play.
The slam of a door snapped me out of my thoughts. Preceding the noise was a woman in a forest green sports bra and matching leggings. Her dirty blonde hair was captured in a high ponytail that swayed as she walked towards the front of the room. My eyes were transfixed on her body.
“Leading the session is Miss Laney.” God, help me. Grant commanded the room, Laney appeared comfortable beside him, if a little nervous as she looked around the stone walls of the basement training room. “While unorthodox for the person you’re paid to protect to teach you defence skills, she is the best on the estate.”
A round of concealed giggles filled the room as the boys looked Laney up and down, I pushed my shoulders back in something like deviance, but Laney didn’t, she cowered. I know I checked her out all the same but not to demean, only to admire! And maybe to indulge . But these boys meant nothing other than offence by their continued scoffs and whispers.
Grant retrieved a gun from his pocket and fired it at the target on the west wall, causing a loud echo to ricochet between each wall and painfully penetrate our ears. “You want her to cut your balls off with a pen knife? It wouldn’t be the first time, in fact, you should be warned, she’d enjoy it so shut the fuck up and listen closely.”
Enjoy it? She looked in my direction briefly then, though her expression gave nothing away.
“You’ll be in pairs. Assigned. Not chosen. We’ll be simulating close proximity knife attacks, from both offensive and defensive scenarios.” Laney said before reading the paired surnames to begin the exercise. Before she reached the letter ‘W’, every single cadet had been selected. Sans me. “Whether, you’re with me.”
Lucky me.
★
After an hour, I was sure all this hand-to-hand combat would leave a lasting bruise. Laney had barely spoken a word to me as we moved from scenario to scenario. It wasn’t until scenario six, while she pinned my wrist down with her knee, seemingly pushing her entire body weight onto it, that I knew there was a reason.
I waited a moment before I flipped her over onto her back, boxing her in with my arms. That way, I had complete control of the situation. She bucked underneath me but didn’t gain any leeway as I held her firmly in position.
“Release me,” she grunted, again, shifting her hips.
Instead of offering a response, I slid my knee to slot between her legs.
She kept fighting as she brought a knife toward the side of my neck but never touched skin. “I command you—”
While the blade skirted an inch from touching flesh, our exposed midriffs were almost skin to skin. I could feel the heat of her body when she squirmed. This was already a compromising position, but the next time she bucks, I’ll knee her in the pussy. Only lightly, of course. Innocent. Indulgent.
“Get the fuck off me—”
“You can tell me, Laney.” I softened my gaze. “You can tell me anything.”
Then she bucked. “No!”
With a jerk, I lifted my knee so that it firmly pressed into her groin, stopping the squirming and silencing her plea. If she moved again, she’d be grinding on it. “Tell me what I did,” I said, moving my face closer to hers.
“Miss Whether, get the fuck off me rig-”
“Miss Whether? I thought you knew me better than that, princess.”
She threw me a desperate glare as she lifted her hips again, struggling to gain traction without causing friction. I knew she felt it because her cheeks turned a rosy hue, and her eyes briefly fell closed. Changing tact, she turned her efforts to my hands, caging her in on either side of her head. She managed to lift one of my fingers with a huff, but I still didn’t budge.
“Why are you so good at training? I see the way you run, and you don’t even break a sweat. You’re not winded now so where did you learn that?” She breathed exasperatedly. Her chest brushed mine with each pant, but I remained still.
“Aw, you watch me run?”
She groaned.
“I’m glad you think so highly of me.” I smiled a wicked grin. It was so easy to taunt an already flustered girl but, as much as I loved to have a girl writhe underneath me, it wasn’t productive. I was no closer to finding out what her problem with me was so that I could fix it. “What do you think I think about you?”
“Well, considering the last two times we’ve met, I’ve been crying, I bet you think I’m kinda weak like the rest of these men,” Laney said with a snarl, exhaling deeply and moving up to lean her weight on her elbows. It brought our faces closer, yet she was looking anywhere but at me. If she did, she would’ve seen my shocked expression at the deprecation in her words. Mafia princess hasn’t been taught her value, huh.
“ No,” I said, crystal clear, “That’s not what I think.” I tried, really tried, not to focus on the way that her breasts now pushed into my chest in that moment. But, God, I’m just a woman.
She lifted her chin as I moved to look down, hitting my face in the process. “Eyes up here, baby.” She said, almost in disgust.
My next exhale was haggard. Baby? I’d mutter a ‘sorry’ if I felt like I meant it, but truthfully the baby comment had me breathless.
It was a weakness.
She shouldn’t have that kind of power over me. I had her under me, wasn’t that enough? “You only let men look at you like that?” I spat. I shouldn’t have let my anger filter into my words, that act alone was an admission of weakness. My dad raised me better. Still, it worked a charm.
Her face fell in apparent outrage, and I had my answer. Well, well, well, chaste little Laney. I wiped the subtle grin off my face, relaxed my knee between her legs and lowered my voice. “Why are you mad at me?”
That was the crux of it. She was pissed off and I didn’t know why. I understand her and Neenan’s suspicion, but that usually elicited a far more covert and wary attitude. Anger? That wasn’t a usual response.
“No men,” she whispered under her breath. She shook her head repeatedly as if the motion would erase the thought. “No men.”
If I was to clear a path in her scattered thoughts, I had to be direct. “Answer the question. Why are you really mad at me?”
“I don’t understand you.” She replied.
“Laney.” I warned. “Why?”
She turned her head to the side and whispered. “You know why.”
“I don’t believe you believe it.”
She sighed and dropped down from her shoulders to lay flat on the floor. “You only wear black. You just arrived. You found her. You did i—”
I cocked my head, confused but unrelenting. “Just say it–”
“HEY,” Grant pierced our bubble, “Kenna, Laney, get up NOW!” His voice was coming closer now. Hands grabbed my waist to lift me off Laney, but I stepped from his grip.
I extended my hand to Laney, still on the floor.
After a moment's hesitation, she took it, but when she got to her feet, Grant immediately pulled her away, muttering to her, “The new recruits are not fresh bait for you to get distracted by pussy.”
That didn’t go how I intended. I only wanted her to concede that she knew I couldn’t have done it because it didn’t aligned with the image of me in her head. Not that I’d admit it, of course, but I had my reasons. I was barely here a week, if I wanted to stay longer, I needed the spotlight off me immediately.
After their exit, I needed fresh air in my lungs to replace what mixed with her breath. But before I could walk through the door to the garden it slammed shut. Beside it stood a young man in cadet uniform with hollowed cheeks and a light scruff on his chin. His face wasn’t something I recognised.
I tilted my head forward, eyebrows high. My eyes flicked from his face to his hand on my bicep, prompting to let go soon or his face will be one with the floor. I didn’t say that, though, I studied him instead.
“I did it.” He said, smug and unprovoked, before throwing my arm out of his grip. It was as if he’d lifted a boulder from his shoulders and threw it over his head.
What did he mean he did it? Did what?
He hung his head. It wasn’t an act of shame, though, it was in a thuggish kind of way that he probably thought made him look cool. When he lifted his head again, pride shone in his eyes, and he looked at me expectantly. But I didn’t know what he was so fearsomely proud of. The only significant event that happened on the estate was Edward Ravencroft’s funeral preparations and Tilly’s mu— Oh no. It.
“You did that?” My eyes wide as I clamped a hand over my mouth. It couldn’t go wrong so soon. “ Here?”
Women and children must not be harmed. That was rule number one in the mafia. Everyone knew that.
When he nodded, I roughly fisted the front of his shirt to drag him out the door, away from echoing hallways and conspiratorial ears. I’d been away from my family for some time. I didn’t know his face. This was new blood, and he looked pathetic. I got in his face before throwing him to the floor.
“ Why the fuck would you tell me that?” I stared at him, daring him to move. I didn’t need an answer to my question, just recognition that he sealed his own fate.
He held two angled fingers to the side of his forehead and smirked. It took everything in me not to kick him in the stomach and embed a bullet in the centre of my boot mark. But I held back. This wasn’t a life that I deserved to take.
All I did was whistle.
The man laid in the grass leaning on his elbows, looking up at me.
I held his gaze, until a group of guards ran over and asked, “Cadets, what’s the matter here?”
The corner of the man’s lips lifted. I don’t know where he got the confidence from. He doesn’t think I’d do it. Then, he’s a fool.
“This is your guy.” I said, “He killed Tilly Morden.”
It was quieter than I imagined, I thought as this man was dragged away. Justice wasn’t always ceremonious, sometimes it was just clarity. That this problem had a solution. But with that realisation came a far graver one.
Being here wasn't only about proving myself anymore, it was a matter of survival.