here. Can you find her?”
A hope the dark-haired man can understand me crashes into me when he demands Trey to watch Justine before he commences searching the compound.
With everyone’s focus devoted on him, I drop the shard of glass from my neck before bending in half to suck in the air my lungs failed to accept the past three minutes.
I’ve barely filled my lungs halfway when Trey kicks the glass I was clutching to the far corner of the room before he raises my hand to check it for damage. I thought he’d be mad about me putting his crew in danger, so you can imagine my surprise when he seems more concerned about me than anyone.
He has no reason to fret. Although the slash mark across my hand is throbbing, the scratches down my arm hurt more than my self-inflicted wound. It may be an emotional pain more than a physical one, but still, it’s there, nonetheless.
“Why are you scratched?” Trey sounds angry, but it’s scarcely noticeable through his frustration.
He’s still on a cliff edge, but instead of coercing him away from it, I join him there instead. “Rory.”
“Rory attacked you?” Justine interrogates on Trey’s behalf, speaking in my native tongue. When I timidly nod, the worry on his face augments. “Why?”
“Pokusil se mě vzít místo Ana. Bojoval jsem s ním.” Guilt transcends when I mutter, “Ana nebyla dost silná na to, aby ho odradila.”
“What is she saying?” Trey’s voice isn’t as stern as it was earlier, but it is fortified with anger.
After taking a few moments to gauge how he’ll respond, Justine tells him what I said. “She said Rory scratched her when she fought him off her.” The sorrow in her eyes matches mine when she mutters, “Ana wasn’t strong enough to do the same.”
“He tried to take K first.” Although Trey sounds like he’s asking a question, he isn’t. He’s summarizing. The tick in his jaw announces this, much less the tight clench of his fists. “If she hadn’t fought him off, he would have…” He can’t work the rest of his words out of his mouth. His jaw is too firm.
From his response, anyone would think this is the first time I’ve been sexually assaulted. I wish it were, but that’s far from the truth.
Does that mean what I think it does? Did he order for me to become a whore like Achim said? Or was that another lie on a long list of many?
I was never told the identity of the man in the butler’s pantry, only that he was so angry about my deceit, I was the cause of the carnage that occurred the following morning. Our night together had tainted him so perversely, I poisoned his mind. India said that’s why he turned his gun on his family and killed his father. He was so sickened about what I had done, he wanted to die.
I wasn’t aware he had survived the six bullet wounds I counted on his torso when he laid across from me lifeless on the dining room floor. I was shipped away to face the consequences of my actions where I remained the past six years, and where I most likely will stay since I’ve once again failed.
Justine’s unique colored eyes pop open as wide as mine when Trey suddenly spins on his heels and storms out of the room. He knows the direction to take in an instant. The roar sounding down the hall is like a beacon for deranged, psychotic men determined to get vengeance. “You not only disrespected me, you disrespected my Ahren! Disrespecting her warrants the punishment of death.”
My eyes drop to the floor when my race down a lengthened corridor has me stumbling onto the dark-haired man beating the living hell out of Rory. He has him pinned to the wall with one hand while his other smashes into Rory’s face on repeat.
I can’t see anything but several pairs of feet, but the crack of the man’s fists to Rory’s cheek spells out every sickening detail on what’s occurring. Even if Trey wants in on Rory’s punishment, the stranger won’t allow it. He’ll kill Rory before he will ever permit him to leave this room breathing. I guarantee it.
My theory loses steam when the faintest voice whispers, “Enough, Nikolai.” It doesn’t belong to a man. It’s the owner of Nikolai’s heart—his Ahren.
After floating my eyes up from my feet, I watch Justine enter the death-scented room with only the slightest quiver to her stride.